Month: March 2011

I want to fill them up with poetry

Grace, Whit and I went to Walden today.  Over the years I have been there often, pulled by something beyond me, and I always go in the winter.  I like it empty and quiet.  I like to be the only person (people) there.  I like it when I can feel the spirituality crackling in the air.  I could today.

As we made our way around the pond Grace and Whit took detours to explore the woods and paused to wonder at the fact that the pond is still mostly covered with ice.  It is definitely not warm here yet, even though it is officially spring.  The trees are still defiantly bare, and their black branches net the sky.  Today that sky was gray, with occasional beams of sun breaking through the thick ridges of white-gray clouds.

As we walked I told Grace and Whit about Thoreau, about how he chose to live simply, to focus on the natural world around him.  Our adventure quickly turned into a Notice Things Walk, and each called out when they saw something worth sharing: a peculiar knot on the side of a tree trunk or the pattern of stones leading down to the water that looked like stairs.  When we arrived at the site of Thoreau’s cabin, we saw this sign and a pile of rocks.
As Grace read the lines, so familiar to me, and I felt my chest tighten.  They both had questions about the last line.  We talked about what meant to live a life so full that you felt sure, at the end of it, that you’d truly lived.  I had sunglasses on so neither child could see that my eyes brimmed with tears.  Then they busied themselves building a cairn in the rock pile, as others had done before.
Whit was very curious about the cairns and he moved carefully among the stones, examining the various piles.  I imagined what those who erected these monuments were commemorating: the example of a life thoroughly-lived, the commitment to art, the desire to immerse oneself in nature.
And then we were off again.  The trail wound its way around the pond, a multi-season combination of dead leaves and tenacious patches of snow and ice.  We walked in companionable silence, Whit’s hand in mine.  He announced, apropos of nothing, that when he went to college he still wanted to live at home.  “Why?” Grace piped up from ahead of us.  Whit didn’t answer right away, just squeezed my hand.  “I want to live at college for sure,” she averred confidently as she danced, occasionally skidding in her tractionless Uggs, along the path.

“Well,” Whit said, not looking at me, “Being with Mummy makes me feel safe.  And I want to stay safe.”  I gulped, remembering the time he told me that holding my hand makes him feel like his heart would never break.  I desperately wish I could keep his heart from breaking and keep him safe forever, but I know that neither of those things is in my control.

I gripped Whit’s little fingers and kept walking, breathing the piney Walden air, hearing Thoreau’s words in my head.  Ahead of us Grace’s red and white parka bobbed up and down.  The air was still, the bracing cold of winter mitigated by the promise of spring.  The only sound was our footsteps.

I want to make sure my children know the feeling I get at Walden, the soaring in the chest that speaks of a similar expansion in the spirit.  I want to encourage them to engage with life and to learn what it has to teach.  I want to fill them up with poetry.  Even more, I want to help them see the poem that lives in every day of their lives.

Present Tense with Corinne Cunningham

Almost a year ago I drove over an hour to have lunch with two new blog-friends.  Jo from Mylestones and Corinne from Trains, Tutus, and Teatime.  Over flatbread we chatted and chatted and barely had time to take a breath.  The time flew by.  And then, over the summer, I got to spend lots more time with Corinne when we took the train to and from BlogHer.  We’ve had a couple of visits since then, notably to hear Gail Caldwell read from Let’s Take the Long Way Home.  It’s never enough though, and I am particularly hoping to meet Corinne’s delicious Fynn and Page, who feature prominently in her blog.

Corinne’s blog is a beautiful series of meditations on real, ordinary life.  She writes about her everyday experiences with her children, about her sobriety journey, and about her nascent but vital spirituality.  She and I have in common a passionate attachment to the ocean and the beach, and I particularly adore her posts about her visits there.  Corinne shares her beautiful photography, too, and I am often as refreshed and inspired by her images as I am by her words.  I urge you to click over to Trains, Tutus, and Teatime and to spend some time immersed in Corinne’s world.  I am certain that I am better for this immersion; there is something about Corinne, both in person and on the page, that makes me calmer, more patient, more open to my own humanity.

And more good news!  Corinne’s creativity has a new outlet.  She has thrown herself wholeheartedly into knitting, and I’m thrilled to point you to her brand-new etsy shop, A Soft Landing, here.  I am the proud owner of a pair of Corinne’s handwarmers, and I tell you I can feel the love that went into the knitting of them every time I pull them on.

