I would like to see the results of a survey of young people in their 20’s, as to whether or not they would like to live a quotidian life. Quotidian – that’s a good word, a rather popular word amidst the literate crowd these days. It has two meanings that go hand in hand. On the one hand, it means things that happen on a regular basis. On the other, it means things that are commonplace, average, mediocre, not notable. So, people who try not to be commonplace, average and non-notable seem very fascinated with this word. They probably would have answered the survey with a resounding NO! I don’t want to live a quotidian life. To be honest, in my twenties, I would have answered the same way. But like most of the people who have gotten interested in this word, my life has been quite quotidian nonetheless.

But let’s take a break from being condemned to the quotidian, and take a quick romp through Google-land to see just how that interesting word is being used. Here is a list:

The Quotidian Theater

Quotidian Public Radio (an interesting parody of NPR and other public radio, which was just asking for something like this!)

Various quotidian-titled blogs, e.g a “journal”, a “quest”, and some “chronicles”

A book by Kathleen Norris, i.e. Quotidian Mysteries

Another book called Prince of the Quotidian (where the author talks about my homeland, northern NJ: “I’ve come to love the tidal marshes of Hackensack, the planes stacked over Newark, even the smell of cloves and chloroform that sweetens Elizabeth”)

Also, there’s The Shipping News, a novel by Annie Proulx that focuses on the quotidian

And then there’s something called “quotidian fever”, a type of malaria

Well, I myself have not contracted quotidian fever, thank goodness. But having now entered the second half of my sixth decade on earth, it has become an occasional source of angst to realize that my life has been condemned to the quotidian. Yes, I once had dreams of taking the political world by storm in the way that Barack Obama has. As with Mr. Obama, my motivation was good; I wanted to change the world (in a good sort of way). But all too soon, it became clear that politics was not my bag. After that revelation, I hoped to have an interesting and high-achieving career in some other field — and perhaps also a successful marriage and a happy family. Well, those things didn’t pan out either.

In my mid-forties, when it was becoming clear that the fruitful career and happy family weren’t gonna happen, I became interested in the writings of Thomas Merton and in the world of monks and monasteries. I learned that the monastic institution was based on an intentional “drowning” of men and women into the quotidian, in the prayerful service of God. Thomas Merton was the odd man out in that regard; he took vows to live a silent life as a forgotten man, and yet achieved fame through his writings about it. Notwithstanding that paradox, Merton and his monastic confreres convinced me that resignation to the quotidian in the name of prayer and contemplation was a noble thing, even if one did not formally join a monastic order. And so I resigned myself to live the rest of my life in a mostly silent fashion.

Have I had any regrets about this? You betcha! (As the lovely Sarah Palin would say). As previously noted, I have definitely mused about my life as a story of squandered possibilities and wasted potential. The ego is a powerful seductress, and hell hath no fury like a seductress scorned. This blog itself is a constant reminder to me of my ‘quotidian-ness’. Years ago it seemed to be picking up readership, but now it serves a (very) small contingent of friends for the most part. And that’s still a good thing. But to the general public out there on the web, it’s nothing special; there are thousands of middle-aged guys with blogs like mine, thousands of thinking men trying to have ‘meaningful lives’ in the shadow. I just stumbled across another one in preping this article, i.e. the “Winged Man”. He’s another fan of monasticism, albeit he’s a bit more true to the Roman Catholic world that both he and I were steeped in as children. I hope that Winged Man’s faith in the Catholic religion doesn’t crash, like mine did.

But at some point, the quotidian angst starts to pass, and wisdom hopefully kicks in. Hey, our little world can’t have a million Barack Obamas or Sarah Palins. If my life can be known to have any real meaning, any true significance, that knowing will have to be God’s knowing. The angst can only pass when God buys a ticket and enters the otherwise empty theater where my life story is being shown. Our world doesn’t have enough time, energy and attention to give every good woman and man the attention that they deserve; public recognition is rationed by luck of the draw. If my story as a well-intentioned thinking man has any audience, it will have to be God.

But at the same time, any thinking man has to harbor some doubt about God, and I do. Sure, I’m a sucker for the standard atheist rants about God not being there amidst all the wrecked lives and horrible events and painful moments in human lives and human history. But then again, it’s the doubt that makes life interesting. The vexing question of whether God is or is not is like a baseball or football game going down to the wire, a real nail-biter. Those are the best games, the ones that make you feel most alive; especially if you have something riding on the outcome. In the God game, my whole little quotidian life is riding on the outcome. And, as with the championship game going into triple overtime, it’s the uncertainty that washes all the uncertainty away about my own being — the knots in my stomach scream out loud and clear that I am.

So who knows; perhaps that’s God’s quotidian way of saying, “yea, me too”.

So for now, it’s back to the quotidian for me. That involves finding a good recipe for green tea cake, and working on my next blog regarding Sandra Tsing Loh’s self-indulgent article in the latest Atlantic Magazine about ending her marriage. Those who have been spared from condemnation to the quotidian will have to deal with stuff like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s possibly/probably crooked re-election in Iran. Bad moon rising on that one, too.