At the bottom of our little street there is a small wooded area known to us as The Magical Forest--namely because, well, it is magical. Prickers are really angry dragons whose chocolate has been stolen by desperate Chocolate Bandits (who only steal chocolate because they have never known the sublime sensation of receiving chocolate as a gift). A large broken tree that hangs down a few feet above the ground is actually a massive trampoline which can catapult a small boy as far as, say, the moon. And a low-looping branch is (of course) a Smoothie Rest Stop on the treacherous journey to the heart of the Magical Forest.
And all this is quite risky and marvelous and the Magical Forest grows and changes with each visit to its wonders. But a few weeks ago--down at the very edge and end of the Magical Forest--Tyler and I noticed a low branch from a tree which someone had pushed into the ground. It was a couple of inches in diameter, and whoever did the deed must have really worked at it.
And succeeded. The branch had been pushed directly into the ground, then covered with a fairly large rock, and then a long, heavy board had been laid across the branch and nailed to it and the base of other small trees nearby. In short: someone had ensured that this branch would grow straight into the ground. (Why someone did this escapes me.)
Tyler and I looked at the strange little experiment and we both wondered aloud what had happened to that branch.
"Daddy! Maybe the Dragons use it as their slide that goes straight into the ground and way way way way WAY to the middle of the earth!"
Tyler's hypothesis was a very good one. I nodded my agreement of this possibility. But then something magical happened in the Magical Forest. Something really magical. Super-duper MAGICAL.
Tyler stepped onto the branch that has been forcefully burrowed into the ground. When he did so, a tiny little thing with green buds on it two feet away moved. Tyler climbed down, and I asked him to do it again. And again: the tiny little thing two feet away moved.
We proceeded to do our own experiment--moving the branch in the ground as much as we possibly could, and each time, the little plant moved. Then, we went over the the little plant and pulled and prodded it and--Holy Crap!--the branch moved.
Deductive reasoning and a little bit of dirty fingernail digging unearthed the truth for us: that branch had said, essentially, I don't think so. That branch had remained underground for two long, hard, deep feet and then it had managed to break the soil and find the light.
Tyler and I discussed how the branch might have said exactly those words: I don't think so.
As a brave, bold knight would say them? I DON'T THINK SO.
As a climber of Mt. Everest must utter them, fighting back defeat and despair? I...don't...THINK...SO!
As an astronaut who has just glimpsed the moon through her tiny little rocket window? I don't THINK SO!
However the branch said these words to whoever forced it into the darkness of the ground, to the heavy rock that lay atop it, and to the board nailed in its path to light--the words came. And--man!--to have heard them.
Now, on each journey to the end and edge of the Magical Forest we make sure to spend a few moments with this most Magical of Branches. We shake, tenderly, both the branch and the plant and watch the reverberations travel along the two feet of hidden, dark growth. We point to the green buds that get bigger by the day, and we wonder at how marvelous the leaves will look when Spring finally announces that it's time.
And I know that many of us, pushed into the dirt by the circumstances of life, bearing heavy weights, often think that the darkness we might find ourselves in is it. That our chances at budding may be irrevocably lost or bound with the heaviness and pressure of nails.
There is a beautiful moment towards the end of George Eliot's Middlemarch when two characters--Dorothea and Rosamond--are meeting and the scene is set for revenge, hatred, bitterness, and despair to reign. Both parties have been deeply hurt and profoundly misunderstood. But then Dorothea decides on a different route: instead of burrowing further into the darkness she bulldozes the walls that stand between her and Rosamond. She shares with bold honesty and remarkable forgiveness all that is on her heart. And in the face of such courage, Rosamond, too, cannot maintain the grasp on her own bitterness and spite. It's at this poignant moment that Eliot writes, simply, "Pride was broken between them."
Pride was broken between them.
In the place of a bitter reluctance to renewal and hope, these two characters tear down the walls that divide them and they break out into open light. Instead of pride, they choose confidence. Instead of a haughty sense of comparison and competition, they choose cooperation and boldness moving forward.
Last night, in the Public Speaking class, each of 12 students shared the start to a speech called One True Thing. We talked about the need to break past the walls all around us--and to refuse and refute the lies of Shame, Fear, Despair, and Bitter Criticism by using bold, clear, and passionate voices to say what we believe.
And as I watched these 12 people of all different ages share their bold truths, I couldn't help but allow my eyes to do what they wanted to do: yup--tear up. I felt an incredible sense of gratitude for just being able to hear these voices. For watching these voices bud with the beautiful green of courage and hope and--in clear language--the I don't think so that the Magical Branch uttered.
Whatever darkness and dirt may be piled on top of you right now, may you hold to the hope that even after two feet of despair, the light may still be found. Reaching upwards, the opportunity to break ground and bud is there, waiting. And there are innumerable people waiting to see what kind of leaves you'll grow, and how--exactly--your voice will sound when you utter those beautiful, bold words, I don't think so.
Showing posts with label perseverance. Show all posts
Showing posts with label perseverance. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 13, 2013
Friday, February 15, 2013
One True Thing from My Dad, Harry Wilson Reynolds, III: A Spark Always Exists
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| Dad and Grandson Tyler |
Pancakes.
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| Dad Snowblowing Nemo! |
On Sundays, throughout my childhood, my dad would cook his own pancakes in our home kitchen. He was a fixture by the stove--and as each of my four brothers and I would wake, and my mother, and when my grandparents arrived, my dad would stare out with wild, wonderful eyes and ask, "How many!"
Indeed, it was more a call to arms than a verifiable question.
What I appreciate most about my dad is his relentless enthusiasm for life. He's had to face some walls that I can't even imagine trying to scale, but every day he has woken up and tried to pass on to his five boys a sense of the wonder of life--the fact that we can hug one another, laugh with one another, noogie one another, fart (constantly) in front of one another, listen to one another, love one another.
When I was in high school, I did a creative writing project whereby I wrote 50 poems and then revised them and collected them into a small poetry book, called Eggs, Sunnyside Up. My dad read the thing and then, one Saturday afternoon, drive me into Hartford and brought me out for a cup of coffee at a place called Zuzu's, where we sat up in the loft and I tried to get used to the flavor of coffee while he told me how proud he was of me. Then he brought me to a print shop and together we chose a cover, font, style, size and he paid for thirty copies of the book to be printed up.
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| Dad and His Five Boys During a Camping Reunion Trip |
My father drove thirty miles to meet me at a local coffee shop--Lasalle's--and sat with me for five hours as I relentlessly graded the things. Everytime I looked up at him with weary eyes that said--I can't do this job, let alone grade these essays--my dad would walk over to the free refill station and grab me another cup of joe, then place it in front of me. "Come on, Lukie-babes, you got this. Yes! Caffeine it! I put extra cinnamon in there, Luke--you got this!"
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| Dad and Tyler and I in Summer 2010 |
And, as often happens when my father comes out with his phrases that arise from his deep enthusiasm for life, I had to smile. My father must have gotten me about twelve cups of coffee that day (and pancakes were a part of the meeting earlier, to be sure). And he made sure to sit across from me until I finished.
In this life, we all face walls that we wish we didn't have to. We all come up against circumstances that we wish we could change. My father has faced a lot of those. But he's always chosen to keep going at it--to keep pouring another cup of coffee and look for a way to find some enthusiasm (or at least invent some strange new phraseology). That's the big lesson I hold onto from my father: don't quit, and while you're not quitting, drink a heck of a lot of coffee and pile your pancakes high.
Without further rambling from me, One True Thing--poetry style--from my dad.
A Spark Always Exists
By Harry Wilson Reynolds, III
Once, when the first snow came,
I saw with wonder
The small tracks.
Sprinkled across the ground,
Like small jewels cast aside,
By a thoughtless Giant.
As I grew
I saw only muddy tracks,
The need to shovel paths,
Jobs to be done,
And the ever insistent song of belonging.
As my step grew slow,
My mind churned unceasingly:
Things that had gotten away,
Magic that had died,
Names of things that I could not remember.
