Come for the stories, stay because it's not Facebook
Cold water flows
Around her little feet
Kicking and laughing,
Gurgling, splashing.
A gentle breeze blows
Through her long curls
Pointing and asking,
Drifting, whispering.
One hand steers
Across the valley of water
Turning and correcting,
Meandering, unfolding.
Life-long friends
The wonder of nature
Together today
And every ‘morrow.
Picture of Beaver Lake
Music by Sleepy Fish
In an instant, the pixelated world distorts, wavers, and dissolves. Vibrant pink, green, blue, and purple hues taken from the palette of one of those trendy nail salon window paintings fades away, replaced by gentle, infinite white. But the seemingly eternal vastness doesn’t represent the truth – the available random-access memory that runs this world is quickly being consumed by digital warfare played out in ones and zeroes, hash collision attacks, and pointer exploits. Functions are being hijacked, variables overwritten, entire programs shuttered and spun up. This faux expanse is all the computer’s hardware can muster to host our digital representations.
Of course, some might argue that my avatar is the only actual representation between the two of us. But that would be a very narrow-minded view. Just because someone doesn’t exist in meat space doesn’t mean they aren’t real. For that matter, there are plenty of people you can meet in the flesh who hardly qualify as real. At least in my opinion.
I’ve got bugs to fix, programs to compile, and users clamoring for features, but this morning, it’s just me and you. Digital paper painted by the hammer of the invisible typewriter, keys clacking silently beneath my fingers. This is what it means to be alive.
In the darkness of the morning, before the rhythm of the day sets in, I establish my own rhythm. One character at a time, converting analog to digital, the innards of my soul to ones and zeroes. And these are my binary patterns, not the ones that the world demands when it awakes from its slumber.
Right now, the world is asleep, and I am alive with creative electricity, pulsing through every nerve, every neuron. Poems come alive, painted in impossible hues against the pitch black that surrounds me this morning. The lights of the city cannot reach me in my forest home, nestled in the hills of the Ozarks. They are my firewall, my analog to the digital firewall that protects my art.
The city, always moving, always consuming, always boppin’ to a never-ending beat – it gives inspiration, but it doesn’t give rest or solace. You don’t feel the breeze, you don’t smell the earth with every breath, feel it under your feet, clench it with your hands – in the city everything is always moving, but everything is always concrete.
Out here, there is stillness in the ever-changing nature of the flora and fauna. You learn to move without moving, freeze while walking. It’s an art of its own, a life of its own, a blessing of its own. In the city, everyone sees you and you see everyone – but does anyone ever notice one another?
Out here you may not see another soul, but you’ll always see yourself for who you are.
A wonderful, beautiful, fearfully made being, the image of God, surrounded by His masterful artistry. Free to create as you were created, free to be as you were intended – fully human, fully aware, fully connected, fully free.
Photo by Kat Jayne from Pexels
