What Maurice Knows

I have the worst guard dog.

The mailman comes to the door? Sound the alarm. A neighbor crosses by on the street? We must clearly be in danger. A leaf blows or cat sitting across the road? Unleash the Kraken.

He sounds like a scary dog. He has a respectable bark, stands at around 3 feet tall and nearly 4 feet from nose to tail. (Have you ever tried to measure a dog? Mine did not enjoy being approached with a tape measurer.)

Standing at attention, ears and tail erect, the look is completed by a small tuft of hair on the back of his neck that puffs up. Almost everyone who comes face to face with his ferociousness proceeds with primal caution. The worst transgression, in Maurice’s opinion, is opening the door.

Which door?

Any door to the outside—the front door, the bedroom door, or any door that separates here from out there. At the slightest hint of a creaking door, he bounds to the opening, eager to challenge whatever danger is about to cross the threshold. And alerting the entire household of his heroism. By all accounts, he is doing his duty dutifully.

Until you actually step into the room.

As the door opens, you are met with 70 pounds of knee-high knighthood. No one would blame you for stepping back, tensing up, and proceeding with caution. What cruel fate befalls you?

A wagging tail and a doggie grin.

Here is a prime example: I was sitting in the living room at my brother’s house when two of my niece’s friends unlocked the front door and walked in. I’d never met them, Maurice had never met them; I didn’t know they were coming, Maurice didn’t know they were coming. Of all the cases for Maurice to spring into protective action, you’d think literal strangers coming in unannounced would be at the top of the list. Instead, they received a couple frightening woofs.

After they were through the doorway, they received a happy dance and a parading of his favorite toys—a stuffed avocado, a penguin, whose hat Maurice ripped off and probably ate, and a Frankenstein doll. Frankenstein is his favorite.

Instead of a guard dog, I got an angry-sounding welcoming committee.

There are two kinds of reality: the known and the unknown. The known is everything in your 3-dimensional world that you are aware of: your car in the driveway, the tree in your yard; your office, your best friend, or your favorite water bottle. The known also includes the voice inside your head and the 70,000 thoughts you have each day that remind you that you are you. In the known is everything you know. The unknown, by contrast, includes everything beyond your known reality: music you’ve never heard, books you’ve never read, people you’ve never met, food you’ve never tried, thoughts you’ve never thought, and experiences you’ve never had.

To Maurice, practically everything is an unknown.

He knows that when he hears a particular sequence of sounds that make the name “Maurice,” someone is talking to “him.” As far as we know, he has no idea of who or what “he” is. He has no idea he is a “dog” and can’t eat certain foods, and he certainly has no idea how large he is—as evidenced by his insistence on smooshing himself into any available space as close to me as possible. He also knows what he wants.

He knows when he wants to sleep, when he wants to eat or get a drink; he knows when he wants to play with toys, when he wants to get loved on; he knows he wants to go with me wherever I go and he knows he wants to catch that darn fly—even if he doesn’t know that it won’t taste very good.

He knows that he doesn’t know what’s on the other side of that door, and when it opens, he knows he wants to rush out to greet it with a wagging tail. He doesn’t know what that smell is, but he knows he wants to figure it out. And probably try to eat it. Most impressively, he knows no fear of the unknown.

The unknown is the scariest place for us. We spend our entire lives trying to avoid it. Every time we face something “unknown,” we try to turn it into a “known” as quickly as we can so that it never has to be “unknown” ever again.

We face the unknown of our morning commute by checking the traffic report. We face the unknown of the weather by checking the weather report. We face the unknown of what to do each day by writing up expanding to-do lists.

We look at the unknown of our futures—where we will live, what we’ll do for money, who we’re going to marry, what we’re going to believe—and we try to solve these as quickly as possible. We find jobs that pay the bills, a house that fits our lives, and marry people that make us feel safe and secure. We build a wall on all sides that form a comfortable sphere we call “known.”

There’s nothing wrong with this—safety and security are basic human needs. We go wrong when we tether our sense of safety and security exclusively to the land of the knowns. When I was a teacher, that’s where I lived.

I knew what time I had to be at work and what that was going to look like each day. I knew what my paycheck was going to be and I knew that it wasn’t going to be enough to pay all my bills. I knew what I had rehearsal on Monday and Wednesday nights, and church on Sunday mornings.

I also knew the feeling of dread every morning when my alarm went off and the feeling of prying myself out of bed. I knew the feeling of disgust when I looked at my bedhead and thought “God why does my hair have to be such a mess every morning?” I knew the feeling of stepping on the scale and either the comfort that came when I saw the number I wanted or the discomfort if it was higher. I knew the feeling of TGIF and looking at the weekend as if it were already spent because I knew what I had to do on Saturday. I knew the exhaustion of conducting a concert, the relief of May, and the anxiety of not knowing if I was going to be able to afford groceries.

I knew so much about my life.

The knowns in our life can keep us safe, and there’s nothing wrong with finding comfort in the parts of our lives that we know. But there are knowns that seep in, and before we know it, completely run our lives. Dread, guilt, shame, and anger; the things we “know” upset us, put us in a sour mood, or ruin our days—all of these become bricks in our self-enclosing walls. We know the words we use to talk about ourselves and we know how to solve our own problems. We “know” how to run the lives that we know, even if that comes with the anchors of the knowns that drag us down.

The unknown is the only land of opportunity, the only direction we can go to reach anything unknown. I didn’t know how to be an entrepreneur. I didn’t know how to support myself. I didn’t know how to decide what I was going to do every day. I didn’t know how to build my uninterrupted life. I didn’t know how to be the best version of myself for my family, my partner, my best friends, my community choir, or the random person in Publix.

And I knew I wasn’t going to find it by staying in my familiar land of knowns.

For thousands of years, dogs have shown us how to rush to greet the unknown. What if we embraced the unknown like Maurice?

On the other side of that door is a new friend to be made. That smell over there is a new delicacy to try. Every trip in the car is an adventure into the unknown, even if it is to the vet.

What if when we felt the breeze on our faces, it was as if it was the first time we felt the wind?

Because, in essence, it is.

Until next time, live uninterrupted.
~Coleman