Dead light
Bathed me daily,
Whispering the lost song of life,
Stealing my last gasp.
The promise of redemption,
Shadowy,
Just out of reach,
Haunts my every thought.
The journey continues
Along a familiar path,
Worn low by replicated desires,
Demon friends that encourage,
Sameness that blankets the night.
Somewhere in that maelstrom
A spark of me exists,
To be blown to life
Amid the rubble of life's hardness,
It's disappointment,
It's stolen expectations.
Tuesday, May 1, 2012
Baritone, Banjo, Belief
As a kid growing up in Windsor, Connecticut, my favorite place to go was Mystic Seaport. Something about the place spoke of legend, of mystery, of the great power of the ocean and all that lives within it, and of the great power of the banjo.
My Uncle Don Sineti's banjo, that is.
Don isn't really a complete, exact-meaning-of-the-word-uncle Uncle. Don is my mom's sister-in-law's brother. And yet, growing up, Don was always playing songs on his banjo for us--in a voice as booming and folksy and resonant and full of base (and soul) as any that I have ever heard. Whenever my parents and my four brothers and I drove the hour in our overflowing Ford Taurus station wagon to Mystic, we could always count on Don to amaze us with his renditions of old seamen's songs, or that great spiritual Swing Low, Sweet Chariot.
When Christmas rolled around, and my mom's massively extensive Italian & Irish family gathered at my Grandpa and Grandma's house in Bloomfield, Don was there to, yes, raise high the roof with his lower-than-low baritone voice. The thing was an instrument itself--but add the banjo and the duo became a superhero for a kid like me.
Seriously.
So a few days ago, after a year and a half here in York, I felt the sudden, inexplicable craving for Don. That baritone, that banjo. That soulful singing that vibrates floorboards and arm hairs. So I was downright delighted when I found some videos of Uncle Don Sineti singing online. Watching them brings me back to Mystic, back to Bloomfield, back to the times when five strings could so overpower all the fear and worry that life can gather and allow only Belief to pass through.
Don isn't really a complete, exact-meaning-of-the-word-uncle Uncle. Don is my mom's sister-in-law's brother. And yet, growing up, Don was always playing songs on his banjo for us--in a voice as booming and folksy and resonant and full of base (and soul) as any that I have ever heard. Whenever my parents and my four brothers and I drove the hour in our overflowing Ford Taurus station wagon to Mystic, we could always count on Don to amaze us with his renditions of old seamen's songs, or that great spiritual Swing Low, Sweet Chariot.
When Christmas rolled around, and my mom's massively extensive Italian & Irish family gathered at my Grandpa and Grandma's house in Bloomfield, Don was there to, yes, raise high the roof with his lower-than-low baritone voice. The thing was an instrument itself--but add the banjo and the duo became a superhero for a kid like me.
Seriously.
So a few days ago, after a year and a half here in York, I felt the sudden, inexplicable craving for Don. That baritone, that banjo. That soulful singing that vibrates floorboards and arm hairs. So I was downright delighted when I found some videos of Uncle Don Sineti singing online. Watching them brings me back to Mystic, back to Bloomfield, back to the times when five strings could so overpower all the fear and worry that life can gather and allow only Belief to pass through.
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Finding a Way Forward
About a month ago, the Treasurer of the Fulford Bowls club passed on--a man named Brian who was 89 years old, had proposed twice but both times was returned a negative and never married, and whose gentle smile led to easy sharing, kind encouragement. Each Thursday evening, as I talked with Brian, it was easy to see a certain longing in him: a great love of children, yet never having his own; a great love of community, yet never creating one inside his home.
The Fulford Indoor Bowls Club, then, was his route to connection. He began the club in 1984, and had served as Treasurer ever since. When I first met Brian, his words, "Welcome, now your first two sessions are free, so make sure you don't pay" were indeed music to my ears. And over the past year and a half, as I've had the chance to get to know so many men and women of an older generation, something about Brian has always captivated me.
He didn't storm the beaches of Normandy like others in the Bowls crew.
He didn't almost lose a daughter at age two.
He didn't travel to five continents and possess stories galore to make those journeys reverberate as if they were still occurring today.
Instead, Brian's story was quiet, as was his voice and even his stroll. The subtext of his words spoke to me about a man who had tried hard in this life--sought love and ended up creating a community every way he knew how. Even though it wasn't his ideal, it worked, and it brought a lot of connection and joy to others as well.
As I now try to balance the books for the Bowls club--an English major and poetry-loving teacher--I find that the numbers don't always add up for me the way they did, I'm sure, for Brian. As I hold the ledger in my hands and read through his script, each number checked with tiny dash marks in pencil, I feel a certain quietness that saunters into the room and glances over the books with me.
For Brian, even though his highest hopes never materialized, life was still beautiful because the quality of his connections ensured it. The people he treated with dignity, the stories he listened to and shared, and the quiet manner of his willingness to put his hopes into any avenue for community that he could--these all speak to the way a river finds a course. Though it runs into rocks, though it may be blocked at many turns, if it keeps seeking, then somehow it finds a way to move forward and still bring water. Like life.
The Fulford Indoor Bowls Club, then, was his route to connection. He began the club in 1984, and had served as Treasurer ever since. When I first met Brian, his words, "Welcome, now your first two sessions are free, so make sure you don't pay" were indeed music to my ears. And over the past year and a half, as I've had the chance to get to know so many men and women of an older generation, something about Brian has always captivated me.
He didn't storm the beaches of Normandy like others in the Bowls crew.
He didn't almost lose a daughter at age two.
He didn't travel to five continents and possess stories galore to make those journeys reverberate as if they were still occurring today.
Instead, Brian's story was quiet, as was his voice and even his stroll. The subtext of his words spoke to me about a man who had tried hard in this life--sought love and ended up creating a community every way he knew how. Even though it wasn't his ideal, it worked, and it brought a lot of connection and joy to others as well.
As I now try to balance the books for the Bowls club--an English major and poetry-loving teacher--I find that the numbers don't always add up for me the way they did, I'm sure, for Brian. As I hold the ledger in my hands and read through his script, each number checked with tiny dash marks in pencil, I feel a certain quietness that saunters into the room and glances over the books with me.
For Brian, even though his highest hopes never materialized, life was still beautiful because the quality of his connections ensured it. The people he treated with dignity, the stories he listened to and shared, and the quiet manner of his willingness to put his hopes into any avenue for community that he could--these all speak to the way a river finds a course. Though it runs into rocks, though it may be blocked at many turns, if it keeps seeking, then somehow it finds a way to move forward and still bring water. Like life.
Friday, March 9, 2012
Keep Calm and Query On is Available!
I'm thrilled that KEEP CALM AND QUERY ON: NOTES ON WRITING (AND LIVING) WITH HOPE is officially out! So grateful to John Dufresne for writing the Foreword; and to Francisco Stork, Ej Levy, Betsy Lerner, and Sarah Stone for offering kind words of endorsement; and to the many writers who allowed me to interview them for the book!
On another note, here is a fascinating video exploring the delightful resurfacing of the WWII slogan, sent to me by Kathy Erskine and John Dufresne. Worth three minutes of time, to be sure!
On another note, here is a fascinating video exploring the delightful resurfacing of the WWII slogan, sent to me by Kathy Erskine and John Dufresne. Worth three minutes of time, to be sure!
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Creating from a Place of Compassion and Love
I first met my good friend Wade Austin when Jennifer and I moved to Flagstaff, Arizona from 2006-2008. One of those rare people who exudes both authenticity and joy, Wade has since been a remarkable friend, brother, encourager, challenger, and someone whom I deeply admire. In addition to many other talents and abilities, Wade is a gifted pianist and composer. Recently, I asked Wade if he could respond to some questions about his process of creation and creativity, as well as share some of his originally composed music (three YouTube videos follow the interview).
What inspires you most to create music?
Wow, great question: I would say several things inspire me. 1) Is hearing good music. When I hear good music, I ask myself and analyze what about that song do I like. For example it could be a good chord progression or an impressive melody, or excellent use of tension and release. Than I try to use it in my own music. 2) I also feel inspired when someone needs something. For example, if one of my friends needs a song for their wedding, or if they need a song to help them through a hard time. I feel very inspired to write.
