Editorial: Staring At The Sky

Tonight’s been frustrating for all the same reasons. So I’m going to get off the computer, lay in bed with my wife and my dog and watch some TV. I’ll leave you with an editorial I started writing last month and didn’t finish.

(Written on July 17, 2010)
When was the last time you sat down, leaned back in a comfortable chair, and watched a thundercloud mushroom in the sky?

I did that today.

It had been a while since I had take the time to do so. When I was in the last years of high school I did so on a regular basis – knowing that I would have the opportunity to do so much longer. It was always this odd self-fulfilling prophecy: Remembering the things that you are doing because you know you’ll never do it again.

Maybe it was the age of self-awareness. Maybe it was just me.

But from opening Upper Deck baseball card in 1990 while listening to Johnny Gill to watching thunderheads build to cutting grass with the lights on a riding lawnmower, the days of watching the world around me seem to be going by too fast … and seem to be do many years in the rear-view.

Do you know how long it has been since I’ve caught a lightening bug? Or even seen more than one?

The fact that the answer isn’t “a couple day ago” is an indictment of the state of being.

All I – and many others – do is, seemingly, work. Yes, I realize without this work there might be a lot of time left to stare at clouds or play withing insects, but the point is bigger.

All this time inside, under stress, is keeping us from enjoying the wonders of nature. It prevents us from focusing on the bigger picture. The much bigger picture.