Reality

Wherefore 'reality'? It is a damned good question much debated by philosopher and doubtful lay-person alike: the unconcerned themselves content to consider it a simple non sequitur flying in the face of an apparent empirical truth. But therein lies the rub. We all 'experience' reality, and much of it is shared with others, so affirming our personal and collective histories: no argument there. But the fundamental [philosophical] question remains: wherein does reality subsist? As our perception of reality is simply that: perception, filtered via our senses to the centre of our consciousness, our brain; we have no other reference by which to frame our 'reality': it is unique and personal to us alone. Save of course, the shared knowledge that forms the commonality of experience that results in our [intertwined] histories. Culture and art form the basis of our innate need for community. To share those indivisible personal realities amongst ourselves as if in cultural affirmation of that we are constantly unsure of: reality. Look to poetry and find your common humanity in words that share at least an evanescent thread of your own reality. A poem by Seamus Heaney captures exactly a childhood memory of mine that was mine own before the poem itself was published; that of the village pump in summer: in my case early 1960s Fromes Hill in Herefordshire [blog posts passim]. To quote Heaney:

'There was a sunlit absence.
The helmeted pump in the yard
heated its iron,

water honeyed

in the slung bucket

and the sun stood

like a griddle cooling

against the wall

of each long afternoon.'

This is pretty much my perception of those childhood days in the country, sixty-plus years ago, and serves to anchor my reality, as personal and subjective as it ultimately is, within the shared communities of human experience and memory. Common ground.