“The horizon leans forward, offering you space to place new steps of change.”
—Maya Angelou
I began working from home on March 19. Since then, I have been mostly at home, self-isolating and having minimal in-person interaction with the rest of the world. Working from home has meant long days at my computer or on my telephone, at the end of which I am often depleted. I quite literally find it difficult to focus my eyes, even if my attention is still on the tasks at hand.
I have discovered that when my eyes refuse to focus any longer within the confines of my apartment, the thing that offers them rest is to get in my car and drive in search of horizons.
Gazing into the distance is like applying a balm to my eyes. Not only that, though. My shoulders relax and stop crowding my ears. My shallow breath deepens and slows. My soul luxuriates in the beauty of the natural world. I fall in love anew with the big sky, whether blue or gray, clouded or clear. I find a spot that draws me out of my Fiat-cocoon to wriggle my toes in grass, or walk on gravel, feeling each small nugget press into the soles of my feet. My nose is wooed by scents of apple blossoms, fresh-turned earth, a million other flirtatious smells just waiting for my notice. And the sounds! Birdsong and frog song and buzz-song of critters flying in concentric circles around me. I swoon over layers of sound, often the voice of moving water humming underneath the rest.
It is generally my intent to just be, on these trips to the horizon: to allow myself to drift into a meditative mindfulness without active thought, luxuriating in the sensuous world. “How restful will that be?” I ask myself.
But I generally fail in that intent.
Instead, the horizon invites my imagination out to play, as well as my senses. Where the pandemic urges me to fearfully draw in, to contract and to constrict my whole world, the horizon gaily calls to me, “Open up!” Memory and dream and possibility and playfulness are suddenly active and vying for their moment in the sunshine. Sometimes, if I am lucky, a wonderful what-if comes out into the light of consciousness. The ordinary day has become a birthday, and I am rich with surprise gifts!
In his poem, “St. James Looks Back at the End of His Life,” Mark Petterson* imagines the apostle ruminating on Jesus’ frequent admonition, “Don’t be afraid”:
“… And true, we were a fearful bunch.
But I didn’t understand it
at the time, why he repeated himself
so often.We misunderstood, I think.
We always took it as an admonishment
about the present situation,
whatever that might have been —
demons, drowning, leprosy.
But now that I am older
I think he might have been
trying to tell us that there are other ways to be,
and other worlds are possible …”
The horizon, too, reminds me that there are other ways to be, if only I will look up and out. If only I will set my gaze beyond today’s fears, real and imagined, to consider the endless possibilities. E.M. Forster, gifted novelist, wrote, “Expansion. That is the idea the novelist must cling to. Not completion. Not rounding off, but opening out” (E.M. Forster, Aspects of the Novel). Excellent advice for novelists, and for the rest of us horizon enthusiasts and spiritual seekers.
(*Note: The Mark Petterson poem cited above is from his book of poems, Transfiguration. This beautiful, insightful, delightful collection of poetry can be purchased online or, when Prairiewoods re-opens, in our Gift Shop. I currently have the copy intended for our Media Center and promise to return it at the earliest opportunity!)
—Jenifer Hanson, Prairiewoods director