I am today years old (8 April 2024) when I finally touch 180◦F extremes. In February 1982 this poor boy from California got off a plane in Chicago when the thermometer said -45◦F and the TV said the wind chill was -60. I had heard something about this brutal level of cold before, and I tested the gossip, finding it true. Standing in that frigid wind I spit and heard the crack before the pieces hit the sidewalk…you see, the outside freezes virtually immediately, and as the interior of the now-iceball freezes too it expands and cracks the outer shell. I became allergic to cold that evening in Chicago, and remember nothing else about that trip TBH.
And now, in Thailand’s hot season and likely hottest month of the year, the temperature reached 112◦ and the “feels like” touched 120. -60 to 120 = 180 degrees of separation. I know I am not unique in this position, of course. But it remains a milestone emblematic of other situations we face.
There are the extremes of hope and demoralization; love and hate; life and death, to name just a few. Do our children today have hope for a bright future that matches or exceeds our own when we were teens? Or is the rising suicide rate among those of young years a sign of the opposite of hope, which has been crafted in just a few generations? Or the opposite of deep, abiding, unconditional love; a vile, nasty, unrelenting hate? Which one consumes our thoughts more today…before you answer, think clearly about all those we are told to hate; other nations, genders, currencies, political parties, corporations. I have experienced death up close and personal, myself, my family, my friends, public figures, and most of them tragically unexpected. Grief can render a life impotent, devoid of meaning, or worst of all, a burden one might end through self-harm. How do I relate to life instead of the offered focus on death and loss?
So….it was my intention to go another few pages on this theme of how we boil our experience down to a duality of extremes that limits us. There’s something ‘boring’ about 65◦F. There’s also the limit of language: sound…dog barking. In the pause between experience (sound)...which btw is experienced with a tiny delay due to the fact the movement of energy takes time…and naming the sound, we have an opportunity to craft a new description without baggage. What I mean is, as a young child, a dog knocked me down and its paw scratched my face, leaving a scar that remains today. So when I hear the sound of a dog, deep trauma surfaces and brings back fear and pain; which likely have no pertinence to this moment, but taint it for me nonetheless. It is in that pause between experience and name when transformation can happen.
The other point in my plan is this: all of our methods of measurement are derivative, not real. It is useful to remember this. I can’t reach down and pick up an inch off the ground. I can’t breathe in a second, removing it from the moment about to happen. I can’t swallow a ◦F; this one is especially interesting to unpack because most of the world uses ◦C, a much more compressed measure of energy. A connoisseur of heat (or cold) might be able to notice the difference inside a single degree Centigrade, yet be unable to do the same within a degree of Fahrenheit.
But friends I must leave this dangling. Sometimes Life gets Wild on its own, without my intervention. Such has been this second week of April 2024. I drop this late and incomplete…and sometimes life is like that too. Be Wild.