On land, the tuggings of the moons can somewhat safely be ignored my men, and left to the more pliant senses of women and seeds and an occasional warlock. But at sea even males are victims of the rise and fall, the twice daily surge of the waters they float on, and willy-nilly the planetary rythm stirs them and all the other voyagers.
MFK Fisher
In the days, long past, when crossing an ocean was a true ordeal, perilous, expensive, and seemingly endless, people underwent an existential change. On those massive ocean liners, powered by steam and the brawn of faceless nameless men, people would eat their steak and potatoes, drink draught beer, smoke lean cigars, talk listlessly to a compartment mate, then drift out onto the deck to try to gauge their location, their speed, their place in the world. Was it the sea? The vast unfettered night sky? The movement of the ship rocking them into a dreamlike trance? What was it that caused people to drift into a different consciousness? With all the water around them, and the moon given free reign, no mineral laden lands to block it's magnetic thrust, I like to think that the moon created a neap and ebb tide out of the water in the voyagers' bodies, realigning them with the natural flow of the vast Earth. In those days, families left their homelands with naught but a few scant coins, a duffel of clothes, and the hunger of memory and hope in their hearts. The young leaned on the old, the men gathered daily to trade second hand knowledge like a commodity, and the women sang to their babies and convinced themselves that they would make it to a new world, succeed, and see their mothers and fathers again. At the other end of the deck, artists and tradesmen would read newspapers, drink cognac, and pace impatiently, eager to reach the other side of the sea. It would take over a week. A week of drifting, of slowing, a week of staring out at the glint of steel grey sea under charcoal white sky, or the deep purple-blue-green unearthly glow on a hot sun drenched sky. How the sea must have played tricks on them! At times they must have looked out over the railing and thought the sea was higher than the boat deck. Other times sounds and smells must have come to them from across the vast breaks. With nothing else to occupy them, the sea must have claimed their souls for a time, shifting priorities, slowing down their gait, lifting them and setting them down over and again.
It was a burning hot June day in Athens, Ohio when I experienced a shift in time that I've tried my whole life to realign. It was the day of my graduation from Ohio University, and I sat impatiently with my friends as the keynote speaker droned on about the ways in which technology would be changing the world. When it was time, we walked to the stage, received our diplomas, listened as our names were called out, walked to the side of the stage, had our picture taken, and walked out a set of double doors into the stifling heat. It was as if I was in a dream, or a movie where the protagonist is shown in slow motion - indicating a sudden revelation or realization - when I walked through those heavy doors into the world. I looked for a familiar face, I looked for my friend who had gone before me, and I waited for my other friends to walk through the same doors, I listened for the applause of family, I looked for anyone to acknowledge the moment... only to find myself completely alone, pacing like a lost soul awaiting perdition. A few people were scattered around, but their voices came to me as if through water, as if I was suspended halfway between the sea floor and the surface. I waited in angst for someone to appear, and after a few minutes my sister found me and, smiling, pulled me out of the morass. It was those few lost minutes I have been chasing for the entirety of my adult life. That summer, I went to Idaho to work for my Uncle at his State Park, which had for two previous summers been a source of joy and exhilaration for me. Not so that summer. I walked around without any pleasure for those three months. I had no desire to explore the canyon like I used to. I only sat on an old lawn chair and read endlessly, or lay on my cot listening to music, wondering what I could possibly do to save myself, and I mourned the loss of the life I had known, the ease of it all.
I believe we all suffer from the same angst. We have all become targets. Our priorities are dictated to us, our desires are subverted from the original to live well and peacefully into a desire to overcome our brothers and conquer the living world. We can agree now that we all love the money more than we love God, and at heart we know this is wrong. All day we say to ourselves that those in power have it wrong, that the world is failing, that they are feeding us lies, and that somebody should do something to change it all. At the same time we've forgotten how to change ourselves. We've become truly docile, domesticated, and subdued. We're fed images of suffering around the world and in our own backyards, and at heart we feel we should be doing something to help our fellow children, but we have no ability to change the minds of the despots and oppressors. So we say it's too late, our paths are set toward the inevitable end. We have been offered the chance with every waking sun to seize control of our lives and the course of humanity and we have simply let it slip through our fingers because we have been sated by comforts and the idea that we are freer than most, and that's good enough.
But I'm through with that negative thought process. I've undergone a grand Sea Change. Like an old soldier coming home across the sea, I'm shaking off the heartbreaks of my youth and looking towards the horizon with a sense of optimism. One can look at human history and see it as a downward spiral from the garden to the ash pile. We can trace the arc of history like an arrow shot from the castle towers, and we can see ourselves at the apex, beginning the trend towards a terrific crash. But I ask, how many times have we gone to the edge, compelled to jump into the abyss, only to pull back and change the forces that push us? How many Kings, swept into the destructive vacuum of power struggle, have capitulated to the servants in order to preserve the race of men? How many tyrants have battled against their own people only to realize there would be no future with the path they have chosen? We have always overcome our destructive tendencies, and when the times are most dire, we have collectively awoken to shake off the dust of apathy, and followed the lighted path of righteousness. For myself, I have already lived with boredom, with capitulation, and negativity. I've played the role of the cynic and pessimist. I can't wake up anymore, look at Anna, and justify being the child I once was. It would be foolish to think that she would put up with a man whose heart was filled with venom, whose soul was all coal and ash. I can see how foolish I was not to at least attempt to live. Happiness is not hard to find, indeed it isn't a place or an object to be found. It's simply a choice, like everything else in life, it's a decision one has to make to become happy. For me, to keep learning is a joy. To try something new is a joy. To improve myself is a joy. If we stop learning, if we've decided we have it all figured out, we might as well not lift ourselves out of bed in the morning. Better to admit to ourselves that we know nothing at all, that the not knowing is the important thing, the best way to live. Only then can we see the world from a fresh perspective, a hopeful one. I owe her that much...