When did you first fall in love with writing music?
I believe that in high school I first fell in love with writing music. While most people stand on the earth and watch the sun rise, I believe artists stand on the moon and watch the earth rise. It is a double edge sword, because artists get a unique perspective of the world, but they also tend to feel alone and misunderstood. Music allowed me to express hidden feelings and also share my perspective. In grief there is so much beauty. I believe that there is such a thin line between pure beauty and grief, and music walks that line perfectly. This is the aspect of music that I fell most in love with.
Can you share a story about a song you've written and the personal experiences out of which it arose?
There is a song I wrote for a wedding. The bride to be lost her brother and I felt like she really wished that her brother could be there. So, in this song I told a story about a woman/the bride who has a deep pain and she is embarrassed to bring this pain into the marriage. Later the fiance says I have pain of my own and I understand how you feel but with my strength I will carry your burden. In the future, the husband has his own burden, but the wife is free of her pain, but she never forgets. I can't play that song without tears coming to my eyes. It also reminds me of how God loves us. Despite whatever we bring to the relationship he loves us anyway. He also helps us get through our deepest grief.
What are your greatest joys and deepest lows when you work on music?
My greatest joy about music is seeing someone heal because of the music I was inspired to write. My greatest joy is when someone says, "I know exactly what that song meant," or "that song helped me through this hard time." My deepest low is when I struggle with feelings of inadequacy. I feel like the music I write is stupid, or people think that I am an amateur writer. It's difficult to compose when those feelings are haunting your mind.
What advice would you share with others who aspire to write music and share their work with audiences?
I would say never quit. Make sure that you always write for yourself. It is tempting to write something that will be popular or that people will like. I guess that is necessary sometimes, but always write something that you enjoy and blesses you.
Can you tell us about the song(s) to which the link or links go?
I put three songs on the web, and they are all songs that I wrote for my wife. They are all about different times of her life.
One of the songs is called "Orphaned Child." This song has special meaning because this is one of the songs to which we first fell in love. She asked me to write music to lyrics she wrote. After I shared the song with her, it blessed her tremendously. It was a crazy spiritual connection. We later walked down the aisle to that song.
The second song is called "Southern Belle." This song captures her experience as a missionary in Louisiana.
The third song is called "Celeste Movement I." This song captures a time in her life when she lost a good friend of hers in a car accident.
"Orphaned Child"
"Southern Belle"
"Celeste Movement I"
What inspires you most to create music?
Wow, great question: I would say several things inspire me. 1) Is hearing good music. When I hear good music, I ask myself and analyze what about that song do I like. For example it could be a good chord progression or an impressive melody, or excellent use of tension and release. Than I try to use it in my own music. 2) I also feel inspired when someone needs something. For example, if one of my friends needs a song for their wedding, or if they need a song to help them through a hard time. I feel very inspired to write.
When did you first fall in love with writing music?
I believe that in high school I first fell in love with writing music. While most people stand on the earth and watch the sun rise, I believe artists stand on the moon and watch the earth rise. It is a double edge sword, because artists get a unique perspective of the world, but they also tend to feel alone and misunderstood. Music allowed me to express hidden feelings and also share my perspective. In grief there is so much beauty. I believe that there is such a thin line between pure beauty and grief, and music walks that line perfectly. This is the aspect of music that I fell most in love with.
Can you share a story about a song you've written and the personal experiences out of which it arose?
There is a song I wrote for a wedding. The bride to be lost her brother and I felt like she really wished that her brother could be there. So, in this song I told a story about a woman/the bride who has a deep pain and she is embarrassed to bring this pain into the marriage. Later the fiance says I have pain of my own and I understand how you feel but with my strength I will carry your burden. In the future, the husband has his own burden, but the wife is free of her pain, but she never forgets. I can't play that song without tears coming to my eyes. It also reminds me of how God loves us. Despite whatever we bring to the relationship he loves us anyway. He also helps us get through our deepest grief.
What are your greatest joys and deepest lows when you work on music?
My greatest joy about music is seeing someone heal because of the music I was inspired to write. My greatest joy is when someone says, "I know exactly what that song meant," or "that song helped me through this hard time." My deepest low is when I struggle with feelings of inadequacy. I feel like the music I write is stupid, or people think that I am an amateur writer. It's difficult to compose when those feelings are haunting your mind.
What advice would you share with others who aspire to write music and share their work with audiences?
I would say never quit. Make sure that you always write for yourself. It is tempting to write something that will be popular or that people will like. I guess that is necessary sometimes, but always write something that you enjoy and blesses you.
Can you tell us about the song(s) to which the link or links go?
I put three songs on the web, and they are all songs that I wrote for my wife. They are all about different times of her life.
One of the songs is called "Orphaned Child." This song has special meaning because this is one of the songs to which we first fell in love. She asked me to write music to lyrics she wrote. After I shared the song with her, it blessed her tremendously. It was a crazy spiritual connection. We later walked down the aisle to that song.
The second song is called "Southern Belle." This song captures her experience as a missionary in Louisiana.
The third song is called "Celeste Movement I." This song captures a time in her life when she lost a good friend of hers in a car accident.
"Orphaned Child"
"Southern Belle"
"Celeste Movement I"
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Synthesis (Or, 4:30am; Revision; Shaving)
When I taught Freshmen Composition at Northern Arizona University, I loved the Synthesis Essay. Teaching the Synthesis Essay was like letting my hands sit under a waterfall of endlessly flowing, gentle, warm, slightly-sudsy, lavender-smelling water.
Consider: synthesis is all about taking one thing and adding it to another and then saying, huh, check out what happened when we did that. But synthesis doesn't stop there. Synthesis--like a true champion--goes the extra round, It says, let's add a third thing and see what that does to the combination of the first two.
Synthesis then amazes even itself by saying (sometimes) let's add a fourth thing. Or a fifth. Or--gasp--a sixth. And in the process of adding all these new entities, the property we began with changes entirely, takes on new meaning, new symbolism, new smell.
Now that Tyler is in the midst of a nap, after waking at 4:30 this morning, and I have a large mug of strong fair-trade Sidamo beside me, I'm in the mood for Synthesis. I turn to Synthesis like you might turn to a good friend and put your arm around his shoulders, then stick your index finger inside of his inner ear, wiggle it around. When he turns to you and says, Dude! I asked you not to do that, like, seven times already! You respond, with that knowing smile, Ah! Yes! But those other seven times, I was using a different finger, so I have not used any of those other fingers in this most recent inner-ear wiggling. It's a new finger!
So: sleep-deprived and ready for the great nature of our friend Synthesis, let's begin.
Synthesis: Thanks for that introduction, Luke.
Me: You are welcome, Synthesis. It's nice to have you here in our kitchen. Would you like a cup of coffee?
Synthesis: Don't mock me. You know I have no throat. Or intestines.
Me: (Nodding gravely and with respect.)
Synthesis: So. You asked me here to do some work for you. What are we using me for today?
Me: Three events. Small events, really. First, waking up at 4:30 am. Second, the nature and act of revision. Third, Shaving.
Synthesis: Okay. Just three?
Me: Yes.
Synthesis: Okay. Easy as making a Jell-O mold with no artificial flavoring and adding some finely chopped, then ground, walnuts to the top in the shape of very tiny hearts. Then, applying a thin layer of peanuts--also finely chopped and ground--on top of those walnuts--just to say, hey, Walnuts, it's not always about you. Learn to play the FOUNDATIONAL role too, not just the role of glory. Haven't you ever heard that moving line from "Eye of the Tiger": you trade your passion for glory? Walnuts, you are seriously in danger of doing so.
Walnuts: Hey, I wasn't bothering anybody. I don't want to be a part of this whole Synthesis thing. Just let me go back to sleep.
Me: If I can't sleep, nobody gets to sleep.
Walnuts: Tyler is sleeping.
