The otherplace desire

Something strange occurred to me when I was reading a C.S. Lewis tribute blog here. I realized that a feeling I had as a child (and sometimes feel again) was a still-unfulfilled desire of sorts, a sort of longing for a place I couldn't describe. Such a feeling was stirred when reading the Narnia books, certainly, but also when playing Zelda on the Nintendo, or playing outside with my imagination on a windy day, or any number of other things a serious-minded person might consider frivolous. When I was younger, I assumed that this desire was frivolous, and selfish, but I gradually came to accept it as God-given, requiring only proper guidance to be sanctified to God's use. However, I did not associate this feeling directly with heaven until I read this particular quotation of Lewis':

"Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing. If that is so, I must take care, on the one hand, never to despise, or be unthankful for, these earthly blessings, and on the other, never to mistake them for something else of which they are only a kind of a copy, or echo, or mirage. I must keep alive in myself the desire for my true country, which I shall not find till after death; I must never let it get snowed under or turned aside; I must make it the main object of life to press on to that other country and to help others to do the same."

Astonishingly, Lewis nails here excatly what I've experienced since my earliest coherent memories. The earthly pleasure of playing Zelda as a child indeed did not satisfy my desire for the other place I couldn't clearly see or describe - that's why I still felt that desire, and feel it as such sometimes today. But the things that I enjoyed the most back then (like Zelda) and the things I enjoy the most today (partly cloudy, windy days) arouse this otherplace desire, reminding me once again that there is somewhere I want to be that can't be found on earth or in outer space, and can't be described using human language.

I have always felt that this otherplace desire is drawing me towards writing a novel of sorts, trying to capture that feeling, which I have long suspected (and now am sure) is impossible. On the other hand, perhaps a book I can write can awaken the latent otherplace desire in someone else, the way the Narnia books did in me. That would easily be one of the greatest earthly pleasures for me.

TPJ