The Simplicity of Goodbye

A little more than a week ago today, my mom and dad drove approximately 40 miles south.  It was a Sunday evening and with them they carried a garden salad.  Their ultimate destination was my grandma's house.  The event, a barbecue.

Barbecues at my grandma's house have never been uncommon.  The setting is ideal. There is a large, wrap-around patio, a well-kept lawn that slopes down to the pond which is often overgrown with cattails and reeds. Beyond this are pastures and orchards and, in the distance, a town, which is most visible at night as a cluster of glowing lights cradled in the base of the valley. When we have barbecues at my grandma's house, the evening begins in daylight, when the red-winged blackbirds are just visible balanced on the reeds in the pond, and ends in darkness, when the bullfrogs echo each other and the brightness of the stars rival the lights of town.

But this particular barbecue was different because it was the last one my mom and her brothers would enjoy on that particular patio. Six, maybe even seven, years ago, my grandma passed away, and a few months later, the house went on the market, where it has more or less remained ever since. Part of the problem comes from having owned a place for decades.  There's just no "right" person to take it over.  My mom and her brothers toyed with the idea of keeping it for themselves. One would say, "it could be a family get-a-way, a retreat." And another would answer, "yes, it is peaceful here.  And the yard... and the gardens." But inevitibly the impracticality of such an endeavor would set in: there was a lot of lawn to mow.  The drive out from town was rather long. Someone would have to come out every other day at least.

Of course, my mom also pointed out, it had never been quite the same since the bank had acquired the orchards in front of her mother's house.  Once it had, the apple trees and pear trees were uprooted and replaced by a series of cheap, vinyl-sided manufactured homes that were already fading and warping. That is why, after so many potential buyers and a change in real estate agents; after so many trips down to make sure the plants were all being watered; after cleaning and re-cleaning the garage and the barns, after dusting and painting the living room and re-carpeting the hallway.  After standing in the middle of the kitchen remembering, over and over, the smell of flour, of apple wood, of dinner cooking, of cookies baking. After all these innumerable days of memories stacking up on top of each other like old dishes, suddenly, finally, it is time to let go.

I dream about that house repeatedly.  I have dreamed about that house for years, ever since the first mention of selling it.  In dreams familiar places become so strange.  The house always looks the same on the outside, but inside the rooms become huge, almost cavernous, and ornately decorated in heavy, dark velvet curtains and furniture.  In my dreams, the bathrooms never work, and there are dead bugs on the carpet.  Perhaps it's my subconsious helping me remember that, for all those years when the house was lovely and decorated carefully and tastefully, there were a number of years when things just didn't work right.  The bathrooms did have plumbing issues.  There were giant spiders that lept out at you from the folds of towels.When grandma's dementia set in, there was dog and cat hair everywhere: on the curtains, the chairs and davenports, the sheets on the beds, the coffee mugs.

So letting go should be easy, if I bear that in mind. But it is never simple. That house is always the place my grandparents live, always where we headed on Christmas afternoon.  It is where my grandpa grew his wine grapes and where my grandma tended her roses.  It is where my sister and I hid out in a bedroom the day (one of the days) the cows in the pasture got lose and ambled through the yard. It is where my grandparents raised their children, where they grew old, and, in the end, where my grandma died. Letting go is difficult because it should be. Unlike saying goodbye, letting go signifies much more.  Goodbye is a word, a farewell, something spoken whether we are seeing someone for the last time or we know we will see them again tomorrow.  Letting go is an act of will. It is saying, this isn't mine anymore.

Of course, the trouble with these kinds of reflections are twofold. I tend to use "it" far too much to be clear, and I tend toward sentimentality, something which is so often undesireable in the world of writing, as I think I've mentioned before. Sentimentality has always had a dubious reputation.  Too often the sentimental can be cloying, overtly sweet, dwelling too much on love or pity, on babies with dimpled smiles and women with small hands and feet. But sentiment is also nostalgia, and while it certainly isn't something one should indulge in too often perhaps, I think once in while, being a bit nostalgic or sentimental has a purpose. I think everyone is allowed to feel lonesome for the past, to indulge in a bit of weepy prose even at the cost of sounding like a namby pamby. 

Today, I am a namby pamby. Well, maybe I always am, but today I am being so rather more publicly. Admittedly, I miss walking in through a certain back door into a certain kitchen and knowing exactly where the cookies are kept.  I miss that kitchen because it is where my grandfather taught me the box step and showed me that buttermilk is made for drinking (though I prefer mine in pancakes).  I miss it because it is where my grandma hammered out the meat for Swiss Steak and where she would set the breakfast table in the mornings, starting each of us off with half a grapefruit before serving us waffles or french toast or stale cereal. I will miss that house for as long as I live.

And now, it is someone else's turn.  I can hope that they won't destroy the place too much by punching out walls to expand bathrooms or closets.  I can hope that they will appreciate the house for what it is, classic mid-century/ atomic era architeture.  I want this new family to love the brick work and the slate flooring as much as I do.  I want them to love everything from the musty basement to the pocket doors to the shakes on the roof.  I want them to love it all as much as I do. But in the event that they are too myopic to appreciate what they have, I hope I never have to know.

All The Pictures You Have Seen

 "You don't make a photograph just with a camera. You bring to the act of photography all the pictures you have seen, the books you have read, the music you have heard, the people you have loved."        --- Ansel Adams

The first time I remember seeing a photograph by Ansel Adams it was in a calendar in a classroom.  I was twelve, and the photo was a black and white picture of El Capitan in Yosemite. The photo was so striking, the light and dark so startling, that I remember the calendar all these years later.  Every time I see an Ansel Adams photograph, I am again in the sixth grade, composing handwritten papers on Afghanistan or the apostle Peter.

I have always found photography so strange because it occupies so many corners of our lives.  It is a powerful tool of communication, even of remembrance, that is at the disposal of nearly every person.  And by every person, I mean especially my family, each and every member of which has the uncanny ability to snap my pic when I am retaining colossal amounts of either water, air, or pizza.  If I don't look pregnant in a photo, I look drunk. With a gummy smile and half-closed eyes, I appear to have swilled my way through half a cooler of beer and to be weaving my way toward a bottle of whiskey. But the worst photos are those where I have been conveniently positioned in front of everyone else.  There I am, Hildegard the giant milk maid with my family clinging to my broad shoulders like a collection of pet humans, peering tentively toward the camera, not daring to breathe lest I become wrathful (as giants do) and swallow them whole.

When on rare occasion, a picture manages to turn out well, I am the first to plaster it all over Facebook. I wonder if it is primarily women who complain over having their pictures taken.  The light must be right, the shadow cast over your nose or teeth or chin must not make those features look unduly large or yellowed or doubled, respectively. Do men obsess over incidentals such as these?  My dad doesn't seem to; I don't hear it so much from my brother.  Why do I grasp desperately at the hope that every picture of me will be head-shot material? Years down the road, will I look at a picture of my 30-year-old self on a day out with my friends and moan about how my hair absorbs light? Or will I just remember the moment, the day itself?

