Today, on my return flight from London, my seat was nearby the place where the cabin crew puts their usual before flight play on stage. You know; the usual "this is the way you fasten your seat belt and when the doom day arrives, oxygen masks will fall" tirade.
It's during this tirade I find it particularly interesting to observe the crew as well as the passengers. Passengers always seem to be extra cool about the whole situation as if they showed the slightest bit of interest, they would be pinned as first timers and made fun of. On any plane, most of the people seem to be spending their whole lives on airplanes.
On that particular flight, a 3 year old boy caught my attention sitting with his parents in a nearby seat. He was clearly amazed by the stewardess' moves. With an awe and a great curiosity he was watching every move of hers sucking at each of his fingers one by one. His saliva was flowing slowly down his chin and his eyes were big looking at the way the oxygen masks and colorful life jackets were shown and worn.
In London, people travelling in the subway system, with all their cool face expressions seem to assume that the city was created with a subway system. But the fact is it's wondrous.
My point is; with every feature we learn, we seem to die little bit. Sounding as paradoxical as it gets, it feels to me that knowing is dying. With every single day left behind, our curiosity depreciates a little taking some piece of our appreciation for life with it.
Not that I don't see a kind of wisdom in the routine. Perhaps little bit earlier than I was supposed to do so, I had taught myself to like and appreciate the meditative peace in the daily routine. I have experienced that and remember it all to be good times.
My last 5 years however could at best be described as an attempt to escape the routine. For now, I want to be uncool. To be able to look at things with awe. To be surprised. To be shocked. To be tortured by the itch of not knowing. I want saliva dripping down my chin.
4 comments:
Beautiful text, thanks for it. Understand you very well.
I experience both in strange alteration: The emptiness of not being surprised at all, understanding that once you've seen quite much, the amount of things that still make you go "ooooh!" is just too small.
And then, an hour later, total surprise and a capital-letter OOOH! about something I know I've seen/done/tasted/... a thousand times.
I conclude it's about the mindset only, and that is luckily one of the most flexible muscles we have.
Let's start an exchange program for "stuff that gets the saliva dripping down the chin". I share mine, you share yours. Places, smells, people, poems, plants, foods, activities, whatever (uh, might even make a separate blog at some point, an ever-growing kind of "task-list" for life, with lots of inspiration yet no obligation).
I'll throw some in for the start:
- Hitchhiking. Never boring, never the same.
- Urban walks in CEE.
- Chernobyl. After two trips still gets me silent.
- Those little black birds that look a bit like ducks: They are hilarious when they dive.
- Magic mushrooms.
- Night-time walks through strange districts in unknown cities
- Watching LOST (better do it next year).
- The taste of Raki. But I'd assume that's more for me ;)
- Hiking in the mountains.
- Long train rides anywhere in the CIS, with a beer and fellow passengers; generally, looking out of open train windows, feeling the breeze of traveling taking your breath away.
i liked many of your ideas!
mine contributions for a start would be;
take up with photography again.
travel through the middle east. namely iran, lebanon, syria, egypt + pakistan (good idea!)
travel through south & central america. especially bolivia & costa rica for some strange reasons. and then maybe the patagonia region. hitch hiking there maybe.
understanding russia. (might take a lot of time.)
take up a physical challenge - like the bosphorus swimming marathon or a trek across aladaglar mountain range.
some chemical drugs for a trial
learning carpentership.
japan!
learning to cook properly.
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