neuromuscular chauvinism

my daily ritual with tea often feels as though it lies just out beyond the smallness of my human world. as i pull the lion mountain keemun into my belly, it seems to fill my heart and soul with such an ancient and timeless warmth. it has the uncanny ability of planting the thumping listlessness of my feet upon the ground. i still feel unable to truly understand or express the depth of my relationship with tea. it feels as though it is an emotion, not a substance. i sometimes think that a wooden fence exists around our feeble bodies, that our souls spend years attempting to disassemble. board by board, laying in a pile on the ground. remnants of wood scattered about. somehow, this tea holds secrets and wisdom along the unknown path of wild discovery. i've had the same mug for nearly three years now, and though i attempt to feel unattached, it is seemingly impossible. for some reason, it doesn't feel inanimate at all, but rather has a soul of its own. perhaps my mug is made up of the leftover pieces of someone else's broken and shattered fence, their broken and shattered life. i am reminded of Skinny Legs And All.

"the inertia of objects is deceptive. the inanimate world appears static, 'dead,' to humans only because of our neuromuscular chauvinism. we are so enamored of our own activity range that we blind ourselves to the fact that most of the action in the universe is unfolding outside of our range, occurring at speeds so much slower or faster than our own that it is hidden from us as if by a veil...on the atomic and subatomic levels, weird forces are crackling and flaring, and amorphous particles...are spinning simultaneously forward, backward, sideways, and forever at speeds so uncalculable that expressions such as 'arrival,' 'departure,' and 'have a nice day,' become meaningless. it is on those levels that 'magic' occurs."
~Tom Robbins

Posted by jeff at May 8, 2003 11:39 AM

....................................