Workin' the Day Job II

Yes, I've been MIA for quite some time. I had an adventure/walkabout/spirit quest and I'm still mulling over the experience. Not sure what, if any of it will be remotely interesting to anyone but me; I have a good friend that says "the only time the phrase 'I had a dream' interests me, is if the next words are 'and you were in it.'" I think spirit quests may fall into the same category. I'm not trying to be coy; things learned in solitude are useful only to the degree they affect us in the larger world. One thing I did learn though is, spirit quests never go according to plan. Maybe that's the point. Once I stopped trying to make anything happen, things got much better. If further rumination indicates, I will share my story with you, I promise.



In the meantime though, go check out this link.



A few weeks before before said spirit quest, I modeled again at the Salmagundi Club, the place where I first met the lovely and talented Ben Conrad. The instructor, David Hassan, had asked me to come back so he could do a demo drawing for interested students. What I hadn't expected was that his right hand man, Alex Leal, was going to videotape it. You don't actually see me (which is probably just as well; it might have gotten messy, I probably would have needed a special SAG waiver, and honestly , who can be bothered?), but you do see the drawing David does. In fact you see a three and a half hour session sped up to a little over seven minutes.



I think this is WAY cool, and I don't think it's just vanity on my part (though I do like the final image, as well as the stages along the way). I showed it to my roommate; he's moving out at the end of this month, and thus has no reason to keep me happy, yet he still insisted on watching the whole thing, even rewinding some parts.



I wish there was a way to show this to a lot of the beginning art students I will be seeing this Fall. Every year there are the same frustrations, questions and insecurities that I think this video would answer, if they had the savvy to see it. For one thing it shows drawing is a lot like sculpting. David masses in big shapes, knowing that if he doesn't quite like where things are, he'll be able to moosh them around later, and get them where they're supposed to be. Because of the speed (as well as David's clear expertise and confidence) it's easy to think every line he puts down is right where he wants it, doing exactly what he wants, on the first try. In way that's true; it's all part of the exploration, the experimentation. He puts down lines to see if that gives him what he wants. If they don't, he changes them. Yes, his experience means he probably gets a lot of the lines and shapes close to where he wants them right off, but he also works in such a way (lightly, yet specifically) that he can easily change and move things as he continues, shifting lines and shapes as needed as the drawing develops.



This, THIS is the sort of thing I love about modeling; the lessons I learn from this have direct application to my work as an actor, or just a person striving to live a conscious, responsible, creative life. Experiment. Try stuff, be confident in the execution, don't be tentative or ambivalent. At the same time, be prepared to change everything you just tried, if it's not working. Commit, but don't clutch, don't be precious. If something doesn't work, you still learned something useful. Change it. Try something else. To quote Samuel Beckett, "Try again. Fail again. Fail better." A mistake on the page is still LOADS better than a blank page, with you standing there, shivering and paralyzed, clutching your unused pencil.



I wanted to rephrase that last sentence, but I couldn't come up with anything that didn't make my inner adolescent snicker. He sees sex in EVERYTHING. All of you are far too mature to have gone down that road though, right? Moving on.



Anyway, like I said, it's also just a cool seven minutes. You watch a realistic image (and pretty good likeness, my roommate and I agree) forming out of squiggles, boxes, smudges and lines. Maybe you won't see a lesson in how to live your life, but it's still a neat experience.

Regaining Perspective.

Friday evening was one of those occasions when I felt like Manhattan was telling me, in no uncertain terms, that there was. no. room. for. me.

I was expecting the commute home to be tricky. The school I work at most often, the Pratt Institute, is deep in Brooklyn. I live at the north end of Manhattan, in Harlem. What this means is a) the commute can take anywhere from 40 to 90 minutes on average, one way and b) I will be going with rush hour traffic for most of the ride. These are the constant irritations to the trip, and I think I handle them pretty well.

But then Friday, you see, there was some moisture in the air. I don't mean there was actual RAIN, mind you, though it had been predicted. Okay, to be fair I think there had been some in the early afternoon. At 5pm, when I was getting on the train in Brooklyn, however, it had been dry for a while. As I think I've written before, any kind of precipitation, indeed even the suggestion of precipitation makes the trains and a substantial portion of the population go spare. Fridays often have their own special craziness, for reasons I've not quite figured out. There just always seem to be more people on the trains on Fridays. This one was no exception.

So we all see where I'm going with this, right? I managed to make it to 59th ST (just past the mid-point of my journey) in reasonably good time, and what's more, I had been able to sit most of the way. Score! For those of you who don't know, 59th St Station is a major transfer point. When I went to the platform for my train home, it was packed to the rafters with people, to a degree that told me a train had not been along in some time. This actually happens a lot during rush hours, particularly the evening rush, in my experience. Something goes wrong with the train, that delays it even a few minutes, which means that the crowds on the the subsequent stations have time to get bigger than normal. When the train shows up, the vast majority of people will force their ways onto the already packed train, and in doing so delay it even more. Often the conductor will tell us that another train is RIGHT BEHIND THIS ONE, but for some reason only a few people believe this, or think it's worth waiting for. As you may have guessed from my snide tone and sarcastic caps, I am one of those few people. If I'm not in any hurry to get where I am going (and usually at the end of the day, I'm not), I routinely let as many as three trains pass me by before getting on. Usually the first one will be, as I said, jam-packed and lethargic, crawling from station to station, collecting more and more surly people, so even once you've made it on, you know that the trip is only going to get slower and more uncomfortable. The next train (and often it is right behind the first one, though sometimes the conductors lie, which is probably why most riders don't believe them) will still be pretty packed, the riders still pretty surly, and the ride still slow because it, of course, has to wait for the first one to clear the station. Usually by the third train, there will be seats. It will still be a slow ride, since now you're behind two slow trains, but sitting down changes everything. You can get off your feet, read, write, basically treat the time as your own in at least a few small ways.

I was fully prepared to adopt the 'minimum three train' policy on Friday. I left for work Friday morning knowing that I would probably have to adopt this policy. When I got to 59th St that night, however, I knew immediately that this was not going to be a three-train wait. Nope, I was prepared to wait for at least five, and the gaps between them would be extra long because there were that many more people getting on.

40 minutes later, after train number seven came and left bursting at the seams, Mr. Crankypants was firmly in charge, and now I would not be riding the train UNTIL I could sit down. By train number nine, I was able to, in part because I didn't mind sitting near the only slightly whiffy homeless guy who had built himself an enormous nest at one end of the train with trash bags.

Door to door, my commute took two hours, twenty minutes.

Any thought I had of going out again that evening was snorted at derisively. I also realized there was an insistent little voice in my head saying I now deserved a treat, perhaps several treats, as consolation for my miserable ride home. Said little voice seemed of the opinion that such treats should include a large order of General Tso's chicken from the local Chinese take-out (if you're not familiar with this dish, it is basically a whole lot of deep-fat fried chicken nuggets swimming in a rich, sweet, oily sauce; I'll usually get it with brown rice. You know, to make it healthy), a truck load of cookies, and I'm talking 18 wheeler, AND a vat of a nice Shiraz. Not a truck of wine, that would be tacky.

When did I become the person who cheers himself up by hardening his arteries and destroying his liver? I swear to god I never thought that way before living in NYC. I've always loved food, mind you, in all its varied and glorious forms, but I don't think I went about medicating myself with it. Maybe my memory is faulty, but I really don't think I did.

Having identified this course of action as perhaps not in my best interests, I decided I would buy a box of Entemann's chocolate-chip cookies and some chicken quarters which I would cook (gasp!) WITH THE SKINS ON. I decided against the wine; I really don't think using alcohol as a means of breaking me out of a cranky mood is a habit I want to get into. I want to enjoy my booze when I have it. Besides the liquor store was too far away.

This compromise with my little voice then led me to think "when did I become the guy who obsesses about chicken skin?" Sure, one reaches a certain age and has to recognize that cholesterol is a concern, that excess pounds gained are harder to lose, that heart attacks do run in the family, that being a grown-up means recognizing consequences... but I mean come on.

Well, navel-gazing aside, I followed through on this plan, and had a great time. I had hoped to have my roommate's assistance with at least the cookies, but he was out, thus leaving me to do some serious damage to them on my own.

And it did help. I was much more cheerful an hour later, as I shoveled cookies into my mouth and contemplated having the whole apartment to myself for another week. What also cheered me up was looking at photos I took last Sunday, during a walk with my sweet Melissa. Her new place is right across the street from Inwood Park, which is all that remains of the old growth forest that once covered this whole island. Just the idea of that thrills me. Then when one walks in it, it's very easy to forget the city is all around.

This is my sweet girl just after we've entered the forest. Already all buildings are out of sight, and most street noise is gone.

(Don't you just want to squeeze her? She gets that a lot.)

This was a carving in the rock we both liked. Despite the sharpness of the edges and the uniformity of the shape, we're both certain this was formed naturally. There is no sign of tools, and besides, why would anyone bother?

Here's a closer look. In Ireland this would be some sort of sacred well, with an ancient name and a thousand year history of magical healing.

I don't know what these flowers in the foreground are, but I can't wait to find out. That's the Hudson in the background. I'm also rather fond of that larger tree. I seem to be turning into my mother. Like her, I now feel compelled to hug trees on a fairly regular basis. One of the odd benefits of living in a big city is, when I was doing this in Central Park a few weeks ago, I knew I didn't have to worry about ever seeing again any of the people who looked at me oddly as they went by. Lately I'm particularly fond of oak trees for some reason. Mom's morning walk includes visiting, and hugging, a catalpa and an ancient pin oak.

At one point, Melissa and I found a clearing in the trees where we got incredible views of the river. The picture on the left is looking north, the one on the right looks south.















