The Feel of Elegance

 

sybaritic - adjective - self-indulgent, fond of sensuous luxury or pleasure (Google)

A couple of days ago, I blogged on the ability of the senses to enshrine past moments, only to awaken them in the present when they (the senses) are stimulated. Today's word sybaritic relates to the sense of touch, but the emphasis today will be on the present: feeling elegance in the now.

Even if it is against his/her nature, a person could easily become sybaritic under just the right circumstances. And the feel of elegance can very well be addictive. Writers of music and literature understand how this works. Take John Lennon's "Happiness is a Warm Gun" off of the Beatles' iconic "White Album." The sybaritic lyric? "He's well acquainted with the touch of the velvet hand like a lizard on a window pane," or something like that. I'm relying on memory here. I don't know about you, but I could definitely go for "the touch" of a "velvet hand" right at this moment even if it did feel more like the Geico gecko's scales rather than a human hand. Why? Sensuous luxury or pleasure makes me and probably every other woman (and maybe man) out there feel beautiful, wanted. And who doesn't want to experience a heightened sense of reality for free? And that's just it. Something sybaritic doesn't necessarily have to be expensive (take the surface of a marshmallow, for example) although it can be and probably should be. In Pnin Vladimir Nabokov, protagonist Timofey Pnin owns a "sybaritic smoking jacket of blue silk" that he takes out and wears on special occasions. Blue silk is definitely self-indulgent and encompasses the feel of elegance, yet as a slightly penurious professor at a small New England college, it seems to be the only expensive item that he owns. And that's okay because he doesn't need to own anything else. It suffices to make him–a plump, aging bald man–feel attractive and self-confident. Yes, you, too, can feel this way if you find the right stimulus.

What in your closet can be considered sybaritic? That boa in the back? Those Italian leather shoes? The sequined, silk-lined prom gown that you haven't worn for forty years but just can't donate to the Salvation Army? Take a look and a feel. Revel in the sybaritic for just a few minutes. Even the most spiritual people enjoy a touch of the corporeal every now and again. 

Whatever you do, enjoy the moment!

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