Holed-up

Both my older sister and brother have ‘snow-birded’ their way to Florida again this January.  Mike is working pretty hard at the range trying to improve his driver and iron play.  Patty reported Saturday when I called that she was at a community ‘yard sale’ and that the sun was lovely, and, well, she was warm enough to take off her sweatshirt. 

Me?  I’m holed-up in Ohio wishing for some snow, which brings me to some thoughts about winter up here in moderately-cold country.

I must admit, I rather like winter.  Sure, I like to travel out of the cold into the sun when I can, but I really like just being home this time of year and leaning into the season.  

It used to be that I looked forward to snow so Huber Heights City Schools might cancel for the day and Cindy and I could have a bonus day off.  I still look forward to those cancellations, but now checking for Vandalia and Northmont, the districts where my grandkids attend.  Imagining them outside playing in snowfall when they could have been taking a social studies test warms my heart.  There will always be time for tests. 

I’ve noticed this year, too, that I’ve been feeling tired enough to hit the sack much earlier in the evening.  Last week I got to bed by 9:30 a couple of times.  Seems unusual for me, but with darkness settling in by 6 pm, my body must figure the three+ hours of no sun must mean it’s time to turn in.  Such must be the ‘long winter’s nap’ Clement Moore writes about in his popular Christmas poem.  

During this time of year, too, I can’t just head outside to start or continue a yard project.  Last week I tried to split a few logs left from the spruce cut-down last fall.  Yow.  Still pretty damned wet and hard to cut.  Yet, Noah took a small piece and with one swift swing of the ax, had his very first log split!  He was pumped!  The rest of those yard jobs can wait until April.

I’ve spent more time this year sitting at windows peering out into the winter.  I’ve read a bit, watched some video, and listened to plenty of music, but find the sitting and watching nicely meditational.   

A high school classmate, whose work schedule runs circles around mine, advises me she recently fell on Ohio ice and fractured a knee.  She now wonders what this event is supposed to teach her.  A week prior to the accident, she mentioned how she was more tired at the end of the day than she used to be.  She thought maybe she ought to slow down a bit.  Now with the knee break, she has to.  If I know her, she’ll try to find the message contained therein.  

Last Saturday we had an icy weather teaser around these parts:  cold rain turned into sleet.  It didn’t do much for sledding, but the roads sure were nasty.  It was better to set a fire in the stove and settle in for a day best spent inside.  Pretty good football last week, too. 

Overall this year, though, white precipitation has been a let down here.  We’ve gotten plenty of grey skies with lots of rain, but no snow to speak of.  There’s few neighborhood experiences better than taking a walk in a good snowfall.  The silence therein is remarkable.  

Perhaps that’s one of the best things about winter:  the quiet.  A quiet that encourages introspection and a good, long sit.  

Besides, a long, snowy season always makes springtime that much sweeter.  Spending winter where its warmer takes the purgatory out of the new growing season of color and birdsong.  I’d rather earn spring, you know?  

Today’s Elder Idea:  

Winter is the best time
to find out who you are.

Quiet, contemplation time,
away from the rushing world,

cold time, dark time, holed-up
pulled-in time and space

to see that inner landscape,
that place hidden and within.

‘Winter Is the Best Time’ by David Budbill, from While We've Still Got Feet. © Copper Canyon Press, 2005. Reprinted without permission.  

Borrowed from Garrison Keillor’s ‘The Writer’s Almanac’ from the Saturday, 28 January, podcast.  

image:  January 2009:  Brother Mike is preparing for his long-awaited journey south, delayed one day by stinky weather in SW Ohio.  Currently calling Detroit home, he knows now that winters are for golf clubs in Florida!

Norman Rockwell

If you live in the Dayton area and have not been down to the Art Institute to see American Chronicles: The Art of Norman Rockwell, I encourage you to go before it’s gone in a couple weeks.  

It is a collection of America, and Americans, right before your very eyes. 

I mention this today because it is a worthwhile exposition, but also because last Thursday when the museum held a poetry night, it was mentioned in the poet bios that this website (The Back Porch blog) was the home of my work on my Mabel Loomis Todd book.  Not so.  

