Arete

July 30, 2018

Greetings from its fullness,

I can just make out the shape of the trees, still cloaked in night, clinging to the dreams that trees have.  There is a dimness that fills the air where sound will be soon.  I sip coffee and wait, savor the quiet with the rich flavor in my favorite mug.  A word comes to me, a new friend I feel like I have known forever.

The sky slowly moves from navy to shades of royal, and I look away for a moment and it is rose-tinted porcelain blue.  God is unsealing the day.  Now the trees are lined with light and color, urged by a soft breeze, gently shaking off the sleep-dew.  Choirs of birds gather for rehearsal. 

The miles are lined up where they always are, stacked neatly in the road, dividing the time into sensible sections.  I move from the end of the driveway, already bright with sun, and join the miles.   I take the word with me.  It has been floating around in the background for months and then this morning surfaced to keep me company on my run.  ‘Arete’. 

I had been searching for what I felt about something and met this word and took it into my circle of friends.  We got to know each other, I introduced it to other friends.  Some were curious, some skeptical, because it was foreign.  But in time it fit in, and we began to get to know one another.

My shadow led me past the farm where the rooster bragged about the morning, and past the tracks and past the place where I was noticing the miles.  My body warmed up, forgot for a time that it was not twelve years old, and suggested that we run forever.

I was introduced to Arete by its cousin Excellence.  They share a lot of the same family and so it was a natural thing.  In that moment I had been trying to find a way of saying something else and then here was Arete to inspire what I meant to express.

I run by corn, steeped in the smell of summer.  Rows of giant stalks, proud of their tassels, almost ready to graduate to whatever waits for them.  There is a squeak in my shoe that wasn’t there before the last time I ran in the rain.  It is funny at first and then like all funny things is not after the hundredth time.  And then it’s gone.

I wanted Arete to help me describe what I was chasing.  I wanted to get to know it well enough that I could say to others what it means to seek the potential in any of us, to find what we are capable of.  Arete was patient with me, like a carpenter teaching a novice to shape a piece of wood.  Part of me wondered if there was something I was missing.

The wind was strumming the grass, each blade vibrating differently, like millions of living things wildly waving at the day.  Across the open field is a knot of maple trees, and two deer wait their turn to own the morning.

I told others about Arete and they seemed impressed I was in such company.  I talked about how much I learned about myself because of my new friend.  Some took Arete with them.

The sun has moved higher so it can see where I am going.  The shadows are tilting in a new direction, shrinking into flatter shapes.  The cool part of the morning has slipped off into some other place, and now only heat remains.  The road unspools over gentle hills, into shallow places, leading me between fields of beans, past peeling barns aching with age.

I had long conversations with Arete.  We discussed philosophy, the pursuit of knowledge.  We exchanged thoughts on becoming a better animal, of understanding the physical potential, and chipping away at boundaries.

The pale blue sky is patched with white wisps, made bold by the sun.  I can hear only my shoes crunching the gravel now, and then a dog barking somewhere, announcing whatever news dogs have to share.  I can feel the sweat running down my back, feel the heat changing me.

I am running back into the sun now as it eases its way toward me.  At first I don’t realize what has changed but then I notice that Arete has paused, is not with me.  I look back along the narrow dirt road and see why.

Arete tells me that the excellence, the potential, the fulfillment of purpose, is not always directed by us, that it exists separate from our desires, our will.  It waits in all things.  It is in the scent of summer, the bite of frost, the sunrise giving shape to the day, the movement of the planets.  Arete is in all of creation, the beauty and the shadow, the grace of the deer, the sound of the moaning pine in the wind.  It is in the rich smell of morning coffee and in the full silence before the dawn.  It is in the words not written.  It is in all of us too, but know it is everywhere our Creator touched.

Of course.  Our friends should show us these things, to remind us to be humble, to look to see our place in our world of incredible excellence. 

The next step I take, and the next, are filled with, surrounded by, driven by what is possible, what is made more possible by Arete.

Hope this finds you reaching,

David

Copyright © 2018 David Smith