Me: I meant, nobody in this kitchen gets to sleep.
Walnuts: (Nods knowingly, respecting the authority of the master-of-the-kitchen-at-this-moment.)
Synthesis: Okay, here we go. Waking up at 4:30 is hard. I'm not going to lie, Luke. It's tough stuff. Your body craves more sleep. You count the four hours of rest you've gotten, and your mind rightly declares: No. No, I will not move forward in this state. And if that were all there was to it, your mind would win the day. Game over. But to your mind's declaration, you add Revision. You add the powerful truths so beautifully expressed here, in this blog by children's author Pat Zietlow Miller.
And you realize that the actual waking up at 4:30 am this morning isn't the whole story. It's only one piece of the story. One chapter. The cool thing is, you get to revise it. Even as the day goes on, you get to revise why you woke at 4:30. You get to revise the time you'll go to sleep tonight in order to get a more human quota of hours. 4:30 isn't the final word. It's only a scene from the picture book of your life, buddy.
And then we add Shaving. Yes. How I wish I could shave! But I cannot. I have no throat, after all. And no cheeks. But Luke, you consider the ways in which your three-year old son helps you hold the bottom of the razor, watching in amazement as the hair falls from your stubble-beard and leaves your face looking clean, fresh, exhausted. You watch your sons eyes. You listen to him say, "I do not have a beard so I do not shave. But when I get big like you I will shave too." And you realize that the wake-up doesn't feel as hard. That the revision starts to feel possible, exciting even. The Shaving marries those first two activities and creates a third, entirely feasible, reality: life is about balance. Some mornings, you will wake and feel exhausted. Some mornings, you will wake and feel ready to do one-hundred jumps on the trampoline of your soul. Other mornings, it's an in-between mixture.
But you take what has happened--the 4:30 wake ups of your life--you add the possibility of revision, and you lather a thick layer of shaving cream all over that and say, Yes, there are going to be moments of such startling joy and mundane delight that the balance of it all will somehow work itself out.
And then you go on living the rest of your day. Including me, of course, in everything you do.
Me: Thank you Synthesis. Really. I appreciate your words very much.
Synthesis: I know.
Me: Yes. Are you sure you wouldn't like some coffee?
Synthesis: Mock me once, shame on me. Mock me twice, shame on--wait a minute, we can add those two instances of your mocking me and...
Walnuts: I feel like I'm invisible, like no one ever really SEES me, you know?
Consider: synthesis is all about taking one thing and adding it to another and then saying, huh, check out what happened when we did that. But synthesis doesn't stop there. Synthesis--like a true champion--goes the extra round, It says, let's add a third thing and see what that does to the combination of the first two.
Synthesis then amazes even itself by saying (sometimes) let's add a fourth thing. Or a fifth. Or--gasp--a sixth. And in the process of adding all these new entities, the property we began with changes entirely, takes on new meaning, new symbolism, new smell.
Now that Tyler is in the midst of a nap, after waking at 4:30 this morning, and I have a large mug of strong fair-trade Sidamo beside me, I'm in the mood for Synthesis. I turn to Synthesis like you might turn to a good friend and put your arm around his shoulders, then stick your index finger inside of his inner ear, wiggle it around. When he turns to you and says, Dude! I asked you not to do that, like, seven times already! You respond, with that knowing smile, Ah! Yes! But those other seven times, I was using a different finger, so I have not used any of those other fingers in this most recent inner-ear wiggling. It's a new finger!
So: sleep-deprived and ready for the great nature of our friend Synthesis, let's begin.
Synthesis: Thanks for that introduction, Luke.
Me: You are welcome, Synthesis. It's nice to have you here in our kitchen. Would you like a cup of coffee?
Synthesis: Don't mock me. You know I have no throat. Or intestines.
Me: (Nodding gravely and with respect.)
Synthesis: So. You asked me here to do some work for you. What are we using me for today?
Me: Three events. Small events, really. First, waking up at 4:30 am. Second, the nature and act of revision. Third, Shaving.
Synthesis: Okay. Just three?
Me: Yes.
Synthesis: Okay. Easy as making a Jell-O mold with no artificial flavoring and adding some finely chopped, then ground, walnuts to the top in the shape of very tiny hearts. Then, applying a thin layer of peanuts--also finely chopped and ground--on top of those walnuts--just to say, hey, Walnuts, it's not always about you. Learn to play the FOUNDATIONAL role too, not just the role of glory. Haven't you ever heard that moving line from "Eye of the Tiger": you trade your passion for glory? Walnuts, you are seriously in danger of doing so.
Walnuts: Hey, I wasn't bothering anybody. I don't want to be a part of this whole Synthesis thing. Just let me go back to sleep.
Me: If I can't sleep, nobody gets to sleep.
Walnuts: Tyler is sleeping.
Me: I meant, nobody in this kitchen gets to sleep.
Walnuts: (Nods knowingly, respecting the authority of the master-of-the-kitchen-at-this-moment.)
Synthesis: Okay, here we go. Waking up at 4:30 is hard. I'm not going to lie, Luke. It's tough stuff. Your body craves more sleep. You count the four hours of rest you've gotten, and your mind rightly declares: No. No, I will not move forward in this state. And if that were all there was to it, your mind would win the day. Game over. But to your mind's declaration, you add Revision. You add the powerful truths so beautifully expressed here, in this blog by children's author Pat Zietlow Miller.
And you realize that the actual waking up at 4:30 am this morning isn't the whole story. It's only one piece of the story. One chapter. The cool thing is, you get to revise it. Even as the day goes on, you get to revise why you woke at 4:30. You get to revise the time you'll go to sleep tonight in order to get a more human quota of hours. 4:30 isn't the final word. It's only a scene from the picture book of your life, buddy.
And then we add Shaving. Yes. How I wish I could shave! But I cannot. I have no throat, after all. And no cheeks. But Luke, you consider the ways in which your three-year old son helps you hold the bottom of the razor, watching in amazement as the hair falls from your stubble-beard and leaves your face looking clean, fresh, exhausted. You watch your sons eyes. You listen to him say, "I do not have a beard so I do not shave. But when I get big like you I will shave too." And you realize that the wake-up doesn't feel as hard. That the revision starts to feel possible, exciting even. The Shaving marries those first two activities and creates a third, entirely feasible, reality: life is about balance. Some mornings, you will wake and feel exhausted. Some mornings, you will wake and feel ready to do one-hundred jumps on the trampoline of your soul. Other mornings, it's an in-between mixture.
But you take what has happened--the 4:30 wake ups of your life--you add the possibility of revision, and you lather a thick layer of shaving cream all over that and say, Yes, there are going to be moments of such startling joy and mundane delight that the balance of it all will somehow work itself out.
And then you go on living the rest of your day. Including me, of course, in everything you do.
Me: Thank you Synthesis. Really. I appreciate your words very much.
Synthesis: I know.
Me: Yes. Are you sure you wouldn't like some coffee?
Synthesis: Mock me once, shame on me. Mock me twice, shame on--wait a minute, we can add those two instances of your mocking me and...
Walnuts: I feel like I'm invisible, like no one ever really SEES me, you know?
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Early Doors
The night began with two of my "woods" going clear off the indoor lawn mat. Usually, at bowls, I can manage to get close enough to the jack--the tiny yellow ball we're all trying to sidle up next to--to make the game interesting. This particular night, though, I was all over the place, unable to find that groove and bowl with a sense of peace.
Tony, a man in his early seventies, comes beside me and puts his arm around my shoulders. He smiles big. We're on opposing teams tonight, though that doesn't stop him from sending a little encouragement my way.
"We have an old saying in South Yorkshire, Luke." He smiles even wider and squeezes my shoulders again.
"Yeah?" I ask, glad for anything to take my mind off my egregious bowling tonight.
"Early doors." Then Tony tilts his head back and laughs like those two words unlock some kind of deep secret of the universe. I laugh, too, even though he might as well have said pumpkin pie for all I can figure.
