daylight savings

“Leave behind sensible perceptions and intellectual efforts,
and all objects of sense and of intelligence, and all things
being and not being, and be raised aloft above knowledge to union,
as far as is attainable, with God who is above every attribute
and knowledge. For by an ecstatic restlessness from yourself
and everything, you will be carried up
to the superessential ray of the Divine Dark.”

~ Dionysius the Areopagite, The Mystical Theology

spanning the darkness

At this time of year, darkness arrives earlier, absorbing horizons seamlessly, over longer spans of time. After enough years of turns around the calendric cycle, I shouldn’t be so shocked at the sudden loss of light. But this year I am taking note. Normally, I’d dismiss the change, much as I’d shrug off a routine decrease of a benefit or some rate increase to a monthly bill. Our adaptive nature may compensate for a continuum of absorption, but it does not regulate reluctance.

Regularly, my workplace phone greeting identifies my department, followed by the respective portion of the day, such as good morning. Often, as I pick up the phone, I look at my watch, to verify whether the moment precedes or has come after transiting the meridian. Late in the day, I check the window. My tendency is to judge between afternoon and evening by sensing the strength of light. The other day, I heard myself say, “good evening,” while answering the phone and looking to the window; my watch read 4:30 in the afternoon.

Lengthened darkness is surely noticeable while on the road. With earlier sunsets, an evening’s navigation resembles a midnight drive. Beyond my headlights’ reach, the surface ahead, left and right, as well as the sky, have identical textures. Medians and guardrails dissolve into the same crepuscule. Shrouds of darkness can be as forbidding as they are compelling. Philosophers of old referred ambiguously to the symbols of the abyss and the labyrinth. The abyss represents groundless unknowing, a gulf without comprehensible perimeters. It also represents limitless expanse, uncharted potential. The labyrinth symbolizes constraint, rigidity which cannot be transcended, yet still uncertain of the destination. Conversely, guidelines symbolize the certainty of terra cognita and the safety of conformity. Borderless darkness identifies with experiences of both the abyss and the labyrinth. Expanse and narrowness accompany the night voyager, testing whether being rests upon belief.




torchbearer

Being a torchbearer amidst reduced visibility demands strength of vigilance. Strength is easily taken for granted, and we use it without much thought or notice. Waking from sleep is simultaneous with physical reaching. But strength is indeed cultivated coordination; it doesn’t happen by itself. Vigilantly, we can be more than our impulses. Describing his philosophy of being, in the context of historiography, Ortega y Gasset observed in his poetic plainness:

“Life is given to us; we don’t give it to ourselves, rather we find ourselves in it, suddenly and without knowing how. But the life which is given us is not given us ready-made; we must make it for ourselves, each one their own.”

Carrying the light across the trackless dark requires a supply of healthful provisions of the spirit. Creativity combats monotony. Keeping a constructive course is a balance of exploration and expression. For me, this means continuing to learn and to reflect. Reading and writing have been tandem nutrients, and I’ve found the one needs the other, or both skills will suffer. To pursue studies and the writer’s adventure means persevering as an inquiring observer. I’ll also say, as an observing inquirer. Writing in this spirit is as one keeping watch, making note of the light- especially as it may turn to increase, ever so slowly.

Expectation is a vital provision, and it is strengthened by an available sense of remembrance. Remembering lights and blessings past has helped me through arduous traversals. Alongside remembering events and gestures is knowing to call upon learned survival skills. I’ve seen sharply-focused routes benefited by healthful diversions that lift the spirit and remind me of the larger context within which my life is actually a small part. Having many artistic and intellectual interests provides various points of reference to distract the natural tendency that dwells upon one perspective. As the popular adage goes, at the occasion of seasonal time change, we “fall back to spring ahead.” Through standard time, a daylight’s savings might help during spells of depletion. The long-range hope must continue to be faith in emergence from obscurity.

sources

Light sources needn’t be limited to short days and lamps. As in any embarkation, knowledge of resources is essential. That means discerning the present and knowing what is needed. A cultivated sense of direction helps me to stay on course. But navigating is no passive thing. When protracted darkness remains unilluminated, the aspiring soul must know to be lit by the night. Saints and sages of old teach us to unrelentingly reach for the Divine, come what may. Dionysius wrote of God as the Hidden Dark, above all things manifest, and above thought. Our thoughts are, after all, limited to dealing with what is differentiated and related. Yet although God cannot be fully known, continued Dionysius, we can nevertheless reach and experience the attributes of God.