The trouble is that, while I may protest the public display of myself as photographically recorded by friends or family on social network sites, I also don't want to feel left out, so I have to moderate my complaints.  If I complain too much,  no one will ever know that I socialize or have friends or even that I have friends and family who want to take pictures of me. If I complain too little, any old thing will pop up -- me looking like a more masculine version of my father, alongside my aggravatingly and perennially photogenic sister. Yes, it is a fine line I tread. Recently, several questionable pictures have cropped up.  Between visits from friends and family, I find myself cringing when my e-mail alerts me to the fact that a "friend" has just tagged me in four new photos.

So why do we put ourselves through all of this (and by we I mean I)? I would have expected that by now human technology would allow us to have moving photos around our houses, hanging on our walls, like those in the Harry Potter films.  Instead, we hold onto the motionless representations of ourselves, our ancestors, our friends.  Some opt for the slide show frames, but even those have proven less popular than good old photos behind glass.  Why? I believe that photography possesses the unsurpassable skill to take a moment and immortalize it. In pictures we find the fleeting expressions that might be missed in film or slide shows.

Photography has a very long history, beginning with camera obscuras that were used in the middle ages to project images onto walls and later to aid painters in the 17th century. The very first photograph was taken in 1827 by one Joseph Nicephore Niepce. It would still be many years before photography became established enough to produce images that would not disappear after being taken. In 1839, Louis Daguerre developed what is now recognized as modern photography with the birth of his daguerreotype (I have no idea how to pronounce any of these names).  By 1850, seventy daguerreotype studios were under operation in New York City alone.

The flourishing of such studios allowed people to possess photographic mementos of their loved ones, and this became especially popular during the Civil War, which was also the first widely photographed conflict.  Here Matthew Brady and his team devoted vast amounts of time to setting up their equipment to photograph soldiers fighting, at their tents, or even as part of the carnage in the battlefields. According to Eric Niiler, Civil War photography "allowed families to have a keepsake representation of their fathers or sons as they were away from home. Photography also enhanced the image of political figures like President Lincoln." Photography also presented the public with "Intense images of battlefield horrors ... for the first time." Photographs such as these were revolutionary.  They impacted the history of war because every major war after has been photographed and recorded in a similar manner, showing viewers not just idealistic propoganda posters but the hard realities of war from Germany to Korea to Vietnam to the Middle East.  Today we are still presented with photography, though through a vastly different method, which glimpses what happens so far away from home.

Of course, photography too can be used as propoganda. The Nazis issued many pictures intended to display Jewish weakness but which now mostly highlight Nazi savagery. Photographs, like any other medium, are interpreted differently by different viewers, the way one might read things into verbal statements or essays, but photographs also allow those viewing them to come to grips with human suffering, or even human experience, in a straightforward manner. The thing which separates the art of photography from any other form of art is its unique ability to capture images of real moments, real people. When I see pictures of the Nuba mountain people of Sudan, of the Jews in Aushwitcz, of Olympic athletes in London, I see a reflection of a person who has, or had, parents, friends, husbands, wives, children. I see people praying, as I do; I see children learning, as I did. I can take that moment and identify myself with the person in that picture even if we are separated by miles, oceans, experiences. Photography draws me to them in an inexpressibly human way.

These moments have much more to do with photojournalism than they do with snapping pics on family outings. Writing for Haartz, Alex Levac writes, "The professional and moral duty of documentary photography is to call attention not to people's human rights, but to their lack of rights. Photography, more than any other medium, has the power of raising consciousness in this basic respect." Photojournalism is a remarkable profession to me because it relies so much on timing. The best photos we see in newspapers or journals are surprising. They are often beautiful.  They are always deeply effective. What I like about this particular aspect of photography, so long as it doesn't descend into tabloid territory, is its ability to occupy the space between family photo albums and jarring artistic photography. These are the photos that our society remembers collectively.  These are our visual reminders of history.  It is, in many ways, a branch of family photography.

My family, like many families, has boxes upon boxes of old pictures and portraits.  I see in them my grandparents as children (my five-year-old grandfather with a dutch boy bob is a particular favorite). I see my great-grandparents and their siblings, even my great-great grandparents, many of whom were immigrants and lived on farms in the Dakotas or Minnesota. There are photos of old homesteads in the Yakima Valley, of old buildings before they were torn out or burned down, of my great-grandfather lounging on the roof of a cabin he built in the woods decades ago, a cabin my family is still able to call our own. These images are not necessities in my life.  They do not alert society to human suffering. They do not contribute to the quality of existance in any significant way.  Perhaps, but perhaps that isn't quite true either. When I hold these images in my hands, these yellowing pieces of heavy paper, I hold a moment. The moment this picture was taken, I can think, my grandma was a young woman, my mother a baby, my father a little boy who still believed in Santa Claus. They are significant because they allow us to glimpse the past we never witnessed and the past we can't remember and the present we need to understand, as societies but as families too.

On a recent canoe trip with my family to Cooper Lake, I gave explicit instructions to the family photographers that anytime I was about to be snapped, I was to be warned.  It lead to a phrase which they would shout at me on the spur of a moment. Rather than the typical "Say cheese," they would cry out -- through the still summer air -- "Tuck in!" This ultimately lead to a series of pictures in which I have uncannily flat abs but also shoulders up to my ears and a tense smile which suggests I'm holding my breath, which I was. Of course, they're terrible of me, but there I am, on a pristine mountain lake, looking out toward Mt. Daniel and its glaciers, surrounded by people I love. And I discover, in a moment of clarity which doesn't involve me focusing on me, that these really are the most beautiful pictures of all.


Sources I used:

A lovely photo from my mom, and:
Levac, Alex. http://www.haaretz.com/culture/books/photography-the-role-of-photojournalism-in-a-violent-world-1.353824.
Niiler, Eric. http://news.discovery.com/history/civil-war-photography-warfare-110411.html.
http://photo.net/learn/history/timeline.adp

A Distant Voice

There is a calmness tonight that I find unsettling.  Night, I think, is one of those funny slips in the twenty-four hours of day.  There are two such slips: night, before I am quite in bed, and morning, before I am quite ready to start my day beyond the walls of my parents' house. Night is for reflection --  for replaying the plot of a movie I've seen; for rewriting and recasting that film and finding in it some niche for myself.  At night, I rewind conversations, wonder whether I should have held my tongue with this person, said more with another, smiled convincingly at an entirely different person, made eye contact with some stranger.

Night is perpetually on the cusp, and so, I've come to believe, is life.  I see myself leaping from the ridge above adulthood to a ridge above middle age to one above old age. Are we always meant to feel unsettled?  Somehow, I had imagined that with adulthood came the sense of permanence, and I begin to wonder if permanence has no place in life. And how strange that I should write of the future at night which I have just committed to reflection.

I think of night in adjectives, great piles of them, and a boy recently told me that a writer shouldn't use too many adjectives.  He'd heard this from a famous writer, and I wanted to ask why she dictated such a rule?  So I imagine myself stacking adjectives until they teeter, like a gleaming, insecure tower of colored glass, and if I must choose to erase one or two, how can I be certain that those I pull won't be load bearing?  Now I see too that I'm using contractions.  In academic writing, this is inadvisable.  I've decided it will be fine here among myself, my computer screen, my elect readers.

