Perception of life

The other day I was thinking on how your situation changes your perception of life. If you are extremely rich, for example, you will surround yourself of a similar environment. You'll most likely never know how different can the world get and never really appreciate the small things in your life. On the other hand, there are people who remain ignorant of the rest of the world because they are 'poor'. These are people that have enough money to maintain themselves but would never dream of having a car, of having computers, or even of traveling away from their neighborhood.

Impresively enough, there are people that live in both of these ways, here in Bogota. For the first example, I'd say, mostly little rich kids. Those that arent old enough to experience a different reality and thus take for granted everything that surrounds them. As for the second example, there are all those 'barrios' in between el "Colegio San Carlos" and "San Andresito". (Just to mention a few.)

Everyone experiences alternate realities that form our whole consciousness. Or in another words, 'the objective reality'. Or do we? Cathedral, one of Carver's finest stories is a story based on the interaction between a blind person, and the main character. A blind person wont experience the same reality that we do, and the drawing of the cathedral on the story reinforces this idea.

Someone who's born blind doesn't get to see how ANYTHING looks like. As opposed to you closing your eyes and picturing something that you cant see. Because we already have an image or a set of images that create a picture in our brains. Well, if you've never seen something then you have absolutely no pictures in your mind at all times.

How strange would that be. To be able to touch, feel, smell, and even taste, but without any images of whatever it is you are 'connecting' with. Now that is a different reality. YOu dont miss not being able to watch, since you cant. But you are left 'alone', in a world which mainly revolves around visibility. You feel safe by watching. You fell that you are in control, when you can see things but when you cant, you are left without the ability to be free. To do whatever you want. (Unfortunately we cannot do whatever we want, in spite of society, but I'm guessing that you are following what my point.)

My question is then, how did the blind man experience the cathedral? The answer to that goes way beyond my level of understanding. I only know that it must be beautiful. Mystical, and fascinating. Confusing and crazy. But in the end, different.

We must firstly appreciate what we have. More than economically,we have to appreciate our loved ones, our eyes, our senses and basically, our lives. We should accept our reality and enjoy it. We have to value every single moment of our lives because after all, each moment is exclusive to ourselves and will never happen again. And besides that, do occasional close readings onto anything, because you'll never know how much stuff you can make up out of them.