When I think about the countless times I have sung exuberantly into my own fist, (reaching those certainly standing in the back row), it’s not really a stretch that I would put a bird into a French outfit and give him a microphone.
Who is to say what is your Grammy, what is your Louvre? The other day a young woman recognized my painting of her grandpa out of a sea of Tik Tok photos, and I was hung beside the greatest in Paris. These lives we’re creating are limitless.
When I first met our neighbor she asked if I was a singer. Without hesitation I said yes. Don’t I sing all the time? It never occurred to me that she meant professionally. (Whatever that means.) After getting to know each other, it became clear to her that I wasn’t a “singer,” but someone who sang. I shrugged and held up my fisted microphone for her to join in. Now she is a singer too.
When asked what they would like their super power to be, most people will say they would love to fly. The closest I’ve found is to let myself become —become a baker, a poet, a singer, a lover, a painter. While I sit in front of the canvas, fueled by homemade bread and the song that is playing, the bird appears and I am all of these, and I begin to fly.
I watched her at the kitchen table in complete fascination as she snapped open the yellow containers, L & R. She wet her fingers with the solution and placed the tiny disc between her thumb and middle finger, rubbing them clean perhaps, but more likely, I thought, working up the courage to place it in her eye. I held my breath as she balanced it now, her hand slowly rising. With her left hand she held her eye open, bringing the other closer and closer. Of course they had made her do it at the eye clinic, but this was her first solo flight at home. Would she do it? Could she do it? She blinked furiously, leaving her right hand under her chin in case a catch would be needed. But it stayed. Her blinking slowed. She smiled and I smiled. Holding in our victory lap as she plucked the other from its case and placed it. I blinked along in solidarity and cheered with both arms raised. She was my hero. My astronaut. My ever “I’ll go first, but I’ll never leave you behind.” I always made sure that she knew how I saw her.
I suppose I’m still doing that. Daily.
In the blink of an eye, it was all gone. That table. That house. But not the love. That remains. And I will always let her know.
It was almost a relief after the first scratch. Oh, the pressure of white tennies from Iverson’s shoes. I tiptoed from bus to class to preserve. And then maybe one day, guard down, laughing over a passed note from the back seat, leaning over a nothing that could be funnier, blocking the aisle of the bus, someone less interested in the joke and more concerned about getting off, stepped through the glee onto my new shoe and marked it with a rub of black urgency. Once the shock wore off, so did the pressure, and the outside rain no longer seemed a challenge.
When I hopped from the final step onto Van Dyke Road, I could see them — all the puddles that gravel will allow. Grownups complained, why wasn’t it paved already. But in this land of 10,000 lakes, our sweet dirt road added more than a few extra. And didn’t the name itself sound like an invitation — puddle…. And so I did, I puddled my way up the drive.
Not to be outdone, my socks were as wet as my shoes as I stripped my feet in the garage entry. There was a small line strung from the ceiling to hang the well traveled. I walked from the outlines of my damp bubble toes on the cement, and went victorious into the house.
I’m reading Gertrude Stein. She writes, “ You are so afraid of losing your moral sense that you are not willing to take it through anything more dangerous than a mud-puddle. ” I know I was brave on Van Dyke Road. I must be braver still. We all must be. This current murk that we find ourselves in, more than a puddle for sure, we must brave our way through. Daily. The moral compass is strong. It calls to the heart well traveled, “Come.”
It wasn’t until university that I studied the Renaissance. And to be more accurate, we studied the Renaissance Man. I cringe at that now. Not only because we only studied men, but because we didn’t question it. I didn’t question it. And this being my first year at a liberal arts college, in the midst of fulfilling the requirements, taking science and math and English and art history, wasn’t I actually living it? And not having come from a generation of “you can be anything you want,” it might be surprising to think that somehow I still saw the possibilities. I still believed in them.
I didn’t have the words for it then, but I hear them now. Neil deGrasse Tyson tells us, “Most humans who could ever exist, never will. And so the fact you exist at all, is against stupefying odds of who gets born and who does not. Realizing this, you are you. I am me. We are alive. We get to die. And to get to die means you get to live. Any moment you spend squandering those moments you are alive, does disrespect to all those who will never even be born.”
I suppose it’s within this respect that I eat the bread that I made for breakfast. I play fashion show in the garden. I put together the weed wacker in the garage. I paint a bird in my studio while listening to music. I write a story. I read a book. This won’t get me studied in Ivy League universities. (But if you know me, you know the “Ivy League I admire most anyway.) I’m not even sure that it makes me interesting, but it does keep me interested, and that’s the most important thing. I am interested in still learning. In becoming. In not disrespecting all of those that got me here. In not “squandering” my moments. I am here. We are here! We get to be alive. I still see all the possibilities.
I’m continuously reminded while painting, that black is never just black, and white is rarely white at all.
I won’t give away the whole piece just yet, but if you look at her “black” coat, it would be nothing without the shadows, the light, the movement — all arriving in shades of living. It’s the same with her hands, her “white” hands are pinks and purples and grays and more.
I used to love to roam through the constant assembly of coats in my grandparents’ farmhouse. Of visitors and helping hands, they hung equally. I wouldn’t have seen it, had I not rubbed my face through sleeves. From afar they draped in winter drab, but up close, they were every color — altered by work, by wear, rain, sometimes snow. Through holiday and honor, they offered a palette that said, (no not just “said” but lured), “come in, see the colors of what is being felt, from face to heart.”
