Hunger for Life

Life is a hunger for Truth, Beauty, and Life. You know, the Big Ticket items. 

We think about this a lot, well, not so much really, mostly after a really long day and we are wondering why we work so hard. Or when we’ve had a little too much to drink and our guard is down.

We really want to know because we’re scared that we took a wrong turn and this is as close to understanding LIFE as we're going to get. There are no big answers, of course, to go with the big questions, only little ones that we fold up and slip into our pockets and pull out now and then to give us a measure of comfort. But we still stare at the beer nuts on the bar trying to decipher their arrangement like tea leaves for divine wisdom.

It may be an unspoken quest of everyone to find these places, these moments, to touch something eternal that will last forever, and then to linger in them for as long as we possibly can.

When I went with my grandfather into nature, we’d row his boat from the Mill Pond through the channel and out to a quiet place on Rock Lake in Wisconsin, put our fishing poles in the water, and sit. Often enough we didn’t catch many fish. We also did not talk much. I think he was teaching me how to listen to nature.

In autumn we’d walk at dawn across the fields and hills, listening to the dry corn shocks rasp against each other in the breeze, and solitary crows call to no one in particular. We’d smell the scent of fall apples in the air, and feel the cold bite of winter approaching.

I think he liked to be outdoors because it renewed him, and I was happy to tag along. We seldom spoke, but his love for the outdoors was communicated anyway. I continue his journey, but these days I hike in the mountains by myself.

I don’t think we need to use words to understand nature, because I don’t think words are capable of conveying this mystery. We just need to be outdoors to watch and listen. Or the mystery of waking up to our beloveds and feeling amazed at the wonder of their being and that they have chosen to be with us.

When we love someone and when we love nature, we move to a place beyond words. I don’t think we need to know why we feel so alive when these moments of intimacy come and we linger in them. We only need to listen the song of love that rises from our hearts, and the song that the rivers sing to the mountains.