The impossibility of cliché

There is no room within us to be stale. “Stale” is such an excellent descriptor. It reminds me of those croissant-looking pastries that you might see in any local bakery. From the outside, they look incredible—dusted with sugar and spice and everything nice (a.k.a. cinnamon). The second you bite into them, however, you experience a mouthful of air—and have never been so disappointed. First of all, you’re sad that you just paid money for shell of a pastry…and secondly, you’re hungry!

May we forget that the word “cliché” ever existed. Things only become cliché when they become stale, and we all know how much fun that is. My really old friend G.K. Chesterton wrote the following in his chapter “The Ethics of Elfland,” from Orthodoxy (read it slowly and soak it in because it is glorious): “A child kicks his legs rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical ENCORE.”

What a perspective! Read it again, it’s so good! As I mentioned before, I read a book that my friend Pat wrote. Pat’s obsessed with sunflowers, so naturally, one whole chapter in the book is essentially devoted to them. Well one day, I woke up and couldn’t help but think of _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ (you guessed it, SUNFLOWERS!). It really is an exciting flower to look at. It stares at the sun all day—all bent and contorted—just to bask in the glory that is its life-giving purpose for existence. It doesn’t just peek its head out the window in the morning and then go back to sleep. It is irrevocably and irreversibly attracted to the thing that makes it green and yellow and alive. Indeed…an eternal appetite for infancy.

-griff

p.s. G.K. was known for being a very, very large man. He must have never ordered the hollow pastries. I was going to say he was “obese,” but it’s not really very funny to make fun of obese people.