Room For Nothing

                                                                                            by my crappy phone camera

I was tidying my bookshelf. I rearranged them by their genres; classics, thrillers, horror, children's books, biographies. I methodically removed all the books and wiped out all the dust on the surfaces. I then replaced them in a better, tidier order.  In the end, there was one whole unfilled compartment. I had more space! I looked at it and thought what I should put there. I was at once excited by the prospect that I could get more books to fill this space. But this excitement subsided as quickly as it came, giving way to a pang of guilt. I have so many books that have not been read. For me to fill this space with even more books would be excessive. The reason I was tidying the bookshelf in the first place was because I did not have enough space!

Now there is an empty space on my shelf. The spaces to its left and right are filled with books, this space in the middle lay barren. I stared at it and felt uneasy. How did I end up with the empty space smack in the middle, not the compartment to the left or the right? The empty space seemed wrong. A compartment should serve a function. An empty compartment on the shelf seemed unclean, blasphemous even. Space is provided to me and I put nothing there? The emptiness just did not make any sense. Other compartments being filled to the brim with books. Why should this compartment be empty? What made you so special? What made you different from the rest? Did you not know that you serve a purpose? To hold things, to keep things in order. This compartment had the tenacity to be empty? If I have an empty space would that mean my life is empty, that I am living a hollow existence? What the hell am I thinking? This is not right, not right at all! The longer I stared at the space, the stranger and more uncomfortable I felt. The roaring voices continued to pound at my mind.

Why? Why? Why...Why Not?

Then all at once there was silence. I stared at the empty compartment. The gaping hole stood out amongst the other compartments filled with books. The empty space that is not filled, does it yearn to be filled? No, it yearns NOT to be filled.  As I continued staring transfixed, calm came over me. Again I asked myself, why is this space empty? Why do I not use it?

But it IS being used, for emptiness. No, not emptiness. For nothing. It is my personal room for nothing. Things will always fill spaces. It is altogether far more difficult to keep spaces empty than it is to fill them. It is totally my choice for it to be filled or not. This nothing space is escape from the encroaching stress and incessant noise of life. It is space for possibilities. It can be anything I wish it to be. It is space for new things and experiences. The room for nothing is my liberation, my freedom. I had room for nothing, so I need to make room for nothing.

...Snowman...