the city and the wilderness

Except from a love letter 16 Aug 2001.

The city and the wilderness...Can I explain this? Maybe. Okay, it's a degree of the spiritual realm. The city is full of the beauty and glory and glamour of life, the clamor and distractions. Man-made things, ambition, opportunities. Many roads, impressions and appearances, buildings, houses, people living (and dying), dreams, conversation, clothing, everything.

The wilderness is its hard contrast. There is absolutely nothing, just you and the rose of sharon that grows there. It is beautiful in itself, but if you were to place it in the city, it would be looked over, taken for granted, and forgotten.

In the wilderness everything is open and exposed, you can go anywhere and end up nowhere, there are no clearly defined paths, just silence. It is the place to find yourself, even though there is nothing, but the city is the place to be yourself. The wilderness is where you are commissioned, and the city is where it takes place. Both are necessary, but you can only do one at a time. I don't know if this is a very good explanation, or if it's worth anything, but I tried.

Maybe you understand, maybe you never will, maybe it's not significant to you. Don't get me wrong, there's still excitement and adventure and new things in the desert, maybe even more so in the wilderness. The city is cut and dry, you know what you're getting, even if it's a surprise. I feel like I'm speaking in contradictions, but that should be your language, since you live your life on both ends of the spectrum and in the middle all at the same time.