Isn't it strange that in an era so apparently opposed to rules that it, or its inhabitants, deems too religious, too political, too __________ (fill in your own -ist here, ageist, racist, sexist, classist, etc.), there have been a proliferation of rules for written language.  There always have been, of course, but now those rules have shifted. Not so much value is placed on rhyme or meter (hooray for syllabic illiterates like myself), but one must avoid other pitfalls.  If I follow those rules, will my writing remind readers of T.S. Eliot, Edna St. Vincent Milay, Dylan Thomas?  Or will I sound again like that teenager I once was, straining to find a place in her poem for a word like "gossamer"?

If I write instinctively, organically, my writing will be more beautiful, but it will not make sense.  Does it matter if poetry, or prose even, makes any sense?

If I would tell you that tonight, for instance, I see myself as a woman in a room in Italy, on the Mediteranean, pushing open the window shutters to face the bright light of day, would you stop me and ask for an explanation?

On Turning 30 and Embarking on a Course of Self Improvement

 I remember the day I turned ten.  Well, perhaps not the day itself, but I do remember the excitement.  Suddenly, I was a whole decade old!  I could measure my age on both hands and with all my fingers! Now, of course, ten seems fetal, comparatively speaking. Having turned thirty nearly two months ago, I've decided it's time to face the music and muse upon the event some.  The key is to think and write about the upcoming decade in a new, refreshing way.  The problem is, that isn't possible.  So, in an effort to be ever revolutionary, I've decided to tie the subject of thirty in with another subject: poetry.

In the midst of embarking on a new decade and of considering possible changes in the future, I enrolled in a class at my Alma Mater this spring.  The class is advanced poetry writing and to my relief does not require students to write their poetry in a variety of rhymed and metered styles.  I have yet to compose, in iambs, a sonnet, yet to wrangle my theme into the body of an aubade, yet to wrack my brain for words that rhyme with dyslexia in a villanelle. Nonetheless, it is a group of would-be poets, and in such cases there are certain things a would-be student (like myself) can predict.  First, they will all be reasonably good at writing poetry and have an interest in doing so.  Second, there will be a couple standouts who obviously have poetic plans in their future.  Third, there will be someone who sits, hunched, mouth open, like a stone gargoyle, in the corner, too intimidated to speak -- that's me, although I do try to breathe through my nose.

Furthermore, prospective students will find that poetry classmates are an eclectic bunch, ranging from the flamboyantly artistic to the prep to the skater/gangsta types.  They will all speak derisively of sentimentality and cliche, partaking in what I like to think of as the "Anti-cliche Cliche."  And when a fellow student's poem borders on either of these, they'll speak, with great care, of their concern lest that poem should slip into the syrupy abyss.

Of course, in reality, my classmates are quite nice, quite helpful, and quite accurate when it comes to feedback, and I am enjoying myself.  The real problem with the class is twofold (have you noticed, readers, that I have a tendency to list things in folds, twofold, threefold?  I do apologize.): the first branch of the problem is purely me and purely mental -- and I do imply craziness here, just to be explicit.  When I start writing poetry, bland and sentimental as it may be, I start thinking in poetry. I'm pretty sure it's a disease. Take, for instance, the other day.  I was on my way to class, as it happens, walking across the lawn, when suddenly I noticed someone behind me, a guy, shuffling through the grass, far too close for comfort (I like to maintain a good ten feet of space between me and my fellow pedestrians -- might be a mark against living in a city one day).  Instead of thinking to myself, Sheesh, this guy is invading my space! You're, like, on my heels, dude! I think as follows:

Behind me in the grass,
I hear the whisper of your shoes
to my right -- too far to pass, too
close for comfort.  Are you my
shadow, come to tap my shoulder,
come to carry me away to the stars?

Please note the alliteration in close and comfort and come. Also note the reference to Peter Pan.  Of course, it's drivel , and such insanity doesn't stop there. When I go to bed at night, suddenly

The night advances, dark
and vast, I stand at the window,
look at the moon, small mirror
of the sun, and wait

Then it ends.  Just like that. Because I came to my senses and stopped myself. I could go on with endless examples, but I'll refrain.  The gist is that, with my enrollment in this class, I'm not just a mediocre poet, I'm a mediocre poet twenty-four hours a bloody day.

The second branch of my twofold problem is much more philosophical: what good is all of this anyway? When all is said and done (yet another cliche!) what good is sitting around, discussing the best way to approach grief or addiction or joy? What difference does it make if a group of young(ish) adults finds Victorian poetry galling or collectively praises modern poetry and its tendency toward explicit language (not that we do, there's just something about modern poetry that is more explicit even when there are no swear words.)?

A few weeks ago I went to the Oregon Coast with my family.  While there, I purchased a small volume called The Very Best of Archy and Mehitabel. The book contains a variety of free-verse poems written by a cockroach (Archy) and often involving his friend, the cat Mehitabel.  Both characters are reincarnated beings, Archy having been a free-verse poet and Mehitabel having been at one time Cleopatra. These characters and their adventures are written by Don Marquis who created Archy and Mehitabel for his column in the New York Sun. But, in keeping with the theme I recently introduced, one poem in particular caught my attention.  It is titled "a spider and a fly", and is an observed conversation between the two, taken down by Archy.  The fly makes an argument as to why the spider should not eat him.  The spider makes a return argument, gets ready to eat the fly, then points out that the "end would have been/ just the same if neither of/ us had spoken at all."  All of which brings Archy "to think/ furiously upon the futility/ of literature."

The point is apt. Ancient, yes.  Cliche, probably. Necessary, I think so.  If we aren't constantly questioning the relevance of art, poetry, literature, etc., is it possible that we run the risk of losing its significance? Of course, many people believe it is redundant, that it rehashes the same questions or the same themes time and time again. Go back to Ovid, and one finds in his poetry the subject matter of much of today's poetry and much of Shakespeare's and Donne's and so on. But, does it matter?

I have probably mentioned this before, but I think it bears repeating here.  My first attempt at writing poetry came when I was nine.  It wasn't very good, but it was a start.  I've been dabbling ever since, and I think it's significant that my first brushes with poetry came as a child, listening to the poems my parents read, "Wynken, Blynken, and Nod" for one.  Something about hearing imaginative language as a child sparks interest in language.

Poetry, incidentally, has a unique position in early childhood development. This may have more to do with learning to recognize sound patterns, but poetry also encourages children to play with words.  In a post for the Norfolk Early Childhood Parenting Examiner, Sharon Oberne states, "phonological awareness, letter learning, phonics, concepts about prints and fluency" are all benefits of reading or hearing poetry from a young age. Furthermore, Oberne adds that "[t]he ability for a child to identify individual sounds in words is essential when he/she is learning to connect sounds and letters. A young child needs to learn to play with language and manipulate sounds."  All of this relates primarily to education and is directed more toward poetry that rhymes and has a meter.  I imagine a lot of people pick up Silverstein or Seuss when they want to introduce their children to poems, but there is also the option of Lewis Carroll or Eugene Field (I just thought I ought to point out that option). 

A short article on Poetry.org reiterates this point and asserts that children are natural poets, and that's true and should be encouraged.  But how do we take what is valuable in childhood development and translate it to something of importance in adulthood?  How can poetry be taken beyond a developmental asset?

