I suppose there was no way to learn it, other than going through it. But I can still feel the slip of innocence, into the wealth of love.
My banana seat bike wasn’t just a vehicle for movement, but my best friend. Never was anything so certain. If I left it in the ditch on Van Dyke Road, it waited for me. If I needed to flee, it whistled like a get-a-way car. It not only welcomed, but carried my bedtime friends in its wicker basket. It was always there, cheerful in color, a banana seated smile. It didn’t simply agree that what I dreamed was possible, it said, “I’ll take you there.” And there were no conditions. Snow. Rain. Field or gravel, it went. It held me. So you can imagine my surprise the moment it happened. I heard a clank and my lead pedal dropped swiftly to the bottom. In panic, I circled the no longer connected pedals with cartoon speed, then dropped my feet to the road just before I fell over. I stood stunned. I had heard of this, the chain coming off. I put down the kick stand and bent over to look. It was if the chain was crying, all drooped to the ground. I touched it. Seeing my hand covered in slippery black tears, my initial disappointment turned to empathy. I would help my friend. Wasn’t it my turn, after all?
I limped it off the road into the nearest and safest spot, Kinkead Cemetery. I don’t know how long I was there. Time has a way of disappearing in such a place. With my left hand I guided the pedal. With my right I moved the chain. It clunked and I coddled, until finally, it was whole again. I was whole again.
This was friendship, I thought. This taking turns. Carrying each other. Enjoying the ride. Together.
I never did step on that rusty nail that we were always warned about, as we barefooted our way up and down Van Dyke Road. And certainly they were there, scattered and abandoned, between every unlocked garage and shed. Maybe it was because we lived in a time when people could actually fix things, or wanted to try. In at least one driveway there was a hood up on the car. A lawnmower turned over. Saw horses supporting more than they should. The hum of power tools. And the smell of cut wood. I suppose that’s why I, we, dared the ground without our shoes. Not believing that nothing would ever go wrong, but understanding that it could be fixed, if and when it did.
And I smile because so far that has held. My mother had it on the yellow sticky note beside her phone, the barefoot equivalent that read, “What haven’t you survived?” Knowing this, it keeps me better than safe, it keeps me vulnerable. Open. For that is when we learn the most. Receive the most.
We can try to protect, seal off the heart with steel toed shoes, but we would give up so much — all the joys of summer — freedom, hope, love. I choose to let my heart barefoot through the day. Rusty nails and all, I will race the morning dew, and I will joyfully survive.
Of course I was going to get in. Everything I had done up until this moment was about taking the chance, saying yes. So when she pulled her car up next to me and stopped, I walked up to the open window. She said the French equivalent of “get in” twice. And it’s surprising how quickly the brain can weigh all the options in a splintering of a second. I opened the door and sat down, and said “OK…” We both let out a nervous laugh, neither quite sure of what we were agreeing to.
It was her husband and son-in-law I had painted. The two men on my daily path. She had stopped me once before and applauded me in my paint splattered shorts from behind the car wheel. We were connected by nothing but sharing the same path. (And isn’t that everything?)
My mind tried to leave the proverbial bread crumbs as she wound us down the gated path. Through the sea of olive trees. Past the pool. She apologized that it was becoming green. She opened the shutters and we walked into her home. She unlocked the armoire and pulled out the most beautiful bottle of olive oil. This was their art — their exchange for the painted portrait. I held the weight of it close to my heart and thanked her in both languages.
I asked about her husband. I don’t see him anymore on my daily walk. The Alzheimer’s no longer allows his trip. A small tear, hers or mine, said he still makes the journey each day on the canvas.
I walked home knowing we always have the tools to connect, if we share the best of us. If we dare the best of us, ourselves.
It’s only a painting. It’s only olive oil. But it’s everything.
Although she only sat down for one, Days of Our Lives, the soap operas played all afternoon on my grandma’s television set in the living room of their farm house. Of course we could hear them as we ran in and out of the screen door, up to the corner kitchen cupboard with the Lazy Susan that held all of the candy. We’d spin ourselves almost dizzy trying to decide between the blur of Black Cows, Sugar Daddies, Sugar Babies, and all things sweet.
Deep into our sugared highs, we acted out the parts we heard from the other room. Using words we didn’t know, but kept repeating them, whispering them into our sweaty hands covered in sticky giggles, after our Aunt Lillian warned us that to say them aloud was to risk living them.