For information on the The Dressy Adventuress:  Mabel Loomis Todd’s Camp Mavooshen on Audubon’s Hog Island, see:  http://thedressyadventuress.blogspot.com/

All the same, thanks for getting this far! 

I was invited to write an ekphrasic poem for the event -- an original piece based on a work of art.  I started by gathering ideas for a poem, or series of poems, but never quite got one finished enough for public consumption.  

Still, about a dozen poets read.  I participated with my writers’ group, Emily’s Boys, by opening the program with a spirited rendition of Walt Whitman’s ‘There was a child went forth.‘  A very nice evening, indeed. 

***

Any number of Rockwell images from the exhibit could accompany this entry today.  I picked ‘Girl at mirror’ just because she moves me so.  Maybe it’s because I have daughters of my own, or because I see an old girlfriend in the face of the young lady.  

I don’t know exactly.  What I do know, however, is that Norman Rockwell’s illustrations had me in tears most of the way through my two times through the exhibit.  

I kept thinking I was seeing my parents and my brothers and sisters in so many images.  I mean, we were everywhere.   I told my 90 year-old mother that she absolutely must let me take her to the exhibit.  I know she’ll be moved as well.  

When analyzing Rockwell’s importance in the canon of American art, one would have to say it is significant because it documents contemporary twentieth century life in America. 

That said, some complain that Rockwell’s work does not show the diversity of Americans -- that it misses so many of who we are.  I suppose that’s a fair criticism, but two of the most moving pieces in the exhibit were based on events from the Civil Rights era.  

Today I would like to celebrate what Rockwell did accomplish.  He succeeded in representing a wide variety of Americans in American pursuits, whether it was a young girl wondering about her blossoming womanhood, or a cop sitting on a bar stool talking to a young boy who thinks he knows enough to run away from home.  

When all is said and done, though, I must say I am drawn to Rockwell’s people:  their faces; their personalities exhibited through pose; the observation of private, personal moments at home; the perfect portraits of Dwight Eisenhower and John Kennedy.   

In the end, though, I have to say I am particularly drawn to Rockwell’s girls.  How can a guy look at that beautiful kid sitting in front of the mirror and not fall in love?  

Today’s Elder Idea:  I paint life as I like it to be.

Norman Rockwell

Morning

I’ve never been good at new year’s resolutions, so I gave up even trying years ago.  I’m sure somewhere along the way I swore off desserts after 8 pm.  Didn’t work.  Just look at my waistline.  I really do love my ice cream. 

One thing I’ve tried to incorporate in my life over the last decade or so is a regimen of zen meditation.  I’ve gotten started a few times, but after a week or so, I remember, “Oh, yeah.  I was supposed to meditate this morning.  Hmmm.  So it goes, I guess....”  

Still, like coming back to the breath countless times with no fault, no guilt, here I find myself.  I am hoping a little time every morning -- at least every weekday morning -- might help me reconnect with some ground that can keep me focused on my book and, well, life in general.  

I always hope to be doing the right thing.  Last week a friend connected my spiritual style to that of a miner.  “I love how you keep digging and mining for sources of inspiration and support for your own soul/spirit/life.  You are a miner and therefore you will never be at rest,” she wrote.  She went on to say her own miner’s life directs her into “as close a way as I can figure to walking through it all with any kind of integrity.”  I know I’m in good company.

So last week, the first week of January, I began a new practice of morning meditation.  In the hope of getting me focused for the quiet, I adapted a prayer I recently found as my forward for the day.  The original prayer addresses God.  I would rather address the Spirit of the Universe.  

Morning

Spirit of the Universe, I have come into the quiet and stillness of your presence to begin this day, so that out of these meditative moments I may take with me a quiet serenity which will last me through the rough and the smooth of this day’s life. 

I have come to find wisdom; that I may know when to speak, and when to keep silent; when to act, and when to refrain from action. 

I have come to find peace, so that nothing may worry or upset me, all through today. 

I have come to find courage, to be patient not to give up hope, when hopes are long in coming true; to accept disappointment without bitterness and delay without complaint. 

I have come to find love, to listen to your love so that all through today I may love, without being attached, that nothing may make me bitter or unforgiving. 

I have come to begin the day with you, so that I may be able to continue it, and end it with awareness of you. 

And I have come this day, O Spirit, to be real, transparent as a mountain stream, with a heart open and spontaneous as a child. 