As I mentioned above, when I take poetry writing classes, I start thinking in poetry -- not quite constantly but near it. When I'm not composing, I meditate upon topics that could turn into poems.  Today while I was out walking, I went by a small pasture on the corner of two streets that have always been sort of rural and are on the verge of becoming slightly more urban (though urban really doesn't suite this town, maybe residential). In fact, there are pastures on both sides of this street corner.  The one to the south is now hemmed in by housing developments and may be a housing development itself before too long.  The pasture on the north side is home, in the summers, to two or three horses and bordered by only one old farm house. Right at the corner of this pasture is a creek which runs year round.  Every year, the grass greens up, the irises sprout, and I love it.  The thought that someone will one day dig it up to accommodate a vinyl-sided, build-by-number cracker box of a house kills me -- not literally, but you get the idea.  I would welcome the chance to write a poem blasting the decadence of a civilization that sees value only in brand new homes, schools, water parks, box stores and which easily discards old buildings, old houses, old pastures -- places where past generations, our parents and grandparents, studied, worked, lived, loved, grieved losses, raised families, died. Clearly I'm too angst-ridden over all of this to write something worth reading, but why bother anyway? Who would read it? I can almost guarantee the city council wouldn't, and if they did, would it even phase them, this one frenetic voice?

Beyond all of this, poetry is often accused of not taking a strong enough stance on even greater issues, specifically human rights issues, genocides, for instance, like the Holocaust.A few years ago, Adrienne Rich wrote a piece for The Guardian (I love that website!), and in it she addresses some of the accusations leveled at poetry. She discusses allegations of poetry's complicity in "the violent realities of power."  On the other hand, Rich writes that "it's not a mass-market 'product', it doesn't get sold on airport newsstands or in supermarket aisles; it's too 'difficult' for the average mind; it's too elite, but the wealthy don't bid for it at Sotheby's; it is, in short, redundant." To sum, Rich states, "poetry is either inadequate, even immoral, in the face of human suffering, or it's unprofitable, hence useless."

But, as Rich observes, "But when poetry lays its hand on our shoulder we are, to an almost physical degree, touched and moved. The imagination's roads open before us, giving the lie to that brute dictum, 'There is no alternative.'" In conclusion she says, "[t]here is always that in poetry which will not be grasped, which cannot be described, which survives our ardent attention, our critical theories, our late-night arguments."  Forgive me for over-quoting here, but Rich puts it so well, why try to out do her?  Essentially, my response is yes. Exactly.  I would have said the same thing but in a less lyrical manner.

I may tire of reading poems on death, but I always remember the first time I heard someone read aloud Edgar Allen Poe's "Annabel Lee."  One of the poems most frequently read at funerals is Dylan Thomas's most famous villanelle, "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night." I used to know the figure, but now I can't seem to find it; however, imagine writing that poem. Imagine producing something which resonates so deeply with readers that thousands of them, decades after the poem was first published, choose this poem to echo their own feelings. As a reader, though, I find in the poems a type of meditation on language, life, faith.  I think of David writing his Psalms.  I imagine Homer reciting The Iliad.  So many poems have outlasted civilizations, and still, today, we reference them.  Why? Because even now we connect with the themes in these texts, whether written two thousand years or two days ago.

I would love to write poems of significance.  I would love to be a champion for something, but I find most often that what I love to write about most are small moments. After grinding my teeth over housing developments and so on this morning, I passed a park.  My feelings about being a parent are ambiguous. Little kids are lovely, but I counterbalance that by constantly reminding myself that these babies are only "yours" for a brief window of time.  Then those little darlings turn.  What stress!  What heartache! How can anyone bear it? So, as I said, I was passing the park, and I saw a large man crouching in the grass.  He was blowing bubbles which his two small daughters chased and then, with great satisfaction, they clapped the shining globes between their hands.  I think that man could have stayed there... and stayed there. There's a poetic moment which communicates nothing more than "hold onto this" and needs say nothing more.

And then, finally, I think about one of my favorite teachers who passed away in February. She had ALS, a disease which affects the nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord.  Even though those suffering from this lose the ability to control muscle movement, they can still think clearly. My professor was able to continue writing poetry as her illness progressed by using advances in technology which allowed her to type by blinking, and, in fact, the last entry on her blog is dated only two days before she passed away. At her memorial service, a friend of hers read a poem that had been written for her son, and in it, the writer states her concerns over what her son will remember about her.  She weaves in imagery and sensory language, eliciting from the listeners a sharp picture and an understanding, if a brief one, of her struggle.

Here is the beautiful thing about poetry -- it gives a voice to those with no voice, even in a very literal sense.  Poetry transcends time.  It lasts longer than spoken words, longer than looks, longer than touch.  We remember what we felt, how it sounded in recitation. The impression of a poem lasts beyond the writing and hearing of that poem.  What is the point of poetry? To me, if it accomplishes nothing more than to say "I love you" or "I miss you" in a deeply personal, deeply unique way, that is enough.

A blog you should read:
http://www.judithkpowell.com/

And the rest:
Marquis, Don (an amazon link, of all things):
http://www.amazon.com/Archy-Mehitabel-Everymans-Library-Pocket/dp/0307700925/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1336169848&sr=1-3

Oberne, Sharon.
http://www.examiner.com/article/parenting-issues-101-the-importance-of-children-s-poetry-part-three

Poetry.org.
http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/17151

Rich, Adrienne.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2006/nov/18/featuresreviews.guardianreview15

The Greatest Possible Good

The day after St. Patrick’s Day, and it is snowing.  The afternoon was bright and sunny, but with evening’s approach, the wind has pulled black clouds out of the mountains.  Now dinnertime, spring has recessed and winter returned.

It is quite pretty, in fact.  Large white flakes set starkly against the grey sky, dark trees, brown grass, exposed dirt. It flies down from on-high with the strength of a blizzard, and I stand at the window and pray it will maintain this noir-like state throughout the night, if not the week. Even as I do so, some poor soul peddles by the house on his bike.

But in this pine-paneled room, with my feet propped up, sitting in my great-grandmother’s rocking chair, I feel disinclined to venture outside.  A storm is ideal for these moods.  Sun goads me into exercise when I least want it. Give me instead the warm glow of a desk lamp, a cup of tea, the challenge of composition, safely buffered from the wintery blast. Within minutes, though, there is a threatening glow to the west, and spring will encroach once more before sunset.

St. Patrick’s Day is not a passive holiday in our family.  It is celebrated with the honor reserved only for Thanksgiving and Easter in most homes. We mark it with the traditional American-Irish meal. We wear green and chastise those who do not.  We watch The Quiet Man in the evenings, this year while sipping Irish coffee. Our Irish heritage is not, I suppose, overwhelming.  My great-great -grandparents were immigrants from Ireland in the 1860s. My great-grandfather was full Irish; my grandfather half; my mother a quarter; and, well, you see where this is going.  But my grandfather was immensely proud of this heritage, and why not? I believe the first things he ever gave me in this world included my nickname, Sam, and two bibs, one which read “I'm a happy Irish baby” and another proclaiming “My Grandpa is Irish”.  So our Irish-ness has been not only bred into us but trained into us as well.

