We Shall Not Cease from Exploration
Written by Katie Robson
“We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.”
– T.S. Eliot
If there is one work that spoke to me most this year, it would be Four Quartets by T.S. Eliot. When I came across this quote from “Little Gidding,” it seemed to me like an expansion of the famous quote by Tolkien: “Not all who wander are lost.” When I think of the word “seek,” I think of an exhaustive measure of searching, perhaps a never-ceasing exploration, as Eliot describes.
For the better part of my adulthood, I’ve felt stuck in an in-between place, always seeking and only sometimes finding, or finding, yet seeking something new in its place. If one were to ask me, I would not have described myself as lost. I have a strong identity about what I like or don’t like, the hobbies I enjoy, etc. I would have said I was just fine, perhaps the same as ever. It was not until I was invited and joined a Well-Read Mom group that I wondered if that was true.
Pre-motherhood, I was a high school English teacher. I majored in English at UT Austin and loved studying literature, especially poetry. Reading fiction was something I was good at and thoroughly enjoyed. I loved sharing that passion with my students. Upon graduation, I moved across the country with my husband, leaving the oppressive heat of Texas for the lush greenery and chill of Seattle. I began tutoring children at a creative nonprofit started by author Dave Eggers.
I poured my heart into my work with them, eventually landing a temp position in the programs department with the hope of being hired permanently. Yet, when the time came, I found myself in that paradoxical sense of beginning and end that Eliot often described. I was told I was too good at teaching to waste my talents at the nonprofit. Still, I had little desire to return to the classroom and the drudge of lesson planning and grading. For the first time in many years, I found myself seeking meaning and purpose in my life.
My lovely friend Jen invited me to join her Well-Read Mom group, and I immediately said yes. Shortly after, feelings of doubt began to set in. Am I cut out for this? Do I have time to read whole books? I was intimidated, mostly because I had to acknowledge for the first time that I had forgotten how to read critically and creatively and study literature.
Eventually, we returned home to Texas, and I left teaching to be a mother. Staying home with little toddlers screaming in my ears day after day for years had left my mind feeling wilted, not unlike “a drifting boat, with a slow leakage,” as Eliot says. The mindless trudge through monotonous routines with little ones left a void in my choleric/melancholic soul, and my daily exasperation allowed my critical reading skills to wither away “with no end to the withering” in sight. “And you see behind every face the mental emptiness deepens, leaving only the growing terror of nothing to think about.” These words from “East Coker” resonated deeply with me.
I joined my friend’s group after it had already started for the year, so Four Quartets was the first book I read with them. I had no clue how much it would change me. Upon starting it, I felt distinctly frustrated. I had purchased a companion book of footnotes, and, flipping back and forth between books, I thought often, “What is even the point of this? The whole thing is just nonsense! Maybe I can’t do this anymore. Is it good literature if you can’t even understand it without reading fifty other, sometimes obscure, random works?” My mind was in crisis, and I was frustrated, wondering why I had wasted time studying literature. I used to be able to breeze through a text easily, but now I can hardly comprehend one at all. I felt lost in a way I never had before.
These feelings came to a head on Epiphany weekend when I heard a homily about seeking. “Perhaps converts make the best Catholics … because they are actually searching for God, want to pursue Him, and seek Him out.”
As a convert myself, having spent the past eight years seeking our Lord in the truth, this homily ignited a fire in my heart. In my pursuit of Christ and the business of motherhood, I had grown complacent and jaded regarding reading literature. I cracked open Four Quartets, determined to progress through the last two poems with a different frame of mind. Over the day, I continued re-reading the whole work, foraging for meaning. I could feel the muscle memory of reading comprehension skills slowly returning, and I felt invigorated.
To seek is not to look or find, as one may assume. Rather, it is to not give up or grow weary, to persevere onward to the end. It is searching with a hint of grit and tenacity. However, it will take many more years of reading and re-reading this text to grasp it fully. I found that at the end of my exploring, I arrived back where I started—that long-lost joy of thinking deeply about a text, extracting meaning from particular words and phrases, and flexing my mental capabilities to make sense out of the seemingly senseless: all the reasons I enjoyed poetry to begin with. I knew this place again for the first time, lost but found, the same yet different, the end and the beginning all at once.
About Katie Robson
Katie Robson is a graduate of UT Austin with a degree in English, and a mom of four beautiful children. When she is not busy running her own photography business, she enjoys relaxing with her husband, watching Korean dramas, or reading a good book.
About Well-Read Mom
In Well-Read Mom, women read more and read well. Our hope is to deepen the awareness of meaning hidden in each woman’s daily life, elevate the cultural conversation, and revitalize reading literature from books. If you would like to have us help you select worthy reading material, we invite you to join and read along with us. We are better together! For information on how to start or join a Well-Read Mom group visit our website wellreadmom.com
