Private Special Moments

There's a scene in the movie Stand by Me where a deer jumps out of the forest mere feet from the main character, alone from his sleeping friends who simply absorbs the moment. When a train whistle scares the deer off and wakes up his companions, his adult-voiced narration says "...it was on the tip of my tongue to tell them about the deer. But I didn't. That was the one thing I kept to myself. I've never spoken or written about it until just now."

While soaping myself in the shower some years ago, a *huge* bubble formed between my arm and my body. I wanted to run out into my dorm's common area (naked) to show the roommates. Although I didn't, and stood staring at the bubble until it burst, I immediately ran and out (clothed) and told everyone about it. I was not like in the movie.

Stand by Me was a coming of age story; so could not having a need to validate our experiences through other's reactions a sign of maturity? I think this might be. Some would call it a pulling inwards if we limit the sharing of our experiences, but I disagree that it has anything to do with anti-socialism. As I often find myself stumbling for words on these pages, I know that it is difficult to capture thoughts on paper. Perhaps some moments are diminished by the translation into words. Telling your friends a deer was right next to you will never be as impressive as actually having it right next to you. Relating to your friends about the big bubble would probably not even cause them to lift their heads, and would mean so much less to than you, who witnessed a fragile display of wonder, displayed in a magnificent spectrum of bubble-oil color most unexpectedly in the middle of the morning routine.

I've become much more content with life over these past years. I see special moments everyday, from innocent babies yawning on the subway to intricate spiderwebs highlighted in dew. Yet these are everyday occurrences, not unique as a deer crossing your path. Perhaps on some level they're all the same - beautiful moments in which us mere mortals could never definitively quantify for comparison. Maybe hushing up is just realizing that there's so much beauty around that and there's no need to tell others, because if that beauty needs to be explained to others, they'll probably not understand it, anyway.

And I pity the ones that don't see it.