These two shots are taken in almost the same location; I've just stepped forward about two paces. Suddenly you can see the city. Again, the left one is north, the right one is south. In the latter, you're looking at George Washington Bridge. My place is just about twenty blocks further south.
This is a picture Melissa took of me, while I was taking one of the pictures above. She took this with her camera phone. That's a damn good phone. Or Melissa really knows how to work it. I'm getting a better average number of focused images with my digital baby, I just don't know how I'm doing it. Generally taking two or three shots seems to be useful; the latter ones are almost always better. My camera's ways remain a mystery to me, and contrary to his original assertion, Tommy is no help. Still, I'm having fun. You just may not want to enlarge any of my photos, if blurry images make your eyes go all wonky, like they do mine.


So once again, it's trees to the rescue in my world. I could ask myself if this is something that needs closer examination, but for now I'm just grateful to have so many places nearby that help me regain my sanity, and such good company to do it with.

Healing Waters: Two Irish Thoughts

We can make our minds so like

still water that beings gather

about us to see, it may be,

their own images, and so live for a

moment with a clearer, perhaps even

with a fiercer life because of our

quiet.

W. B. Yeats

An Tobar/The Well

"'Twill put a stir in you, and life,"

says old Bridget, spark in her eyes

proffering a bowl of spring-water

from the purest well in Gleann an Átha,
a well that was tended tastily

from generation to generation, the precious

heritage of the household

snugly sheltered in a nook,

a ditch around it for protection,

a flagstone on its mouth.

When I was growing up

here in the early 'sixties

there wasn't a house in the neighbourhood

without its like,

for everyone was proud then

of how wholesome and pure

they kept the family well:

they wouldn't let it become murky or slimy

and at the first traces of red-rust

it was bailed-out with a tin bucket

then purified every season with kiln-lime.

Lively, living water, pellucid spring-water

gushed forth from our family well.

In tin-cans and pitchers

they drew it daily

and in the devouring thirst

of sweltering summer

it slaked and cooled them

in field and bog.

It was a tonic, too,

that made them throb with delight

and for their ablutions

it served from cradle to grave.

But, this long time, piped water from distant hills

sneaks into every kitchen

on both sides of the glen;

water spurts from a tap,

mawkish, without sparkle,

zestless as slops

and among my people

the springwell is being forgotten.

"'Tis hard to find a well nowadays",

says Bridget filling the bowl again.

"They're hidden in rushes and grass,

choked by green scum and ferns,

but, despite the neglect,

they've lost none of their true mettle.

Seek out your own well, my dear,

for the age of want is near:

There will have to be a going back to sources."

Cathal Ó Searcaigh

translated from the Irish by Gabriel Fitzmaurice

Happy Saint Patrick's Day, my friends.

A Day Late

March 15th is my dad's birthday. Sadly I wasn't able to be there for the festivities, I wasn't even able to call during dinner as is my usual habit (fortunately everyone will be gathering at Mary's and Tony's tonight for Irish stew and twice-baked potatoes).

I can be reasonably certain how the party happened though. Dad, Mom, James, Mary and Tony all gathered in the dining room of Laceyland, joined by both the dog and the cat. Everyone held hands for silent grace, with Fang insisting she be a part of it too, so people on either side of her each took an ear. (The cat is largely uninterested in grace.)

The smells of Dad's chosen birthday meal -this year it was roast beef, mashed potatoes, and salad- wafted in from the kitchen, making mouths water (probably all seven of them; even I, who don't really eat beef any longer, would revel in the aroma.) Mom brought it out, James opened the first bottle of red wine, and everyone set to. In amongst talk of everyone's day were memories of trips taken, other occasions celebrated, a lot of wonderful meals remembered. We talk about food a lot, my family. A second bottle was probably opened, though none of them would drink much more than two glasses. We like being nicely oiled, or as my sister puts it "goofed up," but not more than that.

The volume and speed of the conversation probably rose a bit, but not to a mind-splitting degree. The lights were turned off, and Mom fetched the birthday cake. White cake, chocolate frosting, sliced bananas and frosting in between the two layers, this is Dad's favorite cake, the one fond memory he has of his mother's cooking. That wasn't really her thing. He blew out the candles (with the baby of the family turning 40 in June, any attempt to put the 'right' number of candles on the cake ceased decades ago), and Mom immediately took them off and dunked them in cold water, to save for the next birthday. Some frugal, Quaker farm-girl habits never die, but she takes the ribbing ('run! run! Get them to the sink! Aiee!') with a good nature.

The cake was sliced, tea poured, tonight the rule about seconds on dessert was relaxed, then it was time for presents. Dad has always been hard to find presents for. From what I hear, this is a condition common to dads. Not sure what the hell that is about. It's gotten worse as he and Mom have gotten older, because they need nothing now, and don't have much in the way of wants either. Even books, the fool-proof present in the past, now are chosen with greater discrimination, though the absolutely perfect ones are not by-passed. Mostly he got nice wine, cheeses, other fine comestibles, since those are always appreciated. Second cups of tea were poured, the news watched on TV, then everyone went off to his or her respective homes and evening chores. Part of what made this evening so special is the fact that it isn't that rare. Mary and Tony may not join them for dinner every night, but family meals still happen a few times a week, even if they're not always this fancy. I feel some envy at not being able to participate, but mostly I feel delighted knowing this quiet family ritual is observed so often.

I've said in other entries that trying to describe why you love a person is hard to do without sounding insipid and trite, or resorting to lists of fine qualities. I think that problem is only worsened when you're talking about a parent. I can talk about all the good I've seen Dad do in the world, as a teacher, counselor to students and colleagues, and now as clerk for The American Friends Service Committee, which has him gallivanting all over the world in his seventies, doing things we would have never imagined like going up the sides of mountains in Columbian war zones in trucks with benches bolted in the back... but this wouldn't tell you about his goofy side. I could mention that in hearing the news about Eliot Spitzer he speculated about what one would get for $4300 an hour, and decided he wouldn't settle for anything less than a trampoline and an off-stage accordian player (and comments like these from my parents have long since ceased to traumatize me, if they ever did), but that wouldn't tell you about his ferocity... I could talk about when I was a student at Dad's college, he and I frequently found ourselves going after the same administrators, so my 'teen rebellion' years got to be spent with my dad in the same trenches...but that still wouldn't give you a full picture of him. I might mention his special bond with babies and dogs, his desire to have a pet penguin and baby elephant that he would take for walks, the way he taught us to that literature and art matter in the world, but didn't let us get precious about it (In a copy of The Joy of Cooking he gave me, he quoted Bertolt Brecht, writing "First food, then rights!"), his love of Benny Goodman, Beethoven, the Beatles, Yeats, Keats, Levertov, Austen, Eliot, of dancing... okay, so I'm making that list I said I wouldn't. And I've barely scratched the surface.

Suffice it to say, I think he's been a force of love, vision, humor, and celebration in the world and he's just been a hell of a lot of fun to be around. We have had our problems, of course. Human beings will, after all, and fathers and sons may almost be required to... but in all the ways that mattered, he has always been behind me.

Below is a poem of his that I'm particularly fond of, and perhaps does a better job of showing his character than my scatter-shot approach above. If you're not familiar with the Dickinson poem he's responding to, it's included at the bottom of the entry.

Happy birthday, Dad. I love thee.






Another Slant of light


This afternoon’s sun is not yet at the horizon,
and it has bathed the unmarked snow fields
a mellow pink. The sun has set a joyful scene, dear Emily,
not like that New England winter light you praised
and mourned, a century ago.


Now more gold has
entered the light, and the snow invites us to urge
the dog’s happy leaps in and out of the drifts. Were
I not too old and stiff, too self-conscious
at looking foolish, I would make snow angels
in the trackless field or roll down the hill
below the meetinghouse. Like the dog, I would bathe
in this light, the brisk cold, the soft-tinged snow.


I hear a different heft of music, Emily,
this winter afternoon: the perfect cathedral tune,
Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D Minor,and the triumphant last movement of St. Saens’
organ symphony. Listen to the opening bars:
dah dah dah dah / da da da da DAH! /
Da da da da, /da da da dah Dahh!
Oh hum along, Emily, wave your hands.


I always want to dance to that tune,
Emily, all around the room, though it
also makes me look foolish beyond my years.


But I don’t just hear organ music. The light
makes me imagine the dancing harpsichord
driving Artie Shaw’s Gramercy Five
on "Summit Ridge Drive" and "Back Bay Shuffle."
(A couple of Boston tunes, Emily.)


The day will darken toward more somber hues
and tones when the sun dips below the horizon,
but for now there is no heavenly hurt, no gouging
into the heart to find the meanings. It is cold, it will
grow dark, yes, as always, but now the light
is soft, golden, pink; the snow receives it as decoration,
as barrel-organ honky tonk, splashy
show-off tunes, as the body’s pleasure
in the triumphal, long-shadowed winter light...

Paul Lacey.



(258)
There's a certain Slant of light,
Winter Afternoons -
That oppresses, like the Heft
Of Cathedral Tunes

Heavenly Hurt, it gives us -
We can find no scar,
But internal difference,
Where the Meanings, are-

None may teach it -Any -
'Tis the Seal Despair -
An imperial affliction
Sent us on the Air -

When it comes, the Landscape listens
Shadows - hold their breath -
When it goes, 'tis like the Distance
On the look of Death -

Emily Dickinson 1890.

Tying Knots

From time to time I’ll feel a vague, inchoate desire to make something. Sometimes it finds expression in baking bread, making red sauce, or having friends to dinner. Sometimes (all too rarely) it results in me emptying my mending bag, sewing on buttons, closing up seams. I can remember a time when it took expression in sketching on pretty much a daily basis, but sadly I’ve fallen out of the habit, and the ability has atrophied. I still make masks, but they are more often motivated by specific projects or commissions these days; less often do I turn to it as pure impulse. Sometimes the house gets cleaned, lemon and lavender scents clearing my head and my mood, clean, uncluttered surfaces letting my eye come to rest.