Until we meet again...
Sunday, February 19, 2012
Sunday, February 12, 2012
February 12, 2012: Blessings of the Father
Fathers and sons, histories of men, old knowledge compiled from experience and distilled through time, the thread of memory, I needed more time to learn. I can feel my father pacing forth in a strange home, see him patting down his arms and his chest in front of a mirror, as if he's trying to remember if he's placed his keys in the breast pocket of his suit coat, when really he is trying to reconcile himself with the image of a man in front of him. He sees the man in the mirror, knows the man resembles him, wonders how the man is able to mimic his actions so acutely, tries to fool the image by moving his raised arms slowly, unusually, in front of himself, then tries to make the man laugh. Father, be at peace. Forget what you have always known now and try to find wonder in the floating dust in the gold sunstreams. Try to lose the memory of us completely, so that when we arrive you retain measures of comfort from us, unexplainable, unreasoned, but real. Forget how this time was stolen from yourself and your wife, this time which was to be enjoyed more than every other time, this reward for a life of toil. You were going to travel. You would have been able to take longer trips than any you have thus taken, spending eternities on the road, seeing the great Glories of creation, wondering at the monuments time has created out of old soil and clay. Try not to know how soon you will have grandchildren bringing back those old enthusiasms of childhood wonderment. Forget how finding a flower in a field is a bit like a miracle to young eyes.
I could talk to you. I could sit you down in front of me and tell you of my gratitude, of my heartache, of my dreams... I could pour oaths and pledges and prayers from a litany of knowledge that would not have been realized without thy tenderness, but I know that you are living in a dreamworld where the past is a river stone, smoothed of it's edges and glistening under the slow light of a sleepy stream. I know that to speak of my plans for the near and far future is to offer up a hopeful sacrifice of sweet smoke to a distant Lord. In this dream present you must travel alone my old friend and teacher. You must lead the way into that next land. But you must try to be kind to us intruders along the way. You must not be swallowed entirely by the dream. For us, you must be a little bit stronger than you have been, to give us a bit of comfort along the way.
If I was to be there in a moment of clarity, I would not speak. I would only listen for as long as you can hold on. If there is a moment of respite from this torment, use it to remind me of those times you let me eat the food from your plate, let me leap onto your back, of the times when you gave up your comfort to please a needy boy. Speak comforts to me, let me know that you will recognize me before you go, tell me to tell your wife that you loved her above all others, even yourself. This is the Bargain I offer to you. I will listen if you choose to speak.
Until we meet again...
Sunday, February 5, 2012
February 5, 2012: Seven Months
This weekend Anna looked at me and said, "You know what today is? We're officially seven months away from our wedding day!" The planning is starting to heat up. Since I proposed in May, We have found a location, hired a retired Lutheran minister, found a photographer, taken engagement photos, and sent out save the dates. She found a dress after two trips with her mother last fall. In the summer, we took two trips to strangers' houses to pick up blue tinted mason jars and burlap runners that she will place lovingly on tables as decoration at the wedding. The location of our wedding supplies the food, and works pretty much exclusively with one DJ so those things were taken care of rather easily. We hired a distinguished and paternal looking retired Lutheran minister to do the ceremony. She has set up a web site complete with photos of us, our wedding party, recommendations for entertainment in Traverse City, and links to hotels. We have booked a large retreat where we will stay for the weekend along with some members of our family, and she has finally decided on her bridesmaids' dresses. Recently we've registered for gifts at two different stores, booked room at a brewery/restaurant for a rehearsal dinner (no easy task in Traverse City during Labor Day weekend), and decided on the style for our invitations. She has logged hundreds of hours on the internet, finding wedding idea sites, looking at possible cake combinations, unique planning ideas, possible decoration and dress ideas, and menu options. She found a honeymoon spot for us in Costa Rica, and we've picked our menus and four exciting activities we will participate in during that week. Right now she is upstairs, and I assume she is talking on the phone with her mother about the things she registered for this morning. Her mother and my mother have been active participants in this process, planning wedding showers, and posting ideas on pinterest. I've had calls from several of my friends just this weekend trying to figure out if we can get together the Friday of that weekend for a boy's night out. Soon we will be sending out invitations, and we still have to figure out the florist situation, shuttle service, find wedding picture locales, pick a menu, and find a cake. We have to plan a social gathering for after the rehearsal dinner, and pick out something for me and my groomsmen to wear. Along with all this is an effort to lose weight. She has been waking up at 5:30 in the morning to go do an intense workout and we've both been trying to avoid fatty food. I'm going to have to start testing skin care products to get rid of some splotchy patches on my face. She has been growing her hair out so that when she styles it she can have more options. We haven't even thought about what we're going to need to pack.
