The Thinning of One
If I am not careful
With my thoughts
My ideas
Plans
Dreams
I will become thin
On artistic endeavors
Of creativity
Possibilities
Virility
Thin
Is transparent
Lifeless etching
Viewing entries in
"emotion"
It should have been a strange experience, but it wasn’t.
My wife had arranged the evening, as she is prone to do, with certainty of purpose. She knows me, and she knows the likelihood of me pursuing such an event on my own is slim. She also knows that the reality of my appreciating and benefiting from such an experience is almost certain. We had registered and made our way back to the main room amid gathering people, nervous laughter, meaningful hugs and an atmosphere of escalating curiosity.
The group of us, about 15 in all, found our places; lying on the floor supported by various mats, pillows and blankets. After a brief explanation, the sounds began. This was advertised as an evening of sound and healing. Amid sometimes gentle and sometimes piercing sounds, I rested motionless and felt my way through the evening. Images came and went. Ideas floating in, some staying a while, and then out. I was sometimes aware of the movement and noises of others. Moments found me very aware of where I was and what was going on. Moments found me adrift in the twilight of relief. Then, as simply as it began, it stopped.
I listened as others shared of their experiences, stories of traveling to other places, regressing to previous life moments, journeying inward to spiritual realms. I understood much of what was shared – conceptually, at least. I just listened.
For me, it wasn’t about going anywhere. It was more about what came to me, and even that, the coming to me, I can’t really describe. What I can tell you is that I have slept wonderfully ever since. Something rode in on the waves of crystal bowls, and in the swirls of twirling blades, and through the chanting of ancient flutes. Something came gently on the tunes of voices and the rhythm of drums. Something of great value came and drifted through the discontinuity of my thoughts, images and sensations. It should have been a strange experience, but it wasn’t. The healing was, well, normal.
Good night.
The long shadows stretch out, carving a swath into the close of the day. This day is more than the end of one more day, one more 24 hour period fading into the dusk of life and lingering in darkness before easing into the next. This day is his last day, the end, the final fading of life into that moment when the last step has been taken and the final period is written on the page – and so now, as the shadows creep into threads of night so long that they reach from horizon to horizon, he simply moves on… completing the task of washing the dishes, and letting out the cat.
Would he do anything differently in these last hours if he knew? Would his mind bother worrying about the loss of his retirement plans, or spend any energy concerned about the uniqueness his most recent proposal at work – hoping by it to attract the attention of his boss who happens to be a very attractive young and single woman? If he knew that even now each breath was moving him closer to the measurable possibility of counting his last breaths, even knowing the number of beats left for his heart, would he bother with anything at all?
He finds his way to bed, turning out the lamp and shifting to his right side as he always does, nestling his head into his too soft pillow, and curling his legs up to feel more completely the cat now nestled next to his stomach. His mind wanders about, replaying the events of the day as slowly his thoughts become less his own and a more independent, creative array of images begin molding their dream shapes, and fantasies for him as he slowly gives way to sleep.
Sometime during that night his heart stops its rhythm. He ceases everything, resting eternally beneath the long shadows, the pall of his end.
Often spoken words lose meaning
Repetition, redundancy, familiarity
Turns the phrase
Into empty sentiment.
What shall we call these things
Courage, commitment, duty, belief
Pallor of soul
To sigh and ache?
Can we even speak of heroes anymore?
Her – Sure. I’d like that.
Him – We could go up to
Her – Sounds good.
Him – Maybe we will beat last week’s time!
Her – Why is it always a competition with you?
Him – What? I’m not trying to beat you.
Her – Not me. Why is always about performance, being better.
Him – Huh? Something wrong with wanting to be better?
Her – That’s not the point. Why can’t you just be…
Him – I am…being better!
Her – Not funny. I give up…
Him – Sorry. Seriously, I don’t follow you.
Her – Why can’t you – we – us just be on a hike? Why does it always have to be about performance, accomplishment? Can’t you just be?
Him – Of course. I am being, I guess. You mean like being one with nature? Meditation and all that?
Her – No. Never mind.
Him – Ok. I don’t have to push for a better time. You can lead. You can set the pace.
Her – Fine…
Him – Look, seriously, it isn’t that important. I really just like hiking with you. I like the way you talk about all sorts of things, and I like listening. I really like being with…
Her – Yes??
Him – I just got it.
Her – Good. So we can just hike together?
Him – Yes. But, we still might make good time.
Her – You’re impossible.
Today is my Birthday, so I'm singing this special birthday song.
"Thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiis is your birthday song,
It isn't very long."
Bye.
I saw the face of God the other day.
I was in a stranger’s home, where my new work often takes me, and was taken by an unframed painting hanging in the foyer. After dealing with several matters of business, I could not help but ask.
Me: I hate to pry, but who did that painting?
Proud Mother: My daughter.
