Eye Wide Shut

Dear Eugene,

I asked my friends this question: Are we aware of the story that we are painting ourselves into?

Of course we could ask it in a different way, such as Are we aware of the story that the world is painting us into?  But this is to neglect we are freewill agents, active participants in the "story," even by omission, even in acquiescence.

Every morning we reach for our phone, for our many screens, to look at news and text messages, trending topics and social media updates, proclamations made to humanity at large and to us at least.

What are we looking at?  What are we looking for?  We can't say we turn on the various screens with no expectation.

I suppose we are checking what has been gaining or losing ground during our sleep, our daily rehearsal for death.

Those with a bigger heart might wonder if the world has gained ground in being a more habitable place since we last died, or a bit more hell-bound to make a mockery of our morning resurrection.

Those with a smaller heart glean only that has to do with our own gaining and losing (and trash the rest): market movement, job prospect, oil price, the next hot thing/activity/people, new treatment for illness and decay we are told we now or will eventually have, who gave us a thumb-up, who slighted us even just by not responding in a way that we explicitly solicited.

And of course there are hearts that delight in tragedy, would love to wake up to a morning of bad things happening to people they don't even know or have a reason to dislike.  These hearts' self hatred is no weaker than theirs for the nameless and abstract.

So the question is really not that hard to answer, isn't it? Are we aware of the story that we are painting ourselves into?  All we need is a very little bit of self-awareness.

Yet I think we don't often ask ourselves this question because, Really, we say in our heart, What else is out there?  There doesn't seem to be a different story or a different way to name things, to connect events, to make sense of people, to paint my self portrait.  We have only one perspective and have to stick to it out of necessity, let alone start to question it.

The landscape is bleak and we blink when the view becomes too much.  Then we blink enough to sleepwalk during daylight, half living, half dying, which half gaining ground a question we blinked away.

Sometimes I see people shutting their eyes right in the middle of a shopping mall and they don't even look old.

Yours, Alex