I suppose we value this St. Patrick’s Day tradition because Grandpa valued it, and it is nice to keep it alive.  For a man who was typically reticent about his life, here is one of the things we can lay claim to as being “him.”

H.C. Lynch was born in 1905.  Over the course of his life he would marry twice, have six children and eleven (eleven?) grandchildren.  He would attend the University of Washington and McGill University, join the Navy in World War II as a doctor, join the faculty of the American College of Surgeons (of which his father had been a founding member), and set up a medical campus in his hometown near the city’s major hospitals.  All of this, and more, he would accomplish, but throughout all of it he would remain a distant, often cold, father.

Is it, I often wonder, a tribute to a man when his children and grandchildren can recite his accomplishments the way they might recite an entry from the encyclopedia? I shouldn't say it like that.  These acheivements are things which we all remember with pride, with very great pride.  I would say, almost as if his having done so much somehow frees us (and by us I mean me) from having to be impressive.  Someone has done that already.  I can brag about him.  But then I hear the stories of his fatherhood, and I think, perhaps, there was room for improvement too, as there always is.

The trouble comes, however, when we try to impose our own ideals onto other people. Grandpa's own father had been so distant from his children you would really have to consider him absentee. Grandpa and his sister, Margarett, whose mother died when they were young, were raised partly by their father, C.J., but also by their aunts. So, I think, when Grandpa approached being a parent, he based his own techniques off of the one example he had of fatherhood.  My mom remembers him being hard on her and her siblings.  Nightlights were not allowed in darkened bedrooms, nor were visits to the parents' room.  Fights between he and my grandmother and, occasionally, his sons could only be classified as legendary. Compliments were rarely paid, and demonstrations of affection were infrequent or nonexistant. To top it all, he was an absolute chauvinist. And those are just the highlights.

But, as I said, my ideals (which are modern) of parenthood would never have been my Grandpa's ideals.  So often we tend to look on the practices of previous generations as backward or old fashioned.  We derisively assume that because we are working with the most current information available, we are the superior in everything from parenthood to science to tolerance.  I think, in fact, we would be alarmed to find that, in many cases, the opposite is true. But I digress.

When I was seven, Grandpa passed away.  Years later my mom told me how she and her brothers sat around the dining room table recalling Grandpa's less shining moments as a parent.  At a pause in the conversation, my uncle said, "I guess we'll be going to the gravesite with shovels." It was, Mom says, a coping mechanism, and she's right, of course.  But I think it's also a reflection of their desire to have known more about their father, specifically that he loved them.  I say this because the stories are still told from time to time, perhaps not as a collection or with the same grief-driven voracity, but those lower points of my grandfather's parenting are ever-present.

Now, to make an awkward transition, I think of a phrase used by my pastor in a sermon he gave: The Greatest Possible Good.  What does it mean to live toward that? My pastor suggested that it means to live toward the greatest good for our society, not just for ourselves. However, sometimes I believe that living for the greatest good in our families and among our friends is the most difficult of all, yet these are the people who feel our influence the most.  I like to imagine myself becoming an influential writer, capable of stirring my readers to action, capable of quelling violence with the stroke of a pen (or, more accurately, a key stroke), capable of promoting a true, substantive tolerance between activists and politicians and religious leaders.  But my dreams unravel when I remember that, at times (let me just emphasize that, at times), simply being civil to my younger siblings and parents and sundry others proves too great a challenge.  I am mightily hot tempered.

There is a very good possibility that I inherited this from my Grandpa.  Several months ago, as my Mom and I were going through some old newspaper clippings, we found a letter that had been written to the editor of The Yakima Herald Republic regarding my grandfather.  It was written in the weeks after his death, and the writer reminded the community of what a treasure they had lost.  He had been a devoted physician, a capable member of various boards.  I'd love to quote it right now, but I don't know where it is.  The point is, I was stunned. To read about my grandfather from this perspective was odd and refreshing.  Grandpa had worked for the good of his community and his patients, quitting only when HMOs disallowed him from practicing medicine the way he felt he ought.

Knowing this about him is very nice indeed, but nicer still are the other stories my mom often recalls. She tells me now that, when she remembers certain special things he did for her, she realizes that those were his way of saying, "I love you." He may not have been there when she received her high school diploma, but he was there the first time she dined on top of the Space Needle, even setting a matchbook on the ledge by their table so she could see how the room rotated.  By the time the meal ended, they had come full circle, returning to that matchbook. He took her to her first Huskies' game, renting a penthouse just for the occasion.

Perhaps the most difficult thing is verbalizing our feelings, but often actions work just as well, if not better.  If Grandpa had been better at conveying his feelings for his children would these special moments he shared with his daughter be quite so special?  This is probably the best lesson I can take from my grandfather: that with family and friends the gift of time is often the most precious, whether atop the Space Needle, in a penthouse, or at the utility sink executing impromptu science lessons.

Ah yes, I have saved the best story for last: When my mother was a young girl, she has told me this story many times, her dad had one of their cows butchered, and he kept some of the organs. He brought the heart into the utility area of the house and put it in the sink. Then, with scalpel in hand, called my mother over to the sink and proceeded to dissect the organ and show her, as I'm sure only a surgeon can, the chambers of the heart. If that isn't profound symbolism, then l don't know what is.

My Top Ten(ish) Pet Peeves of 2012 (so far)

I believe that it is duly time for me to post a list of my top ten pet peeves.  Why? Because it's better than posting a list of my top 100 pet peeves.  But seriously, I feel like it's the appropriate time because, well, because.  Readers may find this list self-serving and self-contradictory, and it is entirely both.  Hopefully it isn't too heavy-handed, but then, how else would one deal with pet peeves?

1. Beverage drinking in church.  I mean, really, you can't live without your half-caf, half-decaf white mocha frap (or cup of joe or gallon of water) for an hour? Have we really become such an impatient society that not even God warrants 60-90 hydration free minutes a week?

2. Households which expect all who enter to remove their shoes.  Now, I understand this as a reflection of a person's culture or religion, but I do not understand it as a general requirement for people who were foolish enough to put white carpeting in their houses.  Of course, I'm probably one of the few who gets their nerves tweaked by this request anymore; however, I do firmly believe that there are ways of making this request that are more polite and considerate than simply leaving a basket by the front door for everyone to stack their shoes in.  My Emily Post's Etiquette book informs me that making a polite request of friends and family to remove their shoes is fine, especially when inclement seasons are longer.  But, she does advise leaving slippers or sandals out for guests to wear.  This avoids the awkward I'm-in-my-bare/stocking-feet feeling.  Also, the formality of the event comes into play as does your familiarity with the people you are inviting into your home.

3. Double dipping.  Blech.  That one bowl of dip has to be shared by a group of people who may not want it seasoned with your saliva. My aversion to this practice has earned me a reputation for being a germ-a-phobe, which I find odd because it's blatantly inconsiderate.  Let me quote Peggy Post: "Don't be a double dipper.  One chip, cracker, shrimp, veggie, or fruit tidbit is for one dip, and only one, in the bowl.  Double dipping is unsanitary and inconsiderate of the hosts, who will have to toss out a dip when they catch a double dipper" (452).  Thank you.  That is all (for number 3).

