Look what came in today’s mail! I’m honored to be in the company of these writers. Many thanks to the editors, Ryan Schuessler and Kevin Whiteneir, Jr. for including my essay, “How to Operate a Hide-a-Bed” and to @beltpub for believing in the power of the written word.
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A chapter, “Keeping Time by the Moon,” from my memoir-in-progress, “The Photo Box,” has been published today in Chelsea Station Magazine. Click through to read.
Although this quote by Chuck Jones was written in January of 1961, it is particularly pertinent to today.
“Today, we cannot envisage a protected world that does not include them all, and so [my] hope this year to all people everywhere is for a future–sheltered by the stars, sweetened by clean air, and above all fostering a climate in which no man can be commanded to stand up and be counted–but where every man can be counted on to stand up.” –Chuck Jones
I found you online, a “tweenie” dachshund with one blue eye and one brown. A few days later, we met in front of the Ralph Lauren outlet store in Carlsbad, you on a string leash, no collar, walking two humans, anxious to let you go. You and Joey didn’t seem to mind each other and so I said, “I’ll take him,” and the string leash was handed to me. We walked, and you, well-trained dog that you were, stepped to my left and stayed there while Joey, still being trained, pulled and jerked his leach, his “must smell everything” at full operating mode. You didn’t seem to care.
Until we got in the car. Then there was a minor dispute about who would occupy the front seat and who the rear. You claimed the front as if it was rightfully yours, and this time, Joey didn’t seem to mind. No growling, no snapping, just as it always was between the two of you, brothers in spirit if not in breed.
Billy Blue Eye, little Billy two-shoes, Billy of the Wild Niguel, always available to be petted and admired, loved and stroked. The softest of fur as if you were put on this earth just to be petted. And so everyone you met automatically reached out to touch you, even in your last days, carried in my arms, friends and strangers would stretch out their arms and wiggle their fingers behind your ears, stroke your snout, kiss you.
A couple of years in, you popped a disc and had to have back surgery. You never complained. A year after that, another disc popped and you had a second surgery and suddenly you were our “$9000 free dog”. What was to be done, though? We loved you and you loved us back.
You loved to go for walks almost as much as you liked to curl up by the back door in the late afternoon sunshine for a siesta. You and Joey were inseparable. We traveled together; up the coast a couple of times to stay in Carmel and no matter where we went you were the star attraction.
There’s so much more, after all we spent almost 16 years together, but this last year, your 20th, was rough and today was the roughest. We had to say goodbye. But you had one last little surprise for us, didn’t you? Driving down the freeway this afternoon, after our last good-bye, Michael said, “look, a rainbow!” And sure enough, there you were, one last doggie kiss in red, orange, blue, green, and violet.
what becomes of the broken-hearted?
how can we be lovers if we can’t be friends?
where is the love?
how do i live without you?
what’s love got to do with it?
how can you mend a broken heart?
wouldn’t it be nice?
who do you think you are?
who’s zoomin’ who?
met an esteemed doctor of neurology the other day when we interviewed him for a work project about creativity.
after we were through, he asked me if i painted. when i demurred and said, “not often, i have to think too hard about it.” he said, “use a bigger brush.”
a piece of advice that i just can’t seem to forget.
this work is something i have painted for an upcoming silent auction. when it goes online for pre-bidding, i’ll let you know.
let’s all remember, when things get rough, complicated, difficult, or seem out-of-reach, just “use a bigger brush.”
what do i know about spring? (did you know that many cyclamen species in their native range–the mediterranean basin–are severely depleted and endangered because of the horticultural trade? nor did i. that makes my two little pots of pink cyclamen that much more precious.) but, spring, yes, what do i know about spring?
when i was younger and living in the north, i know spring was highly anticipated. a break in the cold, gray, drabness of winter, just the hint of water running as the ice and snow melted on a warm day in march. (march is tricky up north, it’s end is the beginning of spring, but also the end of winter. your chances for comfort or disappointment equally elusive), but you take what you’re given.
as i grew older and fled the plains for the chicago lakefront, spring took on a whole new meaning for me. it offered hope, or at least a modicum of aspiration, growth, renewal. of course, that came in fits and starts, much like spring weather. dry and cold, wet and warm, snow up to your ankles accompanied by that faint green aura that surrounds deciduous trees as they leaf out, a little darker green each day, hour, minute, second, pushing out as the snow and cold recede, a time-lapse photograph.
but spring in the southwest is an entirely different experience. it happens suddenly and without warning. plants are blooming, new growth is sprouting on the trees and the shrubs. if you did your homework, the roses are beginning to leaf out fully and some may even have little tiny buds, the first rose to bloom since late last year just a few weeks away. i find that i can wait.
patience, now, a surprise gift of spring and growing older.
Now more than ever, aging takes on its own personality. It wasn’t something I gave too much thought to when I was 20, 30, 40, or even 50, but the 60s put a new, pardon the expression, wrinkle into the concept of time.
It’s different, somehow, this new notion of time, age, and the space one inhabits–moves through. It’s both slow and fast, muddy and clear, predictable and completely random. Sigh. (He thought to himself, that by now, it would have been easier.)
I’m not quite sure what to make of 63 yet, but I’ll tell you this: I’m glad I’m here to be 63. Which is something, I promise you, that I never thought I’d ever say.
