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Tuesday, January 14, 2014

An Enviable Lunatic!

In Par Lagerkvist’s novel, The Dwarf, the author gives this description of an elderly craftsman, a stranger named Bernardo who comes to town to do a painting for the wall of a local Franciscan monastery:

“... (H)e is obviously fascinated by everything. I have seen him pick up a stone from the ground and examine it with the deepest interest, turn and twist it, and finally pocket it, as though it were a rarity. Anything and everything seems to fascinate him. 

"Is he a lunatic? An enviable lunatic! One for whom a pebble has value must be surrounded by treasures wherever he goes.”

Indeed. What if we could recapture all the childlike wonder and fascination we once knew, relive the sense of beauty and mystery in things that have become ordinary to us? What if we could imagine ourselves having been blind from birth, then having our full sight restored and seeing the wonderful world for the first time?

We might never be bored again. Ever.

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