Going places
and seeing things
Last year this time Joe and I were in Chicago, and logging miles walking around and enjoying the sights. It was our first big trip in years, my first time on a plane in two decades. We all know that travel helps us look at things differently, we are able to see from fresh eyes things that are different from our day to day existence. It can be hard to remember to look at the things in our neighborhood with as much excitement, after all, they are always just there. Part of the scenery.
It takes some effort to change this and start looking at things as if they are new to your eyes. The bird nest in the bare branches, the garden statute’s shadow on the snow, even the scattering of spring bud casings along the road, all of them right there for you to see. When I drive places that are not my usual route I am always caught off guard by the changes that seem to have sprung up from nowhere. The house now gone, the new development, the business changes. It throws me at first, then I reset my inner map and add the changes, overlaying the old with an transparent image of the new. This helps add images to my visual library for future referral and use.
Keep an open mind is about seeing new things, using what’s at hand, and pulling from that visual library you have been adding to. Things you store there might languish for a bit, germinating as they do so, and as you go about your life, and them Bam! they will pop up and inspire you to create something from them. Now I know not everyone can plan a getaway to a distant city, it isn’t required that you do so though to benefit from seeing things. You can go to your nearest city, attend a talk at a local community center about someone else’s travel, drive down a different road to get someplace, even watching Rick Steve’s can give you the material you need.
I have lots of extra scraps that though separated by color, tend to pile up on each other in the bins. Then as I rummage through them I find just what I am looking for most unexpectedly. My mom would call it serendipity, it was one of her favorite words.
The thing is that we are surrounded by amazing things, big and small, grand and simple, fine and rough, that just need us to use our eyes to really take them in. Go places as best you are able, it needn’t be a grand tour, it can be viewing the garden from another angle, or seeing the shadows as the sun comes through the curtains. We tend to fall into the consumer trap of only big trips count, only totally new places bring fresh ideas, and the rest is just humdrum and therefore too boring to waste our time on. Known places can be very fresh and inspiring when viewed from a different angle, don’t cheat yourself out of the wonders close by. Keep your mind open.
