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The Mansion and the Lilliputian

May 5, 2012 at 6:35 pm · Filed under Big Cities, Community, Fences, Home, Questions and tagged: , , , , , , ,

I was driving home yesterday with the kids, and as so often happens after a long hard day, my brain — or my awareness – starts to feel like it’s rising out of my head.  I assume this is from fatigue.  I am functioning on a basic level of survival — must drive this car safely — but also feel kind of disconnected from things going on around me.  It’s like my mind is split in two.  So I was dwelling on this other split-level as I passed by a row of very large and fancy multi-million dollar homes.  I noticed a thin, petite woman, dressed in khakis, a loose white shirt, and a straw hat out working in the flowers in the front yard of one of these homes.  I often see crews of men working on the lawns of these houses, but rarely would I ever see a woman, by herself, out gardening.  In fact, I never have.  It seemed obvious to me that this woman must actually LIVE in the home in whose yard she was working.  How novel!

As I passed her by, it seemed very strange to me that such a little person should live in such a large home…It was as if I expected a giant to be out in the yard because only a giant would need so much space in which to reside.  Truly, I could not believe how tiny this woman looked in front of her residence.  Oddly, I almost felt sorry for this her.

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6 pm

November 19, 2011 at 6:34 pm · Filed under Big Cities, Community, Home, Time and tagged: , , ,

I take back my previous post.

I want to be able to get out of my driveway!

I want something in my head besides constant loud beeping!

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Strange Comfort

November 19, 2011 at 6:31 pm · Filed under Big Cities, Community, Environment, Home, Love, Time and tagged: , , , , , ,

Is it weird that the constant construction noise in our neighborhood, as the city puts in sewers, has started to become soothing?

Strange that I smile in my sleep and turn over at 6 am as the man driving the backhoe in my yard begins his day’s labor?

Odd that I have considered making cookies and coffee for my old friends slopping away out in the street?

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Lost and Found

July 22, 2011 at 1:51 am · Filed under Big Cities, Earth, Language, Poetry, Teaching, Trees and tagged: , , , , , , , , ,

Cleaning up my house, I found this poem written nearly a year ago.  It’s not that original at all, but was written during an activity I facilitated with my students.  Now I want to remember the activity, and throw out the paper the poem is written on, so I will type this little guy up as a memory. 

We took a walk around the school in the Fall.  The assignment I had given them (after a couple weeks of talk and activites about poetry) was to write a poem with two stanzas and at least one metaphor and one simile.  This was what I came up with to read to them after the walk.  I have their poems somewhere — I’m sure theirs are more interesting!  I remember one girl’s in particular; she is a refugee from Somalia and is an English language learner, and her poem was fantastic.  The fact that English is not her first language made her poem that much more unique in its descriptive language.

Autumn

The trees are a book of matches
that have all caught fire
together — leaves like red and yellow
flames.  Some trees are bare already:
burned out matches.
 
Next to us as we walk,
the cars hurry by
making a sound like waves
at the beach.  It’s strange
to think of water walking through
 
these dry and crackling leaves.
 
– Fall, 2010

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Favorite Thing She Said Today

June 7, 2011 at 2:58 am · Filed under Big Cities, Environment, Favorites, Home, My daughter and tagged: , , , , , , , ,

Today, my daughter and I were driving back from an art class for kids.  School is out, summer is here, and she and I are doing all kinds of fun activities.  She had really painted her little heart out in the class.  Before we got there, she asked hopefully, “Do you think we will paint?”  She held her palette and brush, wore her smock, and dabbed away at the paper on the wall with great focus.  When the teacher moved on, I thought there would be a tantrum, but she was swept away by the ladybug activity.

On the drive home, I thought she might fall asleep in the car, and although she looked exhausted she did not.  At a stoplight near home, she sat slumped against the side of the car seat and gazing out the window at the tall grasses growing in the median.  She said wistfully — I am not kidding, it really was wistful! — “Maybe someday I could walk in those flowers.” 

It caught me off guard and I couldn’t help but chuckle.  It just goes to show that “nature” really is a frame of mind.  I would never have thought, “Oh, what a lovely spot for a hike, here on the exit ramp off the highway,” but she was right.  The flowers and grasses were very pretty.  She made me see them with fresh eyes.

