Pages

Tuesday, June 21, 2005

The Fool On The Hill

Blog expansion update:
New and somewhat humorous post at Christian Parenting.
New blog called Better Life Blog. My collegue Greg Brooks and I will be posting at this blog.
Starting July 1st, a new blog specifically for Stepfamilies will be launched called Successful Stepfamilies.

Feel free to link these blogs in places that might be helpful to the populations they target.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------


Once upon a time, the Beatles sang a song called, The Fool On The Hill. When I was in high school I considered myself the fool on the hill. I was isolated and was the only one who really knew what was going on. The song gave me hope, for some reason, that I was not crazy. It was important for me in high school to get constant reassurance that I was not crazy. Rereading the words two minutes ago I find that the song is actually weak, trite, short-sighted and was probably the result of some bad Transcendental Meditation and an acid trip. But for a goober in high school who longed for wisdom (yes, that is what I wanted more than anything - even more than girls, who I considered beautiful creatures to be much feared), The Fool On The Hill was my fix, my safety zone, my retreat.

I still long for wisdom. I now think it has something to do with the extent to which I am aware of my own foolishness. I have an unusually keen sense of my own foolishness. The only problem is that this keen awareness only works retroactive. I am only a fool in the rear view mirror. I'm not afraid of girls anymore, thankfully. I married one and am learning the ways of this beautiful creature.

I try to find nuggets of wisdom to hold on to, and then I hold on to them until they are part of me. OK, that's not true. I hold on to them until I get distracted and forget about them. Only later, when they re-emerge in some other situation, I rememeber oh yeah, I used to know this.

Currently I have a couple pieces of wisdom I am trying to make sense of. The first is this:

All of life is preparation for the rest of life.

And the second is this:

Peace is the result of an agreement between the human and the Divine.

Do you have any nuggets of wisdom you are trying to make sense of?

5 comments:

Donna G said...

"It's not about me"- I just can't get my head wrapped around this concept!

"His ways are not our ways"- logically I realize this, realistically I seem to challenge it by trying to figure things out... futile I know

Greg Brooks said...

Something my father says to this day: "Love many, trust few, and always paddle your own canoe."

Greg Brooks said...

My dad also says, "The boy stood on the burning deck, eating peanuts by the peck."

My dad was an English major.

For seriousness' sake, how about this tidbit from noted agnostic Bertrand Russell: "To abandon the struggle for private happiness, to expel all eagerness of temporary desire, to burn with passion for eternal things--this is emancipation, and this is the free man's worship."

SteveA said...

We wake, if ever we wake at all, to mystery. Annie Dillard


Thanks to Jim Hughes for this one:
"It is never too late to be what you might have been." (George Eliot)

David U said...

"Come unto me all you who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest."