Trying to define it

I haven't been on this for a while. The nights are drawing in and life is getting frantic, urgent, hectic. There are Christmas presents to buy, cards to send. Our tree is finally up and decorated and something about the smell of the pine and sweet, amber glow of the lights makes me smile and flutter inside like I'm six years old again.

Winter has a hollowed, haunting beauty. There is something beautiful about survival. Just to get through the days tells us of hope and strength. Walking through my local park today, there were seagulls flocking for bread; some ducks; a swan; a squirrel furrowing for nuts. Wizened sticks trembling out from the trees, defiantly brandishing their berries. Life whittles on.

I think I will come back to Christmas soon because that is a topic of beauty that deserves more space.

I also don't seem to have gathered together any readers yet! At least, any that seem to be leaving comments. I could try to 'advertise' this blog more, possibly get a Twitter account and inform all my friends when it's updated. But, in 'typical me' fashion, I find that there is something to be cherished in its secrecy, in its covertness. And, also - isn't it more 'special' if people just somehow stumble on to this blog, rather than I drag them to its rather sentimental content, kicking and screaming? But perhaps I'm in denials. There is so much to read in this Internet world: everybody has to 'sell' their wares, in order to stand out from the crowd.

Another thing that's puzzling me is that I'm not even sure yet why I feel the need for readers. It possibly speaks of something psychological that I'd rather ignore...

In the meantime, let's jolt back to the main point of this blog: beauty.

I thought a dictionary definition might help matters.

1. the quality present in a thing or person that gives intense pleasure or deep satisfaction to the mind, whether arising from sensory manifestations (as shape, color, sound, etc.), a meaningful design or pattern, or something else (as a personality in which high spiritual qualities are manifest).
2. a beautiful person, esp. a woman.
3. a beautiful thing, as a work of art or a building.
4. Often, beauties. something that is beautiful in nature or in some natural or artificial environment.
5. an individually pleasing or beautiful quality; grace; charm: a vivid blue area that is the one real beauty of the painting.
6. Informal. a particular advantage: One of the beauties of this medicine is the freedom from aftereffects.
7. (usually used ironically) something extraordinary: My sunburn was a real beauty.
8. something excellent of its kind: My old car was a beauty.

Origin:
1225–75; ME be(a)ute < OF beaute; r. ME bealte < OF beltet < VL *bellitāt- (s. of *bellitās), equiv. to L bell(us) fine + -itāt- -ity

I'd like to go back to point 1:

1. the quality present in a thing or person that gives intense pleasure or deep satisfaction to the mind, whether arising from sensory manifestations (as shape, color, sound, etc.), a meaningful design or pattern, or something else (as a personality in which high spiritual qualities are manifest).

To me, this evades a fundamental question. Why do we need to derive pleasure from our senses at all? We need food to live, but need it taste so good? Couldn't we have a driving life force in us that compels us to eat, regardless of this sense? Does grass to a cow taste like chocolate to a woman?

And what is taste, anyway - as we are fixing on taste in this analogy?

When we eat something good, why is it good to us? Oh, I know there's the idea that the taste buds have evolved to help us to distinguish between what is poisonous and not. But isn't there more to this? Otherwise, wouldn't we all be craving salads, and wouldn't too many carbs and a double serving of clotted cream taste positively repulsive?

And then there is 'sight'. Why do we not just 'see'? We have to see to navigate, to perceive, to discern. But why does having sight necessarily lead us to finding a painting beautiful, or a vista of a sailing boat, with the sun setting down its beams across the ocean? Why does our sight give value and not just function?

I am afraid I have no answers. And I'm not a philosopher and I am not terribly well versed in philosophy. No doubt that there are academics who have spent thousands of words on topics like this one, and probably reached highly interesting conclusions. (If you are reading this and you have examples, do enlighten me.) Please be aware that these are just the musings of an amateur. Of someone who just likes to think.

I can't help but also keep returning to the final last bit of that dictionary definition.

The "something else".

Oh my. Surely that's also worth a whole other blog entry at some later point in time...