He notes the quizzical look on my face. Tony always wears a sweater with a collared shirt beneath. As do most of the guys who bowl. They wear ties, ironed and pleated khakis and shoes that shine like the moon on a night that is the purest black we know. I think momentarily of my grandfather, Harold Fenton, who spent his own life building houses all over Bloomfield, Connecticut. Worked from sun-up to sun-down and held a hammer as if it was a permanent appendage. Now, Grandpa wears a shirt and tie every day of his life.
"I never had to wear one in all my work, now it's nice to do so," Grandpa once told me.
And I look at Tony, wondering what he used his forty years of work to do--building, teaching, banking, doctoring, parenting? All the bowling men come dressed like it's a banquet; they bowl ready to meet the most important audience of their lives.
Tony's smile warms me. It welcomes me in like Grandpa's, like grace.
"Early doors simply means that it's only the beginning, Luke. It means, don't worry about it--the game is long. Things change." Tony winks at me, straightens his collar, and collects his next wood to roll it down the mat.
It stops leaning against the jack. He smiles wide.
With my next wood, I end up alongside him, a measure for who's closest to the jack. "There you go, kid," he tells me.
Another wink.
As we walk to the other end of the mat, I take stock of my own sweater and collared shirt beneath it. My own khakis. Granted, mine are un-ironed, and purchased from a charity shop for about four pounds in total. But these guys are rubbing off on me. It's a long cry from when I came to bowls dressed in my pajama pants, a T-shirt and hiking boots.
Something about them suggests that every moment is important--and why waste a single one not preparing for the banquet, not preparing for the finest introduction you might ever have?
Early doors.
And throughout the rest of the evening, each time a wood rolls away off the mat, it's all I can think. Early doors. And the truth is that it's all early doors. Even late in the game, there's still time. It's something a guy like Tony--in his seventies, knows.
It's something I imagine all these bowling guys know: that's it's never too late. Never too late to turn the game around with a wood that saunters up to the jack and hangs close. Never too late to become the kind of father you always wanted to be. Never too late to write the kind of book you always hoped you had inside of you. Never too late to start believing that the mistakes of our pasts don't need to be imbibed for the duration of our future.
Or, as George Eliot put it, more eloquently, "It's never too late to be what you might have been."
As I consider the wonder of whether a book I write will ever make it out into the big wide world, doing well enough to help support our family, or whether I'll learn to be the kind of father who discerns those two poles of love, grace and truth, with great clarity, or whether this journey we're on is more logic than craze, more faith than fear--as I consider all these possibilities, I know Tony's words are true. Early doors.
No matter how much time passes, the thing is to keep playing, to keep believing that this next time down the mat, you just might dance with the jack. And if not, there's always another bowl inside of you. Inside of me. No matter how many chances we've squandered before.
Each time down, hope beckons us to consider the possibility anew.
Tony, a man in his early seventies, comes beside me and puts his arm around my shoulders. He smiles big. We're on opposing teams tonight, though that doesn't stop him from sending a little encouragement my way.
"We have an old saying in South Yorkshire, Luke." He smiles even wider and squeezes my shoulders again.
"Yeah?" I ask, glad for anything to take my mind off my egregious bowling tonight.
"Early doors." Then Tony tilts his head back and laughs like those two words unlock some kind of deep secret of the universe. I laugh, too, even though he might as well have said pumpkin pie for all I can figure.
He notes the quizzical look on my face. Tony always wears a sweater with a collared shirt beneath. As do most of the guys who bowl. They wear ties, ironed and pleated khakis and shoes that shine like the moon on a night that is the purest black we know. I think momentarily of my grandfather, Harold Fenton, who spent his own life building houses all over Bloomfield, Connecticut. Worked from sun-up to sun-down and held a hammer as if it was a permanent appendage. Now, Grandpa wears a shirt and tie every day of his life.
"I never had to wear one in all my work, now it's nice to do so," Grandpa once told me.
And I look at Tony, wondering what he used his forty years of work to do--building, teaching, banking, doctoring, parenting? All the bowling men come dressed like it's a banquet; they bowl ready to meet the most important audience of their lives.
Tony's smile warms me. It welcomes me in like Grandpa's, like grace.
"Early doors simply means that it's only the beginning, Luke. It means, don't worry about it--the game is long. Things change." Tony winks at me, straightens his collar, and collects his next wood to roll it down the mat.
It stops leaning against the jack. He smiles wide.
With my next wood, I end up alongside him, a measure for who's closest to the jack. "There you go, kid," he tells me.
Another wink.
As we walk to the other end of the mat, I take stock of my own sweater and collared shirt beneath it. My own khakis. Granted, mine are un-ironed, and purchased from a charity shop for about four pounds in total. But these guys are rubbing off on me. It's a long cry from when I came to bowls dressed in my pajama pants, a T-shirt and hiking boots.
Something about them suggests that every moment is important--and why waste a single one not preparing for the banquet, not preparing for the finest introduction you might ever have?
Early doors.
And throughout the rest of the evening, each time a wood rolls away off the mat, it's all I can think. Early doors. And the truth is that it's all early doors. Even late in the game, there's still time. It's something a guy like Tony--in his seventies, knows.
It's something I imagine all these bowling guys know: that's it's never too late. Never too late to turn the game around with a wood that saunters up to the jack and hangs close. Never too late to become the kind of father you always wanted to be. Never too late to write the kind of book you always hoped you had inside of you. Never too late to start believing that the mistakes of our pasts don't need to be imbibed for the duration of our future.
Or, as George Eliot put it, more eloquently, "It's never too late to be what you might have been."
As I consider the wonder of whether a book I write will ever make it out into the big wide world, doing well enough to help support our family, or whether I'll learn to be the kind of father who discerns those two poles of love, grace and truth, with great clarity, or whether this journey we're on is more logic than craze, more faith than fear--as I consider all these possibilities, I know Tony's words are true. Early doors.
No matter how much time passes, the thing is to keep playing, to keep believing that this next time down the mat, you just might dance with the jack. And if not, there's always another bowl inside of you. Inside of me. No matter how many chances we've squandered before.
Each time down, hope beckons us to consider the possibility anew.
Thursday, December 8, 2011
How We Know
This is the sound a poem makes:
Flapping wings pushing air;
But the air, too:
Fleeing for new space.
A poem aches
With the kind of grace
That arrives only from
Suffering we can taste.
Because our hunger is so acute.
So finite.
In one number,
A poem moves a thousand ways--
Dancing not just for me or you.
It has to: unanalyzed.
We know when we meet it
Because its stubborness
Is quiet, unrelenting--
As our stomachs, hearts.
Flapping wings pushing air;
But the air, too:
Fleeing for new space.
A poem aches
With the kind of grace
That arrives only from
Suffering we can taste.
Because our hunger is so acute.
So finite.
In one number,
A poem moves a thousand ways--
Dancing not just for me or you.
It has to: unanalyzed.
We know when we meet it
Because its stubborness
Is quiet, unrelenting--
As our stomachs, hearts.
Thursday, December 1, 2011
A Safe Place
Tonight, during the tea break at Bowls, I sat next to a man named Trevor who is in the early stages of Alzheimer's. He smiles. he looks at me when I ask questions--watches my forehead, then my eyes. His face searches, and then he answers, sometimes with the same responses over and over.
Each time, I give him a thumbs up and smile wide. Trevor returns the thumbs up to me.
Around us, older men and women drink their tea, take small bites of their biscuits. The heating in the church hall is on. Strong. Tonight, we are forecasted a freeze.
In a few minutes, when we all rise from our chairs and play the second hour of Bowls, the subtle teasing begins. If I am playing well, it's "Let's buy the American a ticket back to his own country." If I am playing poorly, it's "Square woods tonight, oy ay?" And then a chuckle.
A chuckle that is safe.
Safe for a man like Trevor.
Safe for a man like me.
Safe for a whole army of the elderly who gather here each Thursday to send a ball down an indoor lawn mat, fully knowing that with each bowl, they affirm their belief in the power of life moving on. The power of themselves, to keep believing in the beauty even after knees are replaced, bones are mended, brains slowly fail.