Truly a torchbearer in the darkness of the 9th century, Johannes Scottus Eriugena was known to say, “there are as many theophanies as there are saintly souls.” Eriugena was the remarkable scholar brought from Ireland to the royal court of France, to translate classical philosophical works from Greek into Latin. Among the manuscripts he translated were those of Dionysius. His crowning work was the astonishingly innovative Periphyseon, a complex work that was widely appreciated centuries later. Eriugena built brightly in the shadows of his times, explaining how Divine manifestations are understandable to us as processions. He wrote that God may be comprehended as darkness, due to God’s transcendence. This darkness is actually lux excellentiam, the ineffable light which simply appears dark because of its transcendent intensity. Creation, observed Eriugena, is a paradox, as the original darkness of God, which is no-thing, becomes light; it becomes something. Eriugena inspires readers to sense the similarities between source and destination, between creation and regathering. He preserved sources, while producing sources based upon his experience and learning.

One wonders if thinkers such as Eriugena considered their own times as “dark ages.” Apparently, their greater efforts were invested in pedagogy and preserving knowledge; they may not have thought to editorialize in writing. Perhaps the greater work was to persevere, to keep on going. Carrying light through darkness, even discovering luminous mysteries by darkness itself, is incidental. Perhaps it happens as we persist, as we endure without losing sight of transcendent holiness, holding fast to what is good. But “holding fast” mustn’t be mistaken with inactivity, or clutching as we might hold on to objects. Endurance manifests as something productive, as forward progress. A life’s pilgrimage is a human’s longterm project. What is needed, in order to find light amidst undefined darkness? What is the proper equipage? That is itself a mystery, wrapped in mystery. More concretely is the vitality of encouraging and comforting others, aware to receive encouragement and comfort from others. Maintaining essentials in clear view needn’t depend upon available light, considering its unpredictability. Deep within the crucible, as I see it, is to be consistent and close to the Source of life and goodness through the unknowing.

almost real

“I see my way as birds their trackless way.
I shall arrive! What time, what circuit first,
I ask not: but unless God sends His hail
Or blinding fireballs, sleet or stifling snow,
In some time, His good time, I shall arrive;
He guides me and the bird. In His good time!”

~ Robert Browning, Paracelsus.

almost

For personal causes of self-education, health, and post-work-week sanity, I made one of my usual monthly drives to Boston. There, I visit with friends, and enjoy a full day of study and writing at the Athenaeum. The drive from Portland divides in half: an hour to the Portsmouth area, followed by another hour which is mostly taken up with northeastern Massachusetts. As Interstate 95 merges with an infamous expressway known as 128, thoughtful drivers- including me- are brought to heighten all senses. I must defend against unpredictable right-side passers, tailgaters, and nonsignalers. At the Peabody split, I reflexively disengage cruise control. Committed to making the most of extremely valuable time off, I tune in to AM radio stations with road and traffic reports, ready to divert as needed so that I can get to Boston as efficiently as possible.

At the lower end of the kilohertz scale, my radio picked up one of those abundant money programmes on the airwaves. Another “financial expert,” from the syndicated world sounded very far away from New England, telling me about what I don’t have, and what I should do with that nonexistent pile of loot that I should have by now. Thanks a lot. After a short listen, I moved on to a station with a traffic update. My thoughts lingered a bit longer with the financial broadcaster’s words and yet another reason to acknowledge what has been unattainable. Surely, I know enough to look and listen askance at these market-driven programmes, aimed at a broad spectrum of potential buyers. Not all of us can buy. Notwithstanding, my thoughts accompanied me, beyond the Reading-Wakefield merge, onto I-93, and off through Medford Square. Dashes of autumn foliage helped to lighten my thoughts, diverting them away from my case of the almosts. I refer to my chronic recounting of how I nearly made better choices, and was almost hired for this-and-that job: Almost, but not quite catching the brass rings of my wishes. During a traffic light breather, I looked over at my typewriter on the back seat. Saturday, sunshine, library books, and Beacon Hill awaiting, surpassed my sighs.