And once every great while, the desire to make will find expression in making friendship bracelets. You know what I’m talking about, right? Well, maybe if you didn’t go to a pinko-commie-Quaker-pacifist-hippy-dippy-crunchy-granola college, you didn’t come across them. They’re those colorful little ribbons of macrame, made with embroidery thread. They're given as gifts to someone special (not exclusively romantic partners), tied on the wrist, or in some cases, ankle, then worn until time, sweat, and showers causes them to break off. Almost everyone in my school wore one or two at some point.

From the very start they satisfied some deep needs in me. First of all was the need to play with color in a very basic way. I love rich, deep, super-saturated colors, more jewel-tones than neon. I don’t usually care much for pastels; I like colors with the courage of their convictions, and usually pastels just look watery and wimpy to me (as in all things, there are exceptions). I’m generally disappointed in the colors of men’s clothing. Maybe there will be an ultramarine blue, a tomato red, a green once in a while, less often a lavender – and even then they are shades I find boring or unappealing – but most of what one sees is black, grey, khaki, white, the least interesting browns one can imagine, and of course, navy blue; this is what real men, at least in the United States, are allowed to wear. Anything else runs the risk of making one look frivolous, if not downright faggy.

I like blue. I wear blue. I wear a lot of blue. But the colors that really get my juices flowing run more towards pine green, deep violet, Tuscany yellows, and copper reds just to name a few. In recent years I’ve come to appreciate fire colors like never before, reds, oranges, yellows, (I think coinciding with a lifting in spirit, and greater willingness to be seen) but even then I don’t want them to look like they came from a Crayola box. A SMALL Crayola box. Primary colors in general bore me, especially the most basic blue and red that exist out there (often even in the plaids). I think I would like them well enough, if they weren’t so damn ubiquitous.

So anything made with embroidery thread is a good antidote to all this. They were meant to be used purely for decoration, so there is no need to bow to utility. Every possible color and shade, is available. Just browsing at the store is a delight to the eye. What’s more, the bracelets allow you to explore colors in combination. How will this teal look next to this magenta? How about if a lavender is placed between them? Can a yellow be added, or will it just spend the whole time screaming at the lavender? And what about pattern? The repertoire of the friendship bracelet is limited to angled rows, chevrons, diamonds, and something I call alphas (basically diamonds with an inverted V attached), but that still opens up an array of possible color and pattern combos.

Maybe this need for color would be equally satisfied by finger-painting, but that’s not the only need it fills. I also find a great satisfaction in making knots. In the simple act of joining threads, the image of healing is never far off for me. Then there’s the pleasure in watching the pattern take shape, rows of knots slowly accruing, like weaving but with much quicker results and fewer equipment needs. Also like weaving, the process of tying knots becomes a great gateway to a trance-state, what Abraham Maslow called ‘flow’. At the very beginning of the process I may need to focus on the task so the threads get put in the order I want, but once I’ve made it through the first complete sequence, my hands can take over with only minimal attention paid by my eye and conscious mind. This is when things often rise to the surface, questions I’m grappling with, confusions I’m feeling, all the clutter in my brain that needs shaping, organizing, purging. Occasionally when I’m aware of feeling this way, I’ll choose to make a bracelet. More often than not though, the impulse to make one, even to some extent the choice of colors, will come first, and only after I’ve started do I begin to see what is lurking in the depths.

I used to have this joyful, timeless experience in a lot of different ways; like I said above, drawing used to provide it; so did putting the layers of paper mache on the mold of a mask. In 1992 though, when I had just ended my first serious relationship, I was asked to make some masks for a production, and realized that while I was working, instead of my welcome trance-state, I was tapping into a whole lot of anger. Fights were replayed, irritations relived, I wrote new scenes where I explained why his ‘let’s be friends’ approach was unwelcome and insulting... not the peaceful meditative state I was used to having during this task. I no longer envision my poor ex-boyfriend’s head on a platter when I make masks, but neither have I regained the sense of flow I once had. Someday, I hope it will return.

I never lost it with these silly little bracelets though. And that’s another part of their appeal, I think. They’re completely pointless. Wearing them until they rot off, that's the closest they get to having a purpose. Occasionally I will tie one around a gift bottle of wine, or a vase, but attempts to use them like actual ribbon, i.e. for tying up packages, rarely works. I’ve sometimes offered them as bookmarks, but they’re ill-suited to that purpose as well, for all but the biggest, thickest hardbacks. I made a big one once, just for the hell of it, and ended up sewing it into the bag I made to carry my tin whistles. It does the job okay I suppose, but something else would have probably been better. I rarely give them away these days because people feel obligated to put them on, then they worry I’ll notice it missing the next time I see them. I explain that unless they’re surfers, skate-boarders, or under the age of 20, I don’t expect them to wear it, but they don’t believe me. There was a time when I had a plethora of them, and left them tied randomly to poles and fences in Greenwich Village. I figured I’d recognize my own patterns and color choices well enough that if I ever saw someone with one later, I’d recognize it and strike up a conversation, but so far that has never happened. Chances are good most of them got thrown in the trash by disgruntled supers.

No, they’re utterly pointless, and frankly, I don’t make them for the finished object, but for the process. Sometimes life fills me too full of experience, and I need the clarifying, organizing energies the making of these things gives me.

Last night I found myself needing to stay home. I thought it was simply wanting to take advantage of having the apartment to myself, but soon I realized that I was feeling the desire to make a friendship bracelet. It’s probably been years since the last time. I think I’d been feeling the desire for a few days, so my unconscious finally just made me sit at home, declining all invitations.

Right off the bat my color choices indicated new thoughts. Black, white, sunny yellow, a dark, not-quite-wine-colored red were my choices. I got two strands of each, for a V pattern. These are not colors I would typically combine. Normally I would have seen them as the the easiest choices in graphic design, striking yes, but maybe dull from over-use, in newspapers, logos and posters all over the place. I went with it though, and soon into the pattern realized I liked it, perhaps needed the message each color had to give me.

The white thread warned me of my perfectionism, rigid thinking, my fear of looking foolish, my need for there to be absolutes. The yellow reminded me to notice the simple, quiet, daily pleasures, especially the ones I think I don’t deserve. The red spoke, yes, of passion, love, committing deeply and fully, taking risks, but also of seeing the bigger picture, and committing fully to that as well. The black spoke of mystery and nighttime (when I often feel my creativity is at its most free), of the seed planted deep, committed to its own secret growth. It reminded me to be patient, truly patient, not just pay lip-service, to the secrets working underground, according to their own rhythms.

I felt for a number of years that I was spinning my wheels professionally and artistically; in recent years I felt like I wasn’t even doing that much. This black thread told me to have faith, to trust that things have to work at their own pace. I must tend the soil, water and feed the seed, but mostly I need to leave it alone, and trust I will know what to do when the next step presents itself.

The knots spoke to me as well. They tied me to so many people in my life; to my family and college friends of course; to the new friends I’m getting to know on and off-line; to the old friends who show up out of the blue - even from out of town - with an uncanny sense for when I need them; to the cautious optimism a treatment plan is providing a loved one; to the celebration of a deep bond being made deeper, where I drank too much and kissed too much and gave straight guys noogies that they took with admirable forbearance; to the new friends and gracious hosts who once again opened their home and lives to me, revealing themselves a bit more through older friendships; to the death of a wonderful old man who had helped liberate Bergen-Belsen, and let the horrors of what he saw there move him to connect, to befriend, and to nurture; to another celebration of another impending marriage and the joy I felt in being included; to the cooling words of a good friend reading my first draft of an enraged letter, less than a week after I had done the same for her; to shared meals and late night talks that nourished me more than the missed sleep; all these bonds, all these connections were recorded and celebrated in the tying of knots.

A sense of gratitude has been growing in my life in recent months. You can see it in my blog, I think. I’m sensible enough to know that it isn’t enough however. If the only thing my gratitude leads to is bits of macrame and cheerful mooning about in my apartment, then it hasn’t done me much good. I am ready to take action, but I know I haven’t yet. It’s odd too, because the fact is I like working. At least I think I remember feeling that way. I agree with G.B. Shaw when he says "I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake." I dance with Rumi as he sings "everyone has been made for some particular work, and the desire for that work has been put in every heart." I nod with recognition – and cringe at the unwitting accusation -- when Thoreau says "be not simply good – be good for something." I say this with no self-pity, and with no need for loving denials (Seriously, I’m not fishing), but in recent years I don't think I've been good for much. I’m wary of the ego’s need for adulation being the secret motive for my work (a constant bugaboo for actors), just as I watch his tendency to insist that not doing things at all is better than doing them badly. But the need for work, the need to do, to make, that isn’t ego. It’s recognizing responsibility to life.

Goodness. What a lot to hang on a tiny piece of ribbon. By the end of the evening though, I felt like something important had been rediscovered. There was a sense of grounding: of coming home even. I don’t know what the next step is. But I think I will when I see it.

All About Me

This is Megan.
She's a koala.
She's eating eucalyptus leaves.




(We had just been exercising in the Sheep's Meadow under a hot summer sun. I'm sweaty, red-faced, and blotchy the way you're supposed to be. She looks like she just stepped out of the shower. Maybe she's glowing. A bit. God, I hate that bitch.)


This is Jeff.
He's a clown.
He's wearing a rubber nose.
Also a hat.