I suppose I’m still getting the call. From heart to canvas to word. I have to answer. If not, what was their entry for?
Running feral as I did, from sun up to sun down, on the equally untamed gravel of Van Dyke Road, it’s counterintuitive, (and yet true), to believe that I never wanted to get dirty. Of course dust gathered on my once-only-white gym socks, creating a permanent outline of my bumper tennis shoes. This was unavoidable. But I mean really dirty, purposefully dirty, like when the Norton girl added more water to yesterday’s rain soaked garden and scooped the mud by hand into discarded EasyBake oven tins scattered in their back yard. “The horror!” I exclaimed to my mother, “Mud pies!” She, being ever crisp in her white blouses, understood completely, as she tried to rub out the wayward splatters on my shorts and t-shirt.
I still find a way to run wild, mostly on canvas now. I have specific clothes just for that. Yesterday, in the studio, K.D. Lang was singing along with each stroke. It wasn’t lost on me that I noticed the brown oil on my sleeve as she sang, “Wash, wash me clean. Mend my wounded seams.” And isn’t that what love does? Accepts us. Gathers us, in all of our commonalities, all of our discrepancies, washes us clean.Maybe this is what allows me to dare the palette. To navigate this beautiful mess we’re in.
She left them in my care. Her most crisp and white. It’s healing for me. Tending, wearing, my mother’s blouses. It mends my wounded seam, and keeps her near, through wayward splatters.
I had read my way through the Golden Books on the bottom shelf, and was advancing to the next level of Olson’s Super Market book section. No longer crouched on my knees, I immediately felt more grown up as I reached at heart’s height and arm’s length. This selection went beyond the stories of Snow White and leaned into the more complex tales of Rose Red (her less famous sister.) I had to sound out the larger titles. Pan – do – ra’s Box. My mother was filling the cart from the generic sections of the aisles when I tugged at her blouse, trying to get her to explain. She put the book in the safety of the child area of the cart. As I whined for brands like Chef Boyardee, she pointed to the book, and I was more than willing to make the sacrifice.
The man in the store apron carried the bags to the car and placed them in the back seat of our Chevy Impala. My chubby thighs stuck to the seat on the drive home. No seat belt required, I easily grabbed the book from the rear before we reached Van Dyke Road.
“I don’t get it,” I said as my mother came back for the second paper sack in the driveway. “Read it again,” she said. I did, and one more time on the front steps. Still puzzled, I took it in the kitchen. “I thought curiosity was a good thing…” I said. “It is,” she said. What else could she say? Hadn’t we dreamed a life beyond this gravel on countless Sunday afternoons? Hadn’t we continued to dare things like love and hope? I could see her going through the list in her head as she reached opened each cupboard. She could see me outlining my own heart in worry. That box had long been opened. “You go ahead and Pandora all you want,” she said.
Maybe I never did get the meaning. Maybe I jumped too quickly to the second shelf. I still do that. Nothing comes without risk. But the greatest experiences I have ever had have come from taking the chance. Of course problems come along with it, but the rewards… well beyond heart level.
Maya Angelou wrote, “Curiosity wants to behold, to comprehend, maybe even to become.” And isn’t that what I, we, want — to keep becoming. I fling open the morning window and lean into the possibility of maybe even me.
In 1938, Douglas Corrigan earned the nickname “Wrong Way” for mistakenly making a trip across the Atlantic from New York, when he was headed for California. I only know this because in the fifth grade, during an orienteering field trip, my team, after completing the wrong course, and also backwards, was awarded with our “Wrong Way Corrigan” certificates. I’m sure this is not the sole reason, but I have been making my own path ever since.
That’s not to say that I’m completely flockless. I have come to rely, appreciate, value and enjoy a wide array of people. And I know that I belong, but that doesn’t mean I always “fit in.” Fitting in asks you to change yourself so others accept you. Belonging asks you to stay true to yourself no matter what. This is what I encourage you to (forgive me) flock to.
So if you see me in the trees. In the sky. I’m probably the one wearing the beret, playing the violin, as most of the others sing. But isn’t it all music? Beautiful, sweet music teaches us, you don’t have to blend to belong.
I finished the book Pachinko yesterday. When I went for my walk in the afternoon, I started listening to a podcast about the World Creative Director of Disney. He began the interview by saying that if you have read the book Pachinko, you would understand his history. (Sometimes the universe is quite obvious in letting you know you’re on the right path.) There was no one else around, so I smiled to the birds in the sky, thinking surely they, too, must feel a part of it all.
I don’t know that I really believe in coincidence. I think the more we put ourselves out there, the more vulnerable we are, the more we connect. All of this knowledge, this exposure to others, to books, and art, and music and science and creation — perhaps these are the feathers that lift us. The wings that give us a better view.
It was a joyful walk. It seemed to pass more quickly than usual. I remember smiling, but I don’t recall the ground beneath my feet.
I don’t know which day it was this year that I painted that little pink bird in the corner. I’m guessing it was a challenging day, if I could only bring myself to make these few lines. So you might wonder why I love this bird. It’s not the most detailed. Nor the most realistic. I have painted far more complex birds with extravagant companions. But this little beauty, in its simplicity, all on its own, did something magical. She took away the dull remains of that day, wiped them from memory, and left me in the joy of pink. Her size is so deceiving — nothing small could do all that!
I hope I can bring the pink today, when asked to do the little things. Before I think, what could it possibly matter… let me offer my smallest of strokes. My tiniest of gifts. They might just turn out to be magical.