Hear this, my morning prayer, for the hope of social justice and for the sake of all in the world.   Amen.

Finding myself sitting in a straight chair at the sliding glass doors that face our back yard, I then reach over and start the timer on my iPod.  I try to find a focal point to get lost in, somewhere out back.  Birds distract me.  But I sit, chin up, listening to my breath, just trying to be present, hoping that if anybody has anything to say, I’ll be able to hear it.  I’ll see how it goes.  

 How does your spiritual life go?  Care to share?  ;-)

Today’s Elder Idea:  The challenge is not to mourn what is lost, or over; nor regret that a good experience has come to an end; but rather to gather up all the pieces and take them with me into the next phase of my praying.  

Suzette Cayless

Order of the Holy Cross Companion

‘Morning’ adapted by and then from Kent Ira Groff  (Associate of Holy Cross) from a prayer found in a Roman Catholic seminary in India.  

image:  I mean, morning, you know?  And busy already.  Photo by Tom Schaefer.  


Sorry, but I can't correct the line just above.  The thought is by Suzette Cayless.

On the trail in 2011

Did I tell you the story of a few of us seeing God on the trail this past summer up in the Sangres?  Noah and I were talking about it again the other day and, well, we’re pretty sure we did.  

It all came up because of the little photo book of our summer expedition that was gifted last week.  All those great pictures told the story of all the stuff we did.  There was Grandma up on horseback.  There were Adel’s deer antlers he found.  There we were on the train.  And yes, we did talk about our UFO sighting.  You kind of had to be there, but it was pretty cool. 

Anyway, the section of the book that got most attention from Noah was that of the hike up the North Crestone Creek trail by just the guys where, as chance would have it, we met God.  We think. 

To get to the trail, we drove up a forest road a couple miles off pavement to a small, creekside national forest camp ground.  We gathered our gear, cached our water, and up the trail we went.  

Within the first thirty minutes, the trail narrowed, but it was evident that it was really just the forest road we had driven up on, which was now gated.  Not too much later, though, the trail cut back onto a mountain side, got a whole lot steeper, and we were truly hiking in Colorado.  The stones, wildflowers, the sound of the North Crestone Creek down below us, the guys up ahead.  It doesn’t get much better than that, I have to tell you.  

We stopped now and then to eat something and comment on the surroundings.  Usually it was Adel and Bruce up front, most often out of sight.  Noah and I pulled up the rear. 

I guess if there is any message to this blog today, it has something to do with my willingness -- fear? -- of heading up forest trails up into the mountains.  

At least that’s what the concrete piece of this is.  The real internal piece, I suspect, is more about my fear of doing other stuff in the world besides hiking where nobody can help you.  

What does that mean?  I don’t know exactly.  Does it mean I have to give more of myself to social justice issues?  Does it mean I have to take more chances as a writer to learn more about what I need to write about?  Does it have something to do with my spiritual salvation?  

Could be.  But back to the hike. 

I am aware of walking Noah too far on the trail to where he has a miserable time.  I am aware, too, of that gnawing in me that I might walk too far, cramp up, and embarrass myself in front of these macho guys.  It was complicated.  Probably more complicated than it needed to be, but there you have it.  We were up on the trail -- 9,000 feet, maybe -- about two hours out.  I was thinking Noah had enough.  We talked and we decided that, yup, that was about it.  We’d catch up with the guys and let ‘em know we were done for the day. 

Not more than a minute later, Bruce came back down the trail to check on us.  He encouraged us to forge ahead with the news of a beautiful vista just ahead.  He knew what buttons to push!  On we went. 

Oh.  And such a vista.  Its picture is my favorite of the trip.   It is the essence of what I had hoped for by bringing boys to the mountains.  As brother John Muir wrote, ‘The clearest way into the Universe, is through a forest wilderness.’  I had recorded that portal with my camera, with two students standing by. 

After a bit of a break and our soaking in the sights, we caught glimpse of a solo hiker coming down the trail from farther up on the mountain.  He was an older white-bearded guy in shorts packing enough that it was evident he had spent at least one night up there.  I wanted so much to hear more. 

