ice and balance
last night i saw a documantary called touching the void which quite simply fucked me up. though i won't tell you anything else about it, i will say with confidence, that i believe it was one of the more intense things i've ever watched, and they somehow {how did they?} captured the extreme degree to which the situation was filled with despair. okay, so it's the story of these two brittish guys who find themselves in the midst of a disaster 21,000 ft. up a mountain of ice in peru. it reminded me of hallucinations i had as a young boy with high fevers; immeasurably overwhelming things. i'm often stunned at the degree to which certain pieces of art can impact my emotions.
i stumbled home after crying through the credits, in a euphoric daze of calm. the world felt loud, though it was quiet. in the wake of such things, my own trials feel so terribly small. we humans, with our human undoings can be so fragile at times. of course, as illustrated in the film, we can also be strong beyond what we would ever conceive possible. i found myself wishing for a gentle hand on my chest. the warmth of arms.
a light mist fell on me as i walked, and i thought about the size of the universe in relation to me out there moving my legs up the hill. there were parts of the documentary, where the cameras would pan back and show these tiny, little dots of men clinging to an enormous wall of ice. how small we really are. in the wake of this i wonder, "why do we ever quarrel with the universe?" i suppose because the universe, or whatever it was/is gave us both brains and hearts. balance my friends, balance.
Posted by jeff pitcher at February 17, 2004 10:08 AM
....................................
I don't know how I got onto this journal...'something about those four words that evoked a sense in me, I 'spose...ENN EEE WAYZ...I've been catching your posts when I have an opportunity, Jeff and though many of your offerings have been nebulous at best, this is the first time I've actually caught a glimpse of the person who has until this point (for me anyway) remained veiled by the shadowy verbiage.
Posted by: Falloutsis at February 18, 2004 05:42 AM
resisting to post in order to focus on my overwhelming life (work, family, friends whom i rarely get to see & miss so much, passions to fully unfold, and a 4th marriage proposal i evade to answer)...
...and yet again i fail
my thought prevails
of this it entails....
across my high-rise, the ferry building and piers of SF where my steps set daily for moments to ponder in solitude, where i taste the sweet, intoxicating air that mists upon bay waters, today i encounter some small wonders. like faces the products of plastic surgery, my eyes fixate on these red apples sitting in a bushel, looking almost too perfect to be real. to my awe, they are real. so perfect, i am afraid to hold them in my hands. and so i do not. i leave them, as i leave many things in my life. sometimes i feel i'm undeserving of such perfect things, for i am, in immeasurable ways, flawed.
i am indeed very small, an imperfect nothingness in this vast universe.
Posted by: flawed at February 19, 2004 06:42 PM
