31 DAYS OF BLOGGING: DAY III - Your Favorite Quote
DAY III - Your Favorite Quote
Do I contradict myself?
Very well, then I contradict myself.
I am large. I contain multitudes.
-- Walt Whitman; "Song of Myself"
Once upon a time I was a wee wanderlust thing, still just catapulted into the world of words and books with degrees attached to them, and the marvel that I could become accredited for talking about them, knowing about them and loving them. In this land, I was asked to read Walt Whitman, again, for the third time I think. I had spent all of high school reading it twice, while preoccupied with several other worlds dreading it. So I put it off, and I put it off, and I put it off.
Finally, like the day before I had to have read the whole book again, I picked it off the table, and stared at it like I was girding myself for war, before taking it outside to lay on my back lawn, in the grass while reading, as you guessed it, Leaves of Grass which is where you will find this poem. But something magical happened that day. I fell into Whitman, or he fell into me, or we fell into each other, looking across that vast wide water, like a puzzle piece slotting into place, like a drop of water returning to the ocean, like a snow flake descending slowly and melting all at once.
Suddenly, all of it made sense. Suddenly, I could not close my eyes and I could not read it fast enough. Suddenly, I was underlining quotes, and reading it the way you learn a lover, wanting madly to suddenly know everything, and wanting in every pause to go back and trace the wrist bones and eyelashes that you just found, that could not be as fragile and perfect and unreal as they seem. Suddenly, he was speaking to me, and about me, and the world made sense through him.
There were many things that happened from there (like the fact all my Kindles are named Leaves of Grass [Insert Number] based on nine successive times the novel was republished; I'm on IV), but this quote among several favorite jumped out and stuck forever.
The moment I read these words it rang like a clarion bell, the one I'm so attuned to listening to, in my soul.
The one that said, Look, look, come and see, stop worry if other people think everything you believe does not line up. The one that said, You are larger than one big, big, big truth. The one that said, You are big enough for a million million big, big, big truths, whole unto themselves, and all holy in the their own rights, and not needing to justify themselves to each other.
And somehow it felt like Walt Whitman, speaking about himself, had given me the right to exist. To be most microscopic, and unashamedly, unapologetically, cosmically multifaceted. That it was not a shameful thing to contradict yourself. Maybe it was just a normal thing. A thing that came with setting great things side by side, like breathing and blinking at the same time, like tea and toast. Different, but beautiful things all at once. And true, true even when it wasn't beautiful.
Because it simply was. Like rain, and love.
This is definitely on the list of things I would not mind having tattooed on my skin somewhere, and it will never stop being the top of my journal now that the introduction post has it there.
1. Introduction and recent photo ( LJ/DW)
2. 20 facts about you ( LJ/DW)
3. Your favorite quote
4. What are you afraid of?
5. 10 songs you love right now
6. Your 5 senses right now
7. Your pet hates
8. What's in your handbag?
9. What are your worst habits?
10. What's your best physical feature?
11. List 15 of your favorite things
12. What's inside your fridge?
13. What is your earliest memory?
14. If you won the lottery...
15. Timeline of your day
16. What's at the top of your bucket list?
17. What is your most proud moment?
18. The meaning behind your blog name
19. What do you collect?
20. A difficult time in your life
21. Your 10 favorite foods
22. The best thing to happen this year
23. Your dream job
24. Your favorite childhood book
25. Your 5 favorite blogs
26. An old photo of you
27. Post your favorite recipe
28. What are you looking forward to?
29. Where have you travelled?
30. What's in your makeup bag?
31. Why do you blog?
[This entry was originally posted at http://wanderlustlover.dreamwidth.org/2254802.html. Comment on either at your leisure.]
Do I contradict myself?
Very well, then I contradict myself.
I am large. I contain multitudes.
-- Walt Whitman; "Song of Myself"
Once upon a time I was a wee wanderlust thing, still just catapulted into the world of words and books with degrees attached to them, and the marvel that I could become accredited for talking about them, knowing about them and loving them. In this land, I was asked to read Walt Whitman, again, for the third time I think. I had spent all of high school reading it twice, while preoccupied with several other worlds dreading it. So I put it off, and I put it off, and I put it off.
Finally, like the day before I had to have read the whole book again, I picked it off the table, and stared at it like I was girding myself for war, before taking it outside to lay on my back lawn, in the grass while reading, as you guessed it, Leaves of Grass which is where you will find this poem. But something magical happened that day. I fell into Whitman, or he fell into me, or we fell into each other, looking across that vast wide water, like a puzzle piece slotting into place, like a drop of water returning to the ocean, like a snow flake descending slowly and melting all at once.
Suddenly, all of it made sense. Suddenly, I could not close my eyes and I could not read it fast enough. Suddenly, I was underlining quotes, and reading it the way you learn a lover, wanting madly to suddenly know everything, and wanting in every pause to go back and trace the wrist bones and eyelashes that you just found, that could not be as fragile and perfect and unreal as they seem. Suddenly, he was speaking to me, and about me, and the world made sense through him.
There were many things that happened from there (like the fact all my Kindles are named Leaves of Grass [Insert Number] based on nine successive times the novel was republished; I'm on IV), but this quote among several favorite jumped out and stuck forever.
The moment I read these words it rang like a clarion bell, the one I'm so attuned to listening to, in my soul.
The one that said, Look, look, come and see, stop worry if other people think everything you believe does not line up. The one that said, You are larger than one big, big, big truth. The one that said, You are big enough for a million million big, big, big truths, whole unto themselves, and all holy in the their own rights, and not needing to justify themselves to each other.
And somehow it felt like Walt Whitman, speaking about himself, had given me the right to exist. To be most microscopic, and unashamedly, unapologetically, cosmically multifaceted. That it was not a shameful thing to contradict yourself. Maybe it was just a normal thing. A thing that came with setting great things side by side, like breathing and blinking at the same time, like tea and toast. Different, but beautiful things all at once. And true, true even when it wasn't beautiful.
Because it simply was. Like rain, and love.
This is definitely on the list of things I would not mind having tattooed on my skin somewhere, and it will never stop being the top of my journal now that the introduction post has it there.
1. Introduction and recent photo ( LJ/DW)
2. 20 facts about you ( LJ/DW)
3. Your favorite quote
4. What are you afraid of?
5. 10 songs you love right now
6. Your 5 senses right now
7. Your pet hates
8. What's in your handbag?
9. What are your worst habits?
10. What's your best physical feature?
11. List 15 of your favorite things
12. What's inside your fridge?
13. What is your earliest memory?
14. If you won the lottery...
15. Timeline of your day
16. What's at the top of your bucket list?
17. What is your most proud moment?
18. The meaning behind your blog name
19. What do you collect?
20. A difficult time in your life
21. Your 10 favorite foods
22. The best thing to happen this year
23. Your dream job
24. Your favorite childhood book
25. Your 5 favorite blogs
26. An old photo of you
27. Post your favorite recipe
28. What are you looking forward to?
29. Where have you travelled?
30. What's in your makeup bag?
31. Why do you blog?
[This entry was originally posted at http://wanderlustlover.dreamwidth.org/2254802.html. Comment on either at your leisure.]