Resting against a bale of hay, a bottle of Italian lager, unopened. This caught my attention, while out for a morning walk. It didn’t seem worthy of a mention here, so I walked on, confident that I’d find something ‘better’ to write about later. But then, why not this bottle, unopened, resting against a bale of hay, in a field of 58 – I counted – other bales of hay?
Mary Oliver’s first instruction is simply to pay attention, not pay attention to interesting things, or remarkable things; just be aware of what you are aware of. So, I walked back to the bottle and took a photo of it, had a closer look at it, noticed only then that it was unopened, and counted the number of hay bales in the field.
How quickly I judged my noticing. It’s only day five of this experiment and a voice, that ever-present inner critic, is already appearing in field of bales of hay to tell me I’m not doing it right; other people – more observant, more sensitive people – would be noticing more interesting things; other people would be doing this properly. Well. There we are. It’s astounding.
#5 of 30