I don’t remember much that was said, actually.  I’m sure I pressed him for details of what lakes he had seen.  I’m sure Noah told him who we were.  His parting remark though, as he proceeded down the mountain, would absolutely make our entire day.  

‘There’s a little creek just up the trail, you know, not more than a couple hundred yards,’ he yelled back.  

The creek was, in fact, delightful.  The water was cold on tired, bare feet.  Bruce went downstream a piece and did a full emersion, I think.  We all listened to the water as it bounced over and ground the Sangres into sand.  

Some time after we ate the last trail bar, the identify of the white-bearded one on the trail was questioned.  Who was that guy who turned us on to the best part of our day?  

Who else could it be?  We concluded it had to be God.  There he was, the bearded Godhead floating on a cloud -- caught taking a holiday in Colorado!  We enjoyed that story so much it survived to be told again at Christmas.  Family stuff, indeed.  

So, gentle reader, what is the lesson offered here at the end of 2011?  

Don’t be too afraid of things, I suppose.  For the life of me it sounds just the opposite of what Dorothy told Auntie Em she learned in Oz.  What was it, something like, ‘If you can’t find your heart’s desire here at home, you won’t find it anywhere else because you never really lost it anyway’...?  (I loved the movie but thought that line was preposterously weak.)

Anyway, in 2012 I am going to try to be a little less afraid to do stuff.  Writing, yes.  Bucket list destinations, yes.  Telling people I love them, yes.  Being as honest with myself as I can, yes.  Working for social justice in the world, yes.

Be brave in the new year.  Thanks for reading.  

Today’s Elder Idea:  Don’t be too afraid of things.

your humble blogger

image:  Boys @ 9000 ft. 

Dreams realized

Last year after all the Christmas presents were opened at our house, amid all the neat stuff I got, I felt a little let down.  

It felt familiar, I guess, like when I was a kid.  Maybe you know that feeling:  You’ve tried to drop enough obvious hints for that great gift that you really want, but it doesn’t show up under the tree.  Back in the day when Mom & Dad were making Christmas for seven kids, a guy just accepted the ennui in stride.  After all, the stuff I did get was pretty cool, if not downright practical, and Mom & Dad did the best their budget could afford.

Last Christmas later in the day, though, I took a chance and talked to Cindy Lou about my disappointment.  As you might imagine, she was disappointed with my disappointment.  She loves me deeply, and she certainly expected the clothes given with love were just what Santa ordered.  

Somewhere in that difficult conversation, Cindy came to understand that I prefer stuff to mess around with on Christmas, not stuff to wear.  (I learned years ago she doesn’t want stuff to plug in on Christmas, so I go with things like jammies, jewelry, and books.  I reminded her, too, that our newly acquired Hilton Head timeshare is a Christmas gift of sorts designed to delight her every spring for years to come.) 

I have to say, I was very proud of ourselves for how we handled that difficult discussion last year.  She listened with her heart while I spoke from mine.  It hasn’t always been thus with us!   :-o  

Somewhere in all of that consideration about gifts and disappointments, I got to thinking about dreams realized.  In the midst of remembering cold and prickly feelings from childhood, my better angel had me look at the flip side of my things.   

I think it is fair to say that by the time a body reaches the age of 60, he or she must have some big disappointments to deal with.  It’s just how life is. 

On the other hand, by the time that same body reaches maturity, what wonders of the universe has she or he been blessed to witness?  

So here and now, at the end of one year and the advent of my 62nd, let me list a few of the things I am truly grateful for:

• A meaningful career as a public school teacher who tried to make a difference with kids. 
• Being a retired public school teacher with a pension. 
• Two lovely daughters, six amazing grandchildren, and a wife who loves me.  
• A warm, safe house in a quiet suburban Midwest neighborhood with thoughtful but not nosy neighbors.  
• Enough money to go to the grocery whenever we want.
• Good health and the ability to see a doctor when needed.
• A good education that has encouraged me to pursue so many curious, rewarding topics.
• Appreciation for how hard a bird’s life is. 
• The blessing of having found a loving church community. 
• Living at a time when computers bring magic into our lives.  
• Here at home, great places to sit and read, listen to music, and ponder the meaning of everything while not being tied up in knots of hunger.  

I could go on, but you get the idea.  My life has been and still is amazingly good.  I am a lucky man in a world where so many have so little. 

