"The best way that a man could test his readiness to encounter the common variety of mankind would be to climb down a chimney into any house at random, and get on as well as possible with the people inside. And that is essentially what each one of us did on the day that he was born."-- G.K. Chesterton, Heretics
Few things are more shocking than the habits of those people with whom we share a last name. Who are these people and where did they come from? How could so many with so much in common be so different? How could so many with the same nose prefer such different smells? How could so many with the same teeth pick such different dinners to chew? Variety is forced upon us at home. We leave to escape diversity, not to find it. We seek uniformity. We prefer entitled egalitarianism to sovereign synthesis. We like where our one note is sung instead of the harmony of different voices.
"Of all these great limitations and frameworks which fashion and create the poetry and variety of life, the family is the most definite and important... When we step into a family, we step into a world that we have not made. In other words, when we step into the family we step into a fairy tale."-- G.K. Chesterton, Heretics
Life is more like a story than an equation. When there is math involved, it is always a story problem. The digits must add up and end a certain way, but life isn't like that. It could go any direction. It could be a tragedy or a comedy. It could end on a crescendo or a fade to black. The plot thickens in the kitchen. The pot boiling at home on mom's stove is magical. Poetry is in your own kitchen, not in the drive-thru. Anything might come out of your pantry, but a number six no pickles is always the same at the chain wherever you go.
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