New Eyes on an Old World
As I watch a young Asian traveler gaze down on Seattle from the Space Needle, my own visions wander. I remember that when I was as young as he is, I felt sad that our elders’ wisdom would disappear with their passing, leaving us to relearn all they once knew. Wouldn’t it be a better world if we could pass along all knowledge completely and directly, to move evolution forward more quickly? Like most young people, I was in a hurry then to get somewhere. I thought there was somewhere else to go.
I feel differently now, as I watch the world below through his new eyes, imagining his view as best as I can. I’ve come to celebrate the process of learning more than arriving at knowledge. I’ve come to love the beautiful mystery of looking freshly at something foreign and strange, wondering what it is or could be. I find questions more enlightening than answers, journeys more intriguing than destinations. No longer needing to arrive anywhere, I’ve made progress in releasing my need for progress. I’ve come to love this rugged, imperfect moment as it is.
I wonder what questions this boy has, within his words to his parents. He speaks them in a language I can’t decipher. I watch him look deeply into the jigsaw puzzle of skyscrapers. I let my eyes follow when he looks at the snow-capped mountain in the distance, its radiance heightened by golden-hour sunset light. We both look down at the ground far below, amazed at this strange spire built to celebrate a space age that never came as imagined. When dusk arrives, we watch the city lights form constellations as brilliant as those of the stars. We watch the majesty of sunset across the waters to the west. Keeping the view is an age-old ritual that will forever be newly beautiful.
These days, I’m grateful for new eyes untainted by old visions. Whatever this young Asian boy is seeing and feeling, it isn’t biased by the illusions and mistakes of distant elders. Those too may be lost, and that loss is beautiful. His newness may encourage him to follow vibrant new paths. It may foster unconsidered insights, new inventions, unique paintings and songs, emergent forms of better relationships. Imagining his vision allows me to get beyond my own limitations, by pausing to wonder what the world looks like through his eyes. I don’t need to know. I just celebrate how the wonder refreshes my own sight.
Watching from the Space Needle also aids me in seeing the real space age that came, instead of the one of quaint imaginations. No, we don’t travel by jet pack, nor send our astronauts to the outer reaches of the galaxies. It’s been decades since the last man walked on the moon. Yet the wonder of the cosmos has opened to us with stunning clarity and depth, most recently and vividly via the James Webb Space Telescope, which is peering into the infinite cosmos with unprecedented depth, sharing its visions with all of us. And what are we seeing through its eyes, primarily? New mysteries and new beauty on an unfathomable scale. I celebrate the universal majesty of all we’ll never understand.
Part of this new space age is also the revolution of memory: electronic memory that allows us to store our visions and insights to pass along with unprecedented ease. All we’ve seen, felt, marveled at and questioned, we can now save for generations hence in ways impossible when I was young. Elders’ experience no longer need be lost, whether wise or mistaken. Each is of value, in its own way.
It’s in the state of curious unknowing in which we’re most alive. We’re most open then to exploring the place we’re presently in; the only world we’ll ever even slightly begin to know. It’s within new visions of an old world through which that world is forever renewed. Truly, there’s nowhere to go more precious than this moment. No progress is needed more than to appreciate the persistent magnificence of this wild, troubled world.