All this time she's putting in, all those long conversations we've had, the difficult choices we've made, all are leading to a day soaked in emotion. Along with all this planning, we have to consider the smallest details, like bringing a handkerchief for tears, what kind of paper will we write our vows on, how the preacher's voice will sound as he pronounces us man and wife, how the light will shine as she walks down the aisle with her father. It's not like planning a vacation where we pick a flight, find a hotel, and pack the proper clothing, we have to also consider the overall picture. Anna has been working hard on the details so that on the day, we can enjoy each and every little moment without worry. No matter how many details we work out, though, even if we plan it so minutely that nothing is left to chance, I still think I will be surprised at every turn. I wish we could slow everything down so I could see every emotion on her face, and relish every smile surrounding us. I wish that first kiss as man and wife could last forever. I am worried that we will be barraged by friends and family, trying to talk to us all at once. I fear that someone will not have a good time and that something will intrude on the magic of it all. This only happens once in a lifetime and each minute that goes by will be singed with a bit of regret and bitterness, along with the happiness, because I know I don't want it to end. It seems strange to me how much work goes into just a few hours of dining, dancing, and drinking. We strive our whole lives to find the person that we will spend the rest of our lives with, we expend so much psychic energy on this one event, and it is over before we even know it. A wedding should be a series of celebrations, I think. We should have a week of family dinners, small parties, a grand celebration lasting from sunrise to sunrise, gift giving, games and contests like the old Romans and Greeks, and dancing until we collapse from utter exhaustion. A wedding should not end until everyone has wandered home in delirium after a week of festivities. Strangers should wander in and out, offering food, drink, or gifts. Poems should be read by firelight and songs sung to toast the newly minted couple. When it is over, everyone should feel like nothing was left out. No one should walk away wishing they had gotten more time with the couple. Wisdom should be handed down from everyone who has been through all stages of marriage. People should wander into a corner of the room and sleep while the hardy ones carry on. I say let's bring back the Festival of Bacchus, return to the old ways of paying homage to life changes. We should endeavor to spend more time on these events than we do at work. That way I could truly appreciate the magnitude of what Anna and I are undertaking.
Of course, Anna would have to do some more planning...
Until we meet again....
Saturday, January 28, 2012
January 28, 2012: Building A Life
When I look at my things, I can trace the arch of my desires. I can remember why I asked my mother for a typewriter, because I wanted to write a novel. I still have small dusty jars of model paint from when I was a child building model ships. I have the same paint brushes I've had since college. I have twelve notebooks with songs, poems, and journal entries written from long forgotten days. I have a print in a heavy wooden frame of a picture of Colonel Pershing standing next to Pancho Villa that I bought in Baja, Mexico. I've bought a guitar, a jump rope, leather bound journals, paints and canvasses, and a mountain bike. All these things I've bought while trying to reconcile myself with this modern world. There are three types of people in the world, those who are obsessed with the past, those who live solely in the present, and those who spend their lives preparing for the future. For me, the past has weighed heavily. Most of the things I had to let go of were little totems from places I've been and things I've seen. These things were to be a part of some great collage so I could surround myself with memories, enshroud myself in the blanket of the past. When I buy a guitar, I am trying to rejoin the present... learn something new. When I buy a calligraphy pen set it's so I can become something new, be present. When I buy new clothes, I'm trying to drag myself out of the old ways, to keep pace with these manic times. It's amusing to think of the ways in which we love our little things. We spend our life buying things that are useful, things that are for decoration, and things that serve no purpose whatsoever, then we carry them with us for our whole lives. To me, it's not that hard to imagine being a hoarder. We all have the same feelings within us to a certain degree. Try throwing something you've had for a time in the trash can. Something you have sitting in a display case. You'll find it a daunting task and you might just pick it out and clean it up and put it back on the shelf. It's become instinct to love the miscellaneous tack we gather around ourselves. Letting go of it is like losing an arm. Carlos Castaneda wrote that small totems were infused with the magic of their previous owners. In a very real sense the things we hold onto become our captors, become like prison bars, sitting in front of us, needing constant maintenance and care, travelling with us through our lives. When I moved in with Anna, I finally looked at all the loose things I've carried with me since olden times and realized that I would never use them. I thought I would finally end up in a place where I could raise them from the dustbin, resurrect them in sacred ceremony, and place them on the altar of memory. But now I realize this will never happen. Thanks to this new life I've entered, I know that in order to adorn myself in the past, I would have to sacrifice the present. Each second wasted on such a project, although justifiable, would only be selfish and overtly personal. I might be able to bask in the glow of a wall full of old posters, fliers, pictures, and bumper stickers, but I would be alone. The modern world is so much more interesting, and the things I've collected, although a bridge to the past, to who I am, are outdated and irrelevant.
