I have faith in nature, and it’s effect on the human condition. I am often mystified by the colors changing and the new light it brings to the faces that spend hours looking out the windows.

From a young age, I was one of those faces. Every moment possible was spend staring out the window at the world outside. Car rides were filled with daydreams of nature and enough questions to bring a sleuth to his knees. Why did the sky look bluer than it did the month before? When did the leaves paint themselves so pretty? Did they people stay inside when the world took a shower to give it its privacy? Theses were the product of the daydreaming child that was I. I saw fairies dancing on the winds when I lay in the grass and made a wish on a dandelion. There were ballerinas in the rain that cleaned off my chalk drawings and devils that liked to spin so fast you couldn’t see them when the leaves whipped up, almost like they were trying to get back on the trees. I saw all these wonderful things, and all these wonderful things brought me questions I just couldn’t answer.

Age graced me with the ability to observe. With every passing day towards the dreams of being snowed out there were more grimaces on the faces of my classmates, even more than the red noses they always walked in with. At the sight of the daffodil or iris, my mom was all smiles and stayed that way for half the week. The grass seemed greener on the other side of winter, and ants somehow crept into the pants of every student by the time May came around. It was a curious sight. More curious than that was when half the student body grimaced at the sight of rain while the other half grabbed their best friend’s hand ran into the puddles and mud slicks. Why do they do this? Why does the air smell so crisp in the fall and sweet in the spring? Why does the sky wear darker blue in the summer than in the winter? What made snowy days so “warm and cozy”?

All these questions were asked but I could never find a reason that felt right. Science has not explanation for why everyone ran in the snow and cold winds and then tucked themselves away in an air-conditioned house during the warmer months. Not an ordained man or any kind could explain how some people grumbled at the idea of raking the leaves while others turned the event into a fiasco of flying foliage and giggles galore. Through my hours at the windows not even I could comprehend how the clouds kept all that water up there with them and still look like a butterfly. The sight of a million stars just a few miles outside the city limits took away my breath and never did quite return it. I wondered just how it could be that the world we live in would want to hide that from us.

In ways, I’m a little glab that I can’t answer all my questions. I might not like the outcome, and truthfully I don’t think everything needs to be explained. Dreams were made for dreamers, and without dreams there wouldn’t be as much of the reality we know. The mystery of life is a driving force from generation to generation, and from nation to nation it thrives as the fuel source for the imagination. Robert Frost said it best; “Two rides diverged by a yellow wood, and I chose the one less travelled.” I chose the road less traveled and chose not question the meaning of life, but how I can spend my life meaningfully? Some mysteries just aren’t made for solving.