what is the world for you?

sit by a stream. look up and over the water as it rushes by. something will happen--is it an illusion? or is it a revelation? 

all of the sudden, the water will appear to crawl. each white cap moving so very slowly, it's as though the whole stream is controlled by some widget on an app that has been set to 1/10 speed.  the endless stream of water has been broken into large chunks, each moving with great, nearly comical, effort. 

then, cast your eyes back directly on the water. it is rushing. so fast you could never claim to see it crawl. so fast, it is intimidating.

and, yet. raise your eyes once more to the green hillside, let the peripheral vision take over and it happens all over again. the stream has become chunks. and it is crawling. 

it's not a metaphor, it's real. and also, it occurs to you as you walk away from the stream, it is a fucking metaphor. our own attention, our own perspective is all that we have. does the water cease to tumble and instead creep when you shift your attention slightly away? is it taking a break from the hyper performance your observation of it requires? does your own vision, your own perception of the water impact it so that it rushes? is your own observation necessary to the speed of the water? are you somehow responsible for this whitewater, this chaos?

we are stuck in our own specific gorgeous and terrible point of view. until we catch a glimpse of how things might look from another's.