“one of these things is not like the others. one of these things just doesn’t belong.” (sesame street song – joe raposo/jon stone)
we tend to be different. not like the others. it never really surprises us.
we are holey-jeans-wearing-black-shirt-donning-boot-walking-long-hair artist types. so, walking down the streets of most towns, we sort of stand out – we are not wearing corporate clothes, neat-and-tidy clothes, fancy clothes.
there are towns – however – where we fit in a tiny bit better. they are mountain towns on off-days. these are days when the tourist population is down, the sidewalks are not full of louis vuitton and lululemon, the spots next to the curb aren’t proliferated with expensive vehicle logos. they are quieter days. and we stroll on the sidewalks and feel like we fit in.
we looked up the meaning of hippy. i’d like to ignore the “large hips” definition and skip directly to the “hippie/hippy” meaning. and then, i’ll just parse out the relevant stuff – gentle ideology that favors peace and love and personal freedom. yup. that’s the stuff.
it was just after we had been alerted multiple times – in chorus with every other person – in line or seated – who had a cellphone in breckfast, a busy eatery on the north end of this high mountain town – that there was an active shooter less than six minutes up the main road. we were pretty stunned, thinking that this beautiful place – with fresh air and the bluest skies and vistas you can only dream of – would be spared from that kind of violence.
we strolled down the street of breckenridge – our favorite – talking about this world.
we came across this sticker on the back of a street sign. “be hippy” happy face.
and we nodded, glancing at each other, grateful to be different.
in aspen, colorado, it is one of our favorite trails…alongside the ridgeline, through the aspen forest, ducking under fragrant pine, climbing. the vistas are stunning, the scent is rejuvenating, the air fresh and cool.
this time there was snow on the trail. the combination of the warm sun and the snow beneath our feet was exquisite. new trekking poles in hand, we were in our glory.
if you don’t take the bridge over the more swollen section of the stream and climb higher, than you can take a divergent path and step rock to rock upstream to an old log that lays there just waiting for people to sit on it. we have sat on that very log every single time we have hiked this trail.
there is something magical about that spot. right in the middle of the stream, mountains behind us, dappled sun on our faces. it is as if every single thing becomes clear. we sit in that very space and all the life-whirling stops, the dots connect, the primary is primary. love.
we dropped our hands into the cold mountain stream, water running swiftly over them and on to the rocks below us.
we talked. we were silent. we touched cold fingertips to cold fingertips.
no matter where i am there comes a point when this happens.
when i was little – and everyone else went to sleepaway camp – i tried it on for size. twice. the first time it was ok. we went to camp koinonia in upstate new york and i was with my best friend susan. we stayed in a screened-in cabin with bunkbeds and there’s not much else i remember, save for the lanyard-making. the second time it was another upstate sleepaway camp and, again, i was with my best friend susan. that time did not go well. it rained a lot that week and that contributed to my wistful homesickness. i remember kickball and crafts and i remember a bit of weeping. i didn’t try it again.
i guess – as much as i now love going away – traveling and adventure, immersing in new places – even my favorite places – i am also kind of a homebody. i miss our house, our routines, my feet on our old wood floors, our dogga.
paradoxically, i feel fortunate to have gotten away from home. we needed a little bitta time out of town, a little bitta time away from the usual stuff, a little bitta time near family, a little bitta time in the mountains.
i think even a short stint of time away interrupts us. it grants us fresh air. it pokes us to not take loving our home lightly. it stirs up the wish-we-were-closer proximity yearnings. it gives us fresh eyes to return to our routines and the projects and challenges on our plates. it makes coming home sweet.
i am really, really familiar with the view out the front door of our house. this tree has been there the entire three and a half decades i have now lived here. and i have seen the sky and the seasons change through the arc of its branches.
the trees next to the sidewalk on our road have been aging out. one by one we wake up or arrive home to the roar of heavy chainsaw sounds. it makes me worry about our tree. it would be tough to see that tree removed.
going away and exploring – meandering around – is good for the soul. it’s invigorating and can take you out of your comfort zone. it’s rejuvenating. it gives you space.
coming back home – after going away and exploring – is also good for the soul. it affirms the everyday, the mundane, everything you consider ordinary, the very-familiar. and it elevates appreciation of all of it.
we don’t officially compost. but the side of the garage (it used to be the back, but there is a fence there now) is a place of great organic matter. decaying leaves, wilted lettuce and spinach, bits of broccoli or parsley for the possum, shriveling blueberries for the chipmunks.
i walked past and it caught my attention.
a volunteer tulip.
