Everydayness


Dear Eugene,

Here's a passage from Walker Percy's "The Moviegoer":

“What do you seek--God? you ask with a smile.

 I hesitate to answer, since all other Americans have settled the matter for themselves and to give such an answer would amount to setting myself a goal which everyone else has reached--and therefore raising a question in which no one has the slightest interest. Who wants to be dead last among one hundred and eighty million Americans? For, as everyone knows, the polls report that 98% of Americans believe in God and the remaining 2% are atheists and agnostics--which leaves not a single percentage point for a seeker. For myself, I enjoy answering polls as much as anyone and take pleasure in giving intelligent replies to all questions.

 Truthfully, it is the fear of exposing my own ignorance which constrains me from mentioning the object of my search. For, to begin with, I cannot even answer this, the simplest and most basic of all questions: Am I, in my search, a hundred miles ahead of my fellow Americans or a hundred miles behind them? That is to say: Have 98% of Americans already found what I seek or are they so sunk in everydayness that not even the possibility of a search has occurred to them?

 On my honor, I do not know the answer.”

Has it ever occurred to you that it seems like most people around you have already found what you are seeking or they are so sunk in everydayness that not even the possibility of a search is necessary?

It's so true, isn't it, things that give us meaning take away our need to seek meaning, which is to say make God rather unnecessary.

No, not that we dislike the idea of a God or having this God on our side; it's the everydayness of every morning that makes every evening the fulfillment of a foregone conclusion.  We can put God somewhere along the line of our day.  Anywhere.  Doesn't really matter.  Maybe not today.

We hate to wake up to confusion.  It weakens our heart.  It stiffens our limbs.  The everydayness of a day's grinding mechanism shall chew up our confusion and keep things moving.

WYSIWYG: "what you see is what you get."  We want to get what we can see.  And no more.

We are afraid to see too far anyway.

Your, Alex

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