Imbuing Life with Meaning

As a Christian, specifically a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I often feel constrained to see how the pieces of my life should fit together coherently. Likewise I strain to see how world history can be condensed into a single epic narrative, and I search, many times fruitlessly, to understand our current political situation as a logical step or rational progression in a history arcing toward equal justice. However, lately, this tidy vision through which I tend to see my life, and the events swirling around it, has become more clouded, and the inherent meaninglessness of certain tasks, or irrationality of certain phenomenons has led me to question this more optimistic narrative.

The immediate cause of this paradigm shift has been my new job as a paralegal at a debt collection law practice. The coldly amoral yet supposedly perfect economic market justice so extolled by neoliberals and libertarians loses its shiny quality when applied to the cases of the impoverished saddled with debt at steep interest rates that doom them to wage garnishments, abysmal credit scores, and a life spent paying off the debt at rates barely even with the per diem interest increase. The fact that the debt collection industry has become an industry worth billions of dollars is a sad reflection on the economic condition of our working class. In my job I find myself in almost perpetual internal conflict. The utter disregard our law firm has for the day-to-day condition of the debtors we are obliged to collect from is nothing short of depressing.

For context, the situation of one debtor I will call Anna. She called me one morning, intermittently crying about her $20,000 car debt, her abusive ex-husband, her now deceased fiancee who committed suicide months ago, and the emotional trauma she still deals with from her tumultuous life. She is only the co-signer to the car loan she now owes on–and alleges her ex-husband virtually forced her to do so–but is nonetheless being garnished at rates that forced her to call us. It was a call she made out of desperation, not believing that there was anything to be done. Fortunately, we were able to work out a partial release of the garnishment, such that she would only be required to pay $100 each pay-check (a $200 reduction). However, around a week later we came to find out that the release of garnishment was late in being applied and we received a $350 garnishment for her. I talked to the attorney in charge about what could be done (could we send back the money? etc.). He replied that our firm “does its best” to work with debtors and that our policy is to never give back money once given. In my opinion, a cynical approach, although, no doubt, a monetarily profitable one. Entering that garnishment from Anna into our financial accounting system was painful, but a sort of dull pain borne out of a sense of moral exhaustion.

In “high church” tradition, now the lesson. What sort of coherent and uplifting moral can be drawn from these experiences? What can be learned from witnessing such devastation? Especially as a witness actively involved in abetting such devastation? My mind was never before drawn to the existentialists, but these past few weeks have rosied their philosophical worldview. Yet, I still hesitate to reject any sense of meaning, any order in this world of ours. My faith gives me a different perspective, and perhaps one that still holds out understanding for those bleak moments in which life, beyond simply appearing unfair, starts to shed all its meaning. Through my hope in Jesus Christ, I have already acknowledged a central character in a universal narrative that lends meaning to life. Through my understanding of his sacrifice, I acknowledge an ends, a goal that gives eternal significance to our time here. Nonetheless, I believe that this grand purpose to life, should not be conflated to mean that every single moment on earth has a similar grand design. Maybe it does, but I tend to doubt that every single moment has an inherent moral valence, that each second is imbued with a grander purpose. I am moving in the direction of believing that some moments may be purposeless, inchoate, or senseless. In these times, I believe, it is up to us to imbue them with a grander meaning. To wrestle with what it means to exist in a complex world. Cognizant of a grander (macro) design, but mindful of the fact that we may have a much more integral role in imbuing the seemingly trivial and mundane (micro) events around us with purpose and meaning than we tend to suppose.

Highway Meditations

Highway thoughts are among life’s most precious gifts. They are free and unencumbered by the worn and weary ruts our mind travels through our daily chores, accompanying the stale rhythm of our nearly automated existence. But on the road, on the open road, aiming for some open and deserted landscape, our thoughts seem to reach farther–paralleling the expansive landscape rushing around us.

Yesterday I had another episode of these “highway thoughts,” these vagabond notions that seem just out of reach most days, but in reality seem to wait just around the first bend in the first two-lane we reach. My fiancee, my cousin, and I decided to set out for the San Rafael Swell and a certain slot canyon found within. The very first part of the journey, as we made our way south to Spanish Fork Canyon, stood in perfect contrast to everything we hope to see the rest of the way.

The Wasatch Front is teeming with gracious people who seem determined, doggedly so, to pursue a life quite beneath them. A two-story house in a quiet suburban neighborhood, a nice quarter-acre of manicured grass, a job at a “start-up.” The consumption they deem necessary for their lifestyle is a pyrrhic victory of comfort, not worth the few dollars they have purchased it for. The I-15 through Spanish Fork is the antithesis of what every amenable highway should be, with billboards that make a mockery of intelligent thought and visual decorum, constructed with the apparent intention to widen it as many lanes across as it is miles long. The concrete, steel, plastic, and asphalt surround our car and stand almost in sacrilege, sacrificing the solitude and independence of the journey for the cheap comfort of convenience, speed, and efficiency.

We reach the mouth of Spanish Fork Canyon and our forward motion finally becomes worthy to be called a genuine journey. For any journey is much more than the mechanical movement from point A to B. Any forward motion toward any one place is only a veritable journey if the miles between the starting and ending points are not viewed as an unnecessary burden, but rather as the essential ingredient to the consummate experience.

Although briefly detained for a speeding citation by a friendly police officer outside of the quiet mining town of Helper, we make good time across the beautifully expansive and empty vistas we encounter. Barely listening to the music playing on the radio, but imitating it’s transcending melody and lyrics with my thoughts, we glide down US Route 191 with the Book Cliffs to our west and a hopeful ribbon of highway out in front. This part of the journey is almost uniformly brown, yet, paradoxically, this inhospitability imbues the area with an austere beauty. The area is beautiful in its barrenness, its expansiveness, its otherworldly allure. Conversations on these road trips come easily, and end easily. The views out the window relax and calm, and invite me to stare, many times silently, out in quiet wonder.

As we turn onto the I-70, before turning again onto a smaller road that leads us toward the San Rafael Swell, the scenery becomes even more otherworldy and mystical. The folds in the rocks become even more pronounced, and I try to remember the bits and pieces of geological knowledge that remains from one semester of introductory geology. As we get closer and closer to the Swell, its “reef” looms up like a rocky wave before a flat and unremarkable beach. The spires of Temple Mountain loom up as we make our way to the intended canyon.

Even before our feet touch the trail to make our way to the hike, the catharsis of the weekend journey has already mostly come. To witness the solitude of the open road, the majestic form of a towering cumulonimbus, the fantastically strange contortions of rock, even from afar (even from a car), have given me a quiet peace. My life, if only for a short while, comes into perspective.