"This is our true state; this is what makes us incapable of certain knowledge and of absolute ignorance. We sail within a vast sphere, ever drifting in uncertainty, driven from end to end. When we think to attach ourselves to any point and to fasten to it, it wavers and leaves us; and if we follow it, it eludes our grasp, slips past us, and vanishes for ever. Nothing stays for us. This is our natural condition and yet most contrary to our inclination; we burn with desire to find solid ground and an ultimate sure foundation whereon to build a tower reaching to the Infinite. But our whole groundwork cracks, and the earth opens to abysses." -Blaise Pascal
At the behest of a friend (to whom I am forever grateful), I saw donnie darko for the first time this weekend. It had me near tears, for so many reasons. Not least of which is that it reminded me of how I have felt at times in my life. Tormented by questions about god that opened beneath me like abysses. Feeling as if my inner life was more real than what I and everyone else saw outwardly. Suspecting my understanding of truth to be entwined with mental illness, but not knowing exactly how to disentangle them.
I remember watching the closing credits of rocky and bullwinkle as a child, as the lightening flashed and the ground split open beneath them, and knowing that is not only what I feared, but what I felt like inside.
I often say that there are few things in life that I am certain about. I suppose, if asked to articulate what they are, I might say it this way: That something loved me enough to throw itself under my feet. That something was big enough to fill the infinite abyss.
Posts
