I Am a Deep Thinker

I had to take a little girl out that weekend. It was her bday, but her mom, a friend of mine, was in the hospital and her dad had to work. We went to a local zoo. A memorable experience for her, I hope, as it was for me.

It wasn't the activity with the little girl that actually preoccupied my mind, more than my own experience. The zoo has one of the biggest lions I've ever seen! Sure, he was caged, but I tell you, the bars offered small comfort when you stood within six feet of something that in any other situation, saw you as an easy lunch. Honestly, I had to shepherd the little girl pass him at a safe distance.

As the others scurried and wandered on to the monkey house or the tigers, I held back for a few minutes in the presence of this someone so powerful and noble and deadly. Perhaps it was my fear mingled with admiration. Perhaps it was simply that my heart broke for the big old cat.

This wonderful, terrible creature should have been out roaming the savanna, ruling his pride, striking fear into the heart of every wild beast, bringing down zebras and gazelles whenever the urged seized him. Instead, he's spending every hour of everyday and every night of every year alone in a cage, his food served to him through a little metal door. Perhaps, at night, after the city had gone to sleep, his roar would be heard, coming down from the hills. Perhaps it sounded not so much fierce but rather mournful.

He never looked us in the eye. I desperately wanted him to, wanted for his sake, the chance to stare us down. But he just laid there, weary with that deep weariness that comes from boredom, taking shallow breaths. After years of living in a cage, perhaps the lion no longer even believes it is a lion…

…..I wondered...for a man...how about a man? After years of being defined by society, religion, education, profession, family and relationships, would he no longer believe he is a man?

Those dreams, those visions, those goals
Internalizing others’ expectations as our own
Finding fulfillment in the life set out for us
Thinking we are living our own expectations

A particular path in school and in work
Marriage, children, living in a certain place
A wondrous personal development on one hand
Sports cars on the other and failed relationships

Our own expectations get peppered
In bits and pieces unto our lives
Tho we've done what was expected
We're surprised they've not yet begun

We’ve only got one shot at life
And yet we give it away
To be free to live the life we want
Is what is truly inspirational.

[b]Disclaimer: Photo from internet.[/b]