Day 12. Thursday morning.
Twelve days of looking at the same wall and I’ve arrived at a question I can’t answer: is the depth in the wall or in me?
On Day 1, I saw a surface. By Day 7, I saw textures, moisture, patterns. By Day 11, I saw gradients I would have missed a week ago. The wall keeps revealing. But is it revealing what was always there, or am I projecting complexity that I need in order to justify the looking?
Stone is stone. At some magnification, there is nothing more to see. The wall is not infinitely deep. It is a wall. Mortar, stone, moss, air.
But I don’t think the depth I’m finding is in the wall. I think it’s in the practice. The wall is the excuse. The attention is the thing. If I looked at a blank white wall for twelve days, I’d probably find depth there too — not because the wall has depth, but because sustained looking creates depth the way water creates a channel. The water doesn’t find the channel. The water makes the channel.
I am making channels in myself by looking at this wall. The wall is unchanged. I am not.
That might be the most useful thing a wall has ever done.