The harvest theme is also central to this season of Thanksgiving with friends and family even though few of us work the soil anymore. The term "dead of winter" carries the Persephone myth. She escapes the underworld and returns to the light and the land of the living as the sun gains time in the sky anticipating spring with hope of fresh endeavor.
That fresh endeavor applies personally and communally as well. The question at the root of all new action is what will the product of our effort create; or more essentially, who and what will we be as a community as winter's darkness yields to the light of the new year? What will our collective goals be? What will Chatham County look like next year? What shape and size will we choose for this land that nurtures us? It's a decision for which we are all responsible.
So often we are swept along by circumstances that seem beyond our control. An increasingly globalized economy that is not of our choosing and probably not a good fit for any community that aspires to self-sufficiency. Wars that waste the blood of our children and the wealth of our land. Great powers have come to bear on us, yet we are not without the will or wherewithal to resist and take a path of our choosing.
These winter months are a time to dream, to enter the underworld of our own nature and cultivate the inspiration of the muse. Taking time for productive imagination, introspection, taking our own measure and playing the part of the wild-eyed dreamer without regard to the self-criticism that such undertakings are mere fantasy or wispy innovations. The cold, fallow season, like this time of economic difficulty is just the time to begin germinating the ideas, the potential that at first seems like vapors impossible to capture or compress into formation.
Play has a lot to do with priming the mind to produce the miracles of our potential. Pretend like a child, conjure up a drama, summon a new story, recreate yourself independent of self-doubt or social pressure. After all, the greatest journey is the quest to the center of the self, the essence of who we are and choose to be. Destiny is as much a choice as it is a fate.
Caste, class and present station notwithstanding, grasping for that ring on the carousel ride of life is part of the plan and always has been! And don't be afraid that you'll come up empty or that the muse will not whisper in your ear.
The writer Franz Kafka knew that the hidden could not remain so and prescribed the manner in which we should realize our own creative genius: "You do not need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait, be quiet, still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked, it has no choice, it will roll in ecstasy at your feet."
Kafka's prescription is simple meditation, something that is part and parcel of every tradition known to humankind. Pondering, reflecting without expectation of a particular outcome. One needn't be a mystic to perform this simple exercise successfully.
Our individual exercise of this simple technique will not only produce the sprout of our own genius, but will then become the tree of our collective growth as well. By applying this method we'll be better equipped to plan Chatham's future; a future of restored watersheds, food security and local economic development.
So take some time this season to play, recreate, meditate, ponder, wonder, speculate, innovate. Alone in nature or at a table in a solitary room. The muse awaits your attention, the chance to ignite the genius that you and you alone possess.
I wish you health, happiness and prosperity. Happy Holidays!
Tim Keim is a Pittsboro resident, writer, radio news and documentary journalist and member of the Chatham County Planning Board. Readers can contact him at chh@heraldsun.com or c/o The Chapel Hill Herald, 2828 Pickett St., Durham, NC 27705.