Last week Anna set up an appointment at Macy's in order to begin the process of registering for our wedding. We went to the mall on a frigid January night and rode the escalator up to the second floor and entered a seductive world of young couples, well dressed saleswomen, a DJ, and delicious pastries. Without any idea of how to go about collecting new things, we began walking through a vast landscape of china plates, crystal glasses, silverware, kitchen appliances, home wares, bedding, electronic devices, and vacuum cleaners... after an hour I was reeling. It was overwhelming and when it was over we had only registered for four items. Anna was already planning to go to several other places so she didn't want to commit to a large number of things at one store unless she found something better elsewhere so we walked away unfulfilled. For Anna, registering for gifts is the last great opportunity to collect the material goods to build our life together. Like a contractor ordering lumber, cinder blocks, cement, and tools, she goes about the business of constructing a new world for us with aplomb and confidence. She knows what she wants and she knows how to shop. I'm the perfect sucker for the retail world. I see shiny things and I shell out the money like a child at a carnival trying to throw a dart at a balloon. I know too these things she is buying will replace all the old things I have. But I'm fine with that. I think it's time to let go of my material world, the world of concrete functionality. I will probably hold on to things such as my stereo, books, CD's and DVD's, and the artistic things that I want to explore, but the rest is just gathering dust and I've grown tired of boxing myself in, tired of the avalanche of worldly possessions. The past will always be there, like a museum I can visit anytime. Blessed memory returns so fluidly when it's shared with old friends, is so much more true and real when sitting around with people. I can't really trust myself with those times when I look at an old picture, and it's fairly unfulfilling as well. The future will be taken care of by my future wife, so knowledgeable, so adept at thinking of such things. That leaves the present wide open. Until we meet again...
Last week Anna set up an appointment at Macy's in order to begin the process of registering for our wedding. We went to the mall on a frigid January night and rode the escalator up to the second floor and entered a seductive world of young couples, well dressed saleswomen, a DJ, and delicious pastries. Without any idea of how to go about collecting new things, we began walking through a vast landscape of china plates, crystal glasses, silverware, kitchen appliances, home wares, bedding, electronic devices, and vacuum cleaners... after an hour I was reeling. It was overwhelming and when it was over we had only registered for four items. Anna was already planning to go to several other places so she didn't want to commit to a large number of things at one store unless she found something better elsewhere so we walked away unfulfilled. For Anna, registering for gifts is the last great opportunity to collect the material goods to build our life together. Like a contractor ordering lumber, cinder blocks, cement, and tools, she goes about the business of constructing a new world for us with aplomb and confidence. She knows what she wants and she knows how to shop. I'm the perfect sucker for the retail world. I see shiny things and I shell out the money like a child at a carnival trying to throw a dart at a balloon. I know too these things she is buying will replace all the old things I have. But I'm fine with that. I think it's time to let go of my material world, the world of concrete functionality. I will probably hold on to things such as my stereo, books, CD's and DVD's, and the artistic things that I want to explore, but the rest is just gathering dust and I've grown tired of boxing myself in, tired of the avalanche of worldly possessions. The past will always be there, like a museum I can visit anytime. Blessed memory returns so fluidly when it's shared with old friends, is so much more true and real when sitting around with people. I can't really trust myself with those times when I look at an old picture, and it's fairly unfulfilling as well. The future will be taken care of by my future wife, so knowledgeable, so adept at thinking of such things. That leaves the present wide open. Until we meet again...
Saturday, January 21, 2012
January 21,2012: Animal Signs
Winter, like an old friend, sweeps down on the northern country, blanketing us... teaching us about the holy circle of birth, growth, life, and death. Each breath is like a reminder of the ghosts surrounding us, each gust of wind howls across plains of brilliant white, bespeckled with black sod. I revel in the snow storms as I walk through the hushed streets. Each auto blissfully muted, each train accenting the chiming tree branches. In these dark mornings I take a few minutes, in church parking lots, and lift my head from my chest, breathe in icy air, and watch the snow cover the grime of this sullen town.
Animals are all around, life carries on in darts and flashes, fleeing the shadows and chasing the sunlight. The nightly crow, the industrious squirrel, and the proud seagull brace against the wind. The shock of the cardinal is the most pleasing, with his regal crown and black mask, flitting in between the grey-brown undergrowth. That seductive red seems like fire, like cherries, like velvet blankets against the monotone backdrop. The blue jay tries but can't match that passion. Cats and racoons scurry around houses, ever vigilant for a meal and a hiding place. Occasionally the feminine deer, like a ballerina, dances through the back lots and farm fields, pausing to stare in wonder at me, then dash away with the others as they dig under the ice to find grassy shoots. Huskies, at home in this clime, dusted with powdery snow, smile at me as I pass, as if greeting me like a neighbor.
There are times, in the country, when I see red tailed hawks. I sometimes wonder if there isn't just one hawk, a spirit guide, leading me through my day. Usually He is sitting atop a telephone pole, but at times He hangs in the air, ever subtlely shifting his tail and wings to remain perfectly still on a draft, reveling in the joy of wind and air. Once, while I was driving on one of my routes, pulling from one driveway to the next, a hawk waited for me to commence my ride to the next house, and fly to the next pole in front of me. I felt blessed and wondered at the great power of this bird of prey. I felt like I was playing a privileged role in a game of chase, and when it was over I felt a small pang of regret.
The strangest occasion happened a few winters ago. I was driving out Walbridge Road, towards those little, old, trading post towns of Curtice and Williston. Out there the farm land comes in patchwork quilts divided by punctuated stands of tangled trees. The land was dug out of old marshes and swamps, dug out by old Germans and Irish, reclaimed from ancient lake beds. The land is flat and the soil black with rich silt and nutrients, and it has been left to the heirs to those old Germans, left by the people of the ports and cities as gratitude for the ditch diggers and reclamation engineers. It was in one of these hollows, on a patch of road drifting with snow, in between tree stands, that I encountered a coyote for the first time. In the high desert country of Southern Idaho, along the Snake River Basin, I heard packs of coyotes singing at night, out along the vast reaches of fenceline and scrub. But even in that wild country they were notoriously fickle. Like a flash of light in the corner of my eye I would think I saw one only to find whispers. I couldn't imagine for a second that there were still coyotes in this old part of the world. Surely man has plodded upon this old ground for too long, taken too much away, and cut himself off completely for such a wild thing to still roam free? Wonders never cease. Out of the corner of my eye I saw this brilliant grey-black flash, darting toward my car like a bullet train! He was on a direct collision course with me and all I could do at forty five miles per hour was take my foot off the gas pedal. The wild dog closed in on the car, leapt across an eight foot wide ditch, and dashed in front of my car, across the other ditch, and onto the next field! It slowed down like an Olympic runner, shook his head and looked back at me. I was stunned! It was a game of chicken, good sport! Some old coyote trickster god reminding me that there is still play to be had, still wild life to be lived, and there are things we must do for no rhyme or reason.