They gather like a crowd around a fire on a cold night camping. They warm their hands on the hearth of camaraderie and fun. And I'm grateful to tag along, a few decades early, and be a part of their circle.
Each time, I give him a thumbs up and smile wide. Trevor returns the thumbs up to me.
Around us, older men and women drink their tea, take small bites of their biscuits. The heating in the church hall is on. Strong. Tonight, we are forecasted a freeze.
In a few minutes, when we all rise from our chairs and play the second hour of Bowls, the subtle teasing begins. If I am playing well, it's "Let's buy the American a ticket back to his own country." If I am playing poorly, it's "Square woods tonight, oy ay?" And then a chuckle.
A chuckle that is safe.
Safe for a man like Trevor.
Safe for a man like me.
Safe for a whole army of the elderly who gather here each Thursday to send a ball down an indoor lawn mat, fully knowing that with each bowl, they affirm their belief in the power of life moving on. The power of themselves, to keep believing in the beauty even after knees are replaced, bones are mended, brains slowly fail.
They gather like a crowd around a fire on a cold night camping. They warm their hands on the hearth of camaraderie and fun. And I'm grateful to tag along, a few decades early, and be a part of their circle.
Saturday, October 22, 2011
The Long View
It had been over a month since I'd been to the Fulford Bowls Club--a collection of men over 65 who play indoor lawn bowling. (And one 30-year old American.) Life has been pretty hectic lately, with Tyler fighting cold after cold, sleeping through the night a thing of legend and lore, and allergy attacks gathering around me like I'm a never-ending supply of sticky notes for a highly organized person.
So attending the Thursday night bowling just didn't make the list of Must Do in Order to Survive.
But this past Thursday, I attended again.
Ten years ago, I ran the London Marathon with my oldest brother, Christopher. By mile 20, the two of us were Jell-O men, stumbling forward under the weight of gravity and lunacy, in equal parts. Walking into Bowls last Thursday, my legs felt similarly. I wanted to keel over a few times--or at least just bowl from a chair.
But as I looked around, I felt heartened. So many older men welcomed me back. Told me they missed me. We shook hands. Talked about the weather. Talked about the wars they had fought in fifty, sixty years ago. Talked about bowls.
Always about bowls.
Ah, good wood there, mate!
Just ease up to the Jack. Bring it straight round there.
Oh, ay! That's a Yorkshireman's delight right there.
Every time down the green fake-lawn mat, these older men smiled with joy at the smallest attempt, the closest call, the possible point.
The thrill. Even of indoor lawn bowling.
And I was struck by something my soul was in desperate need of: the long view.
I talked with Ken, one of the men who landed on the beaches at Normandy when he was only 18 years old as a conscript of the British Army. He was paid twelve pence a day. By contrast, American soldiers during World War II were paid the equivalent of four pounds a week. Ken was making 84 pence a week. And he served at the invasion, then for two years in Palestine during terrible battles there. In both places, he was wounded.
Now, Ken smiles with ease. He jokes. He laughs.
Ken has survived. He has taken the long view of life, realizing that we pass through immeasurable difficulty and confusion and fear and sometimes horror, but somehow, we survive. And when we do, we keep on walking the path that falls before our feet.
I talked with Tony, who described how his four-year old daughter (now 39) would wake up screaming night after night after night. For six months. He and his wife had just had another baby, and between the four-year old screaming, the newborn with terrible colic, Tony and his wife had zero sleep. Literally. I watched Tony's face as he recalled the time.
"How did you make it through?" I ask, wanting to glean some kind of wisdom for our own sleep trouble with Tyler of late.
Tony shook his head, looked at me, and smiled. "The thing is, our daughters are beautiful human beings. You just have to love them through the hard stages and remember that you might always know what the hard stages are about, but they pass." Then, Tony smiled and patted me on the back.
The long view.
During the eight o' clock tea break, I talked with Henry, who lives and breathes bowls now, as a seventy-year old man. His face rose and fell like an ocean of glee as he described the five Bowling Clubs of which he is a part. The different match-ups, the visiting teams, what bowls means to him and how it gives him a place to belong.
And I couldn't help but think, here's a seventy-year old man, and he has passion and joy. He looks forward to waking up each day, playing bowls almost every night. He;s not mourning his past, regretting the past 69 years. He's living his 70th.
The long view.
Walking back from St. Oswald's Church Hall at nine o' clock with the wind whipping cold across my ears, hands, all I could think, over and over, was the long view.
I am often so accustomed to contemplating the short view. What is happening now? What if this or that circumstance doesn't work out? What if this hard stage lasts forever?
Such are questions that the vocabulary of the Long View doesn't know or acknowledge.
In bowls, you might have an incredible turn: your ball might land square next to the Jack, lean against it like there's nothing in the world that will take that point away from you. But then another player gets up and knocks your ball completely off the mat. Your point is gone. Lost.
Alternately, you may bowl a ball that is as far away from the Jack as ice from fire. But then another player takes a turn and inadvertently slices your ball, knocks it square next to the Jack. One point.
You never know. The game changes moment by moment. Like life. And you can't play by giving so much power to each turn that you lose the thread of the game.
You can't live by lending so much significance to every circumstance that you lose the narrative of your own arc.
It's what the men at Bowls are teaching me. It's what I am slowly learning to do--slowly learning how to see. The Long View doesn't throw away the moments, nor does it anxiously plan and prepare for the future. Instead, it simply approaches the present with open hands, receives it, but does not allow any present moment to crush or signify the worth of existence. The worth of a life is much more valuable than any one thing, much more authentic than any sound bit, no matter how treacherous or beautiful.
Because what is most miraculous about our lives of it all is this: the story. It's not the sentence that decides our fate, nor the chapter. These are but a part of the narrative. The story as a whole is what matters. The mistakes I have made before, the patterns of fear I may have allowed to beat in unison with my heart--these do not signify the substance of the novel of my life. Nor yours.
The Long View tells us to wait and see. Keep living. Keep going. Keep bowling. The next time down the lawn mat, we may just end up with an incredible bowl, one that we would have missed had we been caught lamenting our last turn.
So attending the Thursday night bowling just didn't make the list of Must Do in Order to Survive.
But this past Thursday, I attended again.
Ten years ago, I ran the London Marathon with my oldest brother, Christopher. By mile 20, the two of us were Jell-O men, stumbling forward under the weight of gravity and lunacy, in equal parts. Walking into Bowls last Thursday, my legs felt similarly. I wanted to keel over a few times--or at least just bowl from a chair.
But as I looked around, I felt heartened. So many older men welcomed me back. Told me they missed me. We shook hands. Talked about the weather. Talked about the wars they had fought in fifty, sixty years ago. Talked about bowls.
Always about bowls.
Ah, good wood there, mate!
Just ease up to the Jack. Bring it straight round there.
Oh, ay! That's a Yorkshireman's delight right there.
Every time down the green fake-lawn mat, these older men smiled with joy at the smallest attempt, the closest call, the possible point.
The thrill. Even of indoor lawn bowling.
And I was struck by something my soul was in desperate need of: the long view.
I talked with Ken, one of the men who landed on the beaches at Normandy when he was only 18 years old as a conscript of the British Army. He was paid twelve pence a day. By contrast, American soldiers during World War II were paid the equivalent of four pounds a week. Ken was making 84 pence a week. And he served at the invasion, then for two years in Palestine during terrible battles there. In both places, he was wounded.
Now, Ken smiles with ease. He jokes. He laughs.
Ken has survived. He has taken the long view of life, realizing that we pass through immeasurable difficulty and confusion and fear and sometimes horror, but somehow, we survive. And when we do, we keep on walking the path that falls before our feet.
I talked with Tony, who described how his four-year old daughter (now 39) would wake up screaming night after night after night. For six months. He and his wife had just had another baby, and between the four-year old screaming, the newborn with terrible colic, Tony and his wife had zero sleep. Literally. I watched Tony's face as he recalled the time.
"How did you make it through?" I ask, wanting to glean some kind of wisdom for our own sleep trouble with Tyler of late.
