joshuawait's blog

 

At 4 AM my infant son Benjamin is staring up at the ceiling with glee. With fascination. No, with awe and wonder. He is staring at the round light in the middle of the ceiling. Which is off. But a slight bit of light from the other room catches the brass nipple shaped decoration at the end of the round breast shaped light fixture. Day and night the boys stare at the $19.95 light fixture from Home Depot. They utter oohs and aahs at it like faithful worshippers. If I could only have that boobie. That boobie. The boobie in the sky with diamonds. Who knew that Home Depot could inspire such admiration?

 

Maslow's hiearchy of needs starts off with the physiological. When a teacher showed me this chart many years ago, my teacher omitted sleep. I guess my teacher took sleep for granted. I'd argue that sleep is even more fundamental than food. Ghandi famously fasted for 21 days, Jesus for 40 days. The longest scientific record of anyone going without sleep is 11 days. So the human body can go for at least twice as long without food as it can without sleep.

 

Yet, here I sit in front of the computer. Staring into the pretty screen. Nice glowing screen, pretty. I feel driven to look at the beautiful. To give my life to it. Even if it is just the boobie in the sky because it is brain candy.

 

In watching my boys I have gained a greater sense of my own human basic human impulses for hunger, for sleep, for brain candy. Me wants pretty. Can it be that all our human toil for gold, diamonds, and all glitters is wired into us? That somehow we long to give ourselves to the beautiful? I think it is. As I mature, hopefully I can stop and ask, is this beautiful object, is this expression of beauty really worth my attention? Or have I merely mistaken a cheap imitation for an object of awe?