Harmony of the Mundane
When one travels and is back from their travels, every experience is grand, inspired, mesmerising and adjectives alike. Never a dull moment it seems. When there had been multiple ones. It is the mundane moments which one tends to forget for the beautiful ones. Nothing wrong with it, you see. Beauty is meant to overwhelm us and enable us look over the mundane. I have done it. All of us do it. It is not a calculated reaction. With the past few journeys however, I have found a new appreciation for the mundane. It can be because of the journal I keep and update as journeying, which has led to a happy realisation that these mundane moments as it happens were moments of small silences – places to rest amid the inspired and hyper-inspired journeys’.
Everyday moments as the wait for the bus, train or other mode of transport to reach the next destination, the wait which is journey itself; how waiting is part of life you cannot escape. Or, to read a vernacular language news daily in the sun, and if there is luxury, watch telly when I’m back Home (which is the homestay or a hotel) after the day’s walk - a ritual followed when not travelling. - A semblance of steadiness it provides to the days’ which look and are non-identical each day. Or, a time when you’d to stay put in the room because of the hailstorm, that book you brought along to read, but in no mood to read it; basically your movement is confined. Or, being surrounded with people who are occupied conversing in their tongue - one you don’t understand, the feeling of being left out, the occasional exchange of glances and a smile to let them know you aren’t feeling out of place, yet, subconsciously making a memory of the gestures, the overheard words and their phonetics, the architecture of home; or, of the mapgpies as they fly hurriedly to find a shelter during the hailstorm, the bitter cold which runs down your spine, the tree trunks wet, the earth wet, both fragrant, distinctively.
Ordinary moments are treasured and many are immortalised within the compositions and canvases of many a great artists. They sacramentalised prosaic, composed serenades for rutting. Insignificant has been their muse. Their artistic works remind us and shall most likely to generations after us that there is beauty to ordinariness and it mustn’t be disregarded neither taken for granted. And yet, many from the travel community neglect the harmony everydayness bring to their journeys’. They are single-mindedly focused on glossy moments – of the dogs who carry on their shoulders (figuratively) the dramatic backdrop of the terrain, to the furry doggos sun-napping often in the middle of the street. It is a cosy sight if you take notice.
Our lives are filled with mundane moments and travel’s no exception. These small moments of silence play a key if subtle role. They invite you to pause, linger and, engender a feeling of connectedness with everything around.