I get messages all the time about my storage being full. Photos and emails. Travels and images painted. Loved ones and new friends met. Really all just an extension of my heart. So the messages don’t annoy me, I can only think, how lucky am I? What a glorious thing to be full!
I run at a fairly high capacity. Always have. So did my mother. When things got too full, especially with the good stuff, the tears would have to come out, in order to make a little more space. When something really touched my mother, she would gather up the tears, smiling, (like sunshine when it rains), and say, “oooh, too much tenderness.”
So I arrange it on my computer. But more often in my head and heart. All that tenderness. And I know that I am blessed. I welcome the reminders, in the form of an email, or tears that flow, telling me that I am alive, that I am full.
Keep gathering it in. The love. The goodness. Those thoughts, so filling and tender. All of it. We’ll always find room for more — (I’ll remind you.)
When I looked it up this morning, I couldn’t believe the drastic difference between definition one and two.
To take for granted:
fail to properly appreciate (someone or something), especially as a result of overfamiliarity.
assume that something is true without questioning it.
I have been lucky enough to live in number two. The only difference, I suppose, is the presence of love.
I never questioned that when my grandfather spoke between pauses of great length, that the words would be true and meaningful. That the hugs received from my grandmother would result in a little flour on my cheek, and possibly some dough on my back. That when I woke from a bad dream, or one simply come true in the afternoon, my mother would be there. I took them for granted in the most beautiful way— not yet knowing there was more than one definition.
Through the years, life has a way of teaching you differently. But sometimes you have to decide to live like no lessons have been learned. I don’t always succeed, but I think there is beauty in the trying.
She came into our house the other day. Just a random Tuesday. In the entry, I asked if she wanted something to drink or eat. Before we reached the kitchen. Before anything could be seen on table or counter. Without proof of availability, she said the most glorious phrase, “I guess I’ll have a cookie.” I couldn’t – can’t – stop smiling. I had given her a bit of my grandparents. My mother. In me, she lived, even for this brief moment, in definition number two. Cookies in hand, we stood in the presence of love.
I remember when I made the frame for the tiny pear. Some might call it scrap, but I think the aged and weathered wood deserves a better name. Yes, it has lived before, but that doesn’t mean it’s “used.” I like to think it’s just beginning again. So I cut the “becoming” wood. I sand it. And I’m not disturbed by the hole in one of the pieces. It is not a deterrent, but an opportunity. Because wasn’t it always a compliment? I heard my grandma say it. Certainly my mother. “That’s so becoming,” she said with a smile. Often to me. Just as often in the mirror. So of course I learned that beauty was a state of becoming.
I found the tiny rope to go through the hole. Attached the handmade paper. Wrote the words – “still life.” And didn’t it describe it all, the pear, the wood, you, me. All of this becoming. These lives we are living. Changing. Growing. It’s all so…very…beautiful.
Any addition that would come into our ever extending family was always greeted with, “Oh, she looks just like…” or “he resembles…” and quite often, “Oh, they have the Hvezda gap…(referring to the space between the front teeth). I suppose we all want to belong, and are forever looking for some sort of proof that it’s true.
It started with my family. Then the gravel road we lived on. Connecting with each skinned knee, or elbow. The schools we went to. Uniformed by teams and mascots. Robed by bands and choirs. There was always something to connect me, connect us.
The impermanence of it all, keeps us searching. Keeps me searching. I suppose that’s why I see it — the connection between loved one and bird. I didn’t plan it. It can’t be forced, only recognized. When I placed the new nesting bird next to my Grandma, it was so clear. The same palette. The gathering in. I live somewhere between farm and nest (the lines are all blurred now, in the “was” and the “will be”s). And isn’t it my mother, about to take flight, sporting the same outfit as the next nesting bird.
I guess you have to want to see it. And I do. I want that for all of us. To see beyond the Hvezda gap. Beyond the divide of politics and nation. To get beyond the differences. Into the blur. The melding. The sweet home of recognition.
I had time to think about it while I painted the individual seeds on top of the loaves of bread. The chalk board behind her in the boulangerie displayed the menu and the prices. It didn’t feel in the spirit of the painting. But what would I put on it? Leaving it blank didn’t seem right either. So I kept painting. Seed by seed. Trusting the answer would come. I was many loaves in, but by the third shelf, I knew.
It’s always the case, but it’s a lesson I have to keep learning. I, we, are in such a hurry to get to the answer. Wanting to bypass the process. The work. But that’s not how life happens. The only way out is through. So I take it seed by seed. Thought by thought. Step by step. Feeling by feeling. Trusting that I will get there. Aaaah, trust, that ‘ol show stopper — it can be a tough one, but every day I’m letting it in, just a little more.
I decided on the words from the old French song, “Les Mains d’une femme dans la farine” The chorus, in translation, sings that nothing is more beautiful than a woman’s hands in the flour. It is perfect, not only because it celebrates the work, but it also connects to our French cousins who co-own the bakery. I’m probably no more or nor less related to any of them, this lovely woman, or the husband of Dominique’s second cousin whom she works with, but I feel connected to all of them. And who’s to say we’re not related? Once our hands are all elbow deep in the flour, in the joyful work of this living, we all become the same.
We do the work. We trust the letting in. We are family.
