A Beginning

I want to write a hagiography of ordinary things.

Of teacups balanced precariously on saucers and tiny squirrel footprints left in spring’s last snow. Of a well-balanced knife or a spoon of just the right shape. Of quick kisses in the kitchen and that moment just before sleep when your lover’s hand slips from yours, relaxed. Maybe the way trees speak or dogs dig or children run. Perhaps the smell of laundry, the smell of bread baking, or the smell of sunlight.

What makes the ordinary so sacred? Is it that it is hidden from us by virtue of its everyday existence? Or maybe it is that without it, there would be no extraordinary.

I think it is actually the fact that we pay so little attention to ordinary things that makes them sacred. It takes a certain mind, a certain slowness of step, to appreciate the ordinary; most of us are simply too busy to notice. I try to cultivate my appreciation, to slow down and pay more attention, but it is difficult. Life speeds up and makes demands, doing the laundry becomes a chore instead of worship, walking the dog a hurried exercise in the cold instead of a chance to explore.

My goal is to notice one ordinary thing each day and write about it here.