I imagine how the next day went. And the day after. Because their lives didn’t end when I got to the last page. Isn’t that what a good book does? With the same tools as every other writer, all the curved lines that form letters, the dots and dashes that make you stop in your tracks, an author can change the way you feel (not just in the moment) but for a lifetime.
I suppose it’s the same with love, when it’s written well upon your heart. That has to be what draws us in. What keeps us thinking. Those whose lives are so developed, whose storyline runs so deep, it continues long after the final turning of the page. These are the lives I want to surround myself with. It’s the life I want to live, and not in a vain way, (although I do indeed want you to keep coming back – I want to hold your interest) but also for myself — I want to be interested in my own life — to see where this goes. What could happen next? I want to live so deeply that the only choice isn’t even a choice, but a continuation.
The morning sun awakens the letters that tickle their way from heart to head to hands…and the story continues…
Receiving a letter in college was monumental. We shared a community phone for our floor, and had to pay for long distance, so it was rarely used. The mailboxes were the tie to the outside world. Located in the entrance of our fifth floor walk-up, what lay behind the gray square door was significantly tied to the speed at which I could climb the stairs. One small letter could erase the added weight of my backpack, loaded down with the likes of Shakespeare and other anthologies. Anticipation picked up each foot. Thumb trying to break the seal before opening the door. Books thrown on sofa, I cracked the remaining seal, and breathed in the connection. And I was saved.
I could always count on the weekly letter from my mother. Sometimes my grandma. An occassional random boyfriend marked with a mascot of another school, or PFC. And I learned quite early on, to get a letter, you needed to send one. To be lifted, you had to do some lifting.
When I was painting her yesterday, the stories ran through my head. Up and down the staircase of my heart and brain. All those things I needed to say. All those things I needed to hear. And I wondered how you would see it. When you saw her. At first glance. Was she getting the letter? Or was she sending it? I suppose it depends on if you are needing to hear something, or if you have something that needs to be said.
We’re always navigating through both. And I guess the key is to keep the chain open. To be lifted. To keep lifting.
Life will weigh us with worry and “other anthologies,” but it will also give us what we need if we choose to participate.
I saw the black and white feathers in the lawn. It’s funny how you can tell the difference between something let go, and something torn apart. While I don’t want anything to hurt our backyard birds, my first thought was, I hope it wasn’t another Magpie.
It’s ironic I suppose, the closer you are to someone, the less you see it coming.
But the resilience of the heart and brain. To keep trusting. To keep loving. It’s so beautiful. And isn’t it even more beautiful that I don’t think about it. That I have to be reminded of it, by feathers in the yard.
I walk through the vacation of our summer yard. Nearly bare of clothes and worry. The birds flutter and sing, and I know we all have it. This youth of spirit. To forgive. To barefoot again upon love’s green, beneath the chatter, the hope of the Magpie.
There were rare occasions when I saw adults cry. Gathered snuggly around my grandparent’s kitchen table. Perhaps to confine the news that came in the letter. Or the heartache of a loved one lost. To give it open space was to let it catch up to us in the summers of our youth. But sometimes, with the need for a Sugar Daddy, or a Slowpoke, I would sneak through the screen door and see it, them, dampened eyes and heads down, and my heart would sink. The ground seemed to shake beneath my bumper tennis shoes. I backed out the door.
It was my grandfather who caught up to me. Dazed and darkened under the largest tree near the road. He could see I didn’t want to be dazzled by false comfort. And he was never one to do it. “It’s like the Magpie,” he said. He was never much for small talk. He got right to the point. “What is?” I said. “The color. So black that it’s blue.” “I don’t get it.” He told me to get up. He led me back to the kitchen. Dishes had already begun clanking. There was the scent of coffee in the air. Chairs being pushed aside. Knees unbending. Even a few laughters of relief. Life. He looked down at me. “Blue,” he said. I smiled and nodded.
I have carried it for years. This knowledge, even when things are so black, they are also blue. You have to get up. You have to want to see it. But it’s always there.
I look out the morning window. He’s still right. I smile into the blue.
Dining outside yesterday, alongside an urban, but calm street, the beams of sun, just like the cars, hummed gently, no need for brake or throttle. And I felt simply in it. There was life and motion, not to throw but inspire. A slow dance of body in air. And would I have felt different, being a blade of grass? Reaching. Among. Within. About.
How do you capture a sunny day? I’ve been trying. Foolish, I suppose. To be a blade afraid of winter. When all there is, is green.
And isn’t it the same with love? Not lost. Even in its final winter, there will be spring. I feel the hum of those who have passed. Music in my heart. No need for brake or throttle, it stays alive within me. My ever green. My sunny days.
It was our first book connection. The fact that we were even exchanging notes of literature was a good sign. My Antonia. His in French, mine in English, but the story was the same. And we were linked.
I suppose it’s like how some will save ticket stubs from a concert, or flowers dried in a box, to serve as reminders. It’s the same for me in a bookstore. I saw it on the shelf yesterday. I picked it up and held it towards him. We both smiled. On the back of the jacket it read, “Antonia had always been one to leave images in the mind that did not fade.” The Antonia of my heart did, does, the same.
