it can’t be easy to be the lone tree in a big, big farmfield. the wind will batter you. the sun will parch you. the snow and ice will pile next to your trunk and bend your limbs down low. the rain will pummel you. you will be tested and you must be steadfast. your very presence may be questioned; it would be easier to plow straight lines than to plow around you.
but consider this: the birds will flock to you. any creatures needing shade or shelter will curl up under your canopy. you will exhale clean oxygen. and wildflowers and grasses will grow at your base. you will interrupt the horizon line with your very beautiful tree shape. you will give visual perspective to the vast fields.
and so you stand there – alone. ready to greet the next day and the next. despite it all.
you know it would be easier if there were other trees standing with you – perhaps a simple stand of trees or maybe a small woods or forest. you know it would be easier if there were even just one other bush or plant holding vigil with you in the big field. you know it would be easier if the west winds would not assail you, you with nothing to block their assault.
and even if the elements push on you, if the farmer ponders your value, if the aloneness feels void of hope, you keep standing.
because you know that you are a tree and that your truth matters and that your presence counts.
in another life i am a potter. i have multiple aprons caked with clay and stained with glaze. i have a potter’s wheel and a giant old table in a big barn that looks out over a lake and mountains, the sun streaming in during late afternoon happy hour siesta-sans-sleep time. and the pots i throw don’t collapse in on themselves.
there is something so very visceral about throwing pots – sitting on a stool, wheel in front of you, a chunk of clay – prepared – kneaded, wedged, ready. my hands are sensitive and the texture is smooth, not sticky. my foot starts the wheel and i form a circle with my hands. and the sun streams in, a gentle breeze through the barn doors, the soundtrack from the movie ghost playing in the background, patrick swayze moving closer. eh! the dream sequence stops here.
i’ve mentioned my pottery successes before: a couple tealight or small trinket holders and one highly-valued dessert bowl. nothing like this stunning handleless wine cup, but maybe someday. rachel stevens – the potter – is clearly gifted, with a textural approach to applying glazes, transfers … like a collage of pottery elements melded into one piece. her spirit, her intention of the beautiful – both evident.
heidi gave us these vessels for our wedding and we treasure them. their earthiness reminds us to stay grounded and centered; their loveliness is a reminder of all that is art and beauty and goodness.
we don’t use these each time we sip wine. we have lovely stemware as well. but the days we do, i am back in the barn…surrounded by crystal singing bowls and potter’s wheels, old farm tables and swivel stools, the sun and a breeze streaming in, the mountains out there as i glance up. a girl can dream.
even upside-down i recognized it. a chunk of concrete – architectural salvage – signed and dated 1978 – it sat there, with an assortment of other stuff outside the antique shoppe – and called my name.
my sweet momma wanted to be an architect. she was way before her time, though. born in 1921, she loved applying her love of mathematics, but the world – i guess – wasn’t ready for her. i, too, love math. and i love design, though i haven’t had any formal training in it. but when a chunk of concrete – or any other item – calls my name, i stop and listen – at least for a moment. there is a conversation to be had.
because it was upside-down and weighs a ton, i asked d to turn it over. i made an instant decision…one, unlike most other purchases, that would have no second-guessing, no post-purchase regret. i wasn’t sure yet what we’d do with this concrete, but it was coming home with us (after some new-york-style price-negotiating).
it’s in our living room now, in case you are wondering. it serves as a side table to a chair and is the right place for our ipod sounddock. it’s perfect.
i was trying to explain – at the antique shoppe – to a couple people there how i try never to buy things to be used for what they are designed for. it’s my own rule of repurposing. it’s also pretty scrappy. now, now, that doesn’t mean a pillow isn’t used as a pillow or a chair as a chair, but old vintage coffee pots are our tea canisters and suitcases are our special boxes. tin displays photos with magnets. a door is a table. you get it.
for years, i rented offices at an historic building on the lakefront. a fantastic old building with high ceilings and wood floors, only cold running water on my floor, big old windows facing the lake. when they were doing some reno work on the building, there were piles by the big dumpsters: vintage window frames, rectangles of radiator grates, old signs. it was a salvage dream. i miss those offices, but as i look around our home, the old window frames are comforting and remind me of days spent chasing concerts, wholesale accounts and mice.
the farm table in our sitting room holds a beloved heart leaf philodendron from my daughter. the old repainted chiffarobe in my studio holds photographs of my parents. ”sisu” is painted on a piece of old wood, created by my son. there are two old rocking chairs in david’s studio: mine and his…both full of stories of long ago.
so the chunk of concrete didn’t really surprise him. i thought for sure – as we pulled in – that he noticed it too. but he hadn’t. so i pulled him over to it, certain he, too, would love it. and he did. most of the time it doesn’t take much to amuse us.
we stood at the doorway from the hall to the living room, admiring our find. we – truly – couldn’t have liked it more. artifacts from time gone past – things that might sit out by the dumpster or in the weather in the parking lot – reclamation of interesting pieces – even roughhewn – loved in our home. we tie new narrative to these, like the doublebows on the boots we wear…a smidge of warmth, of security, of new use, another layer – this doublebow – the old stories and the new stories. we are certain of their place in our home.
sometimes i wonder why i am so attracted to peeling paint, wobbly-legged tables, old windows and doors.
and sometimes i don’t.