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Love and Judgement

May 31, 2011 at 9:11 pm · Filed under Big Cities, Children, Fences, Love, Religion and tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

In college, one of my favorite classes was Literary Criticism.  Taught by a tough prof. who I deeply respected and with whom I am still in touch many years later, the class honed my critical skills.  If I do say so myself, I’m not bad at pointing out flaws and inconsistencies.  There’s certainly a place for that kind of judgement.  If you train yourself to be this way, however, you can get in the habit of being critical of everything and everyone with whom you cross paths.  You might even criticize to your friend the person on the other side of the street with whom you will never cross paths, but who is dressed like a sex worker with the makeup of a clown.

Okay, so you may be good at finding flaws or inconsistencies…I was taught to look for them in many of my college classes.  I had several creative writing classes, however, with a professor who taught us that people are inconsistent.  Thus, when creating a believable character  you should delberately make that person inconsistent.  Ah.  So some inconsistency actually makes for a good story.  It’s good in some forms of writing, but not in others. 

What’s missing sometimes from my critical eye is the rest of the story.  The girl on the street may be dressed in a way I wouldn’t want my daughter dressing, but there’s a reason why she’s doing it and no doubt a sad one.  For some reason her low self-esteem has called her to reduce herself to her breasts and her butt.

I am trying to retrain my thoughts to be more loving and less critical.  I want to think first of someone’s whole story, and to think of that person with love similar to what I would feel if that person were my own child.  The girl desperately calling male attention to herself was a child once; she is still someone’s child.  It’s strange to cut out criticism as if cutting out a tumor from my brain.  It even feels like there’s a nice clean hole to be filled in with something lighter and less dark.  To think first of love is much more relaxing.  It’s nice to sit back and say “who cares?” and not go into paper-writing mode of jotting a thousand notes on the subject.

I tried an exercise at church yesterday during the time of silence.  I directed my vision toward each person in the congregation in turn and thought the words, “I love you.”  It was freeing for me not to worry about what that person could be doing differently — for me to release any control or responsibility for other people.  Trying to facilitate or manage situations or other people’s emotions can be so pointless and exhausting!   ; )

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Seeing the Truth

May 25, 2011 at 1:40 am · Filed under Big Cities, Community, Family, Home, Religion, Small Towns, Sun, Time, Travel, Trees and tagged: , , , , , , ,

It would probably be impossible to have had a life more stable than the one I have thus far lived.  I have lived in the same city since birth except for a year and a half “abroad”.  I have never experienced a move as my parents, who have been happily married for forty years, bought the house they currently live in when I was an infant.  My grandparents have lived in their house since before I was born, and they were married for sixty four years.  I attended the same high school as my mom.  My dad grew up down the street from where I am now and lived there from the time he was born until he got married.  That’s the house in which his father died, and where his mother lived for over fifty years — until she moved into a nursing home.  He has never lived anywhere but here either.  There is no divorce in my family.  I feel like, in the midst of a big city, I have had a stereotypically small town experience.  And that I have been lucky to have had every important privilege. 

Sometimes I feel so attached to this place and this life that I don’t even see it anymore.  It’s like looking at my own face in the mirror.  I’ve been looking at the same things for so long that they’ve almost become invisible to me.  Driving to a restaurant downtown, I suddenly saw the city, the hazy sunset over the fluffy trees, the little houses snuggled close together.  I saw the city as if for the first time and managed to grab hold of that image.  In Buddhism, there is talk of trying to maintain a Beginner’s Mind — to keep that freshness, that quality of really seeing something for what it is.  I have that when I am traveling; I see every little detail of a new place as if it’s charmed.  I notice everything from apartment balconies, to little pink flowers streetside, to Spanish moss in the trees, to the little boy holding his father’s hand.  I want to try to reclaim that freshness of Beginner’s Mind when I look at my own city, so that I am actually seeing where I am — so that I actually perceive the life I am living. 

(And for those us who are longtime adherents to a specific faith tradition, it’s important to also see things as they really are — to not be so attached to our beliefs that we can’t see the truth anymore).

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What is Most Kind?