People always ask me, “how do you remember?” I guess it’s love that leaves the images. And if I feel the slip, I race to paper or pen, to computer or sketchbook, and gather them in. Is every detail perfect? I can’t be sure. But I know it doesn’t have to be. I’m not making a map. I don’t need to travel back, only travel with. And those images, those feelings, they are secure. They will not fade.
Those that play know it’s there, the piano in our library. It’s one of my favorites spots in the house. A collection of art, music, books and photos. And it will call to you, in the voice that you need to hear.
I suppose we’re all drawn to it, what we love, if we dare to follow the radar that pulses from each heart beat. I’m always surprised when people say they don’t know. It’s literally pounding inside of you. I guess they are afraid.
It has been said that we’re driven by one of two things, love or fear. Love will lead you to the piano. Will never allow it to go unplayed. Love will encourage the stumble through each note. The beginning again and again. Love will music your family in, and soon you will all be part of the song.
Fear is quiet. Lonely. Cold. (It’s not lost on me that my painting above the piano reads, “all my heart ever wanted, was just to come in from the cold.”) And it has. This is my hope for all. My welcoming.
In recent days, within minutes of entering our house, our nephew, who was vacationing from the US, was at the piano. I suppose one never takes a vacation from the self. So many miles away, almost instantly, he found his way home.
The best we can do is keep them in sight – the pianos and books, the kitchen tables, the art supplies and open corners on beds, the hearts between outstretched arms. But we all have to listen, to follow, to become. It’s up to each and every one of us to be brave enough to try. To come in. To dare the unplayed piano.
When he saw the painting of my grandfather he asked if we still had the farm. I paused, stuck in who the “we” would even be. I started passing it down in my head, from uncle to cousin, to second cousin, (none to whom I felt a collective we). It passed again in my head to I’m not sure, to finally, it didn’t really even matter, because, I told him, “I still have everything.” And I do.
Even a lifetime and country away, I can feel the warmth of the rock at the base of the driveway. The same steady of my grandfather. The gravel beneath my feet. The jolt of an electric fence. The smell of apples, on and off the trees. The sandy feel of a cow’s tongue. The bounce of a screen door. The scent of my grandma’s kitchen. My face against her sticky apron. The ever damp basement. Jesus on the cross upstairs. Prayed to from the kitchen table. The sewing room that stitched all nine children’s lives together. The front stoop that promised the scent of tobacco and hope. My mother laughing in that kitchen. Crying in that kitchen. Hands folded at that table. Driving away from the rock one last time, never really leaving.
So, yes, I still have the farm. And the we is all who listen to the stories. The we is you who remember your own grandmother’s apron. Who read the words and climb upon your grandfather’s lap. We still have it all. We have everthing.
Something will grow from all of this, and it will be me.
Certainly they were attracted to us. Who wouldn’t be? Sitting on my grandparents’ front stoop. Surrounded by flowers and watermelon seeds. Slo-pokes and Sugar Daddies stuck to our hands. Of course the bees hovered around. I suppose it was instinct to wave our chubby arms in the air, to add screaming when that got them all riled up.
Grandma Elsie could easily tune us out. Clanking the dish pans a little louder. Turning up the volume of the Hortons on Days of our Lives. But my grandpa couldn’t bear the piercing sounds. Never could. He walked purposely from the garage. We elbowed each other anticipating the incoming. His speech, unlike the growth around us, was never too floral. We listened. “You know how you sit with bees?” He asked. We shook our sun pink cheeks no. “You sit with bees.” Of course it took us a minute. He was halfway back to the garage before we started smiling quietly. And he turned out to be right. As we sat, no arm flinging, no yelling, the bees calmed in our calm. We sat with bees.
If I could elbow myself I would. I often forget. I can get myself so wound up in the buzz, which always makes it worse. But then on my best days, when I am more like him, I try to be the calm that brings the calm.
Ever sticky with lingering youth, my heart smiles. And I am saved. I gently wave to the wisdom of his overalls.
Other than the birds in the trees, Bud Christianson was the first to demonstrate the pure joy of music. He wasn’t just teaching it, he was living it. He directed the band at Jefferson Senior High. The only faculty member to drop the mister, we called him Christy. It suited his swagger.
This was long before Fame, Glee, and frankly before most of us had cable television. But I, we, knew we were in the presence of something special. So it shouldn’t have come as a surprise when he told us before the spring concert that not only were we going to play our instruments, but we were going to sing. But we’re the band, we’re not the choir, some questioned. “But listen to that music,” he said, “how can we help but sing?! And stand up when you do!” His enthusiasm was infectious. It did feel good! So in between puffs on my clarinet, I stood, jumped beside my section (I would have flown if I could have) and I, we, sang with all of our hearts. There was no band. No choir. No audience. No separation whatsoever. Because the music!!!
Have we lost the ability to hear? To celebrate our differences? I’m not ready to let it go. I must stand. We must stand! Can’t you feel it? We have to be in this together. United. What do you have without the music?
