Mexico

So, I'm sure you're all wondering where I was for a week. Well, I was in Mexico, for a few reasons. One was a friend's wedding, but more importantly, for capstone research. I felt that to truly understand what "between two waves of the sea" meant I had to experience the act myself. Of course, to do this I had to go to Mexico where it was 85 degrees and sunny. I realized there are always pictures and paintings to be seen of the ocean or of waves crashing against rocks and even though pictures can be beautiful, they can never show the feeling that the ocean gives a person when watching the waves come onto the beach and realizing the immense power that those waves hold. When Eliot wrote, "Not known, because not looked for, But heard, half-heard, in the stillness, Between two waves of the sea." He intentionally compared silence and peace with the ocean. When standing next to the ocean you realize that it is the opposite of silent and peaceful. This is the struggle that Little Gidding presents, the same struggle that we have in understanding epiphanies. Just as the stillness between two waves is almost impossible to catch, so is the meaning of our little epiphanic moments of perfection. The stillness, even when looked for can be unknown to the seeker. While listening intently one night to the crashing of the waves, I realized that there might not be an "ah" epiphany waiting in that second of silence. Instead, maybe that moment in time is meant to be appreciated rather than exasperated.