Where is Paradise?

I'm sure scholars, philosophers, and perhaps architects have written about the link between our view of the horizon and our awareness of the spiritual world around us.  I have seen a vast ocean, and I have looked upward at the limitless night sky. Always my idiosyncratic perception of the heavens was that Allah's paradise was "up there" or "out there" somewhere.  City skyscrapers always made paradise seem, to me at least, even further away, as if the height of the buildings themselves demaracated the material and spiritual worlds.

The single-story compound I visited in the Moroccan countryside had an unexpected effect on my own perception of paradise.  I  stayed in a family compound.  On all four sides of me, there were 10-foot high walls.  Beyond those walls, I could see nothing of the level farmlands,  other nearby structures of similiar height, nor the mountains in the distance.  As far as I could see, the material world stopped at the top of those walls. 

In this circumscribed world, it seemed to my spiritual self as if the breadth and height of paradise began at the top of those compound walls.  Paradise was sitting just above my head.  I could almost touch it, or I could be crushed by the weight of it.

I had not thought, when I went to  visit a family in rural Morocco, that the trip would have such a profound effect on my own  spirituality.  But even the passage of time there was affecting as night came, and the midnight blue of the sky was highlighted by stars.  Then fajr came, and the sky was cobalt blue, backlit from the rays of a sun still too far away to bring the colors of the dawn.  Shades of paradise just above my head.

Moroccan Winters

We are in the midst of the Moroccan winter, which is mild by most American standards, of course, except for the fact that the homes and buildings here are unheated.  It doesn't seem to get down to freezing, but it may get to 40 or 50 or so, with heavy winds and rain on the worse days. Coming into an unheated home  offers little relief  and it's not easy to get used to it.

 I learned quickly that Moroccans compensate in their own ways.  Moroccans have lots and lots of blankets.  Lots of blankets. Moroccan hosts routinely their wrap their guests in blankets as well plying them with with hot tea, coffee and food. A visit to a Moroccan home in mid-winter is reminiscent of a slumber party. Also, a trip to the hammam (ha  MAM), the steam-filled, public baths frequented by Moroccans of all ages, is excellent for restoring warmth.

My first winter here took me quite by surprise.   My Moroccan friends were telling me that heat dries you out and makes you sick.  I looked at them. Yes, right, I got that.  That's why vaporizers and humidifiers were invented.  I was trying to tell them that no heat makes you dead, as in frozen popsicle dead. They looked at me.  They didn't get it.  Although they have had hail in during a bad winter, they had no frame of reference for things like snowdrifts and blizzard or below-freezing temperatures.  I was distressed.

So I've decided now that I need to toughen up a bit and learn to adapt.  I do have space heaters for the really cold weather, but I actually find myself not using them for just "normal" cold days.  I have, instead, discovered the joy (that's not the right word, surely) of wearing up to 5 layers of clothing and sleeping nearly fully dressed.  And of waking up because I'm too hot.