This life.

Man.  This life.

I was listening to an interview yesterday and the person being interviewed was talking about his father.  He described how his dad survived the holocaust in a hole for two years and that when the Russians liberated him his legs were so atrophied he had to be carried.  He also described his fathers battle cancer and his last days.  He said that the holocaust had made his father a gentler man.  That after making it through that, that the rest of his life was a gift.

I think life is a gift that we never give any thanks for.  I am not talking about thanking a god, or whatever you do.  I am just talking about stopping and realizing you are alive.  You are alive in a huge universe.  You get to listen to music.  You get to have a family and laugh with friends.  Look up at night and see the stars spinning silently up there.  Do some research and see where we sit in this universe and marvel at the mystery of it.  It doesn't matter your beliefs, it is still a gift and a mystery.

We don't just exist for a single minded purpose.

How many faces over the millennia have looked up at those same stars and wondered?  How many have had hopes and dreams?  Countless.  The same people that left their hand prints on cave walls tens of thousands of years ago looked at those same stars.  They held their children close and hoped and fought for their future.  They grieved and felt loss.
This last weekend I got to go camping with my boy.  On the second night we just sat by the campfire and looked up and talked about those stars.  We marveled at how many there were.  We talked about where the earth is in this universe and how small and insignificant we are, and therefore, special.  We were gifted that moment in time.  Out there alone with him I felt we were on our own little platform and nothing else existed at the time.

Your place.

Everyone needs a spot.  A place.  It doesn't matter what it is; a corner, room, blog, guitar, potters wheel, motorcycle, horse, trail, your own fucking head, or God forbid your work.  Everyone needs that one spot in their lives that is theirs alone and no one elses and you need to defend it without giving in.  Fight for it with extreme prejudice.  It doesn't matter if the love of your life wants in to that spot; no one can be let in.  If you give in and let anyone in; you are lost. 
In that spot is you.  Your core that your soul emanates from.  You are saying right now that you don't need that spot.  Whatever.  You go on believing that and you will see.  You will need that place and it will be full of someone else's idea of who you are.  They will look through your soul and pick you apart. 
Don't let yourself give in.  Even if you have done something wrong, or even unforgivable; keep that spot.  Hell, I am sure the root of your wrong-doing; for those of us that normally wouldn't do whatever wrong it is; is the fact that you surrendered your ground somewhere. You gave up that one spot you can retreat to and recharge your soul.    Don't let yourself be guilted into giving up your spot. 
If you are unsure of who you are; you may find yourself in that place.  The things you discover in that place may save your life.  I gave up my place.  I gave it up a long time ago, and have never recovered.  I have been searching ever since. 

Its been awhile. Long lost people and food. No grammar rules were observed.

 I used to love to watch my Dad eat toast.  Weird I know but it was so interesting watching him take so long to prepare something he was just going to eat.  He would carefully butter the toast, then with severe attention to detail, cover the entire piece of toast, usually with orange marmalade (yuck!).  After all of that, he would sink his teeth into it with such pleasure.  I never understood it.  It was better to watch him eat his toast than actually make my own and eat it.

This was the same with my Uncle George but with him it was watching him eat fresh fruit.  Uncle George and Aunt Katie would come up from Indiana about the time the harvest in Wenatchee was taking place.  They would go get boxes of peaches, and whatever else.  Sometimes we would go get the fruit because we would visit my other grandparents there.

So Uncle George would eat this fruit with such pleasure.  He would pull out his pocket knife and carve right into the fruit and eat it like he was experiencing Nirvana.  It was awesome and I miss it.

Strange how many memories are attached to food.  Something that happened at the dinner table of my youth, and actually into my adult years was Mom stating the obvious.  As we sat down and started to dish up, Mom would start pointing out all the things to eat that were in front of me.  It used to irritate the hell out of me.  She did it every time.

Then there was my Grandma Pearson.  She could peel a tomato so well that I have never seen anyone do it again.  She was so damn slow, too.  She chewed each bite for an hour!  But she made the best pickled beets!  So I guess it was worth it.  All those hours watching her eat. 

This I suppose is kind of gross but a memory none-the-less.  I used to play basketball with the neighbor kids, very intense games, in the evenings.  Their Dad, Bob, would come down to our dirt court and start playing, too.  As the games got faster and it was summer, so it was a bit warm, he would of course start sweating.   He smelled like ham.