“every day we reconstruct ourselves out of the salvage of our yesterdays…”(james sallis)
we’ve spent days now – so far – going through, organizing, cleaning out. it is – in every way – an adventure. the items of life – in retrospect. stuff that tells stories, emotions wrapped around a piece of jewelry, a note, an old flannel shirt.
it’s a slow go. this time – of looking back – is not to be rushed. some things require lingering a bit. i have sat with many a ‘thing’ in my hand, telling d a tale of its arrival in my life, its meaning, where it came from, where it took me, prompts of life lived. some of it is astonishing – things i’d forgotten. some of it is astonishing – things i still remember. some things elicit the “if i only knew then what i know now” response. some things move into the keep category, while others are making their way to join the do-not-keeps. some things i just stare at, wondering what on earth to do with them.
and in some parallel plane – as i pick up each piece o’ life – touching it, feeling it – and then lay it back down – it is as if somewhere i am also picking up each piece of life – touching it, feeling it, laying it back down. this sorting is powerful, not merely tidying up.
and it is gaining momentum.
as we look at the difference it makes, it invites us to keep going and going. deep into the bins and boxes. into the storage room and the attic, the kitchen cabinets, the back of the closet, the file drawers, the desks, the studio. it seems this is the time. this time the cleaning-out will take; the purge won’t simply be a great idea that dissipates into thin air. even with all the hard work – physically and emotionally – this time i can see it.
it’s that way → → →
and while we have no clue what might be out that way – the amorphous – waiting – we move in that direction. we are giving our home, our lives – all of it – the cleanse it all needs – to breathe and to invite in the new.
minus the beyondness, minus the trees, one would barely know it was foggy.
but context is everything.
up close, the boulders are clear. they are like the notes on the page, the score. technically, they are vital. but context is everything and it is the artist’s job to look beyond the obvious, to seek that which tells the whole story, that which evokes more. it is the musician’s job to play that which is beyond the obvious, to play that which evokes. more.
peter spering, in an online forum that was great-debating which – of technical wizardry and feel – was more important in playing music, wrote the words “…technically great but creatively dull”.
the boulders without the foggy trees: we have all heard this music, seen this art, read these words, watched this dance. if you have listened to a computer rendering of a piece of sheet music, you are aware of neat and tidy technicality, seamless, even perfection. you are also aware of the lack – of any emotion, any expression, any air, any space. boulders will only sound like boulders. there will be no question. there is no beyond. there is no fog.
to answer the this-or-that question from the forum – technical chops or feeling – is both impossible and necessary. music is the expression of the human condition. music is love in sound. it is a marriage of both the technical and the evocative.
yet…if art is to convey questions and answers, to explore and navigate, to inform, to find meaning…if the recipient is to be moved, to be smitten by life, then music – the simple and the complex – must be played with heart. and technical wizardry will cease to matter if it falls upon souls with nary a touch, without any dents or brushmarks or trace that it had been there.
“it is enough when a single note is beautifully played.” (arvo pärt)
because a single note – played with heart – will impact you. it will bring you to a place where – even without standing on the shore – you can see the fog, the trees, the dim horizon.
and you are able to “feel the world stand still”. (arvo pärt)
in most rehearsals, i would remind the choir that their smile could be heard. there is a major difference to the timbre of voice brought forward with or sans smile. the same is true with speaking; even when you are not seen, the difference in tone is distinguishable.
it’s the season of the christmas cantata – a major work of multiple pieces with various voicings, instrumental lines, accompaniment and narration – closer to an hour in length. i’m writing this on the sunday morning that was usually chosen as the day of performance – the second sunday in december. i can’t even begin to remember how many cantatas i’ve directed – and written and arranged – through my decades as a minister of music. just recently a facebook memory came up – it was my post thanking the choir and worship band at a church where we had just performed such a work. the creation of narrative and song is exhilarating – for both director and participants – and everything drives to the downbeat. there is a glow that emanates from such a group – these people who have diligently prepared a musical piece of larger extent – and the camaraderie that weaves its way through – it is joy.