4. Newborns out and about -- not on their own, obviously.  I am referring again to my beef with impatience (see number 1). Infants -- little, tiny, pink things just barely out of the womb -- seem to be joining their moms at the mall more frequently (or has it just suddenly come to my attention?). Isn't really unwise to expose these infants to the wider world of germs?  Not that I'm suggesting zipping them into a bubble for the first month of their lives -- well, maybe I am.

5. Other drivers.  I'm not even kidding.  I wish I was, but I generally find that other drivers often fail to signal, forget the rules of four-way stops, swerve over the yellow line and back as they text their friends that they're, like, on their way.  But especially people who have the gall to suggest that I could ever be at fault in my own driving. Sheesh.  The nerve.

6.  Customers who come into stores right before or at closing.  Now that I work in retail, my suspicions -- developed over years of being a customer -- have been confirmed: those sales clerks do not like customers who absent-mindedly wander into stores at 5:57 when the store closes at 6:00. Especially when said customer's visit is obviously not going to be quick.  I dread the customer who wanders in 30 seconds to closing, hands behind his back, carefully perusing every rack of clothing, every shoe, every tent pole, spork, and magnesium fire starter in sight. Please, stores post hours out of courtesy.  Be courteous in return and check them.

7. Academics who arrogantly dismiss anything they see as pedestrian or sophomoric as being ... pedestrian and sophomoric. To be fair, it isn't just academics who do this.  There are a wide range of high-minded elitists who take delight in shredding books/music/films that they don't see as providing the right kind of intellectual stimulation -- never mind enjoyment, sentiment, humor.  Those are symptoms of weakness.

8. Conversely, self-seeking air heads who don't believe there's any value in education.  Because, like, it's more important to be rich and beautiful than it is to be, like, smart? (Up talk.)  But I am also referring to those who feel that no benefit comes from reading the works of dead people nor from learning of the escapades of dead generations (I mean literature and history... just to be clear). I remember reading an article on a gentleman who said that every time he saw a library he saw an archaism. He didn't put it that way, but he gave the distinct impression that he wanted to see the libraries taken down because the internet holds the future.  He was/is not an airhead (I like to think of him that way, though). He was just narrow minded, which is as bad. It occurs to me, however, that his world is restricted to 1's and 0's.  And that's a little sad.

9.  People who exercise too much.  Don't misunderstand me here.  I know plenty of people who love exercise in its many varieties, but they have lives beyond fitness.  The people I am referencing are those who assume life isn't worth living without constant physical exertion -- and are arrogant about it to boot.  Spandex bike jerks in California; mud-splattered triathletes in Oregon; marathoners in Utah -- wherever.  It doesn't matter.  Just please stop strutting around like your 0 per cent body fat and addiction to exercise are super cool.  They're actually super obnoxious.  Regale me not with tales of your latest survival whilst glissading down Mt. Rainier's glaciers for the umpteenth time. Please refrain from explaining to me the difference between mountain biking, street biking and banana biking.  I get the general idea.  You have pushed your body to its extreme limits and will probably have titanium hips by the time you're fifty.  Hooray!

10. Conversely, people who don't exercise at all, or who do so at such a snail's pace it seems hardly possible they're burning any more calories than they do in front of the computer. And then said folks complain about not losing weight.  Our bodies were made to move.  So move.

And finally, to end on an odd number, my eleventh pet peeve (I lied. There are eleven not ten.)

11.  Pet peeve lists.  Yes, I find people like me highly reprehensible. Do I have nothing better to do with my life than sit around and come up with a list of complaints?  What a loser!  God, save us from ourselves.  Here I am, relatively happy and healthy.  I am allowed to practice my faith, vote as I see fit, eat to the content of my over-eater's heart, and communicate freely with friends and family.  So many things in my world are right that it seems utterly churlish to complain about a few incidentals.  But from time to time I do, if only to alleviate myself of pet peeve-related anxiety.

The Fine Art of Avoiding People

According to the quiz I just took on time.com, I am "most likely an introvert;" I already knew that, but confirmation is nice.  Lately I have been coming across a wide range of articles on introversion and shyness.  They crop up on the new sites I visit;  they appear on friends' reading lists on Facebook. Then, this morning, I arrived at my parents' house to find a pristine copy of the February 6 edition of Time magazine on the corner of the kitchen counter waiting to be opened and read, the cover story in large, black print, declaring "The Power of Shyness".  But my mother absconded with said reading material before I could get my mits on the mag.  Well, I guess she did pay for it.  Hence my attempt to find it online; hence my taking of the quiz; hence this blog.

Shyness and introversion are two topics which have interested me for years.  When I was a freshman in English 101, I wrote that quarter's research paper on Social Anxiety Disorder.  I don't remember the resources I used, but I do remember reading one article which seemed to indicate that SAD wasn't so much a disorder as it was extroverts trying to understand introverts, or people who, unlike them, did not seek out the lime light.  That article, whatever it was, whoever it was by, struck a cord.  Maybe, I thought, I'm not constantly on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Maybe I don't need medication to make me like people more.  Maybe I am just another type of normal.

It's a thought that writer Jonathan Rauch deals with in his article for The Atlantic called "Caring for Your Introvert."  Written in 2003, Rauch's article resonated, and continues to resonate, with many of his readers.  In his article, Rauch distinguishes between shy and introvert by stating that "Shy people are anxious or frightened or self-excoreating in social settings; introverts generally are not. ... Rather, introverts are people who find other people tiring."  He goes on to distinguish introverts from extroverts by explaining that "[e]xtroverts are energized by people, and wilt or fade when alone."  I find it interesting that there seems to be a push to distinguish shyness from introversion, for Rauch is not the only one to do so. And I can understand why; shyness does seem to imply some lack in social ability.  However, while there may be many introverts who are not shy, I doubt there are many shy people who are not introverts.  But what do I know?  I'm only a shy introvert.

Perhaps I describe myself as shy only because I have done so for much of my life, but, after reading Rauch's description of shyness, I'm rather inclined to think I was right all along.  I do get nervous before some social situations, especially if there are a number of people involved (parties, in other words).  I always have an attack of heart palpitations before I call someone on the phone.  I get anxious, and slightly light-headed, in large crowds -- but that may be more of a claustrophobia thing.  There are certain interactions which I once dreaded and no longer have to worry over thanks to our technological, anti-social world.  I used to hate writing checks at grocery stores because it took longer, and I imagined all the people (two, usually) behind me in line rolling their eyes.  One of my friends even came up with a mock check book and played cashier in her kitchen to help me practice writing checks.  I also used to dread approaching bank tellers to deposit my pay checks, especially after one said to me, "You know you can do this at the ATM" (imagine it being said derisively, because that's how I remember it).  Hallelujah for ATM machines (which I finally learned to use) and credit cards which make all of these awkward life moments either vanish or dwindle.

