Look at the Waterfall.

This is a term I use when I see someone or something that we are supposed to find beautiful. The perfect example of this when you walk into someone's kitchen, someone who doesn't cook, but who has 25,000 dollars worth of appliances. Or when you see someone wearing $500 uncomfortable shoes. I derive the term from waterfalls. If you were to see a waterfall you might think of some cheesy romance novel cover and two passionate people embracing while the mist and water splashed on them. Or maybe you think of some Ansel Adams knock off photographing a waterfall in Montana or someplace like that. You may even envision a picnic with someone you love, or wish you loved. But why?

When you really think about it what is a waterfall? It is the culmination of water (not beautiful), interacting with height (not beautiful), interacting with rocks (not beautiful), then finally interacting with gravity (not beautiful). So four things, all not beautiful, combine to make something beautiful. Hmm. I don't buy it. Try it on a person: bad nose, bad hair, beer gut, and backne (back acne). That doesn't exactly describe Jessica Alba. No, the reason why we like waterfalls is that we are told they are beautiful from a young age, they are framed as beautiful to us. Society pressures us into expecting the falling of water to be beautiful. I bet there are tribes in this world that fear waterfalls. I can buy that, waterfalls are inherently powerful.

So take that concept and apply it to the real world, because unless some of my readership are tour guides from Niagara you probably don't see waterfalls every day. How many other things do we see and take as beautiful when it really it just is. I am quick to point out Sarah Jessica Parker, but that seems overly catty. Or how about a wedding cake? Or Celine Dion's music? I am not anti-beautiful. I love beautiful things, but given the choice between looking at a waterfall or looking at a crane in action, building a building, I choose the crane every time. I allow the crane to be beautiful instead of being told its not. What do you allow to be beautiful?