Who remembers the scene in Big Bang Theory where Sheldon breaks cutlery and breaks out of a rut? This one.
Well, it was a bit like that. I tottered down the stairs with a pile of books, an iPad, a phone, and a cup perched on top. How is there always a cargo load being carried up and down the stairs in a home like ours?
The Bird’s Eye
There is something marvelous about taking in a room as you gingerly step down the stairs. The bird’s eye view. The critical eye – is that a cobweb in the corner? Oh – that’s a bird’s nest on the porch – how marvelous! This time, I noticed my elephant ear plant sagging somewhat and went to investigate with the fragile pile in my hands. It was only meant to be a second, and before I knew it, the glass cup perched on top my tottering pile fell.
I know people talk of moments slowing down. Moments when the feeling of being in a bubble is broken, and all that. What I am trying to say is that the moment the glass cup shattered was one such. It slipped and I saw it crash. Not exactly slow motion but it felt like one. I couldn’t catch it on the way down could I? I’ve broken my fair share of things in the past. No one can claim to be that perfect as to not have broken a few things, and Yours Truly is certainly a flibberty-gibbet with enough enthusiasm and speed issues to have broken a few things – bones included.
So, it really shouldn’t be a blog-worthy event. Except it was fascinating to watch.
Kintsugi
What is that they say? Kintsugi – the beauty of broken things and so on. Trust the Japanese to have a philosophical term for something like this.
Kintsugi is the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery by joining pieces back together and filling cracks with lacquer dusted with powdered gold, silver, or platinum, thereby highlighting the flaws in the mended object.
The gold strain that can brings broken things back together? Well, there was no possibility of kintsugi in this case. The largest fragment was the size of a quinoa grain. I have never seen a single coffee cup made of glass crash and shatter so evenly. I wish I had had the presence of mind to take a picture. As it was, I was too pulled into the moment for philosophical musings. I bellowed to the household to ‘not come near’ for I could see the shards would have splattered to faraway spots. Then for a blissful moment thereafter, I just stood there frozen, barefooted, and rooted in the present.
One does not drift near shards of glass. One plots the next move. One analyses. One considers and then one cleans. All in the present. All earthy, practical tasks. Nothing spectacular, and yet intensely so. Every shard was beautiful. Each catching a little ray of sunshine streaming in through the windows. Each beautiful shimmer showing us how it is the little moments that make up a whole and so on.
Superstitious Much?
As I finished cleaning up, the superstitious part of me piped up: Should this be a sign? I mean it is a broken cup – shouldn’t it mean something? I felt all the doomsayers of my youth clamoring to get their voices heard. Something is about to happen. Duh. Maybe. But, said another part of my brain – the broken glass is so beautiful! Not being able to recreate the exact same thing you just lost has a beauty in transition, no?
Sometimes, not being able to kintsugi your way out means you have to learn to let go, isn’t it?
Tempered Glass
Afterwards, I checked the glass – it was tempered glass. Apparently designed to break exactly like it did. Gemini goes on to explain things like the compression layer, tension core etc, which by itself is a fascinating topic. The glass has fallen once or twice from a similar height on a similar surface before, but nothing had happened. However, yesterday, it seemed to have hit the ground at a particular angle to release the stored tension. Like a tightly coiled spring.
Science is fascinating, but so are the fractals of thought around something as mundane as breaking glass isn’t it? No wonder Sheldon had a moment of epiphany – I can’t lay claim to an epiphany, but I can claim a stay-in-the-present present.
I was finishing the cleaning up when a friend knocked on the door with some chocolate donuts. Say what you will about that – it felt like a good omen, not a bad one 🙂
Nourish-n-Cherish 