 On the other hand, I don't think I'm completely useless at being social.  It certainly depends on the setting and the people. If I know a number of partygoers at an event, I can often feel (emphasis on feel) like the life of the party, the belle of the ball, dazzling them with my razor-sharp wit, my insight into puzzling cultural happenstances, my brilliant white-toothed smiles (remember those Windows T.V. commercials where the narrator's would flashback and remember themselves as far more beautiful than they actually were? That's the kind of moment I'm having right now).  All this before I break away from the party (early) to go home and veg for two hours before bed so I don't end up obsessing over what I said or didn't say or should've said -- something I don't imagine too many extroverts doing.  This, apparently, is fairly normal for introverts, the need to recover and recharge.  And yet still separate from shyness, which I sometimes feel is still seen as some kind of medicateable (it is a word because I say so) problem.  When all is said and done, it appears to me that there is no definable way to describe introversion versus shyness.  The lines, as the Times quiz stated, are always shifting.

Of course, none of this means that I take issue or umbrage with any of Rauch's points.  On the contrary, I, like many of his readers, find his comments refreshing.  It is nice to know that I'm not the only one who struggles to overcome the perception that I am a snob simply because I don't gush over someone's dress or shoes or nail color or that I'm aloof because I don't run around hugging people I've known for five minutes.  Not that I'm bitter.  Rauch does, however, make a statement in a later interview with The Atlantic which I find interesting and about which I have mixed feelings. On being told that his article has been one of the most popular pages on theatlantic.com, Rauch states that "[t]he internet is the perfect medium for introverts. ... [O]n the internet, no one knows you're an introvert."

He is so right. I love the internet.  Given the choice between calling someone on the phone or e-mailing them, I'd choose e-mail every time.  Hands down, even with friends, the exception being members of my close family.  I find that I can communicate more clearly when writing.  I don't worry as much about being funny (well, not always) or whether my stories are interesting or not.  I don't have listen to myself try to sound outgoing or infuse my voice with obvious warmth or excitement.  No one is going to say to me, "you sound bored."  There's no initial small talk barrier to get past; I can just start saying what I want to say, and I can say it for as long as I want (which is why this blog is getting to be so very wordy).  But there, my glowing comfort with electronic communication ends.  I like texting, but I don't check my phone often enough to give the kind of quick responses people expect.  Facebook is great for setting up social engagements, but I rarely comment on anyone else's postings or photos.  When friends go through their so-called "friends list" and cull the unresponsive members of that list, I am often one of those who is dropped, even if we were, at one point, close.

My discomfort with social networking is probably rooted in the idea, frequently repeated by many far more educated people, that the more engrossed we become with our on-line selves, the less aware of the real-world we are.  Is this misplaced?  Maybe.  Maybe the internet is the new real-world, and it's just a matter of time before we accept that fact.  But I hope not.  I would much prefer to visit Mt. Rainier, hike its many trails, witness its springtime rush of wildflowers, for myself than stare at its picture on my computer screen, scaled down to the size of a portrait.  And maybe the further danger of social networking, of YouTube, of blogging, is seeing yourself as the main event.  When so many people find instantaneous -- and fleeting -- fame through posting videos of themselves online, how can that hope for glory be avoided?  How can we (or I) blame people for wanting to stand out?  The ironic thing is that as individualized as we may feel our Facebook profile is or as unique as our video or blog may seem to us, 150 million other people feel exactly the same about their site.

A recent headline on The Guardian stated, "Social networking under fresh attacks as tide of cyber-skepticism sweeps US." The article covers a variety of U.S. based authors and their books on the problems with social networking, among those problems isolation and laziness, the loss of the ability to think or reason with any complexity.  But, the article points out, that even these critics have critics.  The internet has opened up communication between people who would not normally communicate.  In a sense, the world is at our fingertips.  But... but.

I can go either way here.  Rauch's assertion that the internet is ideal for introverts is correct, but should it be the ideal?  Are we limiting ourselves?  Do we sacrifice a greater knowledge with our immediate surroundings in order to better grasp something on the other side of world, or computer screen as the case may be?  As with all other wonderful freedoms, there come a new set of restrictions.  I can't help but wonder if part of the problem so many people have with social networking is really just another introvert/extrovert issue.  Have we stumbled across a medium that suites introverts better than extroverts, and extroverts just don't like not having their face time?  That idea is probably off-base and certainly over-simplified, but it does remind me of that article from English 101.  If you don't seek the lime light, there must be something wrong with you.  If your idea of social interaction is an incessant volley of tweets rather than an incessant need for small talk, there must be something wrong with you.

I actually tend to think that social networking is yet another form of extroversion in introversion clothing.  If I can't be compelled to comment on Facebook's endless wedding/honeymoon/baby pictures because I find it stressful trying to strike the perfect non-verbal tone in a unique, ten-word phrase, you can't tell me that social networking sites are any more shy-friendly than a crowded bar would be. Maybe tearing myself out of the house and dragging myself to a social gathering now and then is just as good for me as getting a computer geek out into the sunshine is for him or her.  And maybe I should just take that idea and run and give all five of my loyal readers a break from my apparently endless nattering.  If you happen to see me out and about and worry that I'm overly quiet and perhaps depressed, don't worry.  I'm not.  It's called silence.  And it's a very good thing.

Articles I used:

Harris, Paul.  http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/jan/22/social-networking-cyber-scepticism-twitter
Rauch, Jonathan. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2003/03/caring-for-your-introvert/2696/
Stossel, Sage. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2006/02/introverts-of-the-world-unite/4646/

Today is a Nine

Sundays have always been special days in our family.  When my siblings and I were quite young, our family began a tradition of having donuts after church.  As kids we ate them while reading the Sunday comics and drinking milk.  Over the years details about this tradition have changed -- where we bought the donuts, whether we drank milk or tea or coffee -- but the tradition itself remains.  I think it is not an unusual practice, given how often the donuts we particularly liked were sold out by the time Dad would get to the counter.  I remember that initially our donuts came from a bakery that was located just west of the university campus.  This bakery specialized in making maple bars that were (I think) a foot long and shaped like feet.  I loved that!  I could rarely finish one, but I gave it a valiant effort (now the thought of eating something foot-shaped seems.... gross).  When this bakery closed, we began frequenting the bakery at Super One, and our particular favorite was the half chocolate, half maple bar. I also enjoyed one donut that had white frosting with strawberry and lemon jam in stripes on top of the frosting with shredded coconut on top of that.  Just thinking about it puts me into a diabetic coma.

But, contrary to what the first paragraph suggests, this blog is not about sweets.  All of the above was simply to introduce the topic(s) of this posting.  This past Sunday, my parents and I (yes, I am one of those spinsters -- I hate that word -- who socializes mainly with her parents) were sitting round the dining room table after church eating cinnamon rolls (shake things up a bit) and perusing the Sunday Seattle Times.  I made my way through the comics, Parade, the Seattle Times' insert/magazine The Pacific Northwest, the travel section, the arts section, the front page (mostly reading headlines and looking at pictures).  I had tossed aside the sports' section and the business section as well as the classified section, when I happened across the horoscopes (which must have been in a section I had previously skimmed but had missed).  I'm not much of a horoscope person, but once in a while I read them.  My horoscope on this particular Sunday read, "Today is a nine."  It said more than that, but I don't remember specific details.  Probably something about embracing opportunities and meeting new people, neither of which is an area of strength for me.

