My grandfather used to tell me (When he had still had the patience and memory for meaningful discussion and debate) that a man could spend his whole life studying a square foot of dirt from the garden and die having never discovered everything about it. I understand the idea that perspective is the most important thing in regards to discovery (Personal discovery) but I find myself battling a negative emotion when I 'discover.' For example, last summer I went on a bit of a road trip with my grandfather, and there was a moment when we were deep in the woods in the Upper Peninsula, staring at a waterfall created where part of an old industrial dam had broken under the root of a tree that had grown in an old post hole. We were a few miles from the nearest road and I thought from most people. We spent maybe twenty minutes around the area, taking pictures and just watching the water when a tour group of senior citizens with a polo-clad state park guide came through, doing just as we had done, taking pictures and oohing and ahhing. I felt instantly put off of the whole experience, because I hadn't 'discovered' anything. I was just another tourist, another voyeur, in the day to day of that place. This is an extension of the feeling of my original post, and since that day I don't take quite the same pleasure in being out in the woods, around ruins, old structures as I once did, because in the back of my mind I still feel like a voyeur, like a tourist.There is just far too much stuff we don't know or haven't bothered to think about - to say that there isn't anything left to discover is to underestimate the immensity of details our world has.
That's because it's a square foot of dirt, man. Boring as hell, unless you're really into geology. There's a middle ground between looking at a square foot of dirt and at large uncharted areas. And it's where the good stuff's at. I know how you feel: it's nice to know something probably nobody knows. It's the same with music for me. I've often had music I discovered myself be used in a large ad campaign and at first I feel disappointed (it's the hipster hiding inside me), but in the end I know that way more people will then appreciate it. Maybe that's not happening with the tourists as they just go ooh and aah and snap a picture to forget. But is that really something that should make you feel worse about your experience?My grandfather used to tell me that a man could spend his whole life studying a square foot of dirt from the garden and die having never discovered everything about it.
I felt instantly put off of the whole experience, because I hadn't 'discovered' anything.