Sometimes we are open (mentally) to a change of perspective. Such a moment occurred for me as I was flying home to Nelson airport from Wellington on a beautiful clear August evening. I could see across to the ranges around Golden Bay as the sun cast an orange glow behind them. Below us bush covered the hills in tight curls broken only by the occasional building that erupted like a pimple from the skin below.
Recently I have been thinking a lot about the earth's crust as thin skin over the heaving, boiling body of our plant. I have been trying to get into perspective how we fit in the realm of the universe. Being that high up gave me that perspective. I realised that below me (unseen) were tiny people going about their business like tiny lice between the feathes of a chicken.
It gave me a jolt because I also realised we indeed are like lice on the skin of the earth. We itch at and burrow at the surface, and leave our excrement and rubbish strewn around. And what is more we are as unnecessary to the future of the earth as the lice on a chicken. It was like I was looking through the wrong end of a telescope and seeing myself in context within the universe.
The plane landed and I was absorbed into the crowd of people picking up luggage and being irritated with one another. I chatted with my partner about what the dog did and where to stop for tea, and I was back in the 'Me' who is the centre of my universe, making things happen and causing others to do the things I want them to do. I was back as controller of the universe.
Then, as we drove back over the hill to the place many call Paradise, I experienced a moment of rage when I saw MacDonalds packaging discarded without thought on the roadside. We are indeed lice on the crust of the earth.
