Which is what I saw the other day. But it’s a view that can lead to jumpy thinking.
We have a solitary window at the landing on the second floor, just outside the bathroom door, on the east side of the house. Now and then, if my timing is right and I’m paying attention, I get treated to a sight like this.
Just a few mornings before this one, when I glanced out the window, I noticed how filthy it was. Two days in a row, because of the timing, because of when I headed down the stairs, all I saw was streaks and smears on the glass, somehow made more stark by a weak backlight.
But the glow from the sunrise in the photo is so vibrant that it made the streaks and smears invisible.
Which is the jumping off place for leaps of over-think. It’s a metaphor, sure, of how we view life, how our perspectives change, and so on. Which do you see: Rosy glow or life’s dirty streaks? You could go on and on about it.
But I think it’s just a sunrise, although a glorious one, and I’m glad I got to see it.
The window is still dirty, though, and I’ll have to put that on my to-do-sometime list. I notice now that the damn photo is crooked, and that probably could take on some deeper meaning, too, if I went that way. But mainly it just means I should have straightened it with the editing tool before I posted it on here.
Here’s another metaphor in the making for you:
The zinnias my wife grows from seed have been a remarkable addition to the yard the past two summers. Vigorous growers, with extraordinarily vivid and long lasting blooms. They put on a show clear to the end, like the one above is doing as September wears down.
Here’s where you can insert references to how it’s beautiful even in death. You could muse about the changing seasons of life, how the flowers grow, bloom and fade. Don’t we humans do likewise? No?
Well, sure we do. But on the other hand it’s just a zinnia in our backyard. I enjoy taking care of them all summer long. They are wonderful to see. We’ll plant them again next year, you can count on that. And I hope they grow as well as they have the past two years; they do seem to like the conditions in our backyard.
My point is that you’re not required to look for deeper meaning or symbolism in everyday things. You certainly can, if you want, but you don’t have to. Sometimes it’s just simpler to enjoy what’s in front of you, take it for what it is.
I was going to throw in Sigmund Freud’s famous line about “sometimes a cigar is just a cigar,” but it turns out there’s no evidence the famous psychoanalyst ever said that.
I may not see the sunrise glow tomorrow. I might be carrying a laundry basket down the stairs or stepping over a cat, and miss it. I might sleep in and miss the show.
But maybe you’ll see it, and maybe I’ll see one some other day. If so, I’ll be glad about it.
George Custer lives in Oakridge with his wife Sayre. George is a former smokejumper from his hometown of Cave Junction, a former captain in the U.S. Marine Corps. and ran a construction company in Southern California. George assumed the volunteer duties as the Editor of the Highway 58 Herald in 2022. He loves riding his Harley-Davidson motorcycle, building all things wood, and playing drums on the weekends in his office.
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