years ago i planted a couple hundred tulip and daffodil bulbs. the squirrels – who are intrepid at our house – dug them all up. every last one of them. i had zero tulips, zero daffodils. i haven’t tried again because the squirrels would giggle and smirk, just waiting for me to bring my tired joints back into the house after planting. then they would make short order of digging or, in a slight (tormenting) nod to letting me think i might actually have bulbed flowers one day, planning to unearth them at a later date.
needless to say, we don’t have tulips or daffodils in our yard.
but here was this beautiful tulip! in all its glory, growing out of the mound next to the garage.
i’m thinking some squirrel – with eyes bigger than its belly – had one too many bulbs. it laid it down or dropped it. maybe it was on purpose. maybe it is a thank-you for all the birdseed it had been scrounging out of our birdfeeder. maybe a thank-you for all the goodies at the side of the garage through the years. maybe gratitude for the squirrel highways above our house or a gesture for the acorn holes scattered throughout our grass. or maybe it just simply forgot about it. either way, we will work around this beauty.
happy that it’s there, i’m a little bit gleeful that i finally – at long last – have a tulip in the yard.
there are days like this. when you can barely see the lake. were you not standing on its shore, watching its waves pummel the rocks below, you would not know. you would look out at the horizon and you would see nothing. the fog encases it all. even the line of sky and water. the fog here rolls in as the wind shifts and, for the closest mile in, all is awash in it.
i like to go to the lakefront on those days. it is beautiful. everything is in soft focus. and it seems somehow fitting to gaze out and not be able to discern much at all. there are days when it is important to be in the fog – to be wrapped in it – in order to remember to live the day – really, really live it.
we think ourselves able to plan, plan, plan. we believe our lists are important, get wrapped up in prioritizing what’s on them.
and the fog reminds us: things are not as clear as all that. they fall away into the mist as we stand, squinting our eyes to see. and then, the breath we see in front of our faces, the waves crashing near us as we stand on the boulders – they drop us into now.
i believe it would serve me well to remember the fog on clear days. to remember to hold it all lightly, in soft focus, to be where i am, to make the most of all of it, to not underestimate my fragility here. life is unfolding – both with and without my insistence on how, both with and without any clarity i might have, both with and without me.
until the sun burns through the fog to find the horizon, i am – once again – sitting in the interim of the fog, amazed at what i cannot see. not-knowing taps me on the shoulder. and reassures me that i have right-now.
in the same way this peony bud waits – tightly budded – absorbing the sunshine and the rain, glomming onto every gift nature offers her – i write this ahead, in great anticipation of being in the mountains.
i am a peony bud – wrapped up and waiting to unwind. ready to stand in the sun, soak it in, my breathing a little off as i adjust to altitude, weeping at the first sight of the range in front of us.
and in the same way this peony will soon glimmer in blossoming, i can feel it in anticipation. i can feel standing on a crest or tucked into the aspen forest along the trail or sitting in the brook on a rock. i can feel the petals relax, unwind. i can feel the air brush past me. i can feel my heart beating.
“i am here now,” i will remind myself, “stay here in each moment. don’t go anywhere else but here right now.”
and all that will come – all that will happen – whether ants or good weather or bad – i am nevertheless a bud that will open, unfurling petal by petal. nature and time will have its way. no matter. unconditionally. like goodness and love.
and i will stand today in the mountains – grateful – for peony lessons, for patience and fortitude, for all things unconditional.
yes. remembering dates can be both. on one hand, you can suddenly recall that something absolutely splendid happened on this very date – that it was life-altering, that it was the beginning of a new journey, a divergent path in the woods. on the other hand, you can suddenly recall that something absolutely dreadful happened on this very date – and it slams into you and holds you down for a moment or two while you catch your breath, gulping air, grasping at remembering you are no longer in that very moment on that very day.
today is one of those remembering dates.
but today is the first kind.
eleven years ago today – in baggage claim of o’hare airport – in a pair of jeans, a black sweater and some boots (an outfit pondered over for days) – i stood, holding a single daisy, waiting to finally meet this person i had been communicating with for about six months every single day.
and that moment – on that day – in that place – with that outfit on – was about to change my life.
you can’t always pinpoint those moments, exactlyyy. you know that something – some set of circumstances or events combined to change you – but you don’t always know the moment when something in-real-life enters your life and nothing will ever be the same.
it wasn’t like stars exploding or fireworks. no bells rang in my head. i didn’t faint or have palpitations. i was not weak-kneed. i wasn’t wowed or wooed or walloped. i did not whoop in overwhelming wonder.