In no way do I believe that my summer antics, nor my cousins’, brought to life all of those whispered words we seem to be living within. We say them out loud now. Words like divorce and affair and death and cancer. The only real difference, what they consolidated in less than an hour on the television, has taken a lifetime for most of us, but certainly we have all been touched.
And I think it’s ok to say them out loud. To not hide from them. Not give them the power. To voice our struggles and our fears, whatever they may be. Maybe we knew something as children. We weren’t afraid of any of it. Not the words, nor the warnings. Nothing could stop us. Not screen, nor cupboard, or door of any kind. We raced through it all together.
I suppose I write the words each day in order to release them from the living room set. To fling open the doors and tell you it’s ok. To show you. To run with you. Play with you, amidst it all. We’ve never had the power to rid the world of all the difficulties. The pain and the struggles. But we’ve always had the power to find, still, the dizzying joy, the sweaty laughter.
I don’t suppose the spaces left from loved ones passed can ever be completely filled. But maybe it’s wrong to think they ever were. These relationships weren’t beautiful, memorable, longed for even still, because of their solid perfection. Perhaps they were always stardust, flittering, fluttering, changing shape, with room always left for dancing, beneath the flickering light.
It’s the way I choose to think of it, my mother’s space, not as a hole left behind, but a dance floor. And all that magic that sprinkles from her still, lights up the people around me, and they step in, tap me on the shoulder, and ask me to dance. They are my new daily connections. My new last calls. My shared laughter and secrets. Hopes and challenges. Not replacements, but keepers of the dance.
We’re not all good at the same thing. Some are meant to pull you in, and simply sway. Other’s tap their feet and keep the beat alive. Some dizzy you into laughter. Dance you into breathless. And hold out the ladle of punch. I am grateful for them all. All of you, who keep my dance floor filled, my heart in motion, in sway, in the right tempo, under the stardust.
There is a real difference between paper, canvas and panel. Each one takes the paint in its own way. Likes a different brush stroke, even a different brush. And I don’t like one more or less for it. I’m trying to do the same with people.
I’m not saying it’s easy. But I think just being aware, it helps me fight it less. Sure I still come with all of my seemingly best skills, but they don’t work for everyone. And sometimes I get through my whole wheelhouse — are you paper, canvas, panel? Now what? Then you look at me with all of that leather or lace, that ceramic or stone, and I know I have to try again. I used to think, well, why do I have to change? And the answer is I don’t. None of us do. But if we want to include the people in our lives that provide a challenge, (and I say provide here, because they are giving us an opportunity to grow), if we do want to include them, we may have to thin out the paint a little, and try again. Not giving up on our skills, but enhancing them. Because most likely, they are doing the same, and with any luck, we find a colorful way to be together.
Someone said yesterday, it sounds like a prayer. And maybe it is. I write, not because I have the answers, but because I’m trying to learn them. Day by day. Bit by bit. I have always believed, even when I, we, fail, there is love in the attempt. And if we can see that, we can do anything.
We stood in line for what seemed like an eternity at the new art store in Aix. The cashier seemed to be struggling with the register. The customer seemed to be struggling with her choices. And we struggled simply with time. I’m sure there were eye rolls and heavy sighs, myself included. When the eternity finally ended, as eternities so often do, I placed my few brushes on the counter. She rang me up, and offered a free pencil and eraser with my purchase. A new eternity began – this one of joy – because of my true love for pencils and erasers!
We are reminded constantly of how little it actually takes. Tiny little gestures. A smile. A wave. A word of kindness. The emotional equivalent of a free gift with purchase.
Clutching my tiny bag, and all my teeth showing, I exited the store. The “annoying” woman who had been in front of us was now struggling down the street with her bag. She was older and weighed less than her purchase. Still in full grin, I asked her if I could carry her bag. She joyfully agreed and we talked about art the remainder of the block. She was actually quite lovely. Again, it takes so little to be saved. And it wasn’t like you may think, she was saving me.
Between portrait and sketchbook, I pick up my free gifts, and the grin remains. I gather in my eternity.
Of course we associated the pool with fun. Nestled amid the science lab, and math department, beyond social studies and English fundamentals, it looked as joyful as summer vacation. So it came as such a surprise when the swimming teachers at Central Junior High, disguised as lifeguards, turned out to be actual teachers, with rules and regulations and lesson plans, along with the added responsibility of having to curb our never ending desire to simply splash.
