Having a young daughter feels like an everyday miracle, especially right now, in this world as it is. The root of the word ‘miracle’ comes from mirari "to wonder at, marvel, be astonished.” I am astonished — astonished that she exists and that if an earlier pregnancy had succeeded, she would not; astonished that the universe has, from the beginning of time, contained all the atoms that would be needed to form her. They have shapeshifted, been built up and broken down again and again and again. They have now, for an instant, come together to hold her being, her spirit, her life. I am astonished too that she was born here, safe, in the UK, with a house, and all the food, warmth, and love she will need, when so many are born into hunger and despair.
She is not yet 11 months old, and there have already been so many tiny moments of transition in her life. Moments of something not being, and then being. One day she did not point at things, the next she did. One day she could not eat solid food, the next she wolfed it down.
In thinking about these moments, my mind drifted to the work of French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson. In his social photography, and the ‘street photography’ genre he pioneered, he came to recognise something that he termed the ‘decisive moment’. This moment, he believed, was the exact instance of a unique event being recognised and captured on film — a precise alignment of motion and form, which would never happen again. In the preface to his photobook The Decisive Moment, he says:
“To me, photography is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event as well as of a precise organization of forms which give that event its proper expression.”
If I understand it right, Cartier-Bresson’s decisive moment is a recognition of an event and the alignment of things that have made that event, and in that instant, capturing it on camera.
Perhaps it extends beyond photography too though. I think there are decisive moments in which we might recognise the precise and often unlikely moments, forms, meanings that organise and cohere to create wonder, astonishment, and unique expressions of life — and then not photographing it but pausing, looking, being aware, remembering, making a note, letting it imprint on our being somehow. These moments are fascinating to me, and lately, they have come into even sharper focus — perhaps my daughter has amplified this tendency, or perhaps incomprehensible global events have removed another layer of gauze from my eyes.
I thought a little about some ‘decisive moments’ of existence that I’ve recognised and captured in my awareness, in my soul. These moments of transition can be a privilege, a burden, a revelation, sometimes an impossibility to witness. They are moments of precise alignment of motion and form, as Cartier-Bresson described, but also sometimes alignment of history, of wonder, of improbability, of despair, of beauty, of so many other distilled depths of existence. Here are just a few:
From nothingness to everythingness - in the moment of The Big Bang, everything that would ever exist got called, forcefully, into that existence. Time, at least as we perceive it, began then too, and with it, all the moments that we will ever inhabit.
From group of cells to beating heart - my daughter started out as one cell, then a blob of cells, then those cells differentiated, some became heart cells and in a moment, when some signal was given, those cells went from not beating to beating. That first beat - was it in time to some unheard beat of the universe? Are we all beating to that same rhythm?
From alive to not alive - I used to do some part time auxiliary nursing to fund my studies. Once, I went to check on a patient before a coffee break. She was alive, she smiled, she held my hand. 20 minutes later, I passed by her room and paused, she was still, her arms neatly folded over her chest. I checked, she had died. 20 minutes, and in that, a moment of transition. Perhaps she chose that moment deliberately. I remember feeling that I should have known, that I should have sat with her. I think too of another kind of transition from alive to not alive — the one that can happen when we stop seeing the world and each other, when we close down to awe and possibility, when we think that the pursuit of war and more resources than we will ever need is worth spending our aliveness on. And in reverse, I think that if we are attentive enough, if we’re not pulled under by the weight of life, we might get given the chance to move from sleepwalking our way through the world to having some access to another way of being, another plane; we suddenly feel the unlikeliness of this hospitable world existing at all, and us in it, and the ordinary becomes extraordinary, and existence becomes living.
From Winter to Spring - it has happened every year since the world formed I suppose, in one manifestation or another, but it always takes me by surprise. I get resigned to the rain and grey pressing down from above, and the wind and gloom beating in from the side, and the mud glooping up from below. And then one day — it seems like just one moment — I notice buds break into leaf and bloom, and the air becomes tentatively and then clearly loud with birdsong, and the sun shines more convincingly, and suddenly, connection and life feel possible again.
From separateness to knowing - this is necessarily a more gradual shift, but I have found that the journey from someone being ‘other’ to ‘neighbour’ (literal or metaphorical) is often accelerated through listening, through noticing. What might they be carrying? What might those heavy eyes and slumped posture signify? What is the source of their joy? What if we chose to ask them about their day, rather than tick something off our own to-do list? Sometimes, if we are open to it, I think there can be an almost pinpointable moment of transition from distance to intimacy. I can often trace back the moments where I have felt close to someone, where a wall comes down, to being real and curious and vulnerable. Perhaps to sharing in pain or joy or blessing. It comes with allowing myself to be known, as well as to know — I find this difficult. But I have realised it is life-giving, too.
So many of these and countless other moments are easy to overlook, perhaps because they surround us everyday. And the moments that are not everyday, like the Big Bang, has its own daily-felt ripples — its radiation echoing as white noise on the radio; its created matter forming and holding the life around us.
The decisive moments of our days, our lives, are the moments that imprint on our being if we are awake to them; they can shape us and the way we move through the world. My daughter is helping me remember this, helping me to pause and look at them and be astonished at this one ever so unlikely life.
What are the moments that have impacted you? Moments of transition, or wonder, or revelation — moments of pause or noticing, when you perhaps feel a smidge more awake, more alive, whether that aliveness has come through searing pain or technicolour joy? I’d love to hear about such a moment, and through it, to see the shape of our shared existence a little more clearly.
Thank you for being here.
Love,
Elizabeth
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One May Bank Holiday with the family in South West Cornwall - we climbed up St Michael’s Mount when I was feeling whole body terrible; getting back down on the beach afterwards was the most Cathartic transition I ever experienced.
Lovely lovely Cornwall - Daphne du Maurier would be pleased to know that the spirits of the places she knew and understood so well haven’t vanished.
Elizabeth, your post plucked a note in me. I have known many such moments through my life. The one that always comes in strong and vibrant is when I was a teenager, walking home from school. Our house stood aside a road that provided a view of the Ochil Hills as it sloped down toward the corner houses. It was a quiet road that allowed me the space to daunder down the middle of the tarmac, pondering my inner fears and sorrows.
I was almost home when I glanced toward the hillside and was stopped in my tracks by a feeling so strong, I couldn't breathe. It was a physical and, i now realise, spiritual connection. My heart was in pain with deep, deep peace.
Oh. I could not move, could not think, only feel the physicality of Peace.
I have held that gem of a moment for over forty years and only today have I found a possible answer to the question of the moment.
Thank you for sharing xx