Friday, August 13, 2010

Choices

I had a truly wonderful... amazing... in every sense, "peak" experience, last week.

It was at a lecture about superheroes in the West vs. giant robots in Japan.

It was presented by Crispin Freeman, an anime-mythology scholar/voice actor/director with whom my wife and I have been studying this summer (which studies, by the way, have made this one of the most fun summers in years).

There are all sorts of positive things I could say about the lecture, and go on about said positive things for hours; but for two glorious hours, I was living in a world of crystalline thought. Precision. Clarity. Profundity. And joy--the joy of discovery, the joy of being in a place of crystalline and profound clarity, the joy of the subject matter, the joy of sharing.

Yesterday, I saw my doctor, and told him about the experience. He thought it sounded great (and was sorry he wouldn't be able to see next week's presentation, to which I'm also going). The examination went on as it usually does, he did some neuro stuff, and then he said, "I'm concerned about the way you say your legs are going downhill." (And they have been, they're getting steadily worse.)

I told him, "I don't care about my legs getting worse. If I have the choice between my legs getting better and staying in a state of joyful clarity and profundity, I'll take the latter."

I don't know whether or why that would even be a choice...

But that's my choice.

1 comment:

Karen Kahler said...

Have I mentioned recently how much I adore you?