A Case for Wonder
From where I’m sitting, I can see a handful of jade-green trees.
These trees maintain their vibrancy, despite the season. Not but a day ago, they were heavy with snow; now they are light with sunshine. Out these same windows, I glance a suburban scene: cars, lined in parking spaces; a grass-covered median; people ducking by with their dogs.
To my left is a bowl of carrots. The carrots are of the baby sort — which means not that they are miniature, but that human hands (or machines) picked, washed, sorted, and then whittled them down to their infantile form.
And meanwhile, I sit on a humming machine, purring on my lap, that allows me to write words that, not so many years ago, would have been available only through handwriting, laborious printing procedures, or oral tradition.
All of these things are small. They are things we can easily take for granted, easily overlook. The baby carrots, the computer, the jade-green trees. Tiny miracles that once would have seemed impossible (even the trees were once impossible), now as commonplace as grocery shelves and box-chain stores.
I presence these, uplift these, in attempt to make a case for something I dare say we have lost: wonder. Awe. A sense that the world we are in is imperfect, sure, but stunning in its own right. Magical, ridiculous, totally improbable and fantastic.
And I make this case because — I am not being hyperbolic here — wonder could save us. Awe could radically alter our world. Attuning to miracles has the potential to truly shift humanity.
For to be in this state, in wonder, is to cherish. And what more does our world need right now than for people to cherish it, care for it?
There is so much to marvel at, too. From internet (wow) to post boxes (WOW) to the fact that there are humans researching how to talk to dogs (WHAT?), there is a lot of magic and marvelous in this world.
There is, of course, terror too — how could I ever deny that? There is heartache and awful and racism and war and famine and torture. This past month, there were storms across the US — notably in Texas — that caused immense (and preventable) suffering for pockets of the population, while at least one politician flouted his status by escaping as his constituents froze to death.
But here is my point: it is not that we marvel at these terrors. It is that we marvel at the world so much that when we inevitably face terrors — which we will — it is only natural that we would rush to support, and aid. For that is what you do when you care. When you cherish. When you feel awe.
So please, allow yourself to feel wonder. Allow yourself to marvel. Make a practice of it, even. It is not selfish; it is necessary. It is how we remember to care in a world that can be so strange, cruel, and enormous.
Take moments to look at a leaf in the sun, drink a beverage you like and notice its pristine taste. Take time to listen to music that uplifts you and recognize how incredible it is that someone invented those instruments, then learned them, then made a song from them, then that song got to you. Look at the people you love and recognize just how improbable it is that not only you exist (you exist!!), but so do they, and somehow, in the same place, at the same time. Witness the motions of clouds or a changing sky. Listen to the laughter of a friend. Zoom out and remember how you are so small, on a pale blue dot, in an enormous universe. Allow this to boggle you. Humble you. Open you.
Or just look beside you, to jade-green trees, baby carrots, and a soft sunbeam, and remember the minor miracles that make up every day in this vast and tumbling world.
