I don't get the senior year thing. When we were freshmyn, it was about learning community. As sophomores, we learned to dream and to think about the United States. As juniors, we raveled in cocoons and were guided out of a cave. Then the senior year came, though, and I don't see the larger mission of what we are to learn.I'm not sure why, but I doodled this in a notebook. It fell off my shelf today and I tried to make sense of what I had to say.
Unfortunately, I'm not including all the illustrations.
For What Once Was A Goldfish - 03/03/01
I.
There once was a man who wandered. He went here and there, but was always going somewhere towards what was always supposed to be. It was beautiful to wander.
II.
Along the wandering, a group joined him, heading here and there, towards somewhere that was supposed to be. They traveled for some time, moving together, before anything was known or said.
Suddenly, the man stopped and the group stopped with him.
"What?" they wanted to know.
"Nothing," he responded. "It's just that....well...look at us. We're an odd sort moving forward like we do...it's sort of neat being with one another for a while...a community of sojourners."
And they continued to wander.
III.
They wandered further for a great deal of time with more heres and theres, heading somewhere and and trying to read the supposed-to-be's. They did not stop again, though, until the man thought he heard something.
"Listen," he requested. "Do you hear that? Do you hear how our voices come together to make music under the rules of our wandering? What odd, beautiful laws we follow."
The group agreed and said to one another how nice it was to travel with this man who seemed to be heading here and there, moving forward to where they were supposed to be.
IV.
The group continued to wandering with the music they found in each other's voices, but one by one, they began to have deep, sad thoughts about going here and there, heading towards a direction of getting somewhere with this man.
And the man knew this.
When the time came, the man stopped again.
"We have come a long way together," he said. "But this is not real. We are merely an echo of ourselves walking in circles for a very long time. If we are to get to the somewhere we're suppose to be, then we have to look inside to find our own journey. Mine is not yours. I will continue with you and help where I can. We all must move forward, wandering, but you might want to wander here and there on your own to find the something that is supposed to be.
V.
So, the group continued moving here and there toward the something that was supposed to be listening to their individual voices that once made music together. The echoes began to become clearer.
One by one, individuals came to the man and whispered, "This journey with you has been good, but I no longer here the music of us together, and although I love moving here and there toward the something that is supposed to be with you, I now know I must wander in my own direction towards the something that is supposed to be for me."
The wandering man understood this and felt great joy.
"What fortune," he thought to himself, "to have the company for as long as I have."
He knew the day would come. He had his own here and there of where he was going and felt at ease wandering towards the what was supposed to be. As he watched each of them leave he felt it was as beautiful as the day he first wandered alone in a direction looking for the something that was supposed to be.
He recognized that each of were a part of him now. He understood wandering together was meant to be as it was, but separating also made him smile.
Alone, he wandered here and there again looking for the something that was supposed to be, listening to his own song in his head.
VI.
The man wandered more, here and there, towards something that was always supposed to be, and
along the way, another group joined him. They wandered here and there towards the something that was supposed to be.
This was beautiful, too. This wondering.
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