Morning Fog

Before dawn, fog moves up from the river, through the forest, and fills the woods behind my house. It’s a bit gloomy. Yesterday we had sunshine, and the brightness brought a surge of energy. Today, not so much. I want to put on a sweater, sit in a chair by the window, drink hot tea, and read a book about someone else’s adventures.

As the sun rises, the white particles of mist turn and twirl on the whims of the breeze. It looks like a cloud of fine snow is dancing.

Then I notice.

The three closest trees are in sharp focus, like an Ansel Adams’ black and white photograph. I can see the different patterns of their bark, how deep they go. I notice how one tree bends slightly to the left before straightening, and the tree with a branch that must have broken off during the ice storm last winter. How did I not see these details before? Normally there are hundreds of trees in woods behind my house. Now there are only three. The rest of the forest has disappeared in the fog.

The three trees are magnificent, and stand silently like sentinels. Or like Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Watson, and Mrs. Hudson. Mystery is afoot in the woods.

Sometimes I need a fogged-in day to see what is in front of me.

Most of the time, I take in everything all at once in my constant rush to get work done. Specificity becomes an opaque blur. It’s the difference between mingling at a party, talking to everyone, and sitting on the side with one person, watching that person’s eyes, and seeing in them the history and struggles behind what is being spoken.

Listen to the spaces between the words.

We think we want to understand everything. We want to believe that more knowledge will bring us more happiness. But knowledge is not understanding, nor wisdom, nor compassion, and many things we do not want to know. Too many problems would overwhelm us.

We like the illusions that allow us to live happy, protected lives. We do not want to know how many people are hungry today because family farms have been paved over with highways and shopping malls, how many animals are being abused in food factories so that we can have cheap meat, or how much of the wilderness is being bulldozed and fracked in the name of making money. Destruction does not build integrity or community.

What we want, what each of us really do want, no matter how many illusions we hold on to to prop us up, is to experience one moment each day that is utterly real, a moment that gives us vision, hope, a taste of the transcendent. We want to connect to people, and to stand up against injustice. We want to notice what is going on in the world in front of us and make it a little better. Soon the fog will dissipate into the warmth of the rising sun, but I will remember.

We live for these moments of clarity.

But if we do not slow down and pause when these moments come, then we will never see the trees, the dancing of the fog, or each other.