Recently, I've been meditating on the idea of the extraordinary. That it exists on the "far side of the ordinary" (Letters to a Young Catholic, by George Weigel). I think this is an important distinction. I've noticed, in such meditations, that something of greater value tends to reflect the lesser in someway.
We are moved by the grandeur of a nature scene not because it is something new to our eyes or even our imagination. But because it encompasses more of what we expected than what we expected.
I do not know where the ordinary and extraordinary change hands. Only that they do. And I am convinced it lies on the beautiful side of somewhere. Somewhere just beyond our grasp, and yet, a place we know quite well. A place we need to "know again, for the first time".
3 comments:
Aarong,
I like this entry, though it's a little hard to grasp exactly what you're trying to say. In fact, it sounds like you're not exactly sure what you're trying to say, which may be the point of the whole entry. That is to say, I think you're right.
The TS Eliot quote was well placed.
eric
Perhaps the jist (sp?) of this entry was to remark at how extra-ordinary things seem, after analysis, nothing more than otherwise ordinary things. Not that I have an example for you, and maybe I need one.
I couldn't help but, first of all, wonder at this occurence. At how we find the extraordinary in the rather ordinary. From there, I was intrigued as to what point the shift occurs. Perhaps even intimating a hint of the divine in such an action. Though I know I didn't actually think that when I wrote it.
But I still like it. Usually I don't after I get it out there. It seems a poetic idea. And Eliot helps. So did the Wallflowers.
Did anyone else notice that's two Eliot references in two weeks?
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