The worst of it was probably treading water. Here? After doing it metaphorically in the other five hours of the school day, why, why did we have to do it the pool? We wanted to get somewhere, even if it was just to the other end, and get there fast! We wanted to race to the diving board into the deep end, then run around and do it again. But before we were even allowed to use the diving board we had to learn to tread water. First with our arms and legs. Then only our legs. For three minutes. What seemed like punishment was really a gateway. A path to freedom. A way to save ourselves as we thrust into the excitement of the glorious depth of ten feet.
There is such a high when I finish a big portrait. Every stroke that leads to the crescendo and risk of the reveal — it is exhilarating! Exciting! But then what? Then the normal Wednesday comes along and says what are you going to do now? So I open my sketchbook. My steady. My always there at the ready. Waiting. Not flashy. Not for profit, but certainly for gain. First there was thanks to be given. I had noticed a real ease — a comfortable looseness that I had gained when painting the hair of Charles. And I knew that it had come from the countless hours in this book. Page after page. Bird by bird. My treading water. My gateway to the deep end.
It’s easy to dismiss the daily doing. The lessons. The learning. And I’m as guilty as the next person splashing in the pool. But sometimes I remember, like today, how lucky I am to do the work. Stroke by stroke. I smile, and know, that I am saved.
She’s far too beautiful to be called Lilly, the plant in our entry. Bloom by bloom, her name is Lillian. And yes, I call her by name each time I compliment her fragrance. I introduce her to the field that hangs behind her. Tell her I will care for her with the same hands that painted the picture on the wall. It’s not unlike how I used to interact with my wagon full of dolls and stuffed animals. They all had names and adventures. As they traveled with me along VanDyke Road they learned the hazards of gravel and the freedom of travel. They dared Hugo’s field. Even helped me count the change in my pocket as we walked the mile to Rexall Drug to get a frozen Milky Way. And in all that fun, I guess I was learning.
They say that play is how children learn, and art is how adults play. I couldn’t resemble that more than by definition. And oh, how I want to keep learning. So I paint the birds daily. I cut the wood to make the panels. I stretch canvas. And give names to the flowers and trees. I greet each butterfly by my mother’s nickname. I let myself play. Is it silly? I sure hope so!
In the fifth grade, under the guide of Miss Green, we took spelling trips. We wrote reports on our imaginary travels. Of course we were learning how to spell. How to write. How to form sentences. Without our knowledge or permission, empathy grew for our fellow desk mates, fellow travelers, and we played ourselves into Central Junior High, a little bit wiser than Washington Elementary, a little more Lillian than Lilly.
As I finish today’s blog, I make another click on my gratitude counter, because giving thanks should be fun too. I pass her on the way out the front door, smiling, we are both a little more Lillian!
I was listening to a short story while walking yesterday. Somewhere between the farmhouse, the stranger, the shooting, the sheriff, the horses, the chase, the lost love, the death, the title revealed, my feet had climbed the Montaiguet without ever telling my breath. And it really came as no surprise, stories have always carried me.
I began to learn the power of words at age five. Mrs. Strand read to us in kindergarten. I loved her for it, but I had a sense of urgency to get to the first grade where I knew we would learn to read for ourselves. I’d like to think I took my time. I’d like to think I thanked Mrs. Strand, but I can’t be sure. It was her words that launched me into the front row of Mrs. Bergstrom’s first grade class. I wanted to sit as close to her as possible. If the words she wrote on the blackboard were to travel into her pointing stick as she tapped the word on the board, and be flung into the open and wandering minds of all the wriggling 6 year olds, I wanted those words, that power, to hit me first — so even in this front row middle seat, I leaned ever forward, closer still. And I must have been breathing because I’m still here, but it felt like a year, a glorious year of inhaling.
I joyfully rode that air. Every word she gave to us, I gave to my mother in poems. When the wind was knocked out from inside of her. I, we, replaced it with the hope of each letter. Arranged them again, and again, until we were lifted. Until without our knowledge or permission, we were looking out gratitude’s vast view, and we were saved.
I don’t know if it works for everyone. But I take the chance that maybe it does. I keep writing the words daily. Bringing you inside farmhouse and classroom, on top of bicycles and mountains, on the chance that you too will forget the labor of breath, and only feel the heights reached from all that inhale.
