Showing posts with label being hard wired. Show all posts
Showing posts with label being hard wired. Show all posts

Monday, October 27, 2014

Flying

For Lara, who has taught me so much about the wheel and for Sharleen, who is that determined kid who will get it.
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Round and round, death defying pace, toes scraping trenches into hardscrabble earth, someone jumps off and grabs the rust-flecked metal and starts running again, propelling the welded frame around its axis faster and faster. Sweaty, grubby hands just barely hanging on in the Oklahoma heat. Older kids with wide open faces, laughing and smiling. Younger kids clinging with terror in their eyes, trying to be cool. Flicker of kid and kid and kid and kid and kid and that open seat you are aiming for --missed it-- and kid and kid and kid and kid and--jump to it, bump off, land on your ass in the dirt as your friends howl and another kid pops off to pump the merry-go-round faster and faster. Determined, you pace it again ---kid, kid, kid, kid, kid-- bam! lucky enough to get the seat next to the frame so you can pull your skinny self up and onto the smooth-worn wood and lean out and away into the abyss of flying. 

You are not a brave kid, nor have you ever been, but you feel compelled by the sense of freedom that you believe you'll experience when you are on, through the false starts and times you've had to dart back from flinging legs and uneven ground, muster courage, learn about the pace and the rhythm and the movement before stepping back in, running alongside, hoisting yourself on with whatever strength you have, hoping that you can catch the ride before it starts up again at maximum speed. 

Years later when this metaphor comes back to you in the 5am scratching of pen on paper, you wonder what it meant to you to try, to keep at it, to land on the hardpack ground a few times, to risk. Did you even think about it? Probably not. More likely it was the possibility of movement and sound, your vestibular system afire with sensation, the action not singular but communal, your body used to meeting the dirt and the ground with so much more frequency than you would know in your adult years. And a shorter distance to fall. And less jarring.

So it's there again, that seat that flickers in front of you, the one that you know you have moments to seize before it's taken by another. Think not of the smell of metal on your skin and the ache of your wrists from leaning too far forward. Think instead of the hot wind on your face, the thrill in your stomach as you lean into space, of the excited shrieks of the people around you, of flying, of freedom, of joy and the the reward of having taken that leap.








Friday, September 6, 2013

And in and out of weeks and through a day

For my friend Lara Turchinsky, with whom I have sailed vast oceans. Thanks, my friend.

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“And [he] sailed back over a year
and in and out of weeks
and through a day 
and into the night of his very own room
where he found his supper waiting for him
and it was still hot” 
― Maurice SendakWhere the Wild Things Are

My mother used to remark that every time she sat down in a movie theater, she would fall asleep. These were in the post-Dad-dying days where her burdens were heavy and, I suspect, nights restless. We would load into the car during that hot Oklahoma summer and in the cool dark of the theater she'd drift off until one of us would gently nudge her as it was time to go.

In the darkness of the music auditorium I have a similar experience. Away from handheld devices and computers diverting my attention,  from conversations and questions and things needing to be done, I let my mind drift and wander. I visualize my life in snapshots and pictures. I let the music seep in and replenish the dry landscape of my harried mind and heart. Within this space, I have learned to let go.

Tonight I spent a good long while with a blue-period painting projected on my mind. Eyes upon the back of a woman sitting in a small boat, the water is flat, the sky and the sea enjoined in one monotone color. An arial view shows no land. There is no wind for the sail. There is no obvious way north, south, east or west; no clear direction and nothing propelling the boat forward.

It's not a frightening scene. Just dead quiet glassy water, humidity so thick you can feel it in your throat, close. It's a scene that is wistful for a cool breeze and for the clouds to part. It's waiting. It's not knowing how to get moving or which direction to go. It's not knowing what land will look like when you hit it. It's not being afraid of what you will find but confused about how you will get there. It is being alone in a vast sea, and either waiting for someone to come and tow you in or figuring out how to do it yourself. It's a lot different than being a leaf on the stream.

This is what my life feels like now. I can blame it on cancer and its aftermath. I can blame it on the stress and pressure from every side I feel so acutely that it pools upon my skin in bumps. I can blame it on loss and distrust and the feeling of being alone in the world. But the reality is that no matter the cause, it is a long journey of sailing back over these years that will take me to the place that I can call home.















Thursday, June 16, 2011

Floating

I hold in font of my eyes an image of a leaf on the water. The clear water simultaneously reads brown from the silt below and blue from the skies above. The leaf floats gently, swirls a bit, catches the slow current and moves lazily by. It is sunny and warm in the shade covering the stream. It reminds me of camp summers riding in Colorado, our horses bending their heads for a cool drink while we sip from our canteens. Peaceful, beautiful, calm, centered.

My friend Joanna gave me the image of a leaf on the water when I was telling her of my anxiety about starting chemo tomorrow. "Be a leaf on a stream", she said, and that image came to my mind.

I started out this week in a panic, feeling as though I had put off studying for very important test. Three weeks became two weeks became WHAM! one week with no time to get my life organized before this phase came in. I was supposed to be set up for acupuncture and reiki and have my house cleaned and be meditating and sure as hell be feeling more comfortable and confident that I was at that particular moment. I was supposed to be ready, damn it. I was arrested with dread and fear and disappointment in myself for not preparing to face the chemo better.

But this week the kids went to see their Oklahoma aunties and uncles who welcomed them with open arms and lots of love and gave Nick and me the breathing room we really needed. Days of flexible time and no guilt around being home late from work and relaxed dinners with a man I really love took the anxiety and gave it a coconut butter rub down so that it couldn't stick its sticky claws in quite so deep. I feel somewhat relaxed, that leaf on the stream, just letting myself be.

The past two weeks have been full of interesting observations about my life, too. Things I have always known about myself, but things I think I am coming to understand. This experience has made me more authentic, I think, more willing to stick to things that I believe even though they may not be popular. It's made me more willing to risk at work and in my community life. It's made me realize that this is the shot I get and I need to do according to my true self. There aren't a lot of second chances to do this all over again.

It has also given me insight about something peculiar and telling about my personality that I only just realized yesterday in the car. I had my ipod on shuffle and was listening to a really wonderful mix of music. As the program would dip into the 2,150 songs available, I would find myself intrigued by a song, instantly nostalgic for the memory it evoked or simply enjoying what it had to offer. But shortly into it, my mind would wonder what song was next, effectively ruining the experience of the current song in anticipation of what was to come.

I am hard, hard, hard wired this way. It's not only the way my mind creates and visions new work and ideas, but also makes sense of the world. Anticipating the next song, much like anticipating the next phase, the next treatment, the next reality can be exhausting and allows the monkey mind to run rampant with the endless permutations and combinations that the world of medicine holds.

So tomorrow as they plug me into the machine and we begin the 16 week trip down this potholed path, I am going to keep with that image of the leaf in the stream, of the cool mountain air, the smell of horses and leather bridles, the feel of boots on my feet and nothing to consider but what lies just shortly ahead.

Wish me luck.