“Of two sisters, one is always the watcher,
one the dancer.”
― – Louise Glück, Descending Figure
We rubberneck in traffic, we rubberneck with life. Last weekend I was sitting on my roof deck in Deep Ellum listening to the night. Car engines, motorcycles, laughter and various white noise. I also enjoyed one of my favorite food groups: cigars. I peered at the high-rise next to mine, the Case bldg, you can see the windows on the right in the pic above. I could see TVs in some of the windows, light flickering on the walls. There were people on balconies, talking and laughing. Life was happening, some people living it, and some watching it on TV. That’s how we occupy time: we live life and we watch life. Some of us want to chew it all up, live large and feel all the emotions, whether high or low. Plenty of others stay hidden, not risking big joy or debilitating pain.
It’s the same around the world. People scurry about, trying to love, live and work. Reminds me of driving through towns and villages in third-world countries, where I’d see lights and TVs flickering in homes made of cardboard and aluminum flashing. They were also watching life and living life. Don’t we all long to live and feel? I want to be in each room and engage, ask each person what’s important? What are they thinking? What’s inspiring? What’s missing?
We’re curious creatures, there’s an inherent voyeurism to everything we do. Think of social media, we want to see what others are doing RIGHT. NOW. Wait 10 minutes and check again, what are they doing, RIGHT. NOW!? We want to be where those people are, we wish we were on the beach with them, at the concert, “What if I missed the greatest show in the history of music!?” Often, whether we admit or not, we want our lives to be like theirs. Or with television, we watch as a story unfolds. If it’s a drama, we connect with the characters, their emotions, maybe we want to live their big, cool adventure, their bravery, their sexiness.
That’s where the longing begins, and the dysfunction. Maybe there is community being built online, messaging or commenting with friends on a particular topic. But it doesn’t seem to compare to live engagement in person. Walking and laughing, sitting across from someone at dinner, looking at their face, in their eyes, sharing all the visceral dynamics: the sounds, the expressions, the smells, the flavors.
I guess that’s the question: are we watching life to learn, or watching to escape? For me, when I watch a TV drama, whether movie or series, the story matters. I also feel the desire to escape. I want to shut my brain down and numb out a bit. We all need to decompress and rest, so I’m not saying TV is a gateway drug to evil and anarchy. But we sure do spend lots of time in front of that electronic device as it transmits other lives to us, same as our phones and computers. I feel the tangible anxiety when I watch food documentaries. Ones like Mind of a Chef, Parts Unknown and others, certainly connect with my adventuresome spirit. Right now I’m thinking of a little shack bar no more than 10 ft by 8 ft in Lomé, Togo in Africa. I’d never heard of it either until I went there with a fantastic organization called Mercy Ships. I remember sitting on one of five creaky wooden stools at night, little dirt alley behind us, 15 ft across, various folks strolling by with kiddos. You basically walk up to the wooden bar, the size of a rectangular coffee table, from the alley. One light bulb and a cooler on the ground. I remember looking at the moonlight, drinking a Castel, and thinking “Man, this is pretty damn cool. I’m breathing African air and drinking a cold beer. Thank you Lord.”But the hunger doesn’t stop. I want more. We’re insatiable in our appetites for more experience, some of it a wonderful thing, lots of it an attempt fill a void in our hearts. The scriptures below speak to being vigilant about not watching life go by, but making the most of our time.
Ephesians 5:15-17
“So, then, be careful how you live. Do not be unwise but wise, making the best use of your time because the times are evil. Therefore, do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is.”
Psalm 90:12
“Our days may come to seventy years,
or eighty, if our strength endures;
yet the best of them are but trouble and sorrow,
for they quickly pass, and we fly away.
If only we knew the power of your anger!
Your wrath is as great as the fear that is your due.
Teach us to number our days,
that we may gain a heart of wisdom.”
This is brass tacks of how we show our hubris. We respond to these verses by saying, “That’s not true, I’m managing fine on my own. I don’t feel like I’m in the dark, I don’t need Christ.” And God gives us exactly what we ask. We march along and seek our own fulfillment and happiness, we vigorously pursue our agendas, and don’t realize the shiny “stuff” is not the best outcome. This is what God is referring to as “darkness.” My close friends know my broken record joke: if you leave me to my own desires, you can bet your mortgage I’ll end up in Vegas with a Scarface pile of coke and several women seeking payment for services rendered. Am I joking? Partially, but all of us have a dark side. And all of us can become immersed in accumulation and achievement as our end goal, as opposed to seeing all paths as means to help others. We also run into this ginormous problem known as death, that hammers home our weakness.
I hate to admit it, but I recognize my deficiencies. There are thousands of things I can’t do that are not in my skill-set. Collectively, here’s a short list of man’s inadequacy that validates Isaiah 45:7.
I try not to miss an opportunity to highlight how powerful scripture is. Pick anything you’re struggling with at the moment: loneliness, addiction, anger, money, jealousy, lust, anxiety, worry, doubt; and scripture will address it in the form of a person. Never some esoteric, ambiguous cotton candy, but brass tracks truth that resonates from a real life story. The kind of words you can grab hold of and say, “I know that feeling.” Sometime the words are poetic, other times they’re Hemingway-esque in their brute force. But don’t kid yourself, this stuff isn’t a bunch fables for children. Biblical characters were flesh and blood like you and I, with the same damn battles, and the same triumphs.
I do wonder, did they choose to watch life the way we do? I doubt it. Lord, teach us to number our days. Help us make sure we use your time given as a means to gain wisdom. Help us pursue important things in life, and not shiny images on a screen.
See ya next time. ML