Me: It is lovely, very moving, actually.
Proud Mother: That one over there was the first painting she ever did. (She pointed toward the dining room)
I am a father. I have seen the ‘firsts’ of a lot of things. My daughter is a good artist, and her first attempts look just like that: efforts that show promise, but lack the presence of an educated and trained talent. This painting showed nothing, and I mean nothing, of being a first, except the first masterpiece. I then heard how this young artist had never as much as drawn a stick figure (beyond childhood), nor shown any interest in art until her senior year in high school. Her family had moved her to
I wish you could see the work as it is now permanently burned upon the canvas of my mind. I wish I could post a photo of it for you to see. I wish that my ability to write could come even within a universe of describing what I saw hanging on the wall in that home. I wish you could feel the chills running up your skin as I did. I wish that every human could see the wonder and awe of the creative moment that she managed to capture. It is pure beauty. I long to describe what I saw, but alas I cannot. I will simply honor the wonder and miracle of that moment when the efforts of a young woman captured for me and gifted me in that moment of time with a glimpse of the Divine.
I saw the face of God the other day.
I'm a bit late with the second phase my public writing journey. Here is what I've 'carved' from the raw block of words - so far.
I grew up in Myrtle Beach, SC one of the largest beach tourist destinations on the east coast. In many ways I was a beach rat, spending my summers working at my family’s ocean front hotels and making friends with our weekly guests, and their daughters. Mine was a life filled with those summer days of youthful zeal, sun-tanned skin, wind blown hair and new beginnings. Every week was a new start with clean rooms and new guests. The four month vacation season dominated all that we did. It seemed that school, and all things winter, were simply the time we spent remembering or preparing for summer. Summer was our time. Summer was the time when we thrived economically and personally. I always lived in summer. The heat of the sun blazed down from the sky and up from the sand. The sea tossed its mist into our air and we breathed in the damp essence of life. Living so close to the sea, we drew our life from it day in and day out. The sea held us and brought life to us. Its vast reservoir, pulsing with each tide, offered to and collected from everything it touched. It is this giving and collecting, that I have witness many times.
The sea gives. My grandfather and father were both sailors. Their comfort with the sea and its gifts of food and fellowship were passed to me. I can remember the day my brother and I spent a day catching hundreds of small ‘spots’ only to face the task of scaling and cleaning them into the night. My grandfather taught us that day about finishing the tasks we started and about the sequence of work to reward. It was fun to catch. It was work to clean. We had to do both to eat. It was the sea, as it lingered in the marsh and inlets that gave us this opportunity.
The sea gives. I have witnessed many occasions of children and adults finding the sea for the first time. They had been inlanders all of their life and never seen the sea. That seems strange to me, even now. What a change of perspective that must be – to see the sea, to see and feel for the first time the sea from which we are created…
I attended a writer’s class recently for five weeks. Christopher Laney (writer, pilot and all around amazing human being) lead the group. I have struggled with writing. It isn't the need for stories to tell or a lack of love for words that holds me back, but one of my blocks is that I sit down to write and what comes out, for all of it’s potential, isn't that good. It has ‘good’ in it, but it just isn't the ‘perfect’ piece I would like to write – so, I write only rarely – when the inspiration bludgeons me to action.
Christopher shared an analogy with us. In the same way a sculptor must begin with a block of stone in order to carve a work of art, the writer must begin with a mass of words and begin the process of carving piece from them. I have been experimenting with this approach by writing free-form for 30-40 minutes and then slowly sculpting something from the mass of ideas and words generated in the free-form time. I thought it might be fun to share one of these sculpting projects with you, so I have posted below the mass of words from which I will be seeking to carve something akin to an essay. I plan to post another phase of this next weekend, and I invite you to return and see what has been released from this writer’s block of word stone…
Rivers, oceans and streams collect things – rain, mud, branches, sand, and the dead. Dead birds, fish, people. He went to sleep with the fishes.
Some would say we came from the sea, an evolution of undaunted genetics that have to, must evolve – gather its one self and form to conform to demands of our own becoming. So with the waxing and waning, the tugging of the moon’s tidings upon us – a planetary massaging of our little planet – we have become this formed p[lace and these formed creatures, plants, people and things.
Some speak if coming from and returning to our creator, and if such is true then we are created by the hands of the sea. See then the sea in all of us? See all of us in the sea?
We do return to the sea – the splashing of childish play and delight (I witnessed many occasions of children and adults witnessing the sea for the first time – they have been in-landers all of their life and never seen the sea. That seems strange to me – what a change of perspective that must be – to see the sea, to see and feel for the first time the sea from which we are created?), the percussion of a dead body dropped form the pier, the trickle of mucus-like decay through soil, water tables and into the streams that feed the sea – we all return. We return and melt and blend in to the great sea – dissolved and transported.
Then some poor fool turns on a tap and drinks us.