And the truly cool thing about most of my realized dreams is that I never even had enough sense to dream them in the first place.  But here, with a mindset of mindfulness, I recognize them and I am truly grateful.

Today’s Elder Idea:  

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

Langston Hughes

American ‘jazz poet’

Passion for music

You might think the image accompanying this blog doesn’t exactly fit the headline. 

Contraire, amigo!  

It was back in the 70s when a few friends got together to make music for each others’ weddings, when I learned just how much fun making music in front of folks could be.   

Let’s make this very clear.  I did not play an instrument.  I just sang.  

I don’t mean to sound condescending with that crack.  It’s just that I was very aware that the guys playing guitar worked for hours getting the chord progressions and solo riffs right.  Me?  I got to listen to music and either sing along with the lead or work at picking out a harmony.  I figure I had the much easier gig, even though I had a hell of time memorizing lyrics.  

So in the course of offering a musical service to friends, Collage was born, a local band of buddies who ended up playing a lot of wedding receptions over that decade.  

I can still remember the first paying reception gig.  Our equipment was a wonder.  We borrowed an amp from a relative, I was told. Later on, after a couple beers, the story got a little richer.  For mic stands?   Cement poured into a margarine bowl with an aluminum rod stuck in it.  I can’t remember the actual microphones, but let us just say our set-up was makeshift.  In any case, let it be known that all survived that first three-set night at the long-closed Imperial House North here in Dayton.  I mean, we actually got paid in the process.

Collage started out with a couple of guitars, a keyboard, and a tambourine.  It was Steve Doody on lead, John Lauer on rhythm (sometimes acoustic), and eventually Jeff White on bass.  Marty Doody was our lovely keyboard player and female lead.  I sang lead a lot, but was happiest with harmonies, I think, though I couldn’t always find one.  Marty was a master at harmonies!    

Eventually we added a drummer.  We had a couple different guys, but within a short time that drummer was one Bruce Gunnell, a high school student at the time, but a former junior high school student council president I had quite a bit of fun working with as a new teacher, me serving as student council advisor.  Bruce was a kid, of course, and though mature beyond his years, he tells stories now of how one cold look from John could let him know the drum was too damn loud.  And such a conversation we had over the use of brushes!   Bruce still chuckles about that one today. 

With regular gigs came a showier wardrobe.  And, loyal reader, such is why the blue tux adorns this edition of The Back Porch blog.  I only wish I had a photo of the first tux we guys wore, bought used from Price Stores downtown:  Black & white brocade.  I kid you not.  

We looked pretty good, actually, as did Marty.  She always found something sexy to wear.  She was a pretty girl with a pretty voice.  In so many duets, the two of us worked off of each other to create some nice music.  We had a good time, too. 

I mention passion for music today for a couple of reasons.  First, I’m in the process of reading the Steve Jobs bio by Walter Isaacson, where the author makes it clear Jobs loved music, which, the story goes, is what drove the creation of iTunes and the iPod.   For Jobs it was Bob Dylan and the Beatles.  They rocked his world, and because of that passion, the world is a more musical place.  

Second, Collage’s mild-mannered drummer Bruce Gunnell is still at it, making music, but in a much different market:  Los Angeles.  Cali, if you will.  Today it is guitar and vocal as instruments of choice, with a little harmonica tossed in.  

Bruce has been in love with music forever.  Collage was his first band, besides the Wayne HS marching band, but it would not be his last.  He played in Jerry's Kids at Ohio University, and when he got to LA twenty-five+ years ago, he landed a drumming gig with The Leaving Trains, where he got to travel a bit and make some very loud, and I hear, pretty good, music.  Sorry, wasn’t my style. 

About a year or so ago, Bruce bumped into a guy in his Montrose neighborhood who was looking for a voice to fill out his band.  Bruce was game.  Such was good for a while, but after a time the feel wasn’t right.  That unnamed band folded, but Bruce and the bass player, Nancy Neal, stuck with it.  

In the process of getting more serious about music again, Bruce took to writing some music for one of Nancy’s lyrics.  Then he wrote a couple of his own songs, and the magic was back.  Since Thanksgiving, Nancy and Bruce have been in the studio with friends, recording three new, original songs.  I’ve heard stories of how things went, but I am eager to hear to mixed recordings.  