(It's all right, he's a good clown, he won't hurt you. Seriously, he's really funny. Okay, okay, breathe...No no, the T shirt is a name, not an instruction...yes, I understand but- uh huh... look, he's also a great actor, and he doesn't wear the nose then. Usually. Does that help? ...All right, if you would just come over --look, will you calm down-no... no... Seriously dude, would you CHILL? Jesus Christ on a Bicycle!)




Jeff and Megan have known each other since high school in Northern Virgina (NoVA, to the cool kids, and believe me, these kids are cool), were sweethearts for a while, and managed to maintain a friendship throughout college and the years after. Well, last Tuesday the Koala and the Clown decided that their duo was too good, too right, and should be made a permanent thing. I couldn't agree more.


I've been trying all weekend to explain why this makes me so deleriously happy. The funny thing about trying to explain why you love people is it so hard to do without sounding like a Hallmark card, or just listing their fine qualities. On top of that, the entry about their engagement kept becoming all about me, and why I wanted this to happen. I don't seem to be getting anywhere though, and what the hell, it IS my blog, so here are just a few of the things that make me happy about all this.


I met Jeff doing the original play Significant Circus back in spring of 2001, and he was but one of many precious gifts I took away from that experience. I tend to treat straight men like timid woodland creatures when I first meet them, moving slowly and deliberately so as not to startle them, in the hopes that maybe eventually they'll feel safe enough to eat from my hand. Initially Jeff seemed like a prime candidate for this policy, but I soon found I was selling him short. You have to understand, in this play, while Jeff was playing a human being, I was playing a dog. A talking dog. Nor was this my first time (see, all about me...). We only had a couple of scenes together, and our characters didn't really interact much, we were usually just there as parts of crowd scenes. At one point we had stopped while the director attended to some other problem, me crouched at Jeff's feet, both of us lost in our own thoughts. It took me a few moments to notice that Jeff was petting me absent-mindedly, scritching me behind the ears... Just petting the dog. I doubt he was even conscious of it; like I said, it had been going on for some moments before I was. If that hadn't been enough, I knew we were going to be friends when he, I, and two other (hot!) actors decided to run our extremely physical, acrobatic, full-body-contact fight call in our underwear. Just 'cause. It was that kind of play.


He is one of the most disciplined, hard-working people I know, and at times I feel like he's driven, and too self-flagellating (like life in New York Theatre doesn't beat you enough). I'll tell him to lighten up periodically, yet I'm also awed by how much he gets done. Generally he's juggling roughly 493 projects at once, in three states and two countries (I'm not kidding), but even then, if you ask him to help you move, he's there. I swear, if I suddenly needed to move while he was working in Italy, he would find a way to be there that day, and still miss less than an hour's rehearsal. And you have to understand, we're talking about moving IN NEW YORK CITY. No place to park, five floor walk-ups with no elevators, doors and staircases that are too small for TV sets, let alone actual furniture... nope, he's there, and usually taking charge.


I met Megan a few years later, when she moved to New York as their relationship rekindled. As with Jeff, I initially thought she was sweet, lovely, a bit shy and reserved, a southern gal I might easily scandalize accidentally. I was just as wrong with her. While she and I haven't wrestled in our underwear (yet), I quickly learned she was actually a hot dancer, a rocker-chick with a serious Guns N' Roses fetish and several tattoos. At first I thought it odd someone like this was studying library science, but it just turned out I hadn't met enough librarians. She can drink me under the table, which granted isn't that hard these days, but she IS a lot smaller than me. Of the two of them, she's far more likely to be the one causing trouble in public, and she gets away with it because she can turn on the Bambi eyes, and just look like a sweet young thing. I adore this about her. I also adore the fact that when she's writing papers, she wears bunny ears because "they help me think." When she has her glasses on she looks like she's the librarian at the Playboy Mansion. She and I bonded when we learned each of us has a Muppet Dance (Jeff likes to make us sit on the same side of the booth in restaurants, so he can watch us do them simultaneously). Her sense of humor is often wicked, and I adore this about her too.




Then there are all the things I love about them that they have in common: their writing skill, their empathy, their ability to switch from serious to silly on a dime (and not belittle either one), their love of books, art, dance, theatre, music, good food, red wine -all the things that make for wonderful friendships and amazing conversations, but perhaps not particularly good stories. They've challenged me, supported me, and maybe best of all, helped me make my work better. I feel blessed by my time with them, hearing, being heard, loving, and being loved.



They're also both smokin' hot, and not afraid to give me smooches when I need 'em. (Which, for the record, is CONSTANTLY. Probably half the reason I went into theatre. All about me.)



The road to this point has been a long one, and what with them being human beings and all, not always easy. They were split up for a time, a few years ago. I've had good couple friends break up before (who hasn't) and knew I would have no trouble maintaining a friendship with each of them. So why was I so upset by the break-up? Sure I was sad that they were both hurting, that made sense, but this seemed like something more. Gradually I began to realize that I felt strongly that they were SUPPOSED to be together. Unlike in previous cases, I had an opinion, dare I say, an AGENDA even, in this.



I was good. I behaved. I did not breathe a word of this to either of them, because what the hell did I know, it wasn't my decision, I wasn't involved, I didn't know all the things that had come between them, and besides I know better than to advise people on much of anything but especially romance, yeah, let's look at my track record, and no one wants advice when they're in this much pain anyway, and they DEFINITELY don't need me pursuing my own AGENDA for god's sake, what kind of moron would risk alienating both his friends by meddling in their affairs like this because HE wants them to reconcile...?



(All about me.)



Nope I didn't say a thing (right, guys? I didn't, did I? I was good, right?). And I worked at picturing them with other people, starting new relationships, building different lives. They were mine, I wasn't going to lose them, and since it's all about me, that's what mattered.



BUT... I was thrilled when they reconciled, saw that if anything the bond was stronger and healthier now, maybe in some way the split had been necessary. It was good. So glad you two finally saw sense and did what I wanted, ya pinheads. (Me. All. About.) I'm sure I'm only one of many people saying this to you. Together and separately you have inspired, delighted and supported me. I hope you'll let me return the favor, whenever I can.

Frolic in the Meadow

So, it seems I'm not as good with this digital camera as I may have thought. If I'm trying to capture scenery on a day with brilliant light and diamond-sharp shadows, apparently I can manage not to fuck things up too much. If I'm trying to photograph people, or pets, however, I turn into a drooling moron. The camera insists on flashing, regardless of light or setting, and I don't know how to turn that off (if it's even possible; it must be, right?). It often doesn't really understand what I want to be focusing on, so when faced with this problem it focuses at random on an object of its own choosing. We're working on our communication, though I'll admit I don't always behave like a grown-up and will sometimes remove its batteries in a fit of pique. That doesn't seem to accomplish much, but it makes me feel better. Yes, I'm just that petty. I hate being defeated by inanimate objects.

What is my evidence for all this? See that picture above? Out of all the photos I took of Jess, Marc, the dogs (none of whom have blogs yet), the house, the train-ride, that photo there is the best one I got out of my visit to East Meadow. I mean, you can actually see who it is I'm photographing. The others, all of them, don't know what the hell happened there. Yes, I know you can look at the little screen after taking a shot, see if it came out, then try again if necessary, bite me okay? Yeah, I didn't do that. Like, ever. I blame Marc really. He made this amazing blackberry (yes blackberry) cosmo that is without a doubt the most delicious mixed drink I've ever had. Not too sweet, beautiful color, it went down like water, so I really can't be held responsible.

So, lacking the extensive photo journal I was hoping to share with you, I'll just have to tell you about my lovely day. Oh, that above is Mandy. She is of the devil, apparently. In my own defense, Jess says that effect always happens with her eyes, so again, it's not my fault. She was coming over to smooch me, by the way, not chew off my face, as it might appear. I get those looks confused a lot.

After a relaxing train-ride out (I love trains), Jess was there to pick me up at the station. The conversation started up without any awkwardness, as between familiar friends, as I guess we were by that point. At the house I was greeted by the dogs first. Bernice and Mandy were effusive and affectionate from the start, competing a bit with one another for my attention. Dodger was courtly and gracious, but made clear he was reserving judgement pending further evidence. I can respect that.

Finally I got to meet Marc as well. Both gentlemen were every bit as charming, funny and welcoming as their blogs, comments and emails had led me to expect. What I hadn't gotten to experience directly was the loving banter between them, which started up immediately. They seemed as amazed, amused and delighted with each other as if they had just met, and it was lovely to bask in.

First order of business, I requested a tour of the house. Marc had before pictures to give me a sense of how extensive their renovations had been. Jess grew up in this house, so the renovations helped to shape the house more to their tastes and needs, while also perhaps banishing a ghost or two. The home they've created is both elegant and cozy, taking advantage of some wonderful original features (black walnut trim!), and antiques from their families, combining them with beautiful new marble or granite in the kitchen and bathrooms, wonderful light fixtures, and a variety of rich, soothing colors. Throughout there were several large beautiful photographs hanging and only later did I learn that Jess had taken them. The house throughout sang of the two of them, and of their relationship. After turning to smaller bedrooms into one large one, they decided to make it the new master bedroom. Jess felt he was never going to be able to see the original as anything but his parents' room. Talk about a recipe for chastity. I would have made the same choice. Periodically one of them would point to what I thought was a small, tastefully arrayed collection, and say "sorry about the mess."

They are never, ever coming to my house.

So much of the furniture or collections (there were actual ones too) came with family stories, so one sensed the history of these two men in a way that I have rarely found with Americans. I got to hear about some of their relatives -Jess's mom and grandmother, Marc's mom- triggered perhaps by a collection of silver pieces, a surprisingly valuable couch (that narrowly missed being left on the curb) or a great old cabinet.