Tony shook his head, looked at me, and smiled. "The thing is, our daughters are beautiful human beings. You just have to love them through the hard stages and remember that you might always know what the hard stages are about, but they pass." Then, Tony smiled and patted me on the back.
The long view.
During the eight o' clock tea break, I talked with Henry, who lives and breathes bowls now, as a seventy-year old man. His face rose and fell like an ocean of glee as he described the five Bowling Clubs of which he is a part. The different match-ups, the visiting teams, what bowls means to him and how it gives him a place to belong.
And I couldn't help but think, here's a seventy-year old man, and he has passion and joy. He looks forward to waking up each day, playing bowls almost every night. He;s not mourning his past, regretting the past 69 years. He's living his 70th.
The long view.
Walking back from St. Oswald's Church Hall at nine o' clock with the wind whipping cold across my ears, hands, all I could think, over and over, was the long view.
I am often so accustomed to contemplating the short view. What is happening now? What if this or that circumstance doesn't work out? What if this hard stage lasts forever?
Such are questions that the vocabulary of the Long View doesn't know or acknowledge.
In bowls, you might have an incredible turn: your ball might land square next to the Jack, lean against it like there's nothing in the world that will take that point away from you. But then another player gets up and knocks your ball completely off the mat. Your point is gone. Lost.
Alternately, you may bowl a ball that is as far away from the Jack as ice from fire. But then another player takes a turn and inadvertently slices your ball, knocks it square next to the Jack. One point.
You never know. The game changes moment by moment. Like life. And you can't play by giving so much power to each turn that you lose the thread of the game.
You can't live by lending so much significance to every circumstance that you lose the narrative of your own arc.
It's what the men at Bowls are teaching me. It's what I am slowly learning to do--slowly learning how to see. The Long View doesn't throw away the moments, nor does it anxiously plan and prepare for the future. Instead, it simply approaches the present with open hands, receives it, but does not allow any present moment to crush or signify the worth of existence. The worth of a life is much more valuable than any one thing, much more authentic than any sound bit, no matter how treacherous or beautiful.
Because what is most miraculous about our lives of it all is this: the story. It's not the sentence that decides our fate, nor the chapter. These are but a part of the narrative. The story as a whole is what matters. The mistakes I have made before, the patterns of fear I may have allowed to beat in unison with my heart--these do not signify the substance of the novel of my life. Nor yours.
The Long View tells us to wait and see. Keep living. Keep going. Keep bowling. The next time down the lawn mat, we may just end up with an incredible bowl, one that we would have missed had we been caught lamenting our last turn.
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Writing with Enthusiasm
Say that something's in the air: the changing of seasons, exhaust from the cars, baby gifts to the world as strollers (aka buggies) whirl past our little home on Lesley Avenue. Whatever the case, enthusiasm has been my best friend lately.
There are those days when the writing feels hard to begin. When e-mail seems a lot more exciting, or easier, and reworking that MG manuscript or picture book idea for the 21st time doesn't doesn't seem to possess the YES! that it sometimes does.
This past year in England, though, writing has become more of a Show Up endeavor. Specifically, this process of writing not by emotion but by will entails two parts:
1. Show up.
2. Write.
The more I show up at the computer each morning, afternoon, or night (depending on Tyler's sleep schedule), the more the Emotion, the Inspiration, and the YES! decide to join me. In other words, once those Lovely Three start to learn, hey, this guy's going to write his brains and heart out no matter what, it's like they decide, Okay, well, if he's that loyal, let's go give the guy some company.
And lately, enthusiasm has been pounding through my heart and fingers--even when I haven't recently poured myself a cup of strong-beyond-belief coffee.
Take today, for instance. After dropping Tyler off at pre-school this afternoon, I came home and went straight up to the computer. Before I checked e-mail--always the culprit that sucks time like a Hepa-Filter-Super-Powered-Vacuum-Cleaner--I opened up my MG work-in-progress, Fortress (about a Muilsim boy, a Jewish girl, a Christian owner of an old, falling-apart movie theater, a Grandmother with Alzheimer's who, only at three a.m., is struck coherent and relates a story about York, England from 1198 that involves King Richard the First, Robin Hood, the Crusades, and a little girl named Liljiana who loves flowers).
I wrote and I wrote and I wrote.
I wrote like my characters were no longer characters. As though the letters of my keyboard were very, very tiny orange lifesaving floats that I had to furiously press repeatedly to get them to reach the characters but then--
Oh no!
Something would inevitably happen and my characters had to find out how to deal with the new storm, the new joy, the new complexity.
All that to say, this afternoon, writing was not writing. Writing was living for a group of people whom I could watch being created by fingers that moved across the keyboard that were not my own.
I wish every writing day could be like today. But the ones that are not hold their own beauty, their own excitement. (Even if that excitement only happens to be a single line that is made right after forty attempts at the sucker.)
But man, I sure an grateful for days like today: when emotion and will mix and create one heck of a little baby.
There are those days when the writing feels hard to begin. When e-mail seems a lot more exciting, or easier, and reworking that MG manuscript or picture book idea for the 21st time doesn't doesn't seem to possess the YES! that it sometimes does.
This past year in England, though, writing has become more of a Show Up endeavor. Specifically, this process of writing not by emotion but by will entails two parts:
1. Show up.
2. Write.
The more I show up at the computer each morning, afternoon, or night (depending on Tyler's sleep schedule), the more the Emotion, the Inspiration, and the YES! decide to join me. In other words, once those Lovely Three start to learn, hey, this guy's going to write his brains and heart out no matter what, it's like they decide, Okay, well, if he's that loyal, let's go give the guy some company.
And lately, enthusiasm has been pounding through my heart and fingers--even when I haven't recently poured myself a cup of strong-beyond-belief coffee.
Take today, for instance. After dropping Tyler off at pre-school this afternoon, I came home and went straight up to the computer. Before I checked e-mail--always the culprit that sucks time like a Hepa-Filter-Super-Powered-Vacuum-Cleaner--I opened up my MG work-in-progress, Fortress (about a Muilsim boy, a Jewish girl, a Christian owner of an old, falling-apart movie theater, a Grandmother with Alzheimer's who, only at three a.m., is struck coherent and relates a story about York, England from 1198 that involves King Richard the First, Robin Hood, the Crusades, and a little girl named Liljiana who loves flowers).
I wrote and I wrote and I wrote.
I wrote like my characters were no longer characters. As though the letters of my keyboard were very, very tiny orange lifesaving floats that I had to furiously press repeatedly to get them to reach the characters but then--
Oh no!
Something would inevitably happen and my characters had to find out how to deal with the new storm, the new joy, the new complexity.
All that to say, this afternoon, writing was not writing. Writing was living for a group of people whom I could watch being created by fingers that moved across the keyboard that were not my own.
I wish every writing day could be like today. But the ones that are not hold their own beauty, their own excitement. (Even if that excitement only happens to be a single line that is made right after forty attempts at the sucker.)
But man, I sure an grateful for days like today: when emotion and will mix and create one heck of a little baby.
Sunday, October 16, 2011
It
We cut our fingernails,
Peel back the sleep from our eyes.
We pull the stray hairs off,
Watch them fall.
Crooked eyes make for
The straightest disguise:
We wear the face of humanity--
Our imperfect noises, ideas, cries.
In the face of despair,
We turn our tired eyes towards
Light.
However dark our lives,
We rise.
Against all logic,
all fear,
all confusion,
all despair.
We rise like rain
That bounces off rock:
Too bold too stay,
Too strong to remain.
Made for more than this,
More than superficial bliss,
We rise.
And while we stand,
The crooked of our pain remains,
But the straight of the sun dances
Like it's new again.
Like it's piercing holes in
Despair.
Like the Nothing that we
Worshipped was a sham.
(I wrote this poem while listening to the following song on YouTube over and over, and over and over, and over and over. And again. Hold Us Together by Matt Maher
Peel back the sleep from our eyes.
We pull the stray hairs off,
Watch them fall.