What is the lesson? There is none. These animals aren't here for us. They are here, and we tread upon their grounds, impositioning ourselves, labeling them with our problems. They are, and we are not. That coyote was showing me something, though... That old dog was proving how strong he was to himself and to me, and I loved him for it! Until we meet again...
Animals are all around, life carries on in darts and flashes, fleeing the shadows and chasing the sunlight. The nightly crow, the industrious squirrel, and the proud seagull brace against the wind. The shock of the cardinal is the most pleasing, with his regal crown and black mask, flitting in between the grey-brown undergrowth. That seductive red seems like fire, like cherries, like velvet blankets against the monotone backdrop. The blue jay tries but can't match that passion. Cats and racoons scurry around houses, ever vigilant for a meal and a hiding place. Occasionally the feminine deer, like a ballerina, dances through the back lots and farm fields, pausing to stare in wonder at me, then dash away with the others as they dig under the ice to find grassy shoots. Huskies, at home in this clime, dusted with powdery snow, smile at me as I pass, as if greeting me like a neighbor.
There are times, in the country, when I see red tailed hawks. I sometimes wonder if there isn't just one hawk, a spirit guide, leading me through my day. Usually He is sitting atop a telephone pole, but at times He hangs in the air, ever subtlely shifting his tail and wings to remain perfectly still on a draft, reveling in the joy of wind and air. Once, while I was driving on one of my routes, pulling from one driveway to the next, a hawk waited for me to commence my ride to the next house, and fly to the next pole in front of me. I felt blessed and wondered at the great power of this bird of prey. I felt like I was playing a privileged role in a game of chase, and when it was over I felt a small pang of regret.
The strangest occasion happened a few winters ago. I was driving out Walbridge Road, towards those little, old, trading post towns of Curtice and Williston. Out there the farm land comes in patchwork quilts divided by punctuated stands of tangled trees. The land was dug out of old marshes and swamps, dug out by old Germans and Irish, reclaimed from ancient lake beds. The land is flat and the soil black with rich silt and nutrients, and it has been left to the heirs to those old Germans, left by the people of the ports and cities as gratitude for the ditch diggers and reclamation engineers. It was in one of these hollows, on a patch of road drifting with snow, in between tree stands, that I encountered a coyote for the first time. In the high desert country of Southern Idaho, along the Snake River Basin, I heard packs of coyotes singing at night, out along the vast reaches of fenceline and scrub. But even in that wild country they were notoriously fickle. Like a flash of light in the corner of my eye I would think I saw one only to find whispers. I couldn't imagine for a second that there were still coyotes in this old part of the world. Surely man has plodded upon this old ground for too long, taken too much away, and cut himself off completely for such a wild thing to still roam free? Wonders never cease. Out of the corner of my eye I saw this brilliant grey-black flash, darting toward my car like a bullet train! He was on a direct collision course with me and all I could do at forty five miles per hour was take my foot off the gas pedal. The wild dog closed in on the car, leapt across an eight foot wide ditch, and dashed in front of my car, across the other ditch, and onto the next field! It slowed down like an Olympic runner, shook his head and looked back at me. I was stunned! It was a game of chicken, good sport! Some old coyote trickster god reminding me that there is still play to be had, still wild life to be lived, and there are things we must do for no rhyme or reason.
What is the lesson? There is none. These animals aren't here for us. They are here, and we tread upon their grounds, impositioning ourselves, labeling them with our problems. They are, and we are not. That coyote was showing me something, though... That old dog was proving how strong he was to himself and to me, and I loved him for it! Until we meet again...
Monday, January 16, 2012
January 16, 2012: Tree of Knowledge
January 16, 2012: Tree of Knowledge
Genesis 3:5 "No. God knows well that the moment you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods who know what is good and what is bad."
My job, though physically strenuous, affords me enough time and quiet to drift through my thoughts and daydream. A meter reader has to pay attention to what he's doing at brief moments of the day, opening a fence, entering a backyard, greeting the homeowner, avoiding the pitfalls of frozen ground and mud... but these things have become such habit and ritual that I'm afforded the pleasure of examining all that I know. After nearly a decade of working at this job, and around four years on the same routes, I can probably trace my footsteps by rote. I've worn a groove into the lawns of Perrysburg, Rossford, Oregon, Walbridge, and Genoa. When the deep snows of winter linger for more than a month I can see the ghost of my footprints from before, like those old Roman roads with wide, smooth wagon wheel ruts polished into the cobblestones from ages ago.