Jess and Marc then began preparations for dinner in the kitchen, while I sat in the living room, peeking through the large window there, sipping my cosmo, and petting any dog who stopped by to say hi. Dodger seemed to be warming up a bit. All five of them had been in Vermont over the weekend with friends, so Iwas informed the dogs were a bit more sedate than usual, due to being tired. I was comforted to hear this, since I was starting to wonder if I should be offended by the fact that Mandy had not yet lived up to her nickname -Moose- by trying to climb into my lap.

Just so you know, if you say to these gentlemen "please don't go to any trouble" what they hear is "please order gulf shrimp from a company in Texas that provides next day delivery." Jess tried to make it seem like that was all Marc's doing, but I didn't detect any evidence he had tried to stop him.

Not that I'm complaining, mind you. Jess made a delicious scampi, while Marc sauteed asparagus, and buttered garlic bread, periodically checking on the state of his cheesecake. He then topped up my drink, discreetly provided me with a tarp the size of a circus tent to deal with my drooling, and the six of us sat down to eat in the sunroom. The meal was every bit as wonderful as you're thinking it was, topped only by the company and the conversation. I learned more about Jess's parents, and regretted that I would never get to meet them. The love they shared for over forty years had clearly shaped Jess, his siblings, and the home in ways too many to count; one felt it radiating out of the walls, surrounding us with a warm, gentle glow.

Once the humans had eaten our fill, Bernice and Mandy intensified their campaign for scraps, and were rewarded with some pieces of garlic bread. Dodger has to be invited to partake, such a gentleman he is, but he didn't require too much coaxing.

Jess and I continued talking while Marc disappeared for quite a while in the kitchen, until I began to feel like we had abandoned him. "Don't worry," Jess assured me, "he would much rather we stay out here for the moment." Far be it from me to disturb an artist in process.

Eventually we retired to the living room with our cheesecake with strawberries (heaven!) and our coffee. This is the one room in the house where the dogs are not allowed. Bernice and Mandy accept this without complaint (or at least they did that night). Dodger, on the other hand, utilizes the debate of legal minutiae so popular with dogs and teenagers. He'd lie just outside the door, only his snout crossing the border into the living room, testing to see if the judges felt this honored the spirit of the law. That having gone well, he tried the reverse, placing his entire body in the living room, except for his snout, which also helped his case, since he was facing out of the room. When this began to look like he'd push too far, he also stretched both forepaws to the safe side of the border. Eventually Jess told him to leave, and he did, with no evident disgruntlement.

Perusing some of the Adonises (Adonisae?) hot guys in Jess's high school yearbook -he was the editor, so had a certain amount of say in who got multiple shots- led to a discussion of opportunities missed because we were too young, timid and closeted. This led somehow into a discussion of whether there is life after death. Trust me, in the context that jump made sense. Actually you probably can come up with your own links without much trouble, can't you. I learned about the trip they took with Marc's mom to Europe, getting her out of the country for the first time in her seventies, for what was clearly a wonderful time for all three of them. Jess says they have a 'don't ask, don't tell' policy for her sake, but occasionally she forgets, and calls him 'son'.

A phone call from a friend led us to the TV room (Oh, I neglected to mention the Bose surround sound system throughout the house!) so said friend could get Jess's expert opinion on some guns being evaluated on the Antiques Road Show. Marc suddenly thought it had been cruel to keep me in the living room, no dogs allowed, when I had come out in part to see them, but he needn't have worried. The company in both rooms had been a delight, I didn't feel deprived in the slightest. This did however give Dodger a chance to deliver his final judgement, which he did by playfully wrassling with me, biting ever so gently. Jess informed me this meant I was in.

We were all looking at early starts the next day, so I elected to get on the 9:30 train back to Penn Station. The three of us drove to the station, which meant I got to save my hugs until the very last moment with both of them. As they drove off I appreciated the fact that three rough looking guys were standing next to three fabulous young gay boys (one of them in a sequin-covered vest, a fedora, and just a touch of eye-liner) without any evident animosity. Even the 'burbs of New York tend to have a live and let live attitude most of the time.

The train arrived right on time, and after I had been riding for a bit, I thought to turn my phone back on. There was a text message and a voice message from Jess. The voice message said "Marc wanted to know if you'd made your train all right--OW. I just got hit. Okay I was worried you might have missed your train, it's the Jewish mother in me..." I called back immediately to reassure Mama, and thanked them again for a lovely day.

I was home before eleven, which gave me time to make a full report to Nicky, and to learn that my photos were for shit. I guess that just means I'm going to have to go back for another visit, after I've beaten the camera into submission-I mean learned all its fine nuances and needs. It's rough, but for you, my readers, I'm willing to make that sacrifice. No need to thank me. Its just the kind of guy I am. I'm a giver.

Thanks again, Guys, it was wonderful. It's my turn to host next, which I'll find some way to do without letting you see the state of squalor I generally live in.

The Instruments

by Rumi

Who is the luckiest in this whole orchestra? The reed.

Its mouth touches your lips to learn music.

All reeds, sugarcane especially, think only

of this chance. They sway in the canebrakes,

free in the many ways they dance.

Without you the instruments would die.

One sits close beside you. Another takes a long kiss.

The tambourine begs, Touch my skin so I can be myself.

Let me feel you enter each limb bone by bone,

that what died last night can be whole today.

Why live some soberer way, and feel you ebbing out?

I won't do it.

Either give me enough wine or leave me alone,

now that I know how it is

to be with you in constant conversation.

translated by Coleman Barks.

Thank you, my friends, virtual and not, for entering into conversation with me. Why live some soberer way...

I won't do it.

Happy Valentine's Day.

Two Steps Forward?

I've been mulling over my reaction to the death of Heath Ledger, and reading the heart-felt responses from many in my blog family. Brokeback Mountain obviously struck a deep chord with a lot of people, as it did with me. In one of my earliest posts, written just after seeing the movie, I talked about how connected I felt culturally to this particular story in ways that didn't make sense. I had privileges Ennis never dreamed of, yet I still see how easy it would have been for me to become him. For an interesting interview with Ledger on his experience working on the film, go here. The skill and emotional insight Ledger and Ang Lee brought to this character created a resonant performance, one that deserves all the accolades and awards it received. I think it may go down in history as one of the great film portrayals. I was inspired in deep ways by the beauty and commitment of Ledger's work, and it's obvious I was not alone.

Ledger -and in fact, Gyllenhaal as well- impressed me in another way. As is still the case whenever a straight man plays a gay role, members of the press, particularly the gay press, often feel compelled to ask if the decision to take the role was 'scary'. It's not uncommon for there to be a fair amount of thanks given for an actor's willingness to play gay, like he is doing us some kind of favor. Read Ledger's response to a variation on this question in one interview (see above link).

Question: Who was the biggest supporter and biggest detractor in you playing this role in regards to the gay aspects?

Heath Ledger: No one was trying to detract me from it. Everyone was very supportive of it. I understand everyone else or people found it risky. I hate to call it "daring" or "brave"; firefighters are daring and brave. I'm acting. I didn't get hurt and I'm not mentally wounded from this experience.

I love him for this response, and I love what it tells us about the present landscape in Hollywood. I am even more encouraged by comments he makes later in the same interview.

Question: Why did you take the role when others in the past had said no?

Heath Ledger: It was a beautiful story. It was a story that hadn't made it on the screen; which is rare to come upon a script so beautifully well written and hadn't been told before. It was very exciting to tell a new story. Ang lee is attached to it. I don't think I would have done it if it were in anyone else's hands. He was the perfect director for it and that's really [it]. I looked at it as a wonderful opportunity to get in the head of this character. I never saw it as a huge risk that everyone else was seeing. It's all relative to the person you are and how relaxed you are with people and the people around you. I was very happy to tell a story that hadn't been told and I thought it should have been told.

This response reveals to me both a sensitive artist and an astute businessman. He recognized the challenges of the role -playing gay was not one of them- and saw the potential for a rewarding project and improved career. No one can know in advance if a film is going to be a critical or popular success, but part of being a successful actor is learning how to pick projects wisely, to weigh the potential risks and benefits, and to strike a balance between personal challenge and box office success. It seems to me that Ledger recognized the benefits far out-weighed the risks, especially for him.

It's easy to forget now, but before 2005 (when Brokeback came out), Ledger's career appeared to be on a downward spiral. After making a big splash with his Hollywood debut, being identified as a hot up-and-coming actor, Ledger had four commercial and critical flops in a row, and in Hollywood that is often the kiss of death. At this point he was in the papers more often for his high profile romance with Naomi Watts than he was for his work. People were already looking at him as one of those 'where are they now' stories. His response to this career crisis was that of a talented artist (as opposed to determined star); he looked around for projects that would, yes, improve his professional standing, but do so by connecting him with artists he admired (he wouldn't have taken the role without Ang Lee, remember), in challenging, well-written material, and as he says, a story "that hadn't been told before."

Don't misunderstand me. I am not discounting Ledger's achievement in this role. I applaud Ledger for insightful, detailed, captivating work with a character who was as different from him as he could be, but was also a difficult person to portray on film. Lee told him the thing to keep in mind in portraying Ennis was 'stillness'; between the two of them, they did just that, and it worked brilliantly. Ennis' clenched jaw, physical awkwardness, and flattened speech showed us a man at war with his feelings, the demands of his culture, even his own body. Ledger deserves all the praise he received for this work, and more. I simply want to counter-act the idea that he took a huge gamble to play gay, or did so as a favor to us. To his credit, he never made any such claim, in fact he denied such claims when others suggested them. There was a time when playing gay could seriously damage a career even for a straight man, but Ledger, perhaps in part by looking at the list of actors who had done so with great success before him (a partial list, off the top of my head: Tom Hanks, Antonio Banderas, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Justin Kirk, Campbell Scott, Dermot Mulroney, Daniel Futterman, Daniel Day Lewis, Ewan MacGregor, Christian Bale, Jude Law, Matt Damon) realized that risk was now pretty minimal. He saw an incredible opportunity, and he leapt at it.

