Why is it that, over time, we begin to believe that good things, beautiful things and miraculous things are scarce? That those really distinct moments in life are to be had infrequently and that our days really just consist of hard work with staggered pay-off?

I don’t believe we’re supposed to live like that. With low expectations for joy.

And I was reminded of this yesterday morning. I was playing my violin/singing with the worship band for my church. It was very early and our practice had been challenging, leaving me feeling somewhat unprepared for the 6 sets we had to play.

Just as the first set started, I noticed something fluttering around me (in and out of the beams from the bright lights). Turns out it was a big orange butterfly that had somehow entered the building (in cold Colorado morning weather). The butterfly landed right at my feet, relaxed his wings and stuck around for the entire first set. I move a lot when I play, so I was amazed that the butterfly didn’t fly away with two heeled boots threatening his life for 30 minutes.

My perspective shifted as a continued to play. Instead of focusing on the music and transitions, I was reminded that worship is much less about preparation than it is about the winsome calls of a really beautiful God who loves us.

I think it was the fact that something so simple and so misplaced, a lost butterfly that passed up everyone else in the auditorium for me, served as a reminder that no circumstances should rob us of our joy.

Jeff told me that I was a nerd yesterday. I guess I am. As much as I love the arts (and the idea that art will always carry with it mystery), I’ve become a technology/science addict. Jeff, though, was specifically referring to the fact that I was devouring the latest edition of WIRED Magazine as he was driving through rush hour traffic.

The cover story focused on Manga (Japanese cartoons), but that’s not the story that caught my eye. It was an interview with Rhodes Scholar Jonah Lehrer on Art for Science’s Sake. It bugs me a little that he spent so much time dissecting the works of some of our world’s greatest artists, but I was completely intrigued by his assertion that some of science’s most complex questions can be or have already been answered in the arts.

Excerpt from WIRED:

Jonah Lehrer wants scientists to bone up on the classics. A former neuroscience lab drone, the 26-year-old Rhodes scholar would devour pages of Marcel Proust’s Swann’s Way whenever he wasn’t spinning down DNA. In the process, he made a discovery: Artists have something to teach researchers. In his new book, Proust Was a Neuroscientist, Lehrer argues that many artists have foretold the scientific future — Proust revealed the inaccuracy of memory, chef Auguste Escoffier anticipated the fifth taste sensation we now call umami, and post-impressionist Paul Cézanne proved that the brain fills in what a painting doesn’t show.

I disagree with some of Lehrer’s ultimate conclusions (click here for the entire interview), like the idea that “there is no you in the brain, no neuron that is you or that cares about you. You’re just a massively distributed parallel network.” I believe that we’re unique, created and impossibly mysterious beings. However, I love Lehrer’s prompt that true science can never ignore the creative, right side of the brain.

I call her water. My kid-like interpretation of aquatic life. It’s what I would love to see most if I jumped off of a bridge and landed in a lagoon where I could breathe with gill-like precision below the surface. It depicts the creatures I’d love to encounter and what I envision would happen if a 4th of July firecracker was ignited below the colorful depths. And if all my visions were edible, I’d expect this one to taste a little like coconut towards the bottom, a hint of lime/salt off to the left and a mixture of tangerine and raspberry off to the right.

But that’s just me. If you don’t see water or don’t taste tangerine, then I’d be so curious to know what you do see. I guess that’s why art doesn’t have an audible voice. It kind of sits quietly and lets you make your own observations, form your own impressions.

Now, if you’ll excuse me for a minute…

Dear water,

I loved painting you. At first, you were shy and kind of mean. And to be honest, pretty ugly. But, I believed in you from the start and you really came through. Now, just being around you makes me happy. Oh… and I’m sorry for leaving you in a cold, white-walled room for two months before finishing you. I would have gone crazy too!

Love,

Leora