II.

A story enters my mind that I used to hear of my father. He was, as the phrase goes, “young and dumb” though in reality he was not so young. At any rate, he thought it would be funny to climb inside a functioning clothes dryer and see if it would spin him. As it turns out, his 6-foot frame somehow fit and the machine did indeed spin. Blessed be the foresight that induced him to select an air only cycle. Perhaps we have the fact of his “grown-up-ness” to thank.

A silly story, if even really a story at all. I mention it only to point out an amusing contradiction in our language. We expect each other – and even more so ourselves – to reach some arbitrary point at which we boldly proclaim “I/we/you are grown up” as if we had simply flipped a switch. We simultaneously expect children to plan and prepare for this aha moment they can know nothing about until they’ve reached it. Foolishly asking them what they want to be when they grow up, rather than simply what they want to be, who they want to be. Pressing pause on their passions, placing start dates on their dreams. All to have them reach their miraculous age and still be spinning in dryers.

What then is it to grow up? Or to even ponder the thought? I might say in reality that it is simply to grow; forget any notion of upwards direction. You see, at time I have felt myself growing out — expanding into unknown parallels, broadening my reach of understanding and perception as if to tell the world, “Hello, I am here. Can you feel me in places you didn’t before?” hoping to hear it respond, “And do you feel me, filling you with knowledge and more questions than that knowledge will ever be able to answer?” To be quite honest, I have even experienced at times the odd sensation that I was growing down – reflexively folding into myself when growing out seemed unreasonable and growing up proved impossible.

I feel I’ve said all this only to say that I don’t know much, except what I perceive. And for all that, the flaw may not be with the concept itself but with me and my understanding of it. Who in this world can say? Well, Denver said it best – it’s just fine to talk of poems and prayers and promises and things that we believe in.

Yes, what a way to pass the time. I’m realizing now that perhaps that is exactly what all of this is.