Then of course, I began to hear the ugliness -John Gibson's reprehensible response, Fred Phelps desire to picket Ledger's funeral- and I thought, maybe I was dismissing the risks of playing gay too quickly. Further examination though leads me to believe I am not. Yes, horrible things are being said in response to his death, making it clear (surprise!) homophobia is alive and well. More than one whack-job is suggesting Ledger's death is God's punishment for his involvement with Brokeback Mountain. Gibson may have been ridiculing him as a 'weirdo' with a 'drug problem', but his exclusive use of Brokeback Mountain quotations tells us what really bothered him.

The fact is though, this stuff came out in the open again only because of Ledger's death. It wasn't stopping him from working while he was still alive. His career was not damaged by Brokeback, in fact it was significantly improved by it. He had gained A-list status in Hollywood and remember, and this was not a status he had ever had before. I honor Ledger for his work on this role, and for the respect he gave to Ennis and the film as a whole, and I honor him even more for his clear-sightedness on how little a gay role threatened his career. Neither he nor Gyllenhaal were the first actors approached for these roles; men with bigger names were approached first, and all of them passed. I hope at least some of those actors are now realizing what an opportunity they missed, and that their fears were unfounded, or at least archaic. And those folks spouting such poison about this man's death and his career choices, I think that's just further evidence that this film struck a nerve. If I had been involved, I would be taking almost as much pride in the viciousness, as I would in all the accolades.

I could easily start writing more about related issues (gay actors being cast in gay roles, gay actors being cast in straight roles, lesbians getting cast at all), but those seem topics for another time. Ultimately I just want to acknowledge that I am greatly saddened by Ledger's death, not only because I find it horrible when anyone fails to make it past thirty, but also because he was clearly a great artist whose best work, I can only assume, was still ahead of him. I am sorry for the grief his loved ones are now experiencing, and I regret the work that we will never see now. Most of all, I am grateful to him for the gift he gave us in Ennis Del Mar, and for making it clear that playing gay was a risk only if he let it be.

Don't Forget the Means

In honor or Martin Luther King Day, I've been leafing back through my copy of his book, Why We Can't Wait.  I'm tempted to post the chapter Letter from Birmingham Jail in its entirety, since it stands as a wonderful synthesis of so much of his philosophy, but instead, I'll link you to it here.  It is easily googled (this really is a seminal text), if for any reason this link is not to your liking.  The book as a whole is magnificent, and his writing is as lucid and inspiring as his speeches.

As I remarked in an earlier entry, MLK jr. is well on the way to being a national hero.  Some might claim giving him his own day is evidence he already is, but there is still some controversy around it.  Nonetheless I'd say a growing majority of the nation recognizes that his tireless and inspiring work played a principle role in the passage of the Civil Rights Act.  He is recognized as one of the twentieth centuries great thinkers and orators, his words made all the more impressive by having contributed to impressive results. I think there is a growing admiration for what King accomplished, but I fear how he and his followers accomplished it is getting swept under the carpet.  

After resisting the urge to post one entire chapter of his book, indulge me while I quote him extensively from an earlier chapter.  

Fortunately, history does not pose problems without eventually producing solutions.  The disenchanted, the disadvantaged and the disinherited seem, at times of deep crisis, to summon up some sort of genius that enables them to perceive and capture the appropriate weapons to carve out their destiny.  Such was the peaceable weapon of nonviolent direct action, which materialized almost over night to inspire the Negro, and was seized in his outstretched hands with a powerful grip.

Nonviolent action, the Negro saw, was the way to supplement-not replace-the process of change through legal recourse.  It was the way to divest himself of passivity without arraying himself in vindictive force.  Acting in concert with fellow Negroes to to assert himself as a citizen, he would embark on a militant program, to demand the rights which were his: in the streets,on the buses, in the stores, the parks and other public facilities.  

The religious tradition of the Negro had shown him that the nonviolent resistance of the early Christians had constituted a moral offensive of  such overriding power that it shook the Roman Empire.  American history had taught him that nonviolence in the form of boycotts and protests had confounded the British monarchy and laid the basis for freeing the colonies from unjust domination.  Within his own century, the nonviolent ethic of Mahatma Gandhi and his followers had muzzled the guns of the British Empire in India and freed more than three hundred and fifty million people from colonialism.  

Like his predecessors, the Negro was willing to risk martyrdom in order to move and stir the social conscience of his community and the nation.  Instead of submitting to surreptitious cruelty in thousands of dark jail cells and on countless shadowed street corners, he would force his oppressor to commit his brutality openly-in the light of day-with the rest of the world looking on.  

Acceptance of nonviolent direct action was a proof of a certain sophistication on the part of the Negro masses; for it showed that they dared to break with the old, ingrained concepts of our society.  The eye-for-an-eye philosophy, the impulse to defend oneself when attacked, has always been held as the highest measure of American manhood.  We are a nation that worships the frontier tradition, and our heroes are those who champion justice through violent retaliation against injustice.  It is not simple to adopt the credo that moral force has as much strength and virtue as the capacity to return a physical blow; or that to refrain from hitting back requires more will and bravery than the automatic reflexes of defense...

To the Negro of 1963... it had become obvious that nonviolence could symbolize the gold badge of heroism rather than the white feather of cowardice.  In addition to being consistent with his religious precepts, it served his need to act on his own for his own liberation.  It enabled him to transmute hatred into constructive energy, to seek not only to free himself but to free his oppressor from his sins.  This transformation, in turn, had the marvelous effect of changing the face of the enemy.  The enemy the Negro faced became not the individual who had oppressed him but the evil system which permitted that individual to do so.  (Why We Can't Wait. Martin Luther King, Jr., published 1963: Harper and Row.  pp. 36-38.)

I fear what is getting lost in all this is just how radical this movement was.  Perhaps because it was effective, and the victors write the history books, it's easy to look back on that time and think there was a clarity then that is hard to see in today's conflicts.  'Whites only' facilities?  Open prevention of black votes?  NOT LETTING THEM SIT AT A LUNCH COUNTER?  There isn't any thing to defend there, is there.  It may be easy to believe with 20/20 hindsight that nonviolent action was not merely the most honorable choice, but also the most effective.  It's important to remember that at the time, this movement was considered by many to be dangerous, subversive, or hopelessly naive.  I take great heart in the fact that they remained committed, not because they saw it as the most effective response, but because they saw it first as the most respectful of human dignity, theirs and that of their opponents.  

Simple Pleasures, Simple Minds

I was feeling a big glum on Tuesday afternoon, as I walked through Greenwich Village, when I realized I was close to this little tchotcke store I had explored just before Christmas.  It's the sort of place that sells Buddha piggy Banks, tiny lava laps, solar system mobiles, mood rings, that sort of thing.  I was looking for stocking stuffers for my family.  I toyed (sorry) with the idea of getting a Crazy Cat Lady action figure for my sister, since she used to joke that would be her fate.  The thing about those action figures is, after the initial chuckle, one is left with a figurine and a gazillion little pieces of plastic that have to be displayed or stored somewhere.  Maybe you put it in the bathroom so your guests can have that momentary chuckle, but if you decide to take it out of the box, everything collects dust until one of the accessories ends up under foot in the middle of the night when you're walking half-asleep to go pee.  

So I decided against the action figure.  

I did, however, decide to get my younger brother a drinking bird.  I knew about them, of course, though I couldn't tell you how or where I first learned about them.  I think I picked up on their existence through a process I call cultural osmosis.  It's why I can quote I Love Lucy episodes without having seen them.  It's how I know most of the Bible.  When a drinking bird made a cameo in a Simpson's episode, I knew enough to be amused by Homer's dim-witted delight in it. Little did I know I would share that dim-witted delight.  

On Christmas Day, James opened it, we set it up, and he thought it was cool enough.  He likes things like that.  To my surprise, however, I LOVED this bird and realized I'd have to get one for myself.  So Tuesday, needing some cheering up, I went in to the store and less than four dollars later I was already feeling more chipper.  I took it home, set it up, and my little bird, whom naturally I've named Bob*, has been drinking from his water glass ever since.  Okay that first night he stopped at some point, but I made some minor adjustments Wednesday morning at 6:30, and he's been going ever since.  It's 11pm Friday night, and he's still going.  

I can't tell you how much I adore this bird.  I can't tell you why I adore this bird.   But I really really really love this bird.  If you scroll down the photos below, then scroll back up again, you'll get a sense of what he does, but you won't get the full sensory experience that Bob provides.  There's the moment of upright stillness, when each time you're sure he's finally stopped, then begins the almost imperceptible tilt, leading into a moment of suspension just before he falls suddenly, dipping his beak in the water.  He bounces back, rocks a bit, and the whole thing starts again.  

Okay, I haven't been watching him that much, but each time I come into the kitchen, I check in on him, and when I sit writing over breakfast, he is there drinking in front of me.  Over time he shifts around the glass too, I think because the vibration of the rocking jars his feet a bit.  There's a lot to study.  

I could claim there is something meditative, almost Zen about this process, but I'm not meditating while I watch him, I'm sitting there slack-jawed and drooling while he falls, then squealing and clapping my hands like a moron when he drinks.  Ole Bob here just cracks me up, and so far, three days and counting, I haven't gotten bored with him yet.  

If only my pleasures were all this simple.  


*I'm not remotely sorry for this.  

Looser Ends than Usual

After coffee and afternoon naps,  is there any greater adult pleasure than putting on a brand new pair of plush socks?  I got some for Christmas, and I couldn't be more delighted.  

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A friend recently quoted Calvin (of Calvin and Hobbes fame, not John Calvin) to me.  

