The Edge of Possibility

I could take a camp chair and sit out in my side field at 3am to read a book by flashlight.  The lightning bugs would accompany me.  But I'll never do it.  I could pitch a tent, of a January evening, on the front lawn and sleep there all alone.  But I won't.  I could diverge from my daily course, take an unexpected road, wander long and far into other places, learn the language of the Arapahos, acquire a taste for tortillas and beans.  I could stray off into the mountains of Mexico, like some ruined desperado in a Cormac McCarthy novel, there to take my place at a corner table in a sunny cantina on a village square.  In daylight hours, the tiny plaza would be noisy and bright, sparsely shaded by the patchy branches of four old acacia trees.  By night, the little square would be alive with possibility.  The lower branches of the acacias would glow with strings of red and green Christmas lights in the middle of July.  There, at my corner table, staring out at the plaza, I'd drink my liver into iron.  I could do it; alcoholic lounging in exotic locations is not new to me.  But I won't.  I won't.  The world and I have both grown too old now.

There are wildly extravagent possibilities that pass by us unnoticed.  There's potential in each new moment, but its power is hidden from us by boredom and routine, by unimaginative living.  In fact, I've come to believe that energy, matter, and potential are all there is.  Perhaps the life-giving power that people have called "God" is really nothing more than the potential hidden in each ordinary moment of every day?  Or perhaps "God" is some combination of two or all of these?  

We passed through Washington, DC, en route to the Outer Banks.  Both places are better than I remembered, but still their touristy locations are as dreary as a new suburban cemetery.  The Outer Banks are overrun by Western Pennsylvanians who used to vacation at Atlantic City.  The North Carolina coast has become Upper Saint Clair on stilts.  (And Atlantic City is pretty much Homewood-by-the-Sea.)  And yet, the vacation was too short.  The ocean is good wherever you meet it.  Take your troubles to the ocean, and you're sure to come away with some consolation.