The days drift past me mostly. Time is measured in distances in between houses and through neighborhoods. I break halfway through the day to eat a lunch in my car and listen to NPR, then float through the rest of the afternoon thinking about afternoons in the winter and how people will be coming home and the sun will be sinking low. Fridays and Mondays pass by without fanfare and we all age without even knowing it. But in that time, I learn things and I feel the world around me. I think about the truths behind the truths and I think about all the things that we have come to know. Knowledge, in the early days, was beautifully simple. There were good acts, there were acts that went against the good of the community, God was in his heaven and we dug the plow in the dirt after it thawed. We drank from the river, we played games with our children that taught them how to live, we watched the women laugh over the animal hides, and we were wary of strangers. It's not a surprise that we long for the lost old simple ages.
This is a postmodern world. Post Freud, Marx, Darwin, and God. We have eaten the fruit from the tree and we can see the bad and the good in ourselves... at least some of us can. We know many things now. We know that the whole universe is in motion, and filled with things we can only see the shadows of. We know that the lights we see in the night sky may be the light from stars that have died long ago, like the howl of a wolf that lived in the time of the conquistadors reaching our ears today. We know that the eternal sun, the same sun that shone on old Egypt, on the knights of Medieval England, and which will shine on children not yet born to us, will eventually consume itself and this little oasis of life. We know that the ground we stand on, which has afforded us a safe place to lay upon since we could first stand tall, is hard cold crust laying precariously on a vast swirling mass of liquid. We know that if we look at each other, and keep looking ever closer and closer, we will disappear and vast spaces will open up where once there was a sentient being. It is in a world like this that we are supposed to live and be happy.
Is it any wonder that we're all chasing spirituality and philosophies? Is it hard to believe that we clash with each other in our search for a true life? What is the question that we're trying to find an answer to? We analyze and we fret... we drift from book to painting to dance to craft thinking that we're getting closer and closer... desperate to tell our loved ones that we're on the path to righteousness! Then we fall breathless into our beds, dream anxious dreams, awake to our pills and carry on the fight. It is a psychic morass, this life. With so many people in the world we have to claw our way to meaning, shove our way through the crowds, shout to be heard, and try not to drown in the quicksand. Do I sound like I have an answer? Am I being a bit macabre? Probably. Make no mistake, I am an optimist. I can see the old answer is still the perfect answer... love will keep us together.
After a century of Freudian analysis, of Gallup polls, of sociology and anthropology, of Marxian historical reductionism, of deconstruction and abstraction, of new wave neo-pathology, particle physics and fractal geometry, have we found the final thesis, or are we compounding silken threads on top of one another in an ever increasing web? What does it mean to know? To me it is a bit of a laugh. It is a wonder how our mind works. It is a pleasure to discover new things. I don't subscribe to the notion "What good does this knowledge for us?" I'm no pragmatist. I think the more we think about the world we inhabit the better we can make it. But to love is to make everything simple again... to work for happiness for each other's sake, and to give comfort in an ever increasing uncomfortable world. Until we meet again...
Genesis 3:5 "No. God knows well that the moment you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods who know what is good and what is bad."
My job, though physically strenuous, affords me enough time and quiet to drift through my thoughts and daydream. A meter reader has to pay attention to what he's doing at brief moments of the day, opening a fence, entering a backyard, greeting the homeowner, avoiding the pitfalls of frozen ground and mud... but these things have become such habit and ritual that I'm afforded the pleasure of examining all that I know. After nearly a decade of working at this job, and around four years on the same routes, I can probably trace my footsteps by rote. I've worn a groove into the lawns of Perrysburg, Rossford, Oregon, Walbridge, and Genoa. When the deep snows of winter linger for more than a month I can see the ghost of my footprints from before, like those old Roman roads with wide, smooth wagon wheel ruts polished into the cobblestones from ages ago.
The days drift past me mostly. Time is measured in distances in between houses and through neighborhoods. I break halfway through the day to eat a lunch in my car and listen to NPR, then float through the rest of the afternoon thinking about afternoons in the winter and how people will be coming home and the sun will be sinking low. Fridays and Mondays pass by without fanfare and we all age without even knowing it. But in that time, I learn things and I feel the world around me. I think about the truths behind the truths and I think about all the things that we have come to know. Knowledge, in the early days, was beautifully simple. There were good acts, there were acts that went against the good of the community, God was in his heaven and we dug the plow in the dirt after it thawed. We drank from the river, we played games with our children that taught them how to live, we watched the women laugh over the animal hides, and we were wary of strangers. It's not a surprise that we long for the lost old simple ages.
This is a postmodern world. Post Freud, Marx, Darwin, and God. We have eaten the fruit from the tree and we can see the bad and the good in ourselves... at least some of us can. We know many things now. We know that the whole universe is in motion, and filled with things we can only see the shadows of. We know that the lights we see in the night sky may be the light from stars that have died long ago, like the howl of a wolf that lived in the time of the conquistadors reaching our ears today. We know that the eternal sun, the same sun that shone on old Egypt, on the knights of Medieval England, and which will shine on children not yet born to us, will eventually consume itself and this little oasis of life. We know that the ground we stand on, which has afforded us a safe place to lay upon since we could first stand tall, is hard cold crust laying precariously on a vast swirling mass of liquid. We know that if we look at each other, and keep looking ever closer and closer, we will disappear and vast spaces will open up where once there was a sentient being. It is in a world like this that we are supposed to live and be happy.
