Sidewalk Oracles: Final Chapters

Notes on the final chapters of Sidewalk Oracles by Robert Moss, Winter 2024

“Kairos moments multiply when we are in motion.” — Robert Moss, Sidewalk Oracles

A Willingness to Walk the Path

Each week, I will post some general discussion, reflection, and thoughts on the chapter or “games" from the week. You are invited to share your experience with this book in the comments section.

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Basic Information

📌 We are reading Sidewalk Oracles: Playing with Signs, Symbols, and Synchronicity in Everyday Life by Robert Moss.

📅 The reading timeline outlines a slow reading (with weekly discussion posts) for anyone who wants to read along.

📌 Weekly reading notes and discussion (the timeline links to the weekly posts)

🍥 I encourage you to go into this reading with an open mind and a willingness to consider what is being described/discussed.

🧵 I use the comment area for discussions rather than a chat thread. Neither would be private because this read-along is free to everyone. You are invited to comment on comments and interact with those reading together.

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From Within the Fog, Final Chapters

We have reached the end of our shared reading of Sidewalk Oracles by Robert Moss. Thank you to those who read along. 

In the final chapters of the book, Moss shares more stories of his experience with moments of synchronicity and with the “trickster” (fox) archetype.

Chapter 5, “On Other Planes,” is a string of moments experienced in airports. For the most part, the encounters didn’t strike me as profoundly as I think they may seem to Moss. But, of course, symbol and synchronicity can be subtle, possibly details only we would notice individually and in our own context.

Airports. Planes, trains, and automobiles. Moving in the world. This is one of the things that I worried about from the beginning of this book, the sense that finding sign and symbol might require being constantly out and about, out of your element, or among new things. 

Realistically, this doesn’t make sense. If you are willing to believe the universe drops symbols and messages in your path, then you should assume that the universe will meet you where you are. Why would the universe make judgments about whether you have an “on the go” life or not? Why would symbols and messages only be left in places you are never going to look? (Part of me says there is a level of privilege to his emphasis on stories that all take place “as part of his nonstop travel.” These, however, happen to be where his stories are collected.)

It does seem much easier to look and see when you are out of the house, whether that means traveling (as in Moss’s stories) or simply going to the grocery, neighborhood park, pharmacy, coffee shop, library, riding the bus, or spending time in some other community or natural space. Being out in the world puts a new and varied tableaux in front of you at every turn and also puts you in a mix of sounds and, possibly, conversations. 

This doesn’t mean one can’t have a life rich in symbol (or kairomancy) when one is mostly at home, but I do think nurturing and cultivating that richness takes intentionality and the nurturing of concrete habits that invite seeing, an invitation to find symbol and synchronicity even in the familiar.

[This post is from a 2024 read-along. The remainder of the post has now been placed behind the paywall.]