i laughed. we hugged. and we skipped. and i felt like i had come home.
the universe had somehow – in some kismet-ish sort of way – sorted through the billions of people on this good earth – and had connected me to a person who would give me equal shares of blissful moments and infuriating moments, the person who would be my favorite person, the person who would be my favorite pain-in-the-ass, the person who would make me think and feel and cry and snort, the person who would be my rock in a never-ending river complete with gentle pools of lazy and boulder-laden whitewater rapids, the person whose kiss on the top of my head nearly breaks my heart open.
i saw the letter k immediately. one always sees ones initials, i suppose.
it immediately made me think of the way i used to sign everything – back in the day. (note: “the day” means the 70s – which is now – shockingly – half a century ago – which makes me laugh aloud!!)
i used a combination of my initials K, E, A – joined together – nothing extraordinary, it looked like this:
i used it everywhere. i signed my poetry with it. turned in lab reports with it. i autographed my lyrics in black-and-white-speckled composition books. i signed all my greeting cards with it and left notes on crunch’s windshield adorned with it. my monogram traveled with me everywhere.
and soon, recipients of my dedication to this began to use it back to me. i even have a beautiful gold necklace that was gifted to me with my cherished self-designed monogram.
and then, the guitar strap.
it was a present.
it was during the time that tooled leather had more than a minute. like everyone, i already had tooled leather keyfobs, bracelets, belts, change purses and full-sized handbags.
but the guitar strap stood out.
i used this guitar strap for five decades on my guitar. i had compartmentalized what it represented, the person who had given it to me, the time of which it reminded me.
until one day, a few years ago.
when you join together with a partner much later in life, you are full of the stories of the rest of the time you were not together. it’s rich history, narrative begging to be shared. and so, these stories start to tell themselves a little at a time as you get to know each other. and so one day i told him the story.
in horror he listened. he held me as i wept. he gently asked questions. he was quiet with me.
the bungie cord tightly lashed around the compartment of the sexual abuse flung free, snapping back, narrowly missing us. and the box was opened.
i removed the guitar strap from my guitar, unweaving the leather cord that held it onto the neck just under the tuning pegs. i stared at it for a few minutes, my monogram tooled into stiff leather that had somewhat softened through all the years.
and i took it outside and placed it in the garbage can.
“starlight. starbright. first star i see tonight. i wish i may, i wish i might, have this wish i wish tonight.”
he said, “you’re not normal. you two are not normal.”
he didn’t mean it in a mean way. in fact, he quickly explained it was a compliment. he elaborated that it was his way of saying that we lead with creativity and artistry and that just isn’t a normal thing, that we don’t necessarily give credence to how naturally that is a part of who we are, how we move in the world, what we do with our time.
because our success is not measured like the success of others, it’s a little hard to take in this compliment. the success of our imperative is measured in resonance with others, in touching hearts, in poking thoughts, in giving space. the success of others is measured in salaries and annuities and perks and material goods. there is a vast disparity between the payroll of the artist and the payroll of the white-collar-ed.
at the queen tribute band concert we attended there was a woman in the next row who held an intense conversation during intermission. she spoke about their son who had chosen a different route – not to go to college – and who was succeeding mightily nonetheless. she spoke about how others looked disparagingly upon him, but how she supported his choices. the most telling thing she said was, “at least in life he isn’t doing a job he hates.” i did a double-take. the tone of her voice, the look on her face showed she was underplaying her own feelings. she is clearly doing a job she hates. for the long haul.
we’ve all had jobs we hated. it’s a fact of life. bills need to be paid, obligations need to be met and we are responsible people.
we talked about this on the way home from the concert. eh…who am i kidding? we talk about this all the time.
our life is different than most anyone else’s we know. our dreams are maybe a little different too.
we immerse in moments that remind us of the good fortune of merely breathing. we flail in moments that remind us we are not “that kind” of normal. but seeing stars in dried flowers and hearts in verdant underbrush and angel wings in clouds and appreciating the sunshine on the quilt, the old birdhouse on the mantel, the tiny cairns on our shelves, the harmonic overtones in the air all remind us.
i wish i may, i wish i might, have the wish i wish tonight…
to not worry. to know that this work that we do in the world is valued. to feel some of the same ‘normal’ as most of the people around us.
but if i have to worry and wonder and feel ‘not normal’ to be the artist i am, to maybe have something i do resonate with someone else, touch them, make them think, change them a tiny bit, give them a little space of peace, then i’ll take it. because i don’t hate what i do.
reverse threading 