What Now?
A call to connect, a call to imagine, a call to act
I wonder who the first person ever was to think or speak the words, what now?
What language did they use? What conditions were present? Who else was there?
Did they ask this question – so simple, so profound – in fear? Or awe? Or frustration?
Did they believe the world was ending, or did this utterance coincide with the beginning of everything yet to come?
Did they look to the sky or the earth or another person?
Have there ever been humans who didn’t want to know what would come next, or who didn’t wonder how they would survive, what would sustain them?
I imagine the storytelling that started as soon as the first what now left their lips to mingle with the rest of existence.
How do imagining and action dance into the future?
Is everything a matter of free will, or are certain things inevitable – beshert?
I am feeling philosophical tonight, hearkening back in time, so far back it is inconceivable yet also tethers me to some ancient human story that stretches behind me like the train of a bridal gown.
This is sometimes what happens in the quiet, when I step back from all of the what nows of this moment and consider the timelessness of the question itself.
Then again, asking what now in my safe, quiet home, on my safe, quiet street, in my safe, quiet town is one thing – and entirely another for someone else somewhere else.
Isn’t this always true? How do we hold it all?
The only answer I can come up with is: We don’t. We can’t.
What now can be a lonely, desperate question.
What now can be a wildly hopeful question, buoyant with possibility.
What now can be a cry for connection, a way of saying, I need you, join me, let’s figure this out together.
What now can be a reckoning, a confrontation, a parting, or a reconciliation. Endings and beginnings are kissing cousins.
What now?
It is up to me, it is up to you, it is up to us. It is a call to imagine and to act.
Let’s choose well.
Join me on WEDNESDAY, September 25 at NOON EST for Writing Into the Days of Awe. This 90-minute workshop is a chance to step into the quiet, to listen, and to let the page hold it all as we move towards Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
All welcome – no special Jewish knowledge or writing background required. No one will be turned away for financial reasons; please reach out for a sliding scale.