"What's the point of wearing your favorite rocketship underpants if no one ever asks to see them?"

I acknowledged the wisdom of this.  Then I asked if she had anything she wanted to show me.  Let me just tell all of you, if you ever want me to see your lucky underpants, all you have to do is say so.

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Fellow blogger users, do you find sometimes that when you're writing, the automatic return stops working, and you'll find the sentence just keeps going to the right forever?  I've been having this happen a lot.  It didn't when I was writing on the library computer in Indiana, it's not happening now (naturally) but almost every other time in the last month it has.  I find if I put the cursor between two words, delete the space between them, then put it back in, the auto-return will work again, but that doesn't necessarily translate into how the entry looks once it's posted.  This is the reason why most of my entries recently will have weird short sentences in the middle of paragraphs for no apparent reason.  Maybe blogger thinks I am trying to write poetry.  

Is anyone else having this problem?  And if so, did you find a way to fix it?  
 
 

Fun with Toys: Christmas 2007

Solstice Walk

On the solstice this year, I decided to take my old walk.   I wanted to visit some important personal sites, and do so in the order I always did as a kid. After reading Bruce Chatwin's The Songlines I wondered if this served a similar purpose in my life, but I think the concept of dinnesanchas comes much closer.  The term comes from Irish, and means something like 'the naming of place'; the idea as I understand it is that when a place has been inhabited for a long time by people with an unbroken narrative tradition, every rock, hummock, hill, stream, or creek has a name and a story.  Describing my little walk with this grand term is pompous, hanging far too much weight on it, but there is still something in the concept that resonates with me.  

I break with tradition almost immediately by starting from my sister's and brother-in-law's place, rather than my parents' home, but I realized that the distance between them never really had much of import for me.  The special places and the stories start later.  

First stop is the kicking post.  This was a gift to the college from the class of 1940, and is a simply a small menhir about my height, sitting right next to the main entrance to the campus.  I had always thought it was meant to be a way for Quaker students to vent their unseemly anger, but this time I actually read the sign posted on it, and realize that you are supposed to make a wish and kick it for good luck.  I'm somewhat surprised the class of 1940 would have been willing to offer such a superstitious, verging on pagan, monument, but I make a wish and kick the post, being something of a pagan myself.  Besides, I never turn down a chance to make a wish.      

The next stop is actually a recent addition, since my adulthood.  Boy for a trip down memory lane, I've already screwed it up.  If this were my Songlines, I'd be subject to the death penalty by now.  Okay, this stop is an enormous catalpa tree, with a trunk so wide that with our arms out-stretched my mom, dad, and I can only just barely touch fingers.  This is the tree friend my mom visits -and hugs-  each morning with the dog.  She has done so for at least twenty years, I believe.  Something about its presence calls to her, and feels welcoming.  An enormous pin oak has recently entered her life as well, but I think this catalpa is the only tree she visits every day.
Today I notice that one of its huge limbs has a bee hive in it.  It almost looks like the bulge in the branch has been created by the hive, since their entrance is right in the center of it.  It's worrisome that the bees are out and about, since it is December 23rd, but since it is almost 60 degrees F, I assume they knew what they're doing.  

I then walk along the west edge of the campus, which has a tall fence separating it from the cemetery next door.  The fence didn't completely separate the two places when I was a kid and college student; lots of students used to go study in the beautiful surroundings.  There was a gentle hazing tradition, maybe still is, where upper- class students would tell first-years to go find the Glass Tomb.  There really is one, once you figure out the joke.  

The cemetery never played heavily in my childhood fantasies though, so I don't mind the new fence (Mom does).  On this side, I'm walking through a windbreak of evergreens that are so tall and dense you can almost stay dry in a rain storm here.  An owl had a nest here for many years, but I can't tell if she's still here.  I stop to visit the tiny grave of Morton Bisp.  For reasons unknown to me, this little tombstone for a child who died before his sixth birthday (in 1953), is separated from the cemetery, one lone stone that didn't make it onto the other side of the fence.  I assume he was buried on college property on purpose.  

Now I'm at the top of the sledding hill, the place we always came as kids.  If you could see this shallow little valley with its two modest peaks, you'd realize just how midwestern my upbringing was.  I remember the rides down being quite satisfying, right up until I was thirteen or so, but when I look at it now, I laugh.  I know it's still used that way by faculty kids.  The family dog before I was born, the first Fang, loved riding on sleds.  We tried to get Lilly, the dog I grew up with, to try it but it never appealed to her; she liked running along side barking better.  This was also a good rolling hill in the Summer, and you could get some pretty good speed up for that.  Once after seeing me do it, Lilly gave it a try, but her legs kept getting in the way.  She learned that she liked the feeling however, so from then on her walks usually included rolling blissfully in very clean grass.  Dew-covered grass was her favorite, so we think she may have been bathing.  She always kept herself very clean.   

At the top of the other hill there is a bronze statue honoring Mary Dyer, a Quaker hanged on Boston Common for preaching in defiance of the Puritan authorities.  She's seated, looking at her hands.  As a kid, I would climb up to sit in her lap, but that no longer seems appropriate, since her hands would now be cupping my ass. Behind her is Stout Meetinghouse, where I went to Sunday meeting from birth through college.  I find the building quite beautiful (though that isn't supposed to matter to Quakers), with its white-washed walls, long dark wooden benches and windows looking out on grass and trees in three directions.  I check the holly bush on the east side.  I don't remember the actual superstition, but I have a vague recollection of it being beneficial to bring holly into the home on the Winter Solstice, so I've brought clippers and a plastic bag for the purpose.  This bush has no berries though, so I check out the one behind Stout to the south.  Much better in the berry department, but I'll have to come back; my walk is only just begun, and I'd rather not have to carry a bag of spikes for the next half hour.  

I sit down on Dan Kinsey's Bench, a granite monument to a former teacher and coach.  I still feel the lack of the old honey locust tree behind it, gone now for ten years.  It always kept this bench cool in the Summer, and I would spend hours lying here, looking up through the leaves.  

I had an epiphany once, sitting on this bench.  As a kid I was as dismissive of my hometown and its boring terrain as anyone; I only saw beauty in mountains, lakes, the ocean, at least some dramatic hills.  This flat land had nothing to recommend it, as far as I was concerned.  Then when I was fourteen, my family spent three months living in London, and traveling all around the UK and Ireland.  I wasn't all that fond of London (it made me feel claustrophobic), but I drank in the scenery of the Lake District, and the west coast of Ireland.  It felt like I got into a new habit of seeing, and when I got home this habit stayed with me.  I sat down on this bench soon after we got back, looked over the playing fields, the far side of the bowl that held the football field, the horse pasture and farmland off in the distance, the big, clear blue sky... and suddenly it was breath-taking to me.  It was as if I was seeing this view for the first time.  I still crave mountains, lakes, rivers, oceans, big hills, but since that day I feel an expansive sense of well-being whenever I'm in a Midwestern landscape.  Here in New York, I have to make sure I go someplace with a wide vista at least once a week, to regain a sense of calm.  

Moving on, I walk across the two playing fields (where Fang runs her joyous figure-eights), heading towards the old stables where I took horse-riding lessons as a teenager.  This was another of the perks of being a faculty brat.  This is my archetypal image of a horse stable.  It's low, painted red, with Dutch doors at the entrance.  Inside there is a row of stalls and two boxes for horses that needed more space or sequestering.  An open area once stored hay, and housed a dynasty of barn cats that helped keep the rat population down.  At the other end is the tack room.  I have vivid memories of being in there, cleaning my saddle and bridle along with my teacher and classmates, all of us glad to be huddled in the one warm room in the place.  In my memory it's alway snowy, rainy or dark when I'm here, which doesn't make any sense, since we took classes on Saturday mornings in the Fall and Spring... but the memory is still cozy, friendly, and for some reason makes me think of John Steinbeck.  

Having been replaced at a new location, these stables are no longer in use,  and are looking pretty decrepit, so I'm just as happy not to see inside.  Besides, I've arrived at the entrance to the real magic of this walk.  

The stables sit on the edge of a deep gorge that contains a small creek.  These are MY woods.  A set of beams carved out steps down into the magical place.  Walking here today, I'm struck for the first time by how perfect it was to have this path be so tucked away and hidden, flanked by the stables on one side, and the tree fence of the grave-yard on the other.  It couldn't look more like a secret entrance.  It makes perfect sense I turned this place into Narnia, Middle-Earth, Mowgli's jungle, and the hunting grounds of the Fianna.  

The steps have fallen out of use, so they're overgrown with brambles. The main path down now is the one that used to be only for the horses when we went on trail-rides.  For the sake of tradition though I force my way through the first bush, and realize the rest of the steps are still fairly clear.  At the foot of the steps, the path forks.  I take the right-hand path heading west.  I pass the old log where I could often find a six foot bull snake sunning itself on warm days.  I find it noteworthy that the log still seems to look the same, since it must have been decomposing for at least 30 years.  Looking at the trees on either side of me, I realize for the first time that they're mostly slender, and surrounded by undergrowth.  There are some grand old trees with massive trunks, but they are few and far between.  At an unconscious level, I think I always thought of this as the forest primeval, but recognize now that it must be less than 200 years old, perhaps much less.  I wonder how I'll be able to find out more about its history.  Europeans were settling and farming here in the early 1800s and would have farmed every inch of land they could clear.  This area was probably last choice, since it's so steep, rocky, and uneven, but it's unlikely it was left untouched.