In the meantime, I’m honored to host Corinne here today for Present Tense.  I know that the effort to remain open to her own life is important to Corinne, as she and I have talked about it.  I was delighted when she agreed to answer my questions.  So here is Corinne, with her trademark wisdom, humility, and flat-out wonderfulness.

1. When have you felt most present?  Are there specific memories that stand out for you?My wedding. I remember almost every moment of that day vividly. The other moments that stand out are days with my husband and kids. We take adventures now and then, trips to the beach or hikes, and being in nature with the kids and Lucas… it’s just incredible. When the sounds are the wind or ocean and birds and your children giggling and your  husband laughing and talking about life… it doesn’t get any better, and there’s no reason for the mind to drift away.

2. Do you have rituals or patterns that you use to remind you to Be Here Now?

When I feel hurried and like my mind is getting too far ahead of my body, I find a quiet space and tell myself to take deep breaths {which is the same thing I tell my kids when I see their minds spinning out, or their actions getting on the crazy side} and then I sit with my breath and reflect on why I’m spiraling. Those few moments of quiet bring me back to the moment at hand.

3. Do you have specific places or people that you associate with being particularly present?  Who?  Where?  Any idea why?

The beach. Any and all beaches. It’s my place, where I feel most at home and alive and calm all at the same time. It’s the place that I long for, and when I’m there, it’s just me and the sounds and smells. As far as people, my kids. Always. They remind me to be here. There isn’t any other place I need to be. So combine a day at the beach, with my children, and I’m completely, fully, present.

4. Have you ever meditated?  How did that go?

I’ve tried many a times to meditate. I also have the monkey mind… and it’s so very hard to keep it from wandering. Recently I’ve found that knitting is a sort of meditation for me. I have to focus only on my hands and it keeps me very aware. I can concentrate on the task at hand, but also my breath and it’s calming and helps to clear my mind.

5. Has having children changed how you think about the effort to be present?

Absolutely.  There was a time years ago, probably in high school, that I was keenly aware of being present and living authentically and focused on my dreams and hopes {which I think are all combined somehow} But then I went off to college and my drinking began to get the better of me. It took having my children to realize the areas that I needed help in. It took having
my children to realize my drinking problem, to then get sober and focus on being here with them. With me. With my husband. With whatever is right in front of me. I have my children to thank for bringing me back to that place where I can focus on what rally matters. Being here.

6. And just cause I’m curious, what books and songs do you love?

There are far too many books to list! The ones that come to mind at first are Brene Brown’s The Gifts of Imperfection, anything and everything by Anne Lamott, and for some reason Raymond Carver’s short stories are always a favorite. I just skimmed my bookshelf, and though they’re childhood loves, I still adore the Anne of Green Gables series and JulieEdward’s Mandy.

Songs…The Weepies are a favorite right now. Their songs Stars and Gotta have you play often around here. Jame’s Taylors Secret of Life, and Carolina in my Mind. Jack Johnson is another one that I love love love, and Jason Mraz. The Avett Brothers and their I and Love and You album. Roll Away Your Stone, by Mumford and Sons. And anything by Ingrid Michaelson… I
just adore her.

Sadness

Last week I read Susan Piver’s beautiful writing about the importance of sadness and sighed, nodded, and cried at the same time.  She was expressing exactly what I was trying to say, unsuccessfully, the other day.  I wasn’t having a bad day, though several friends called me and asked if I was OK after reading the post.  I don’t think I have a desperately tortured approach to the world, though perhaps others differ.

I was simply trying to describe what it’s like to be me in the world.  I feel intense joy and grief in equal measure, and it is safe to say that both emotions mark every single day of my life.  If the definition of a broken heart is feeling things, including sadness, overwhelmingly, then I have one.  Every single day.  It’s just another way of saying I’m porous.

I love, too, what Susan has to say about the instinct to turn sadness into one of the less uncomfortable emotions: bitterness, anger, helplessness.  Even defensiveness can be a place to hide from sadness.  It’s not an exaggeration to say that the last years for me have been a journey that is in large part about accepting my own fundamental sadness.  Resisting the impulse to run from the discomfort that true sadness brings.  Instead, leaning into it.  This is not easy, and for sure, a lot of the time it hurts.  Though there are many things that cut me to the quick, my essential sadness is time’s swift passage; that is the black hole at the center of my life, the unavoidable truth around which all the planets of my being orbit.