Before I knew how to spell either, the word nest was synonymous with the word comfort. I built one for my baby dolls and stuffed animals right beside my twin bed —sheeted with Raggedy Ann and Andy, topped with Big Susie, the largest of my stuffed dolls, who watched over them all when I went to Kindergarten at Washington Elementary. And when I needed a nest of my own, when spelling, or sharing, or the afternoon milk break became too much to handle, I would borrow the blankets (with their permission of course) and build a nest beside my mother’s bed, and she would Big Susie me through the night, and I was saved.
It’s no secret that I love to paint birds. This year, for the first time, I started giving them nests. So perhaps it’s no surprise that this is when it appeared, the giant nest at the edge of the forest. I’ve already built one panel with the wood, and it continues to support me daily. Between step and worry, it always makes me smile as I pass. This could out-Susie any problem that I had. And so I leave it at the nest.
And isn’t that what we all have to do in order to fly? I empty my cares, and walk a little lighter. This may be the day, this could be the day, the day that I fly!
Yesterday I made bread both in kitchen and on canvas. The lines are definitely blurring between art and life, without imitation. But then I’ve never really been one to follow.
The North End of Van Dyke road was not just a direction. It was uncharted territory. The Norton girls, who lived the closest, were lucky — with five of them, they always had someone with whom to brave this open unknown. Perhaps my steps were extra loud as I passed their driveway, just before the final hill. Maybe they would hear me and want to join in the exploration. But it was hard to be heard over the din of five young females vying for the attention of one Phyllis, so I trudged on alone.
I was always amazed at how quickly it became so quiet. And I was certain, as I listened for each crack of twig and gravel, that someone, something, was also listening for me. And I found comfort in that.
Depending on the time of year, the mounds of dirt could be the dunes of summer, or our winter Alps. I suppose in all that quiet, my imagination was allowed to flourish. And I could become. And become. Not without fear, but in spite of it, beyond it, above it!
As I face new unknowns, (we all do daily), I channel that bumper-shoed young girl, and keep walking. Not to find the path, but to make one. I believe we’re here to create something. To be someone. Between kitchen and canvas. Between the certainty of bread and the exploration of the becoming. If you hear me above all the noise, you’re always welcome to join in. To sit at my table. To wander my ever changing trail. To become.
Words were always my tiny hammers to break the glass. I had seen them in the halls of Washington Elementary, but of course we didn’t have smoke alarms, or a fire extinguisher at home. But we did have books. We had poems.
At some point my mother must have given me the drill, but I don’t remember not knowing. It could help in almost any situation. The list would have read something like this, “In case of emergency, read a poem, memorize a poem, write a poem, be a poem.” Her favorites lines were marked in books, underlined, rewritten on sticky notes by the phone, recited over phone lines, hugged into the separation between hearts.
I’m so immersed in it, I often forget what those tiny hammers have gotten me through. I was walking with a new friend on the path the other day. She asked about my afternoon. I told her. She said, “it sounds like a poem.” I smiled, still knowing the drill.
I suppose there will ever be ceilings and barriers, struggles to surpass, and fires to put out. But I have the tools. My mother saw to that. I live in the word. I am the poem.
I suppose it’s as unique as a fingerprint, as someone’s handwriting. When I pulled the two identical lipsticks from the gift bag, I knew which one was mine, and which one had been my mother’s. The way she applied gave the rouge its own unique form. I know it as clearly as the touch of her hand, be it on paper, or around my shoulders. The shape of her love was hers and hers alone. To know it, to identify it, this is the never ending gift.
It’s all in the details. But we have to be curious enough to see them. To really see people. We need to ask the questions. Listen to the answers, with hearts and minds. To make note. To not be afraid of the differences, but accept them as the gifts that they are. When someone dares to show you, they are saying they trust you, trust you to be gentle with the offering. When did we become so afraid? There is no this and the other. There is only us. How beautiful it can be.
I didn’t have the words for it then, stability, but from teachers, to neighbors, to the toy aisle at Ben Franklin, I was certainly seeking it out. Placed strategically on the center shelf by the back door, just in reach of my chubby hand, the family of Weebles resided. I stood, mesmerized by the cartoon colors. I kept a close watch on my mother’s head that rose above the rack as she looked for material. My heart dared my finger to test it. (My heart was always doing that. With my grandma — would she bandage this? With my grandpa — would he pick me up? With my mother — would she always stay?) One quick glance up for her head, then back down to the Weebles, I poked my finger in the middle. It rocked. But it didn’t fall down. I smiled. I tested the whole family. Only rocking. Sweet rocking.
Of course like any child, I did my share of Ben Franklin begging. But for reasons I know now, that I couldn’t explain then, I didn’t need the Weebles at home. I was fine to leave them on the shelf. Wobbling. I suppose it was only the proof I was seeking. I made my way across the store. Past the penny candy. Into the material section. My mother was still there. She always would be.
I love to paint pears. Their strength is not obvious at first glance. Their fragility, one might say, is perhaps even obvious. But when paired together (pardon the pun) they may wobble, but they don’t fall down. Sweet and glorious stability. It may not always be in arm’s reach, but look around, it is there, perhaps just across the aisle. Not only do I lean on it, daily, I am a part of that sometimes wobbly, fragile, joyful strength.
