Why for instance is this thus, and what is the reason for this thusness?
Being good is a matter of closeness and farness. Part of what I love about Roby is that she doesn’t over think a thing, she simply is. She’s a baby, she feels, she cries, she smiles, she giggles, and often times in very quick succession. She’s not manipulating anyone, she’s not viewing a bigger picture, she’s just being herself. And Herself is a being of pure honesty and tenderness. Tenderness to the point of pain at times, but also to the point of unvarnished joy, as well.
Obviously things get a bit more complicated when you learn how to walk and talk and work and have relationships with people other than the ones who carry you around all day.
I’ve written before about the fact that I don’t have much day-to-day experience with Evil. I won’t say it doesn’t exist, because obviously it does, but it’s not something I have ever really seen. What’s interesting about that is...it doesn’t really account for the degree of suffering in the world. If suffering can’t be attributed to a bunch of bad actors running around doing evil, then from whence does it spring?
If everyone is out doing their best, why are things so rough so much of the time? I think it’s closeness.
It’s charming for Roby to be unable to see past her nose. But she’s 6 months old. Too often adults lack that same capacity. They make decisions based on what is right in front of them with no insight into sacrifice or perspective. That all sounds clear, people are foolish and short sighted, of course...but where it really gets prickly for me is that many people can be making the right choices when viewed from inches away, but clearly the wrong ones when viewed at even just arms length.
We live in a world where every single decision you make can be ethical and right and what you’re doing can lead to untold suffering and ethical horror. It’s uncomfortable, but it’s true.
I watched Lincoln tonight for the...Xth time, and I love that movie, it has made me want to read a book big enough to bludgeon a man about him. I pale at the decisions I have to make, at the judgments I must make for the benefit of Abby and Roby, to consider Lincoln having to judge lengthening the Civil War for an opportunity to put an end to slavery in America is an ethical dilemma I cannot even begin to fathom, and all within the personal context of his personal tragedies.
We’re all Lincoln,
or we ought to aspire to think as deeply.