When I was a kid, though, this was the great wilderness; the old memories take me over, and once again I am Finn MacCool, Cuchulain, Mowgli, Legolas and a Miami Indian Chief.  One of my great-grandfathers was American Indian, and as I kid I was absolutely fascinated by this.  We never learned what tribe or nation he belonged to, since one day he simply walked out on my great-grandmother; Dad says she was a bitch with oak cluster, which may have had something to do with it.  Like a lot of kids (and no few adults) I romanticized this man, desperately wishing at times that I could be ALL Indian -or at least look a little bit like one.  In my woods I would try to walk without being seen or heard by my animal quarry or any white men.   I occasionally found some arrowheads, which helped the fantasy.  I still have one of them sitting on my dresser.  I'm not sure we ever even knew this man's name, I'll have to ask Dad.  Maybe someday we'll learn something about him.  Dad's side of the family consists mostly of questions.  

The path forks again, and I take the upper one, which brings me out to a ledge overlooking the creek.  In front of me is a huge black pipe that stretches across the shallow water about twenty feet in the air.  This, and two other pipes in the woods, used to annoy me.  I'd be desperately trying to create the illusion of being far from civilization when boom, here'd be one of these damn reminders that I was still surrounded by it.  After I saw Planet of the Apes though, I'd pretend that these pipes were all that was left of an ancient culture that had destroyed itself, leaving the world to return to a state of wild beauty.  That helped.  It wasn't unusual to find grocery carts abandoned here, which was all the more mystifying since the closest store was a good half-hour's walk away, at least half the walk over grass and mud. I could never figure out why someone would work that hard to make something look so ugly, not yet being familiar with the concept of under-age drinking.   That's still the only explanation I'm able to come up with.  

The black pipe was also where I was more likely to run into other kids, not always friends, because crossing on it was a popular test of daring-do.  One kid broke his arm falling off it, but that's the only accident I can remember hearing about.  Some graffiti on the pipe lets me know it's still a fairly popular destination with someone.  Off to the southeast lies the white pipe, which is both wider and lower to the ground, so crossing it was less daunting.    

Standing on my ledge, I can survey pretty far.  I ignore the grave yard looming behind me, and look up and down Clear Creek.  When I was a kid, the name of this stream was distressingly ironic, since a local chemical company was dumping waste in it further upstream.  Along with giant pipes and grocery carts, I had to ignore dirty foam build-up and algae in the water.  That is one thing that has improved in recent years though, due partly to stricter enforcement but probably mostly from the company going out of business.  I still wouldn't drink this water, but I think it's doing less damage to the local fauna now.  A few years ago I saw a great blue heron here, winging its way silently when I startled it.  That was encouraging.  

I walk down the hill to the creek's edge, and head downstream.  The bed has changed a little since I was a kid, at least one ox-bow now being a straight channel, but over all it looks more or less the same to me.  In past winters I've been able to walk along the frozen creek itself, rejoicing in the musical burbling up from the air holes, but today is too warm for that.  What was a clear path when I was a kid is almost gone now.  At times I'm not sure if I'm following the old track or the previous bed of the creek.  I wonder why no one seems to wander down here any longer.  When my mom was a student at Earlham, she said no one ever came down here.  I was playing here unsupervised by the time I was six, if memory serves.  I'm at least a 30 minute walk from my parents' house, and out of sight of any other building or area where there are likely to be crowds.  As a kid this was one of the biggest draws of the place, but I wonder if people would see it as too dangerous now.  Or maybe fewer kids these days want to go bushwacking, preferring to stay glued to their computers and video games.  That just doesn't seem likely though.  Kids don't change that much; they still want to have secret hide-outs don't they?  Well, if they do, maybe they're finding them elsewhere.  

I come out at a fairly wide path.  This part of the woods is where the college biology department has been conducting a number of experiments.  When I was a kid, I could stand here and look across a fairly large space that had been planted with saplings.  Now I can only see about two feet in front of me, the saplings having become a tall forest.  Thirty some years, yup.  It's almost twenty since I graduated from college.  Yipe.  There are occasional pink ribbons tied to trees as markers for students, but I don't know what they signify.  The study is watching how forests form, seeing what changes and shows up as the place ages.  Though I can't remember when it happened, there was a point when the appearance of this robust forest took me by surprise.  Maybe I hadn't come this far into the woods for a few years, so the jump was more drastic.  That doesn't sit with my memories, but is the only logical explanation.  

Now I take the path that loops around and through this place.  I pass blackberry canes, now bare of leaves and fruit, glowing purply-white against the greys and browns of the rest of the woods.  Fang's immediate predecessor, Sybil, was fond of blackberries, and would even delicately pick them herself, though she found it much easier to beg them from Dad.  

In the spring the whole campus is blanketed with violets, one of my seasonal markers, and down here, just a few weeks after the purple ones come out, fields of white violets show up.  That has always been one of the reasons I found this place magical as a child.  Somehow those flowers felt like secrets, or evidence that unusual forces were at work.  

Up a short steep (for Indiana) incline, and I'm at another biology experiment, the big pond.  This went in my senior year of college, but it so captivated me that it got woven into my childhood fantasy seamlessly.  I've always loved water, have at times wished I were amphibious -when I wasn't wishing I was a wolf, a Miami Indian, or the half-Sidhe hero of Ulster.   This pond is particularly ripe for fantasy-making, since it was constructed with an island in it.  It sits at one end of the long thin pond, near a large gap in the trees that were created so birds like ducks and geese, which need a runway to take off, would be willing to land here.  Almost the minute the pond was finished, a pair of Canada Geese showed up, raised a brood, and took off again.  Each Spring I now wait for my family to tell me the geese have arrived, how many goslings they hatched, then what day they all disappeared.  We try not to think about how many of the goslings probably stayed behind, in the gullets of snapping turtles.   Turtles gotta eat too, I guess.  Today I startle a small creature of some kind as I come up.  I never get a really good look at it, but am pretty certain it's a muskrat.  This feels like an especially nice omen, since I've never seen one here before.  Where do these creatures come from?  

I swing around the pond, and come out between two more biology experiments; on one side is the meadow, on the other is the prairie.  It's astonishing how distinct they are from one another, separated only be a six-foot wide strip.  The prairie side gets burned every few years, so that probably helps.  In the summer this area is swarming with flocks of goldfinches, and butterflies. Tony the entomologist has taught Mary and me how to identify the sex of Monarchs, along with a lot of other fun information.  Who knew we'd all become so interested in bugs someday?  

At the edge of the meadow is the school observatory; Indiana is not a good place for serious star gazing, because it's hazy and rainy so much of the year, but when I took astronomy my first year, I got to see several planets in clear detail through this telescope.  Saturn was the most beautiful.  Across another set of playing fields is Brick City, a whole development of ugly single story red-brick buildings that are used as housing for visiting professors, grad students, and anyone else who chooses to live here.  Because of the observatory, all the streetlights nearest are shielded on this side, to cut down on the light pollution.  

Then I visit the smaller, older pond that went in sometime while I was in high school.  As with the larger one, fish, frogs and other animals simply showed up here almost as soon as the pond filled with water.  I believe their eggs were transported by bird guano, but there is still something magical about the apparent spontaneous generation of life that water causes.   

Now I'm on the paved road, looking at the old horse-pasture, and on the other side of the bowl, the back side of the college campus.  When I was a student here, whenever things seemed particularly overwhelming, I would take a walk out here and look at the school.  Somehow seeing it all from a distance like this helped me regain perspective most of the time.  Years later I found myself doing the same thing as I road the bus home to Jersey, and looked across the Hudson at Manhattan.  Seeing it all contained and distant like that, my blood-pressure would drop immediately.  

The former horse pasture now houses the ropes course and a huge community of voles.  My family calls it the heath, and Fang is fond of vole-hunting (and crunching) when we let her run here.  I cut diagonally through it and arrive at Firefly Lane.  This is the name my family gave this narrow corridor of greenspace that runs behind the backyards of College Avenue, alongside the heath.  It earned this name one summer when the firefly population was particularly huge, and all the trees here looked like they'd been festooned with Christmas lights.  After some attacks, safety required thinning out a lot of the trees to improve visibility, so the Christmas light effect has never been repeated, but the name stuck.  At either end it is blocked off by horizontal wooden beams, to dissuade anyone from driving a car through here.  In the early 80s, some students went joy-riding down this greenway, then back to their residence in Brick City.  I believe drinking may have been involved.  The next morning the head of security followed the black, muddy tracks to their door, and came in for a chat.  After a brief silence he started mildly "You boys lack discretion."  I know all this, having heard the story from the driver, now a good friend and a well-loved, tenured member of the faculty.  

Now I head up the bowl, returning to get my holly.  I make sure to leave some berries, while still getting enough for both Laceyland and Hazelthorne.  After this the walk is more or less complete,
the sites all visited.  I'm struck by how much things have actually changed since my childhood, and how little it bothers me.  Right after I graduated from college, I was more ruffled by such things.  On visits back I'd accompany Mom, Dad, and Sybil on the afternoon walk, and feel disgruntled at any change in the route.  It was like I was some cranky, hide-bound anthropologist telling the natives how they were supposed to observe their traditional rituals.  Now I'm much more pleased by the evidence of change in my school and my family; it shows that life goes on, and no one is getting frozen in place.  My sister is one of the senior faculty on campus now.  Dad is long since retired, and off saving the world in other settings.  Mom and Fange still take their two daily walks, visiting their tree friends and vole-hunting grounds.  Life keeps growing and changing.  It feels good.  I know this terrain is not to everyone's taste, and even if they like it, they don't see what I see.  My place is as much one of imagination as it is grass and trees.  I once showed Brian my walk and he was a very good sport about it, but he couldn't possibly have seen what I was seeing.  His secret havens, most of them in Cape Breton, are by objective standards spectacularly beautiful, so even if I wasn't seeing what he was, I still fell in love with the place.  This place is much more a cultivated taste, I know.  I know too though that this will always be home for me, in some primal, archetypal way.