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| Stopping to Enjoy One Moment on the Way to Work, Steve Brown 2024 |
This morning, I woke up from a beautiful dream. I thought I was in a rut, working in a small restaurant, going nowhere, living in a house with a leaky roof that I didn't have the money to fix.
I am at work--the details from the dream here aren't clear--and I get this call from a Mexican restaurant owner in the area. He's speaking in Spanish, and I can't really understand him. I had Spanish in collage but barely passed the class, and that was years ago. It's frustrating, but I know this guy. He is a tall, slender, older gentleman with warm, brown eyes lined with soft wrinkles. His food is amazing. I can tell from his voice he's feeling pretty desperate in the moment. I stay on the line, ask him to repeat things over and over, and then I give back what I think he's saying and have him say, "si" or "no," whether I've got it right or not. We do this for quite some time. Turns out his one stove-burner died, and he has a big pot of beans to heat. Not just any beans. He uses white beans and cooks them with lots of garlic, onions, and who knows what. They are heaven to the mouth. He's wondering if I can come get them and heat them on our stove. I say yes. To me it's like if Paul McCartney has called up and asked, "Hey, I'm trying to work out some lyrics on this song; would you mind coming over and giving me a hand?" This guy, though not famous, is to food what Paul McCartney is to music. And it doesn't matter whether the world knows it or not. I do.
So, I let my boss know the situation, and I head out. Our place, a small, a locally owned Denny's-like joint, is at the end of a long block with an alley that starts next to it running down the length of the block. The Mexican restaurant is near the other end, and the quickest way is down the middle.
It's late afternoon, and I'm headed down this concrete alley that slopes down in the middle for drainage. It rained all night, and I woke up to a wet living room and the feeling of slow moldy doom--a life spent working to get nowhere. But now, the late afternoon sunlight is igniting the various brick rear facades of the businesses gloriously. That is reflected in the long puddle.
Halfway down the alley a large electrical pole, golden orange, is reflected in the puddle. Something so pedestrian yet so beautiful!
Wow! High, on one of those gray metal electrical cylinders, a bald eagle, his head intensely yellowed by the sun, his eyes glittering!
This is it. I don't know about others, but for me, this is enough. This is why I'm here. Not to accomplish anything in particular. Simply to be.
And I all of the sudden I have this sensation from deep inside that in some preexistence I'd chosen this moment and all that came before, including waking up to a soggy living room, in order to be here and witness that eagle and serve the owner of the Mexican restaurant on this day, and that as long as I am fully invested now, whatever that might be, with love and service, I am doing exactly what I'm meant to do, and what that is doesn't really matter. I know in that instant life isn't about what you accomplish but rather who you become. If we enter each moment intently, openly, unguarded, willing to serve others, there is absolutely no way of getting life wrong.
And then I woke up.
I had such a moment last fall, writing and looking out the sliding glass door behind my desk at a single sunflower illuminated by the last direct sunlight of the day.
I don't always remember it. I have moments when I feel lost, frustrated and question the meaning of life. But all of those times are spent in my head in negative inner dialogue that either attempts to puff up my ego and justify my actions or beliefs, or just as often, wallows in self-doubt and pity. As soon as I realize it and refocus again on now and tune my eye into some detail of the world around me there is absolutely no question about why I'm here: to live. It's that simple. Life is its own meaning. Because long ago we chose it. You might not be able to intellectually grasp that. I'm not sure I can--it's so different for everybody, but at the same time, all the same. Yet, I'm pretty sure everyone can feel it--but only when you get out of the could-have's and should-have's and enter this moment completely.
I think life is going to get very difficult in the near future. We will reap the consequences of our collective choices. Smoke filled skies. Mind-boggling winds and great floods. These will become more and more common. As will political strife.
But there is no moment that cannot be either narrowed or widened to perfection through an eye focused on learning the lessen that moment exists to teach.
All life can be glorious--even death and destruction--when the soul is open, and the eye is focused. Similarly, the most naturally glorious moments can jog by unnoticed because we are stuck in our mind, stuck on our devices, or stuck in our addictions.
But this moment is our entry into eternity. Always. It's just deciding what we want now--to be distracted or to be focused.
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