Virginia Woolf said “The beauty of the world has two edges, one of laughter, one of anguish, cutting the heart asunder” and I could not agree more.  In accepting the sadness I’ve seen so much more of the joy; in acknowledging my innate broken-heartedness I’ve also learned to be open to soaring moments of inspiration and even to belly laughter.

Naomi Shihab Nye’s gorgeous Kindness addresses also the ways that sadness is inextricably linked to sweeter emotions.  Her lines remind me of my thoughts about gentleness, another word that has been in my mind of late.

Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth/
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.

And so I supposed the message is not to shirk our own sorrow and not to bolt to safer harbors whose emotions are less painful.  At least if you’re wired like me, the path is paved with sadness, but that doesn’t mean the sky isn’t filled with glory.

Alchemy

alchemy

any magical power or process of transmuting a common substance, usually of little value, into a substance of great value.

Alchemy has always been one of my favorite words.  And in that way the universe has, which I’m learning to pay ever-closer attention to, two marvelous people used it in their comments on my post where I confessed I’d almost majored in Chemistry.  I’d never made the connection before, and suddenly understood that yearning in the younger me much better.  For a word I love so dearly, I use it rarely.  I went through the archives of this blog and saw that I’ve spoken about the alchemical properties of cooking and about the “particular alchemy” whereby some of the memories I recall most vividly are of random, ordinary moments, whose power I could never have known while I was living them.

Alchemy is, I realize, the best word for what it is I try to do every moment of my life.  A line from Coelho’s The Alchemist says it best: “it’s the simple things in life that are the most extraordinary and only the wise can see them.”  I am working – slowly, slowly – to notice the small things in my days, and through careful observation, to see them as the miracles they are.  I’d never call myself wise, but this is surely the central effort of my life.

These things, even amidst the dust and frustration that seem to permanently swirl around me, are life incarnate.  The expression on Grace’s face as she walks into Hogsmeade at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter.  The gradual slackening of Whit’s face as I watch him surrender to sleep, lying next to him in bed.  The transcendent peace that descends when I read a poem in O magazine.  Returning home to the relief of my familiar stack of books by my bed, to the practice of folding laundry, to the love that radiates off of the hand-drawn pictures from Grace and Whit tacked to my office wall.

Attention is the true alchemy, it seems to me. Being here, carefully witnessing, and breathing.  Realizing that even in the great aggravations and impatiences that crowd every day there are glittering jewels.  May I continue to believe in – and pursue – the alchemy that transmutes these ordinary moments into the most important of my life.

the miracle in everything speaks

I’m in, on the surface, one of the world’s un-poetic places.  Disney World.  And yet.  And yet. It’s been busy, with tired children and tired in-laws and lots of walking and lots of crowds.  Finally, at last, yesterday afternoon I had a few moments to sit down and read.  And I opened the new O magazine.  And it was all about poetry.  Once again, the universe smiled on me.

My favorite words in this issue packed with words I loved were these, from Mark Nepo, on the last page:

You Ask About Poetry

You ask from an island so far away
it remains unspoiled.  To walk quietly
til the miracle in everything speaks
is poetry.  You want to look for poetry
in your soul and in everyday life, as you
search for stones on the beach.  Four
thousand miles away ,as the sun ices
the snow, I smile.  For in this moment,
you are the poem.  After years of looking,
I can only say that searching for
small things worn by the deep is
the art of poetry,  But listening
to what they say is the poem.

To walk quietly till the  miracle in everything speaks is poetry.

Isn’t this, ultimately, what I am trying to do, every minute of my life?  To seek the poetry in everyday life?  To observe the miraculous twinnedness of life and death in the unfurling of trees around me, the endings and beginnings in January light, the message in a frost-covered field and the heartbreaking words of a five year old boy?  To be quiet so that the messages can come through, so that I can finally hear my own voice, so that I can be open to the thanksgiving that children offer?

To listen to what they say.

Yes.  Yes, it is.  Everyday life.  The practice and the poem.