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August 26, 2004
Face to Face
The simplest tunes from childhood are the most enchanting. Whispered
cradle songs tickling infant ears, or nonsensical ditties about meatballs and raven pie and an existentially lonely piece of cheese. In most matters, not just songs, origins have that bizarre attraction which reminds us of some half-remembered truth or lie or imagining which came and left us before we could categorize it. Modern anthropologists enjoy looking down their increasingly long noses at the idea that culture, or as we may define it, proto-culture is
something we are born with. Does a redneck like pick-up trucks because of some F150-philic gene his parents gave him at conception? I, for one - popular science notwithstanding - wouldn?t doubt it.
Like the lullaby with the forgotten lyrics, or the sound of wind rustling through pine trees, or the light voice carrying soft admissions of love, these things never leave us. The good things
bring us back to the single moments in time when the present met eternity - when God, who is in the present at all times, gave us a peek into what might have been and what will be. The haunting things, echoing off walls which keep us from what we should have known, are much the same, unfortunately. Man is not master of his memory. In this way, he is indeed his own prison guard. His vilest enemy.
But the mind baptized and renewed is in many ways given the keys to exit this prison of remembrance. A certain door is opened and memories which were before, at the most, subconscious, become vibrant and mobile. The old lullaby from the Garden suddenly becomes the song you knew all along but were too sleepy to recall. The Wind whistling through the branches of the Great Tree in the courtyard becomes immediately and perilously alive. The singing animals from your dreams and childhood nursery rhymes really do begin to talk and chant. Memory becomes thought. Story becomes reality. Dream becomes waking. Shadow becomes light. And then we shall see face to face.
Posted by Davey at August 26, 2004 01:51 PM
Comments
true that... davey, i'm using your name in a story. you're very nice and quite
traumatized by what happens. you're a four-year-old. hope that's ok. i need to
ask you sometime if you know anything about the code for causing a banner image
to span the breadth of the browser window -- if there is any such code. happy
classing.
Posted by: joy at August 30, 2004 11:11 AM
I'm sure my literary alter ego will show himself worthy and noble -- young and sadistically
traumatized though he may be. As for the image streching, that would depend on
if you're using tables or CSS.
Posted by: Davey at August 30, 2004 02:14 PM
css. and he has a tough life, but he grows up and goes to
college at western washington university. after that, he hasn't lived yet, or i
would tell you more. i can tell you he doesn't become a wiccan. have a nice day.
read some latin for me. i haven't gotten to mine in days.
Posted by: joy at August 30, 2004 04:07 PM