Your Very Own Groundhog Day

What would you do if you were stuck in one place ... and every day was exactly the same,
and nothing that you did mattered?
Phil Conners in Groundhog Day

Those of you have seen Bill Murray in Groundhog Day know the story. Phil Conners (Murray) is an arrogant and heartless TV weatherman who has traveled to Punxsutawney, PA, to cover Phil the Groundhog, only to discover that he is reliving the same day—February 2nd—over and over and over again.

I was in the Virgin Islands once.

I met a girl.

We ate lobster, drank pina coladas.

At sunset, we made love like sea otters.

That was a pretty good day.

Why couldn't I get that day over and over and over?

Phil’s despair grows so intense that he begins devising and implementing various ways for killing himself, only to repeatedly wake up to Sonny and Cher singing, “I Got You Babe.” For the self-aware individual, there is a knowing -- a realization that this theme has all too often been lived out in his or her own daily experience.

Up at 6, brief prayer and Bible reading while sipping coffee, exercise, shower, a few minutes checking the news and sports or, if you are a parent, getting the kiddos ready for school or sitters, off to work at 8, home from work at 5.30, dinner, a favorite TV show or DVD movie, maybe some time on the internet or reading a novel, off to bed, up at 6 … blah, blah, boring blah.

You want a prediction about the weather, you're asking the wrong Phil.

I'll give you a winter prediction.

It's gonna be cold...

It's gonna be gray...

And it's gonna last you

For the rest of your life.

(Shades of CS Lewis’ words regarding the wicked Witch’s curse on Narnia, where it was “always winter but never Christmas.”)

When Phil discovers that he cannot die, he decides to begin educating himself: he memorizes poetry, he learns to play the piano, he gains detailed information on everyone in the city, but, at least in the beginning, all with the goal of entertaining himself, and seducing the fair Rita. (Played by Andie MacDowell.) While Rita warms to Phil, she never succumbs to his manipulation, as each day she realizes (again and again) that his care for her is utterly self-serving.

What is it that finally delivers Phil from Groundhog Day? Love. True. Genuine. Sincere. Love. A love that is all about The Other, not The Self. A love that deeply cares, that is willing to sacrifice, that gives itself freely and wholly to the happiness and the wellbeing of The Other(s), with little thought of Self … A love that wishes to know more and see more of The Other, and, in this knowing and seeing, finds that it is growing deeper and broader with every passing day: days that are “new every morning.”

As I was writing the above, I ran across a story by Paul Coelho who describes this love in his metaphor, The Cloud and the Sand Dune. (Found in his book, “Like the Flowing River.”)

Not long after a young cloud was born over the Mediterranean Sea, a great wind blew the family of clouds toward Africa. As they floated over the Sahara, the young cloud spotted a sand dune it wished to inspect and, so, found a gentler wind that would help it hover over the dune. While the other clouds called for the young one to move on toward the forests in the South, he decided to remain, as he had fallen in love with the golden haired dune.

“'If you would like, I could rain on you now. I know I’ve only just got here, but I love you, and I’d like to stay here for ever.'”

“'When I first saw you up in the sky, I fell in love with you too,'” said the dune. “'But if you transform your lovely white hair into rain, you will die.'”

“'Love never dies,'” said the dune. “'It is transformed, and, besides, I want to show you what paradise is like'”

"And he began to caress the dune with little drops of rain, so that they could stay together for longer, until a rainbow appeared."

"The following day, the little dune was covered in flowers. Other clouds that passed over, heading for Africa, thought that it must be part of the forest they were looking for and scattered more rain. Twenty years later, the dune had been transformed into an oasis that refreshed travelers with the shade of its trees."

"And all because, one day, a cloud fell in love, and was not afraid to give his life for that love."

Copyright, Monte E Wilson, 2008