it’s been a few years now since i have directed a cantata. i’m guessing it’s a few years since many of the people who participated have sung or played a cantata. not every minister of music or choir director is up to it and some choose other programming. while you are preparing weekly anthems for sharing in service you are concurrently rehearsing this large work, so it takes time and energy, a compositional spirit, an innate ability to discern cantatas of value, ingenuity, the ability to rearrange on the fly, the belief in showcasing your choir – as a choir – accommodating any ability level, the recognition that simplicity is potent, much flexibility and humor, meticulous planning and true dedication. it is knowing as a conductor – in the moment after the downbeat – that you will merely guide this integrated group of singers and musicians through this visceral experience of purity. yours is a backseat to the magic – this is not your microphone. it is an undertaking not for the meek.
to say that i miss cantata-day would be understating. the gift of music is to make resonant that which is hard to see, that which is not tangible. the gift of music is to evoke powerful imagery and to open emotions tucked away. the gift of music is to bring forward beauty and the magnificence of producing something together. the gift of music is to offer just that – the gift of music. impactful, moving, music has the ability to change souls.
we pass the leaf on the trail – so very obviously lips curled in a smile. i think about all the times i have urged a singer to smile, all the times i have listened to the difference between smiling and not smiling – like the difference between the keys of d minor and e minor. vast.
and right now – as i write this – i wonder how many choirs are gathered on chancels, singing their hearts out, smiling inside and out.
it was the color that stopped us. we have walked this route for years. the other day – wind blowing off the lake, waves crashing over the rocks, rain falling intermittently – we noticed the color.
the east side of the trees was iridescent. cobalt blue and teal green mixed in with the rich color of its bark. we stood in front of the trees, studying the mix of color, the tooth, the randomness. later, it took some research to discover what might – just might – be the reason for these colors: amaurodon viridis – a fungus. if that is true, we don’t know what that means for these trees. both are stricken on the side that faces the lake – the side that takes the pummeling of the wind in lake-effect storms. we’d imagine that side of the tree is decidedly moister than the side facing the afternoon sun. but – at best – even with a bit of research – we are making it all up. we aren’t tree experts or even tree knowledgers. we are, however, tree lovers. and we are tree noticers.
it did make me think of october days we spent in breckenridge, colorado. days where the town took tree-safe paint and designed an art installation on the aspens. with biodegradable water soluble colorant, social and environmental artist konstantin dimopoulos inspired the painting of the trunks of aspens blue-blue-blue drawing attention to them – stunning yellow leaves in fall against this blue – impossible to not notice – an effort to point to the importance of trees to the planet and the devastation of global deforestation. it was breathtaking.
the work of an artist is to ask questions, to prompt thought, to nudge and cause both comfort and discomfort, perhaps to elicit change. the work of an artist is not to take the easy pre-cut path. the work of an artist is to linger in not-knowing, in seeking. the work of an artist is to notice, to pay attention, to educe the notice of others, to stir up paying attention. to encourage stillness and wild interaction, both.
the trees got us to stop. and as we stood and noticed and wondered, they stood tall, knowing they had done their job.
the orange sherbet sky is a stunning backdrop to most anything but the milkweed’s wisp is anything but most-anything.
we pass by and notice. we pay attention. texture and color and movement from the gentlest breeze – it is a photograph before it was a photograph. my job was simply to snap it.
our days are slower. we linger in not-knowing. we acknowledge time as it sneaks by. and the next week comes before any of us are ready, before it seems possible. even the milkweed is surprised.
we are learning lesson after lesson. that this is life: the things our fingertips touch, the scent on the wind, the view before us, the call of the black-capped chickadee, the ground under our feet. we are caught up by the impermanence of it all. we are realizing the folly in the gathering of stuff. we immerse in the river where there is no stratum. we feel the moment, without knowing the edges of next.
the orange sherbet sky doesn’t dawdle. color has another place to be. and as the sun drops below the horizon, the shadow-gaps fill in.
we stand with the milkweed in dusk, close, loitering in early night and, with gratitude and rest, ready for next.
the shaggy manes clustered in front of the stage. it was a crowded mosh pit and there was no allowance for height. they were all just smushed in there, trying to see in-between pogo-ing to the music.
i couldn’t tell who the artist was. i was simply watching the audience reaction. it was clear to me that this was big. the artist had drawn a large crowd and all the shaggy manes were jazzed to be there. with rapt attention, they engaged in the concert, though all i could hear was silence. they were still there when i left, still standing, still moshing.
we create – paint, draw, compose, write, mold clay, cartoon, dance, act – for the shaggy manes in the world who wish to engage in our art form and, also, for the shaggy manes in the world who do not. we are noisy. we are silent. whether they walk away, stand quietly or pogo-mosh is not up to us. it is only up to us to put it out there. after that, we have no control. no machinations can force our work to resonate with a shaggy mane.
and as our work floats about in the universe – gaining or losing momentum, either – we trust that following the imperative is what we can do, what we must do.
and i am reminded – time and again – even if one shaggy mane gets it – one shaggy mane is moved – one shaggy mane is changed, even for a moment – then i have done my work.
reverse threading 