“In my own worst seasons, I’ve come back from the colorless world of despair
by forcing myself to look hard, for a long time, at a single glorious thing:
a flame of red geranium outside my bedroom window.”

– Barbara Kingsolver, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, essayist and poet

Have you noticed how often depression or low feeling is described as a world in which the color has gone out, how everything is dulled with no vibrancy in food or feeling to be found? Isn’t it something, then, that forcefully looking into the beauty of one thing for a suspended note of time can force back open a sliver of color?

I’m not low right now but I wonder if during the times that I have been, if forcefully opening my eyes and looking hard at one glorious thing would have helped. When you think about it, our senses are the only portals through which new information gets in so it makes sense that if the world has gone gray, forcefully opening the portal would help. In that way, taking in the beauty of a flower becomes the equivalent of a bowl of broth or a cold compress, something that brings the healing on.

I glanced outside just now and saw a little boy skipping ahead through a scuffle of leaves, followed by a mom holding the hand of an even littler kid, her long red sweater flapping behind. It was a nice thing to see.

Have a glorious Wednesday. I hope you see some good things through your eye portals today.

E