March 6, 2011 at 11:15 pm · Filed under Big Cities, Community, Fences, Love, My daughter, Questions, Religion and tagged: , , , , ,

We make it to our Quaker meeting a couple times a month, and always try to sit in the last pew with our two year old, as out of the way as possible.  It seems no matter how much prepping I do with her about whispering in the “big room,” or how many little toys I bring for her to play with as she sits between J. and me, we only make to the children’s message half of the time.  Today I reminded her that she could stay with Mom and Dad as long as she whispered, but if she wanted to be loud she would go play in the nursery with Miss Amy.  She fell off her seat twice in the first five minutes uttering loud (and adorable), “Whoopsy Daisy!”s.  As J. ultimately carried her out, she was heard to shout to the congregation, “I not want to see Miss Amy!”  

The past few months, a man who J. and I presume is homeless, sits at the other end of our pew in the back of the room.  Typically, it is just us on the one end and him on the other, with no one in between.  He usually sleeps through the service, though I imagine he also simply enjoys the opportunity to sit in a warm dry place, listening to hopeful words.  He does not stand for the songs during the service, and he slips out before the last hymn and final words.  I am embarrassed to say that I have not, until now, really known how to handle the passing down of the little attendance pad.  Usually, you sign your name and pass the thing down for the other people in your pew to sign, but I have been ignoring the thing altogether.  I have been reluctant to disturb him, unsure as to whether my passing him the pad would be an unwelcome intrusion on his respite, or whether my not passing it to him is a great act of un-kindness.  I’ve decided it’s the latter.  He is there in the church, and therefore should be included…even if he doesn’t want to be included.  Right?

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Looking Around

January 18, 2011 at 3:07 am · Filed under Big Cities, Community, Death, Fences, Home, Sun and tagged: , , , , , ,

This past week a couple things happened that made me want to write something down on “paper” again — made me want to get something down “for the record”.  The first thing that “happened” was that as I drove through my neighborhood for the millionth time, I suddenly noticed how beautiful the glittering snow around me actually was.  First, I noticed that I was being blinded.  But when I took a closer look, I noticed how the clear sunlight was catching every snowflake’s diamond edges, reflecting in tiny heavenly lights all around me.  Even through my salt encrusted windows I could see how spectacular this was, and it made me stand still in my insides and look around, where lately I feel I’ve been spinning my wheels.  Winter is the season that I least appreciate, and typically I just grit my teeth and try to survive it without feeling too much of anything.  But this time, I was able to see its unique beauty.

Next, I was dismayed to learn today that my neighbor in the house directly to the south of me passed on a few weeks ago, and I had absolutely no idea.  This information made me stand still once again, as I wondered how I could have been so oblivious as to have not noticed this.  Upon further reflection, I felt I was not such a bad neighbor as I recalled that she had spent 80% of her time this past year in a nursing home.  She was almost never in her own home, and every night I would look from my window through hers, lights on with the aid of timers, wondering how she was doing, wondering about what her life had been like, wondering about the details of a person I happened to live beside.  When I look through her window now, the timers still have the lights on, but it feels so much more lonely knowing she’s not out there somewhere, still remotely attached to her house.  I guess I believe that she still is out there somewhere.  She lived alone, and was 88 years old.  I have wondered what shit she had to deal with over the course of all those years, a black woman in America, being young during the days of legalized racism.  I had three conversations with her in the last four years.  This makes me feel like a crappy person.  Or at least a crappy neighbor.  I did give her my phone number (along with some zucchini bread) in case she ever needed anything, but she never called….

I guess what dismays me so much is that I live such an isolated life that I had no idea that the person living right next to me was gone.  I would have attended her funeral service, but I knew nothing about it.  My grandfather reads the obituaries every day, but that’s not a practice of mine yet…I think when you’re older you’re looking for friends’ names — expecting to see friends’ names.  Or maybe that is what a member of a community is supposed to do.

It’s odd how (to paraphrase Ferris Buhler) when you’re running along with your eyes on the ground, life — both beautiful and sad – just slips quietly by without a word. 

(Rest in Peace, Helen).