temporal

Almosts have persistent ways of infiltrating streams of thought. Though I’m grateful for the gift of lucid, long-range memory, I’m also aware of the burden attached to razor-sharp recall. Remembering things I’ve almost accomplished, almost said, and ideas almost developed stirs my perspective into self-casting as a perennial underachiever. In a general sense, perhaps it is a human ache to desire to live up to one’s potential. In The Luminous Trail, Rufus Jones strikes a chord in his discourse about roads that evolve as we live:

“There is in most of us a vast acreage of our inner estate which has never been touched by the plow. It remains uncultivated. We are this; we have been this, but how much more we might be! Coming to ourself, our true self, and reaching out with divine help and the gift of Grace to win the whole of ourself is to be ‘spiritual-minded.’”

In that Grace is the ability to be unfettered by defeatism. In defeatism, I refer much more easily to unaccomplished ventures, than to vanquished waters long under the bridge. Navigating the turbidity of almost has the added afflication of the indefinite. This kind of wilderness has undefined limits; the traveller cannot see the end. The pilgrimage is accompanied by thirst, by longing for a satisfying stability and permanence. Living a long succession of almosts is wearying, as is the vigilance of keeping watch for an arrival into fulfillment. But even our most established days are temporal at best. Many of us know about fleeting moments in a theoretical sense, but very few apply that awareness as practical knowledge. How much sensible theory has become lived practice? Perhaps the core of each almost reveals the temporariness of what seems solid to our mortal senses.

holding pattern

An unending chain of almosts, combined with short-range visibility, makes for a provisional view of life in all its dimensions. Athletes experiencing their version of almosts are prone to exclaim “wait ‘til next year,” having the advantage of an off-season during which they can recondition before re-entering their respective arenas. That is surely not how most of us live. If “offseasons” are preparatory spans of time, the average working person must intertwine active, vigilant forays with short and intermittent respites. I’ve learned to do this with occasional retreats. Tirelessly working, while waiting for my fortunes to improve, seems like a life spent in preparation for tailwinds that do not manifest. With undetectable boundaries, the provisional is undefined.

Pursuing a preparatory path is safely familiar, and not altogether without achievement. My student days, primarily dedicated to postgraduate life and employment has continued on with scholarship as intense as my job adventures and related searches. Scholarly life is inherently preparatory. Studies and research anticipate application. Critical reads, note taking, and indexing bridge discovery with future reference. Looking forward through the temporal can lose the present, relegating life to a perpetual holding pattern.

Living in a constant state of preparation is its own form of almost. In a continuity of those turbulent and tentative student years, renting my home and keeping my living simple, makes it easier to uproot as opportunities arise. Parallel to that, I have not ceased in my quest for better and more stable work. Living portably awaits the fulfillment of the almosts. Putting away money for the future reflects thirst to bring the temporal into port.

“real”

The provisional should be just as it says, and not a permanent condition of unease. Over time, there develops a sense of the overdue, and at worst, the too-late. The latter becomes something to avoid and to be feared. Another pitfall to beware of is the notion of rehearsing for the real thing. Perceiving the present and continuing to do so, as treading water, devalues the voyage. Banking up energy, resources, and knowledge may be wise and prudent, but if it’s in anticipation of the real thing, there comes the question of whether there is a real and an almost real. Is the unsatisfactory ephemeral as real as any other circumstance? Perhaps it is more real, existing in the amenable present, and compared to the anticipated which does not exist yet. As unsuitable as it may be, present and temporal conditions are as real as foreshadows of hoped-for reality.

From this lookout, straining ahead for improved reality to materialize, and struggling with the ill-fitting aspects of the present, there remains a reckoning with the past. As in archival processing, there are arrangements and descriptions of life’s chapters, based upon their points of origin and provenance. Are the organized documents through time’s continuum informative artifacts, or evidentiary references for condemnation? Commenting on our developing understanding of history, the philosopher Ortega y Gasset observed that our changes in thinking do not negate timeless truths, but rather that we change as we see truths anew that we hadn’t previously seen. He wrote about a progress in modern historiography that departed from the 18th century penchant for “cataloguing failures.” Like Gasset, I’m less interested in a sense of exoneration, and more drawn to redeeming my remaining time. Assurance of heading in a worthy direction would inform me that I am not obstructing my own progress. As surely as I write these words, the story continues to be composed.