Hi from UrThum
by UrThum on March 8th, 2007, 7:53 pm
Hi PCF members! this seems a fun and enlightening community. I look forward to a truly mind-bending experience. Peace. I am writing from the coffee shop in Eau Claire, WI, USA. I write music constantly. I love the films of Werner Herzog. I love nature. I like people who are nice.
Saturday, February 24, 2007
widow's walks
Current mood: calm
Category: Religion and Philosophy
On the east coast of the United States, there are many homes that can still be found equipped with a tiny balcony on the top floor of the house. These little additions are left over from a time when seamen would go to sea for an indefinite amount of time. Their wives were left to watch for their return, hoping to spot their ships sailing in.
These ledges were named widow's walks at some point. These women were not truly widows. Their husbands could very well have been alive and in good health. However, it was quite possible that they had already died at sea. To not know, yet continually hope for their safe returns, must have been heart-wrenching. Surely many of these widows spent some time each day of their husbands' absences watching, waiting, wondering. Will he come home tonight? Will he ever come home? Will I ever be the same again until he is here? Does he even remember me? This prospect must have been daunting.
Many of these sailors did come home, their returns lending immense relief and overwhelming joy to wives only half-complete. Some waited, and watched, in vain. Still, some experienced the initial joy of reunion, only to taste the sorrows of a love sapped by alcoholism and abuse. It occurs to me that all of us are entrenched in some varying relation toward a ship sailing in, even if that ship is the day when all thought of ships is obliterated-- laid to utter waste. Due to this innate sense of longing-- forever implanted in the human heart; waiting to germinate, sprout forth into some living entity, and bear fruits of love(as Christ taught), or power(as Nietzche believed)-- we cannot cease to interpret the world with a linear attachment to reality. This would be a usurpation of all will to live. This is what happens before people jump off of bridges. There have been many, Buddha most prominent among them, who have suggested that to remove from ourselves all notions of existensial causality-- even right and wrong-- we can elevate ourselves to a realm that is truly sublime, that which he called Nirvana. However, I see this as a pursuit of it's own. One with real tests and criteria for advancement toward the ever growing light of truth. It is, still, a ship.
Believing, as I do, that we all wait and watch for our ships to come, for our completion, our day in the sun, our actualization, I had better make sure that I am awaiting a ship that will bring lasting joy, and peace of mind. It seems that all too often the arrival of our "husbands" is at first amazing , but leaves us beaten bloody , with the task of cleaning vomit off of the floor. We feel cold, empty, uncertain, scared, and compelled to duplicate the first night our "husband" came home.
What, then, can possibly suffice? How can we ever find lasting peace and joy? How can we spot a "husband" of undying love and affection on the horizon of our own lives? I believe that he is already here. I will venture a guess that you have heard of Jesus Christ. This same Jesus Christ is exactly what he purported himself to be. He is the son of the living God. He is our eldest brother. He is our closest friend. He was chosen, before this world was, to do the will of the Father. He agreed to lead a perfect life, suffer the entire weight of the world's sin, guilt, sickness, sorrow and grief, and then accept execution at the hands of his own subjects. He was the original one to, "take one for the team." All of what we think of as goodness, virtue, and kindness, emanates from his infinite presence and indelible imprint on the history of this earth. He actually created this earth, and ministers continually to the earth's spirit. We can approach him in prayer if we are sincere. Through his merits, we can approach the Father with our deepest concerns and fears. He has promised to speak peace unto our hearts. The ship is in the harbor, but the onus is on us to walk the few blocks down to the wharf.
Seek and ye shall find. Knock and it shall be opened unto you.
--Book of Matthew, New Testament of the Holy Bible