The French have an expression when someone passes away — “casser sa pipe” (to break your pipe). I only learned of this two days ago at a funeral. But somehow, my heart, not driven by language, already knew. The two portraits I painted of my pipe-smoking grandfather both have his pockets full — his pipe always in reach.
That’s the question I guess, is “how do we keep our loved ones alive?” And the answer lies directly in the question itself — love. I speak to my grandfather daily. My grandma. My mom. Nothing is broken. The love remains, so the heart’s conversation continues.
When you know someone, really know them with all of your heart, you can keep them present tense, keep their pockets filled with the love that you still have to give — a love always within reach.
She said, “I’ll take that in mauve,” as if I had stock of my mother’s birthday present that hung on the wall, and in different colors. I looked at my mom to see if I actually could sell the poem that I wrote for her birthday, the poem that painted her picture in every word, line and phrase. She clapped her hands in front of her smile, and would have been the first to carry it to the woman’s restaurant had it been ready.
We never looked back.
Maybe it was the approval, the validation in the sale. But it seemed more to be the pure joy of stepping into our lives. Finding the doors and walking through. No longer looking for permission, but offering it up to those behind.
The woman who owned the beautiful new coffee/bagel/restaurant in town, covered her walls in my images, right down to the “lipstick woman” in her bathroom. For years my mom would get the random call, “I’m in the bathroom at Time Square.” The first time was alarming, but it brought years of laughter, and even friendships were formed from that image.
I saw people reminiscing about the place yesterday online. The tagline read, “for people on the go.” And weren’t we all…on the go…becoming. I think we still are. Still standing in front of doors, wondering, do we take the chance, (still feeling those that have closed), but pushed forward by the joy of the time we were mauve. The time we dared, and kept daring. And believed. And believed again. This is the time, once again.
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.
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.
It is said that John Steinbeck had a writing ritual with Blackwing pencils. In order to not waste time while he was in the middle of writing, he would sharpen 24 pencils and place them tip side up in a pencil box. Next to it would be the same box, but empty. He would take the first pencil and write until it became dull, place it in the empty box tip down, and take the next sharpened pencil. His advice, “Repeat this, until you have the Grapes of Wrath.”
I laughed when I heard it. I laugh when I tell it. But the truth is, that’s really what it comes down to, simply doing the process again and again. I suppose it’s true for everything. How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, practice, practice. I can’t say that I will write the next epic novel, or hang in the Louvre, but I want to be the best that I can be. To get better each day — this I suppose is my gathering of Grapes. My ritual of art. My daily practice. Some may say that is simple, and I’m fine with that.
She wrote a comment on a post featuring my Grandpa. She said she always admired him. That he was kind. That my Grandma brought them sandwiches. That times were simple – but she could see, feel the love in that. (And that was the greatest compliment, I suppose.)
So I use my pencils. I clean my brushes. I write and paint and post my “sandwiches.”
I have raved through the years about my banana seat bike — the flowers on the seat and basket that could have been delivered from the “Laugh In” set by Goldie Hawn herself. The brightest of pinks, yellows and blues that brightened the gray transition of the end of March, when I received it for my birthday. But I didn’t get there directly from my red tricycle. There was another bike. In between. It looked almost homemade. Perhaps it had been Frankensteined from neighborhood parts gathered in the back shed. It was gray and white. The pedals almost worn down to the stub. It only blurred into the gravel that I was learning upon. Dropped and abandoned in ditches, it still was the one that took me to the brightened glory of the banana seat.
And just as forgettable, I suppose, was the three speed black bike from Sears that in-betweened my banana seat and my electric blue 10-speed. And didn’t I park that bike in the furthest rack away from the playground at Washington Elementary? Not quite ashamed, but close enough that it pangs my heart still.
Maybe it takes awhile to see the value of the things that get us through. It’s easy to celebrate the milestones and forget the random Sundays. Our city is mostly shut down today because of an Iron Man competition. I can lose these hours pedaling feverishly toward Monday, or I can choose to enjoy them as the gift given. I hope I do. I’m going to try. These are the words I’m learning upon.
My cousins had a wood burning stove. Each weekend their family would, as they called it, “make wood” — which meant cutting down trees, then into usable pieces, then bringing to their house. When the teacher asked him what he did over the weekend, as was standard each Monday morning in school, my cousin said they “made wood.” The teacher corrected him and said they probably cut some, loaded some, put it in their trucks, but certainty they did not “make” wood. The next week when the question came around to him, “What did you do over the weekend?”, he answered, “We certainly didn’t make any wood.”
I thought about it yesterday as I began to finish the panel for painting. I cut the piece first in half. Sanded it. Measured to make the frame. Sanded those pieces. Glued them to the back of the panel. Clamped. Sanded again. Then Gessoed. For me, there is a real satisfaction as I rub my hand across the smooth surface, the smell of forest still lingering, traces collected on the tops of my shoes. Soon it will enjoy a new life. Become a painting. And while I know with all humble certainty that I didn’t make the wood, I do know that I am a part of it all — the nature of things. And that feels good.
It’s easy to get caught up in wanting to feel masterful, powerful, useful. I know I have caught myself thinking – I made that out of nothing. Certainly I didn’t. It began, as all things do, I suppose, as a gift. And the best thing, I think, is not to squander. Not to look away. But aid in the becoming. To be a part of it all, to humbly, joyfully, creatively, lovingly participate — that might be, well, everything.
I recently learned that when birds sleep in a row, the two on the outer edges keep one eye open to protect and allow those on the inside to fall asleep. It doesn’t surprise me, I have rested within that protective watch.
There is a big scientific name for it, which I’ve already forgotten, this act of being able to keep “one eye open” while being in a half sleep — we’ve always just called that “pulling an Elsie.” She had to have been doing the same thing — birding her way through every card and dice game played on her kitchen table. Able to sleep while we pondered over our next move, then waking at the exact moment to handily beat us with chirping joy! And I saw her do it everywhere. In the funeral home where she phone-sat. At the grocery store check-out line (she did indeed check out). Even once in the car. But I was never worried. The speed at which she could belly-jiggle herself awake allowed all of us to rest, to play, to run in a carefree summer, to sleep soundly under her watch.
I suppose you could just rule it all as nature. But I know not everyone was blessed with a Grandma Elsie. So I give thanks. And make my way to the outer edges.