Interestingly, Sunday was probably pretty close to a nine.  I had no obligations in the afternoon.  I read or watched t.v. (why is there a period after both t and v when television is one word?) or chatted with friends.  In the evening I made a foray into the world of socializing but was home in time for Downton Abbey. In many ways Sunday was much like any other day off.  And it occurs to me that maybe this isn't what is meant by a "nine" type of day.

All those months ago when I started this blog, I mentioned that I had made an attempt at starting it the previous year.  The blog was intended to be a way for me to lay claim to more "nine" days.  My great and glowing hope was that it would motivate me beyond my current, rather staid, situation in life. To some extant, it has.  There are great plans underway, but I am gravely concerned that they will remain only plans.  The real issue, as I'm sure I've pointed out before, is my own lack of discipline, my frightening inability to care where I am or what I'm doing.  Then, once in while, I'm given bursts of panic about my life, sudden rocket-glaring realization that I cannot always be here.  I find it infinitely important that I try (at least) to make some forward movement in those moments.

Referring to my previous blog attempt was not pointless.  In fact, my plan throughout all of this rambling has been to illuminate one small but important feature of this blog -- its title.  My favorite book  is, and has been for some time now, Howards End by E.M. Forster.  It is a beautifully written novel which deals with the idea of spiritual heirs and connectedness, upper class and lower class, imperialists and idealists.  I studied it and wrote about it as a graduate student for a portion of my ill-fated thesis, and, though not one person may ever know my astounding theories on this astounding book, I still find myself drawn to its timeless narrative.  I say timeless because so many of the issues dealt with continue to be relevant. I won't go into detail; it wouldn't be as good as the real thing.

As I began to type that first, and now long-lost, post, I turned to Howards End for inspiration.  I don't remember exactly what I wrote.  Perhaps it was about connecting with our fellow human beings; perhaps I tackled the effects of education on class or Edwardian gender issues. Perhaps I did nothing more than quote my favorite passages.  But, ultimately, I came upon a portion of narration of which I had taken little note previously.

Margaret Schlegel, who was meant to inherit the house Howards End, is taken there by the widower Henry Wilcox.  Wilcox knows his wife left the house to Miss Schlegel in a last minute, hand-written missive before dying, but Wilcox supersedes his wife's wishes, burns the note, and leaves Miss Schlegel none the wiser. As Miss Schlegel makes her way through the house, she looks at the ancient wych-elm tree in the front yard and contemplates its relationship to the house.  The narrator writes, "It was neither warrior, nor lover, nor god; ... It was a comrade, bending over the house, strength and adventure in its roots, but in its utmost fingers tenderness, and the girth, that a dozen men could not have spanned, became in the end evanescent. ... House and tree transcended any similes of sex. ... [T]o compare either to man, to woman, always dwarfed the vision."

The point is that Miss Schlegel understands the house in the same way that Mrs. Wilcox did and in which Mr. Wilcox never will.  As Margaret is being shown the house, Mr. Wilcox talks about nothing more than remodeling the house, telling her in a "monologue" the "use and dimensions of the various rooms," all in terms which indicate to readers that the house is not really his, much as he would like to think so. The tree is a symbol of England and tradition.  Often elms were associated with death in England, but the leaves were also used to feed livestock.  In Germany, the tree was seen as a gateway between this world and the spirit world.  The fact that Henry Wilcox does not see it for its tradition, even for its Englishness (Forster asserts that the house "was English, and the wych-elm tree ... an English tree"), suggests his own rootlessness;  the fact that Margaret Schlegel sees its tradition and resists assigning it, and the house, a gender in order to avoid dwarfing her vision of the two suggests her own inevitable permanence there.

Often we are victims of the "Henry Wilcox" myopia.  We look at our lives and our world in compartmentalized boxes and see just what is nearest.  We have deadlines and to-do lists.  We want to earn a certain amount of money by a certain age. Own a house; get on the ladder.  We blast forward with our lives, leaving our traditions behind.   All of these plans would indicate some thought, at least, for the future, but if something happens to a person's finances, to the housing market, to any of these mortal, transitory concerns, what is left?  Wilcox, at the end of the book, having lost his wealth, is left a weakened man, so sickly that he needs looking after.

The "Seanse Ducken" myopia isn't much better.  I may not be worrying about housing markets or Wall Street, but my vision is certainly fixed on the here and now, on what I feel like doing, on what floats my boat this instant.  If I feel disinclined to apply for graduate schools or to look for jobs with benefits because Netflix instant play is calling my name, how am I any better than the Henry Wilcoxes of the world?  It's far more likely that I'm worse.  So, a full month after New Years', I have settled on a resolution. I resolve to create more "nine" days.  Or perhaps more accurately, to redefine them.

An Explanation as to Why I Don't Blog More Often

You spend your last two hours in bed half-sleeping, flitting from dream to dream and in and out of them.  You go from a movie filmed in an old screen star's house in the Tri-Cities (of all places) to a play in a diner to a series of vignettes starring you and your colleagues at work trying on brightly colored silicone shoes.  Each scene is brief and possesses for you an eerie sense of belonging -- which isn't supposed to and doesn't make sense.  As you wake, you remember that last week you dreamed of someone comparing your writing to the voice of angels (wishful thinking on the subconscious's part), and once, years ago, you dreamed of snakes that sprang at you from tree branches.  Then your mother showed you, in the dream, how by catching the snakes in paper bags and twisting the bag and snake together until they evaporated you could kill them.  You turned that dream into two poems.  Or was it one poem used for two classes?

On rising from your bed, you find yourself feeling like a metaphysical abstraction -- keeping with your dreams -- but a slice of reality cuts through your bedroom curtains, and you realize it is later than you thought.  In the bathroom, leaning on the counter, you stare at yourself staring at yourself. You think about how months ago before the New Year people started talking end-of-the-world scenarios, climate change,
natural disasters, mass killings.  You turn on the shower.

Funny how all this coincides with your upcoming 30th birthday -- a date you dread, not so much the number as the fact that people will go from saying, "I loved that age" to "Oh that was a tough birthday for me." Even if 30 is the new 20.  Even if is 50 is the new 30 and 65 the new late middle age. Right.  Tell it to the space invaders or the sea monsters or whatever harbingers of destruction will appear on December 21.

Once in the shower, reality settles down more firmly around you.  Your shampoo smell like coconut but makes your hair limp.You keep forgetting to buy new body wash.  And razor blades.  And conditioner. Fortunately (fortunately!), you have the whole day ahead and to yourself.  You have the bright, sunny morning which will unfold into either a bright, sunny afternoon, perfect for walks, or a suddenly dark, stormy afternoon, perfect for books, and both options perfect for plotting the future or overeating or watching too much t.v.  Even now there is breakfast just ahead and two months left of being in your twenties.

Even now you realize that all along you've been saying "you" when you meant "I" or "me", but you won't revise as it would disrupt the narrative flow of your mental dithering.  Things come together more quickly now: the outfit (or what passes for one), the hair (such as it is), the make-up (wait -- scratch that; it's your day off).  You remind yourself to bookmark your morning insanity, to make physical note of at least some of it, to be divided and researched and expanded upon and, somehow, uniquely illuminated.

Writing them down is low priority though, and you go out and meet faces and carry on conversations. And the next time you come face to face with your computer, you've forgotten what you were going to say.