I have always loved a window, especially an open one.
Interpretation
The quote expresses a fondness for open windows, symbolizing openness to the world and nature.
Wendell Berry's quote reflects an appreciation for the beauty and freshness that comes with an open window. It signifies a desire for connection with the outside world and suggests that an open window can bring in not just air and light, but also a sense of possibility and inspiration. This love for open windows often translates to a broader love for nature and the comforts it brings, as well as an invitation to embrace the life that exists beyond our immediate surroundings.
In practice
This quote can be used during a nature retreat to emphasize the importance of openness to natural experiences.
We weren't allowing our hopes to become expectations. Expectations are tempting, pleasant, maybe necessary. They are scary too, once you have had some experience. They are not necessarily and not always a bucket of smoke, but they can be and are even likely to be.
The uplands of my home country in north central Kentucky are sloping and easily eroded, dependent for safekeeping upon year-round cover of perennial plants.
A corporation, essentially, is a pile of money to which a number of persons have sold their moral allegiance.
WE ARE DESTROYING OUR COUNTRY - I mean our country itself, our land. This is a terrible thing to know, but it is not a reason for despair unless we decide to continue the destruction. If we decide to continue the destruction, that will not be because we have no other choice. This destruction is not necessary. It is not inevitable, except that by our submissiveness we make it so.
Much of our waste problem is to be accounted for by the intentional flimsiness and unrepairability of the labor-savers and gadgets that we have become addicted to.
We had entered an era of limitlessness, or the illusion thereof, and this in itself is a sort of wonder. My grandfather lived a life of limits, both suffered and strictly observed, in a world of limits. I learned much of that world from him and others, and then I changed; I entered the world of labor-saving machines and of limitless cheap fossil fuel. It would take me years of reading, thought, and experience to learn again that in this world limits are not only inescapable but indispensable.
What beauty. I saw clouds and their light shadows on the distant dear earth.... The water looked like darkish, slightly gleaming spots.... When I watched the horizon, I saw the abrupt, contrasting transition from the earth's light-colored surface to the absolutely black sky. I enjoyed the rich color spectrum of the earth. It is surrounded by a light blue aureole that gradually darkens, becoming turquiose, dark blue, violet, and finally coal black.
Of all wonders, this is among the greatest, that some fresh waters close by the sea spring forth as out of pipes: for the nature of the waters also ceaseth not from miraculous properties.
And as he spoke of understanding, I looked up and saw the rainbow leap with flames of many colors over me.
It is evident that many wars are fought over resources which are now becoming increasingly scarce. If we conserved our resources better, fighting over them would not occur ... protecting the global environment is directly related to securing peace. Those of us who understand the complex concept of the environment have the burden to act. We must not tire, we must not give up, we must persist.
What we are doing is, rather than living on the interest of our basic biological capital, we're using up our capital, so we're dipping into our capital. We're using up what should be our children's and grandchildren's legacy.
The sea is only the embodiment of a supernatural and wonderful existence. It is nothing but love and emotion; it is the 'Living Infinite.
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