I gave this a thought the other day. And my thoughts led me to water. Very specifically how water is soft, till it’s rough. Water is gentle, till it’s brutal. Water is Elohim, Phanes, Brahma until it’s Satan, Perses, Shiva. Water is Terra Mater when she’s merciful and when she’s angry. Plato had philosophized on this too a long time before I did: what is the shape of water? He’d said that in its purest form, water takes the shape of an icosahedron. An icosahedron is a 20-sided polyhedron. I supposeit means things like beauty, humanity, love have many faces. You can't judge a book by its cover, we say in a cliche now. You can't neatly box people by your own limited worldview and restricted interaction with them. Things have a way of being more than what they seem. Like how water takes the shape of what contains it.
But dear lord, how water breaks the container sometimes!
There is no place on earth that can be a nice haven that does not have sufficient water supply. In all the places I’ve ever travelled to, I’ve noticed that my peace of mind has depended largely on whether or not I have water at my disposal – to drink, to wash up, to whatever. No village is ever nice that has scarcity of water. And my stars, how amazing to just sit by a babbling brook, listening to the music of water flowing over smooth rocks the entire day. Zen.
The nature of duality has always fascinated me. The binary code even of life and death. We cling on to life so desperately and yet we get closer everyday to the day we die. Ends of spectrums. The nice grey shades in between are something of acceptance and/or tolerance. Even in bureaucracy – the Law that stands, the Deviation that is the M.O., and all the variants that necessitate or justify that deviation. Very interesting!
Water though. The shapes it takes. The roles it assumes. The life it gives. The destruction it leaves behind. The destiny it shapes!
I once saw an IG reel saying perhaps God is Water. Life-giving. Death-bringing. Everywhere. Assumes all shapes. Be all. In all. It makes me remember all the times I’ve ever been captivated by the omnipresence of water. Even in religion. Christian baptisms are with water – immersion or not; it’s supposed to symbolize death of a life and birth of another. Hindus would bathe in the Ganges; or otherwise symbolically bathe in it by pouring a little water on their heads to begin the day. Water is a portal of change; it is how you leave one realm and enter another. Even in sci-fi and fantasy fiction, like Mirror Mirror for one, magical portals would often be water or water-esque. Even the rebirth of Lord Voldemort was water-adjacent, in a cauldron, simmering with magic potions that gave him new life.
You have to respect water. Because water is patient. It will outlast all of us. All the smooth rocks in rivers have been smoothened by water, is all the proof you need that water will beat you. Because it will always play the long game.
I heard recently that scientists have found traces of water in Mars. Doctor Who fans will tell you to stay away. Respect.
Jesting aside, water is a force that can not be tamed, no matter how much we fool ourselves into thinking we can and have. And with all the life it gives, to me, to talk of water is to talk of Nature. You can’t tame Nature either. We think we can only at our own peril. To paraphrase Gandhi, the earth has enough to satisfy our need, but not our greed. With all the necessary civilization we are expanding on our piece of Earth, we really should consider making nice with Gaea while we are at it. Mother Earth? Khuanu? Whoever you want to call her.
Because as even a mere mortal like me who seeks only to fly under the radar gets caught in drama and then fights back, the life of bountiful peace Water offers will turn into war when we don’t consider the ramifications to our senseless actions. Senseless actions. This is, by the way, to quote Taylor Swift again, why we can’t have nice things.
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