Is it any wonder that we're all chasing spirituality and philosophies? Is it hard to believe that we clash with each other in our search for a true life? What is the question that we're trying to find an answer to? We analyze and we fret... we drift from book to painting to dance to craft thinking that we're getting closer and closer... desperate to tell our loved ones that we're on the path to righteousness! Then we fall breathless into our beds, dream anxious dreams, awake to our pills and carry on the fight. It is a psychic morass, this life. With so many people in the world we have to claw our way to meaning, shove our way through the crowds, shout to be heard, and try not to drown in the quicksand. Do I sound like I have an answer? Am I being a bit macabre? Probably. Make no mistake, I am an optimist. I can see the old answer is still the perfect answer... love will keep us together.
After a century of Freudian analysis, of Gallup polls, of sociology and anthropology, of Marxian historical reductionism, of deconstruction and abstraction, of new wave neo-pathology, particle physics and fractal geometry, have we found the final thesis, or are we compounding silken threads on top of one another in an ever increasing web? What does it mean to know? To me it is a bit of a laugh. It is a wonder how our mind works. It is a pleasure to discover new things. I don't subscribe to the notion "What good does this knowledge for us?" I'm no pragmatist. I think the more we think about the world we inhabit the better we can make it. But to love is to make everything simple again... to work for happiness for each other's sake, and to give comfort in an ever increasing uncomfortable world. Until we meet again...
Thursday, January 12, 2012
January 12, 2012 New World
I was struck recently by an image I read in a book called, "How the Irish Saved the West". In the book the author describes a bizarre and almost incomprehensible occurrance in medieval Ireland. Individual monks, of their own volition and under the spell of religious fervor, would construct small rafts (yerts, perhaps?), pack a few days worth of food, and set themselves afloat on the vast unknown Ocean. These solitary men, these devoted souls, these men of knowledge and contemplation, these children of God, decided they would set their corporal body into the hands of the Almighty so that he might place them in the spot He wanted them to be. They would either perish and be enfolded in His warm embrace, find new land where they would build a place of worship and spend the rest of their lives praising His Glory, or find other people to whom they would teach the word of God.
A striking image indeed. I of course would love to think of myself on those high seas, sitting cross legged in the center of a small circular raft made of wood and lamb skin, tied together with rabbit sinew and pitch, praying desperately as the waves lash at my crusted lips. As I swim out past the breaking waters, smiling in my profound belief that this is where the arc of my life has led, I would look back and see my brothers blessing me and raising their thankful arms to the Father. How bold a thing to do! How fearful they must have been in the days leading up to this sea march. How sure they would have to be that the Lord not only exists... but cares enough about each individual that He would carry them to their destination. In many ways they had to be a bit carefree... either they would find a new home where they would spend the rest of their days living under God's sun, on God's untrod earth, in God's grace, or they would cast off their old tired bones, be washed clean of the dirt, and sink into the arms of the next Golden World. There was no indecision, no hesitance, only pure devotion.
If I was a good man, a true man, I would use this story as an analogy to describe my life, and especially my adult life. The idea of the world of men as an ocean and my singularity as a raft on that uncaring expanse is a seductive one. We could all be described as lone figures being blown about by winds of fortune, and all our encounters are but brief halloos in the cold Atlantic night. But upon further investigation, either the analogy falls short, or my true life falls short of the analogy. To say which is pointless. In order to set oneself adrift, one has to have FAITH in that endeavor. One has to DECIDE to go. Those old Celtic monks sat on that raft for days upon days, sleeping, waking, praying, sleeping, until there was no return. At what point did they stand up and realize the truth of their endeavor? What was the moment like, in a.d. 1200, when Brother Christian found himself in the North Sea, near delirium, ranting the Lord's Prayer until the words became all one? I like to think at this point Brother Christian, like a clap of thunder, found himself floating above himself, looking down at the wonder of his own breath, and laughter came washing over him like white light.
For me, there was no decision and no test. The great arc of my life has been more like a flat line leading steadily onward, with no deviation, through the great wide passageway of the middle, with a vague hint of the end that awaits us all. Fear has kept me from living a good life... fear of trying and failing, fear of looking foolish, fear of nameless powers around me like government, terrorism, society, damnation. I created a comfortable prison of couches, TVs, food, drugs and alcohol, and longing. As I sit here, now 38 years old, now 217 pounds, now high cholesterol, now aching bones and joints, now still unhappy, I can see that there was no effort, no motivation, no belief, no heart. As I sit here I feel the days slipping by with still no raft built. I truly feel left behind by life, like I never really got started. To be even more honest, life was going on all around me, but I never engaged it. I've watched my friends all get married and have children, get great jobs that they love, move away, my parents get old, and my family drift slowly apart, making their own families. I've clung desperately to the past, covering my youth in a golden gauze until the truth of those days is unfamiliar, and I can't trust my own memory. I know, however, that I must cast off these sentimentalities and embrace the present, because to do so is to live, and I want to live.
