waxing falafelosical: beauty

I've had the opportunity to make lots of leaps and bounds in my quest to understand myself as of late, especially regarding my relationships with many people. This is the result of my involuntary isolation from meaningful face-to-face conversation and encounters with close friends in Montreal. There, I have friends I can call and meet. I find nothing more refreshing than catching up with a friend who I haven't seen for awhile and just sharing stories, laughing, reflecting. But this summer in Toronto (like last summer in France), has seen a lot of fleeting acquaintances, half-hearted promises to hang out "sometime" this or that weekend, and ultimately ended with me sitting at home or most likely a café with a book. I remember clearly sitting one day near a window at the Starbucks on Queen Street West, reading Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World," but I kept getting distracted by all the people passing by.

It had been awhile since I just sat at a window seat and watched people, so that's exactly what I did: I sat for perhaps 4 hours and watched, occasionally writing down observations and thoughts into my little blue notebook. I suppose the one thing that struck me the most from that day was all the beauty I saw that day. And when I say "beauty" I do not refer only to physical appearance. I saw beauty in almost everyone that passed by, in all shapes, ages, sizes and groups. I saw beauty in the scraggle of teenagers walking by, basking in the warm glow of summer and laughing infectiously amongst each other about something one can probably only laugh about as a teenager. I saw beauty in the old woman dressed in her simple summer dress and carefully coiffed hair, walking alone. I saw beauty in a young African-Canadian woman and her vibrant dress and graceful walk, and of course I saw beauty in the countless couples that walked by, holding hands and talking about this and that.

I used to struggle a lot with the concept of beauty on a personal level, in terms of what it meant for me and others. I think that I still struggle with it even now...although not to the extent that I did earlier on, in my adolescence. I looked up "beauty" on Wikipedia and found a surprisingly succinct, and insightful introduction to the concept of beauty:

Beauty is a characteristic of a person, place, object or idea that provides a perceptual experience of pleasure, meaning or satisfaction. Beauty is studied as part of aesthetics, sociology, social psychology and culture. As a cultural creation, beauty has been extremely commercialized.

An "ideal beauty" is a person who is admired, or possesses features widely attributed to beauty in a particular culture. A number of historical individuals have become icons of beauty - for example, women like Cleopatra VII, Helen of Troy, and Marilyn Monroe.

The subjective experience of "beauty" often involves the interpretation of some entity as being in balance and harmony with nature, which may lead to feelings of attraction and emotional well-being. "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder" is a common phrase that expresses this concept.^[1]

In its most profound sense, beauty may engender a salient experience of positive reflection about the meaning of one's own existence. An "object of beauty" is anything that reveals or resonates with personal meaning.

While I'm sure that in the realm of philosophy, there is much more to be said on the subject, I can gladly resign myself-- for the moment-- to accepting that I am very much a subjective beholder of beauty in this world. I think that objects of beauty live, breathe, and walk among us every day, embodied if not in individuals then in their presence with others, in their words, their actions, their creations. It's one of the reasons life is really worth living.

What do you think?