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Cool Kids

December 4, 2010 at 2:49 am · Filed under Big Cities, Children, Death, Earth, Environment, Favorites, Language, Meditation, Teaching, Water and tagged: , , , , , , , , , ,

I have been doing a huge project with my students this semester, with all the lessons centering around our local river.  This thing has involved two field trips, one a canoe trip on the river, and another a visit to our local university next to which the same river runs.  I almost lost a tooth canoeing when one of my kids slammed me in the mouth with her paddle…all’s well that ends well.  At the university, we walked through campus, getting a little tour of my alma mater, and then we walked down through the woods to the river.  I had the kids sit by the river by themselves and in silence while they wrote in little notebooks for fifteen minutes.  I want to share some of the things that they wrote: 

Student One: It’s so hard to write about life or your future when you can’t see what’s ahead and don’t want to look back.  I’m glad I came on this trip.  I’ve been to this college at least a hundred times, but I’ve never been to this spot.  It’s a soothing place to be.  Being here opens my mind and lets thoughts pour in…Maybe there’s a blessing for us in the future. 

Student Two: I can see myself here at this college, being out here just enjoying it, but I don’t want to go to college.  This place here at the river makes me want to get out more and do lots of stuff.  It inspires me to want to get out and just have fun.

Student Three: You know, sometimes I wish that my life was like the river – soft and calm, or maybe like the soft soil that blankets the earth, or even the evening breeze that blows on a Fall day…So the question occurs to me: Why is life so hard?  Why can’t my life be as simple as the elements of the earth?  And as an answer to that, I feel that to the elements of the earth there are greater components than what we see.  So as a result, it becomes difficult, but like the elements there is a deeper meaning than what is actually seen.  That is my reasoning why life is so hard.

Student Four: This is my first time sitting out by a river in complete silence…it is wonderful to just hear the birds and the water.  It’s cool to just look out and see nothing but water banks and trees and river, to feel the sun and the wind.  I love it. 

Student Five: Life is like the river that flows through things.  Life hits us hard and when it does we cry and it just flows away.  The water comes from heaven and the river hits the rocks hard, but then it flows away.  Sometimes there is time for us to stay still and not move.  That time is the time where old memories come to mind.  You say to yourself, I wish that I could turn back time.  I wish everything could be the same, but sometimes it’s not.  It gets worse.  And that time is the time where you think to yourself, “Man, I wish my special person could be here to help me react or answer my question.”  We just have to keep that memory in us to enjoy later on in life with others.  Sometimes you love doing something, but the one who is higher than you takes it away from you and all you can do is smile and not show you’re angry or sad.  Be strong for others.

Student Six: Today feels like I’m alive because it feels so good and warm.  I want to stay here forever and listen to the water flow away.  Every tree has a different color.  Most of the leaves have fallen down.  Nine of us are sitting writing and eating cookies and most of the others are yelling over behind the trees and chasing each other.  I like the sounds they make and the way the water moves.  It feels like you can sit here forever.  Listen to it; everything is peaceful.  I wish the city would be like this.  You can feel the wind going into your skin…I have nothing in my mind right now other than this peaceful place.  The other kids are coming back now.  I want to stay forever, you know, but after awhile we will go.

Student Seven: My path, where I’m going to end up, is like the water that I see.  Flowing without an ending.  How the sun beams on the water!  It’s how the spotlight will beam on me.  My impact on others will be like the waves I see; I will touch one and the rest will be touched by me.  And my determination to do as I speak is just like how the water passes by the rocks; it reminds me of the obstacles and how I squeezed by them to reach my destination.  How the water resembles me!  My voice will be like the leaves falling of the trees.  They were silent at first, but they spoke and everyone was listening.  

Student Eight: Peaceful, calming, the sun is shining bright.  Everything is fine and I don’t feel like going back.  When I see the woods and listen to the water running, it makes me feel better.  I have enjoyed coming here, but I hate leaving.  I would want to stay here forever and never go back.  I like to think about them when I’m here…it’s like they never left.  Every time the wind blows, they get closer…They never leave; they are always the same.

Student Nine: This was nice of the teachers to do this for us because it’s peaceful and tranquil  to just sit down and write what comes to mind.  We’ll see where I will be in the future, but I will miss this field trip.  I don’t really write, but in this case I will because when I am in a peaceful environment I can think.

 Student Ten:  A lot has been going on in my life…and I feel like I have the worst luck…I miss my mom.  I pray every day that things will get better for me because I want to better myself.  I don’t really know how to deal with the pressure of the things I am going through.  I love the fact that God can make things better.  That’s why I never give up hope.  I really like the fact that we came here today because it’s very relaxing and it soothes me.  This is the first time I have really faced my problems and talked to myself about them.  I would love to come here again very soon to relax myself more.

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