This year is 2012. There is a strange convergence going on and I've felt the soft stirrings of life within me. My father, bless his soul, has been ravaged by Alzheimer's disease, and we've sadly had to place him in a home. This has broken my mom's heart and my own, but I've learned one more valuable lesson from my old man... life is short, and a happy death is no guarantee. I consider this year to be year 1, and I want to catalogue it because there are many things that I want to do, many things I want to say, and some strange things will be happening throughout this year that I feel are all in some way related. There is no doubt, at least I feel there is no doubt, that we are all dancing together on these vast plains, that we are all still a great community, albeit a community of tribes, and as a man who has learned much about our past, I am full of optimism for this great time we live in. After all, if this is the peak of our civilization, why aren't we enjoying it more? I've been intrigued about the predictions of the end of the world by Nostradamus and the end of the last cycle of the Mayan calender. Movies about alien invasions, demonic possessions, and machine revolutions are on the rise. It seems we've become obsessed with old gods and old myths, trying to find the answers to age old questions about the end of time. It seems so appropriate that the end of the world coincides with my forthcoming wedding. I hate to use the word ironic because frankly, I don't know what that word means anymore, but it's absolutely fitting that after 37 years of solitude, the year I get married will usher in the end of days.
I'm going to try my best to not ask so many questions, at least not ones that I can't answer. I consider these posts to be a series of my own personal essays, to be my own rafts, and I hope that you can see yourselves in them because despite the medium... we all need to reconnect with each other, to gain wisdom and find love again. Until we meet again...
A striking image indeed. I of course would love to think of myself on those high seas, sitting cross legged in the center of a small circular raft made of wood and lamb skin, tied together with rabbit sinew and pitch, praying desperately as the waves lash at my crusted lips. As I swim out past the breaking waters, smiling in my profound belief that this is where the arc of my life has led, I would look back and see my brothers blessing me and raising their thankful arms to the Father. How bold a thing to do! How fearful they must have been in the days leading up to this sea march. How sure they would have to be that the Lord not only exists... but cares enough about each individual that He would carry them to their destination. In many ways they had to be a bit carefree... either they would find a new home where they would spend the rest of their days living under God's sun, on God's untrod earth, in God's grace, or they would cast off their old tired bones, be washed clean of the dirt, and sink into the arms of the next Golden World. There was no indecision, no hesitance, only pure devotion.
If I was a good man, a true man, I would use this story as an analogy to describe my life, and especially my adult life. The idea of the world of men as an ocean and my singularity as a raft on that uncaring expanse is a seductive one. We could all be described as lone figures being blown about by winds of fortune, and all our encounters are but brief halloos in the cold Atlantic night. But upon further investigation, either the analogy falls short, or my true life falls short of the analogy. To say which is pointless. In order to set oneself adrift, one has to have FAITH in that endeavor. One has to DECIDE to go. Those old Celtic monks sat on that raft for days upon days, sleeping, waking, praying, sleeping, until there was no return. At what point did they stand up and realize the truth of their endeavor? What was the moment like, in a.d. 1200, when Brother Christian found himself in the North Sea, near delirium, ranting the Lord's Prayer until the words became all one? I like to think at this point Brother Christian, like a clap of thunder, found himself floating above himself, looking down at the wonder of his own breath, and laughter came washing over him like white light.
For me, there was no decision and no test. The great arc of my life has been more like a flat line leading steadily onward, with no deviation, through the great wide passageway of the middle, with a vague hint of the end that awaits us all. Fear has kept me from living a good life... fear of trying and failing, fear of looking foolish, fear of nameless powers around me like government, terrorism, society, damnation. I created a comfortable prison of couches, TVs, food, drugs and alcohol, and longing. As I sit here, now 38 years old, now 217 pounds, now high cholesterol, now aching bones and joints, now still unhappy, I can see that there was no effort, no motivation, no belief, no heart. As I sit here I feel the days slipping by with still no raft built. I truly feel left behind by life, like I never really got started. To be even more honest, life was going on all around me, but I never engaged it. I've watched my friends all get married and have children, get great jobs that they love, move away, my parents get old, and my family drift slowly apart, making their own families. I've clung desperately to the past, covering my youth in a golden gauze until the truth of those days is unfamiliar, and I can't trust my own memory. I know, however, that I must cast off these sentimentalities and embrace the present, because to do so is to live, and I want to live.
This year is 2012. There is a strange convergence going on and I've felt the soft stirrings of life within me. My father, bless his soul, has been ravaged by Alzheimer's disease, and we've sadly had to place him in a home. This has broken my mom's heart and my own, but I've learned one more valuable lesson from my old man... life is short, and a happy death is no guarantee. I consider this year to be year 1, and I want to catalogue it because there are many things that I want to do, many things I want to say, and some strange things will be happening throughout this year that I feel are all in some way related. There is no doubt, at least I feel there is no doubt, that we are all dancing together on these vast plains, that we are all still a great community, albeit a community of tribes, and as a man who has learned much about our past, I am full of optimism for this great time we live in. After all, if this is the peak of our civilization, why aren't we enjoying it more? I've been intrigued about the predictions of the end of the world by Nostradamus and the end of the last cycle of the Mayan calender. Movies about alien invasions, demonic possessions, and machine revolutions are on the rise. It seems we've become obsessed with old gods and old myths, trying to find the answers to age old questions about the end of time. It seems so appropriate that the end of the world coincides with my forthcoming wedding. I hate to use the word ironic because frankly, I don't know what that word means anymore, but it's absolutely fitting that after 37 years of solitude, the year I get married will usher in the end of days.
I'm going to try my best to not ask so many questions, at least not ones that I can't answer. I consider these posts to be a series of my own personal essays, to be my own rafts, and I hope that you can see yourselves in them because despite the medium... we all need to reconnect with each other, to gain wisdom and find love again. Until we meet again...
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