And, I just got word yesterday from Brother Bruce that said music is in the mail, winging its way to Ohio for Christmas.  I can’t tell you how eager I am to hear what the old Collage drummer has come up with.  

His passion for music turned out to be a mighty good thing. 

Today’s Elder Idea:  Rock and roll is here to stay, it will never die / It was meant to be that way, though I don’t know why....

from song by Danny & the Juniors

Missing Harry Chapin

It was back in July 1981 when I was on Hog Island for the first time, making new friends and having the adventure of a lifetime, when the tragic news of Harry Chapin’s passing reached across the narrows into paradise.  

Story was he was heading for a charity gig driving down the Long Island Expressway when his car somehow went out of control and ended up under a semi in a grinding crash that claimed his life.  

My new buddy Kevin from New Jersey heard the news first.  We went searching on the island for a newspaper for confirmation.  Sure enough, there was the story right there in the most recent New York Times somebody had left behind.  Kevin went on in some detail about how horrendous traffic can be on that stretch of highway.  We both had to sit for a few minutes, poring over the story, hoping somehow it wasn’t true.  But it was.  

I guess I feel the same way about Harry as I do about John Denver.  Both men wrote songs that I not only liked and could sing, but could somehow relate to.  Denver wrote about finding Colorado in his ‘twenty-seventh year.’  I did that, too.  Then he wrote about wild Alaska, peace in the world, the beauty of kids, and loving a woman, all stuff I knew or dreamed about.  He eventually even wrote about divorce, songs I cued up when I was going through my own.  

Harry, on the other had, was more of a epic story teller.  His protagonists were common men, one having given up his dream of being a pilot in order to make a living driving a taxi.  Wouldn’t you believe one night he picked up a fare who turned out to be his first girlfriend.  After smiles and brief stories were exchanged, Harry dropped her off in her ritzy neighborhood and did the only thing he could:  he stuffed the big tip she left him in his shirt -- and drove off into the night into his own, less complicated life.  

Or what about Mr. Tanner?  Here was a dry cleaner from my hometown -- Dayton, Ohio -- who had a lovely voice and was encouraged by his friends to go to New York City for a stage that truly fit his gift.   Reluctantly he went to perform, only to be skewered by a reviewer.  Devastated, he returned home, went back to work, and gave up on singing -- even to himself.  His great love had become his greater pain.   

Or what about the speaker in ‘Dreams go by’ who has his best girl and a whole life in front of him to achieve his dream as an artist.  What happens instead?  Kids.  Life.  Work.  Time spent doing stuff not all that important in the grand scheme of things.  Conclusion?  Dreams are to be lived when one is young.  Where do broken dreams go?  Indeed. 

Harry Chapin was Everyman to me.  He sang in my range, told storied I could relate to, and made some damn fine music.  I saw him once in concert here at Memorial Hall.  A couple of great sets.  I didn’t know all his work like my old buddy John did, a musician in his own right.  John loved Harry’s music.  Both of these beautiful men would be dead at the age of 39.  

Music is a powerful element in my life.  I sang in a few  bands in my day, happy to find musicians in search of a singer.  It started with a small band of us making music for each other’s weddings and turned into a couple of groups over a couple of decades doing rock and roll at local parties.  

My old buddy, John, too, was mighty significant in the music of my life.  Poor guy had a lousy voice, but loved to play.  He told stories of staying up late into the night after gigs just noodling a melody of, say, an Eagles song, trying to find the chords to share with the band.  As a cousin to my first wife, John often played guitar at family gatherings, whether parties or funerals.  More often than not I provided the solo.  Ah, those were the days.

So here I am reflecting on my 60+ years of living, wondering what kinds of great songs Harry would be writing now.  Sure, he wrote of being a grandpa when he was in his thirties, but now, by God, he’d be there.  John Denver, too.   

I wonder what those guys would be up to now?  I know my old buddy John would still be playing -- and I’d still be singing.  That much I know.

Today’s Elder Idea:  

Oh, if a man tried

To take his time on Earth

And proved before he died

What one man’s life could be worth

I wonder what would happen to this world.  

Inscribed on Harry’s headstone

lyric from his song, ‘I wonder what would happen to this world’