the middle

"Middles might be said to be under-theorized. There is an abundance of work on opening and closure, but very little discussion of what comes in between. This is obviously because the theory of the middle is taken simply to be the theory of the work as a whole. Beginnings and endings are marked points within the work, but the middle is just the work itself with those points lopped off. There is, however, perhaps more to be said."

These words were spoken by Don Fowler, an English classicist, said to be a pioneer in the area of modern literary theory, the thought of literary theory's beginnings an entry entirely unto itself. None the less, I find myself, upon reading these words, over and over again by now, stopped still in my tracks, back to the wind of the world, finding the truth seeking deep, flowing forth, being real.

It's true, we seem to have no time or tolerance for the process of things. We are either excited to begin a new project, a new chapter, a new book in life, a new idea, or we are itching for the end of it, we are counting down the minutes, we are thrusting ourselves into the next moment or movement before we have completed our current stage, we have ignored every and all good (and bad) signs in order to get ahead, we are cheating ourselves a little, racing for the finish line after cutting through the woods or tripping up others along the way.

It's no one's fault, really, that we have grown to think this way, that we have been trained to expect immediate results or that we feel so caught up in what's coming that we forget to consider the importance of right now. We fret, and freak out, over the next ten years of our lives, totally missing what's before us, completely unaware that today is the stepping stone of tomorrow, of those next ten years or twenty, that without going forward with now, without self-awareness in the present, we will find ourselves in the same place later on, or always, we fear.

I'm not denying that it sounds like a load, especially when I am the the queen of waiting for the future to hurry up and get here. In all our impatience, we are demanding marked posts of accomplishment, we are expecting omens or warnings or welcomings. It's too bad that in our frantic search for these things, we are flat out missing the actual direction for which we seek. Would it be so crazy to wonder if the sign is the middle itself? I know, I know. Tell that to a dying man, wandering in the same circle, in the same desert, sure by now he will never make it out alive. Tell him that to find your way forward is to stand still, to embrace what seems to be destroying us, to find peace within the darkest part of our journey. It's not what I want to hear, either. And it might not even be true, at least from every perspective. But just in case, in the scenario where the valley is perhaps not our permanent dwelling place, but the place where we might be formed for the next part of moving forward, rather than our usual ultimatums, perhaps we should only stop and ask: what then can we learn from the wilderness?