Crooked eyes make for
The straightest disguise:
We wear the face of humanity--
Our imperfect noises, ideas, cries.
In the face of despair,
We turn our tired eyes towards
Light.
However dark our lives,
We rise.
Against all logic,
all fear,
all confusion,
all despair.
We rise like rain
That bounces off rock:
Too bold too stay,
Too strong to remain.
Made for more than this,
More than superficial bliss,
We rise.
And while we stand,
The crooked of our pain remains,
But the straight of the sun dances
Like it's new again.
Like it's piercing holes in
Despair.
Like the Nothing that we
Worshipped was a sham.
(I wrote this poem while listening to the following song on YouTube over and over, and over and over, and over and over. And again. Hold Us Together by Matt Maher
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Prove What?
When I was in high school, the movie Rudy came out, and it instantly became one of my favorites. The fact that it was a true story. About a guy who had little natural ability, but who worked his butt off harder than anyone could have expected. That he made the Notre Dame football squad at five-foot nuthin;, a hundred and nuthin'...
And what I used to love about the movie, of course, was the final scene in which Rudy runs out onto the playing field for his glorious 27 seconds of actual Notre Dame football. The climax. The moment of victory.
Recently, I found a clip of the film that I love so much to use with my night Public Speaking course. The course explores growing confidence, belief in one's voice, and clarity. And I realized that I wanted the learners in that course to sense that it isn't the result--the official outcome--that matters most, but rather the way we carry ourselves--the way we speak, live, and believe that really matters.
And so I didn't show the final, climactic scene: the 27 seconds of glory.
Instead, I chose the clip where Rudy finally realizes (through the remarkable speech of a friend) that not quitting is the victory. Choosing to keep going is the victory. Realizing that he doesn't have to prove anything to anyone but himself is the victory.
Three minute speech. A lifetime of truth. Check it out.
And what I used to love about the movie, of course, was the final scene in which Rudy runs out onto the playing field for his glorious 27 seconds of actual Notre Dame football. The climax. The moment of victory.
Recently, I found a clip of the film that I love so much to use with my night Public Speaking course. The course explores growing confidence, belief in one's voice, and clarity. And I realized that I wanted the learners in that course to sense that it isn't the result--the official outcome--that matters most, but rather the way we carry ourselves--the way we speak, live, and believe that really matters.
And so I didn't show the final, climactic scene: the 27 seconds of glory.
Instead, I chose the clip where Rudy finally realizes (through the remarkable speech of a friend) that not quitting is the victory. Choosing to keep going is the victory. Realizing that he doesn't have to prove anything to anyone but himself is the victory.
Three minute speech. A lifetime of truth. Check it out.
Friday, July 15, 2011
Purple Man
We first met him seven months ago, after we had been in York for only a couple of months. Fraught with the culture shock, not-having-a-car-shock, and a general litany of other shocks (as small as no discussion of American politics to an inability to find a number of American books we wanted to read), our early time in York certainly left us with the lingering question, What in the heck have we done!?
And in response to this question, there was Purple Man. (See his website here.)
He rides an eternally immovable bike. (Purple.) He wears an endlessly blowing necktie. (Also purple.) His face evidences a thin layer of stubble and a massive smile. (Yes: purple.)
We see him most frequently on Stonegate, embodying the very essence of joy as he sits atop his bike, first fixed, then moving to say hello to some tourist visiting York, only to bring them closer, whisper conspiratorially, and then raise his bucket of paint and paintbrush.
"Would you like me to paint your hair?" he asks, in such a kind voice and with such a clever smile that no tourist--or local, for that matter--can resist.
The cameras flash. The Flip videos record. An audience of onlookers raise their hands to their mouths.
It wasn't until after Purple Man had painted Tyler's, Jennifer's, and my hair that we realized the paint on his brush is dry. He smiles with glee at the excitement of it all--the uncertainty as to whether or not you've actually been painted.
After the first time, Tyler began calling for Purple Man every time we went into the city.
"T-Man, what do you want to do in the city today?"
"I want to go see Purple Man."
"And then what?"
"Then I want to see Purple Man."
"And after we say hi to Purple Man, would you like to go to the library?"
"No, I just want to see Purple Man after I go to see Purple Man. We can do that one?"
"Sure."
And thus our little York experiment took on a new life. A new energy. Purple Man came to represent, for us, a kind of living that included telling any setbacks, Hey, Dude! Watch Out! We;re not giving up. We're not giving in. So what if we have to hang our clothes outside to dry in the rain? So what if we have to walk 45 minutes to church? So what if feeling a gas pedal beneath my right foot and getting somewhere--anywhere--fast feels like an impossible dream? We're sticking this one out. We're going purple.
Why else, after all, would someone decide to paint themselves purple, smile at people he doesn't know, and make them laugh? Why else but to share one small piece of something we all know to be true about this thing called life: joy.
Joy. We can most of us complain for hours on end about how hard certain events are, certain discomforts, certain having-to-do-withouts. But in the final analysis (whenever that is, and whether it takes place in a Graduate-level college classroom, or along some distant shore on a beach while the tide comes in) we've got a heck of a lot to be thankful for--a heck of lot of joy to embrace. For one thing: the color purple. (And yes, The Color Purple, too.)
Purple Man never gives advice on how to make it through the tough times. He doesn't wax poetic about the glimmers of hope or the cracks of despair. Nor does he recommend books, movies, or therapists.
He sits on his bikes, paints your hair purple, and smiles. Which, in my mind, is just about as good, if not better, most days.
Thanks, Purple Man.
And in response to this question, there was Purple Man. (See his website here.)
He rides an eternally immovable bike. (Purple.) He wears an endlessly blowing necktie. (Also purple.) His face evidences a thin layer of stubble and a massive smile. (Yes: purple.)
We see him most frequently on Stonegate, embodying the very essence of joy as he sits atop his bike, first fixed, then moving to say hello to some tourist visiting York, only to bring them closer, whisper conspiratorially, and then raise his bucket of paint and paintbrush.
"Would you like me to paint your hair?" he asks, in such a kind voice and with such a clever smile that no tourist--or local, for that matter--can resist.
The cameras flash. The Flip videos record. An audience of onlookers raise their hands to their mouths.
It wasn't until after Purple Man had painted Tyler's, Jennifer's, and my hair that we realized the paint on his brush is dry. He smiles with glee at the excitement of it all--the uncertainty as to whether or not you've actually been painted.
After the first time, Tyler began calling for Purple Man every time we went into the city.
"T-Man, what do you want to do in the city today?"
"I want to go see Purple Man."
"And then what?"
"Then I want to see Purple Man."
"And after we say hi to Purple Man, would you like to go to the library?"
"No, I just want to see Purple Man after I go to see Purple Man. We can do that one?"
"Sure."
And thus our little York experiment took on a new life. A new energy. Purple Man came to represent, for us, a kind of living that included telling any setbacks, Hey, Dude! Watch Out! We;re not giving up. We're not giving in. So what if we have to hang our clothes outside to dry in the rain? So what if we have to walk 45 minutes to church? So what if feeling a gas pedal beneath my right foot and getting somewhere--anywhere--fast feels like an impossible dream? We're sticking this one out. We're going purple.
Why else, after all, would someone decide to paint themselves purple, smile at people he doesn't know, and make them laugh? Why else but to share one small piece of something we all know to be true about this thing called life: joy.
Joy. We can most of us complain for hours on end about how hard certain events are, certain discomforts, certain having-to-do-withouts. But in the final analysis (whenever that is, and whether it takes place in a Graduate-level college classroom, or along some distant shore on a beach while the tide comes in) we've got a heck of a lot to be thankful for--a heck of lot of joy to embrace. For one thing: the color purple. (And yes, The Color Purple, too.)
Purple Man never gives advice on how to make it through the tough times. He doesn't wax poetic about the glimmers of hope or the cracks of despair. Nor does he recommend books, movies, or therapists.
He sits on his bikes, paints your hair purple, and smiles. Which, in my mind, is just about as good, if not better, most days.
Thanks, Purple Man.
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