In the spirit of the holidays (if you celebrate at this time o year) or just cause (if you don’t), I’d be interested in hearing about what fills you with wonder and just knocks you on your ass, either metaphorically or literally. It can be a person, a picture, a thought…anything. And the good kind of wow, not “Wow, I didn’t know farm machinery could do that to a person.”
For me right now it’s that I’m almost in a perfect place: I’m rooming with my best friend in a great apartment that has a river view, I’m working out three times a week, I have a good job (except for the paranoia; mine, not theirs) and a whole group of us are planning on starting our own comic company. Dreams maybe, but still…A significant other would be the icing, but in time…
You?
Sapo, dude (or dudette?) – you need to join! I really enjoy reading your posts.
I can’t always predict what’s going to elicit the wow response. But I’ll related one that totally knocked me on my ass nearly 20 years ago, and I still get chills when I think about it.
I had followed to Cambridge, Enlgand, a study abroad group from the college I worked for at the time for the purpose of shooting a recruitment video. I went with them on a field trip to Ely Cathedral, which we got to kind of late in the afternoon. The plan was to do the tour, have an indulgent cream tea in the refectory, then attend Evensong services.
With some time to kill before the service, I wandered back into the sanctuary after the tea. The last rays of the sun were coming through the octagonal tower, and the choir was rehearsing for the service. That light, that sound…WOW! It was piercingly beautiful.
Wednesday morning, I came out of my bedroom and started heading into my living room when I noted something fly through my tiny enclosed back yard and land on the ground where I toss seed for the sparrows and juncos. My glasses still in my hand, the brownish blur looked to be a flicker (we have the red-shafted ones here) or maybe a pigeon. Once I got my glasses on, the blur turned into a hawk!
For about five minutes, I had the wonderful opportunity to watch a truely beautiful bird from the distance of 20 to 30 feet, depending on where he would alight. My binoculars happened to be nearby, so when he briefly checked out my neighbor’s hydrangea bush, I grabbed them, sat in my computer chair and just watched. He also went inside of one of my camelia bushes, looking for a songbird to munch on. Luckily, they prefer my other camelia because it’s right above where I scatter their birdseed.
After he left, I got my bird book and discovered it was a male sharp-shinned hawk. About the size of a crow, they’re the smallest of the hawks hereabouts. What a beautiful bird!
Yesterday, he came back briefly and though I know he’s preying on my sparrows but I can’t help but hope he’ll come back again.
Birds I rarely get to see close up make me say Wow!
During this past summer, i spent 24 days hiking through many of the National Parks in the U.S. Southwest. I had many more “Wow!” moments than I can remember. Especially awesome were the Grand Canyon during a thunderstorm, Arches, and especially Bryce Canyon, Antelope Canyon and Horseshoe Canyon.
In the winter, the air over Los Angeles is clearer. We have these crisp blue skies, and from my office, I can see the ocean. Lately, with the clear skies, the sunsets have been phenomenal. When the sun starts setting, there are a handful of my co-workers who will gather in an office; we’ll watch the sun go down, then go back to work.
It’s funny; no matter how many times I see it, it’s still breathtaking.
This is kinda small, but the night sky down here makes me say “wow!”
I used to live in a very large metropolitan area, with much smog and other air pollution. It just got dark at night; sometimes you noticed the stars. Now, I live a thousand miles closer to the equator, in an area with no heavy industry. I go with a couple of friends to a blues club out in the sticks, far from the city. We’ve been out there on full moon nights with a clear sky, and it seems you can see every star from horizon to horizon, with no terrestrial light interference. The moon is so bright you could almost read by it. It’s a breathtaking sight. It makes me wish I had a camera capable of taking panoramic night pictures.
A full moon rising will make me say “wow”. Or even gasp aloud, causing my husband, if he’s driving, to panic, then become irritated. But the beautiful full moon, so luminous and bright and impossibly big, rising… Wow.
A falling star. A wow, when lying on my back in the summer grass at night, is a wow. Even better, walking the dog, and looking up at just the right time and place, to see an unexpected one… wow.
The northern lights are a wow, and woe, for I miss them.
My life at the moment, where I’m doing work which I love deeply, getting paid for it, and watching my debts fall away, one by one.
Seeing something I’ve written published.
Seeing an aurora australis this far north. Happened once – definitely a series of “wow” moments.
Watching meteors speeding overhead on a chill winter’s night.
Airplane travel. Still a novelty for me.
Watching birth, animal or human.
The Blue Angels aerobatic team, when I saw them in flight this summer.
My sons, when they say something that impresses me, or tell me a joke that is really - to a 42-year-old guy who’s heard 'em all - funny.
A star-filled night in the country, after months in the light-polluted city.
A taste of my wife’s new innovation: fudge with peppermint sprinkles.
Statistics that surprise me. Just today, I read in Newsweek that about half of all U.S. currency is held overseas, and that 13 other countries have now adopted the dollar as their own currency. Yes, that actually made me say “Wow!”