At those times in my life I didn't realize how much I would miss the things I described above.

I would love to sit at a table again with my Grandma peeling her tomatoes, eating slower than hell, Dad eating his toast, Uncle George taking great pleasure eating his fruit, and Mom telling me there is salad, meat loaf, ranch dressing for my salad, green beans...

Ridin' home, The Matrix, Chandlers, and walking the fields.

Strange how smells, tastes, sights, and sounds can trigger memories, or take you back to a time in your past.  Not necessarily a memory but a feeling from a time period in your life. 

I was driving home from work; turned on the radio; fumbled through the usual pop stuff, a little classical, blah, blah, blah.  Well then I hit KKZX just as Journey's "Don't Stop Believin" started.  You guys remember in the Matrix when you get sucked down that phone for the first time?  That sound and that holy fuck feeling?  Well, I did anyway; that is the best way to describe what happened to my brain; something deep in there.  Suddenly, I had that feeling I had from that time in my life.  I was there, and didn't want to leave.  I could feel all those dreams; the stupid ones that we know are going to come true but end up leaving us for someone, or something else.  Those dreams that take off to fool someone else.  My profile picture up there on Facebook; that is from that time.

I love that picture.  Although I wonder WTF happened to me!  Too much of a bad habit probably, and  I believe that there is a design flaw in the way we are made.  Hair should not leave it's rightful spot on the head and move to the ears, nose, and wherever else you might find it.  Where are those clothes now?  And look that is a rotary dial phone with a cord.  Amazing!  I miss the Chandler farm and the fun around that table where Mr. Chandler is sitting.  The table where Mrs. Chandler would sit laugh and make us all laugh just because of her happiness.  Lil' Chan and Joe look like they stepped right out of Back to the Future.  Holly, cute as hell, who we all had a crush on whether we would admit it, or not; most often not because then there would be much harassment.

These days I wonder what the hell I am doing pretty much everyday.  I expected to not be wondering about that by now.  I look at the pictures from when my dad was the age I am now.  What was he thinking?  What were his struggles?  His secret thoughts?  What was he going through?  I search his face and wonder.  What was going on behind that smile.  Everyone loved my dad; thought highly of him.  What did he think of himself? What, if anything, would he have done differently?

I call this blog Stubble Fields.  I call it that because I used to sit on the tree line and wait for something to walk out of the forest on the other side.  I realized it was like sitting between two worlds.  It is where as I sat I couldn't help but notice the little worlds right underneath my butt.  All the creepy crawlies that I so love that no one ever pays attention to.  I especially like to do this at dusk.  Once, as I walked on the edge of a field on Floyd Norris' land just as the last light of the day was fading; something shadowed me in the woods.  It would growl every time I would stop and look; the forest was too dark to see what it was.  I am pretty sure it was a coyote.  I like to do this, too, on cold fall mornings and listen to the ravens talk to each other across the valley. 

Well, that is enough for now.  Thank you for indulging me.

These days

So going a little looney these days.  I have not been smoking and have had to deal with a bit of stress over the past few months; so it has been a struggle. 

I saved my dog.

I am losing myself.  Whoever, that is.

Been studying Zen

Trying,

And failing.

Pissing off people at work,

And at home...always at home.

My kids save my existence everyday.

I would just be a puff of smoke on the wind

If they didn't remind me everyday

Saying, "Daddy, you're the best."

I’ve changed my ways a little; I cannot now
Run with you in the evenings along the shore,
Except in a kind of dream; and you, if you dream a moment,
You see me there.

So leave awhile the paw-marks on the front door
Where I used to scratch to go out or in,
And you’d soon open; leave on the kitchen floor
The marks of my drinking-pan.

I cannot lie by your fire as I used to do
On the warm stone,
Nor at the foot of your bed; no, all the night through
I lie alone.

But your kind thought has laid me less than six feet
Outside your window where firelight so often plays,
And where you sit to read—and I fear often grieving for me—
Every night your lamplight lies on my place.

You, man and woman, live so long, it is hard
To think of you ever dying
A little dog would get tired, living so long.
I hope than when you are lying

Under the ground like me your lives will appear
As good and joyful as mine.
No, dear, that’s too much hope: you are not so well cared for
As I have been.

And never have known the passionate undivided
Fidelities that I knew.
Your minds are perhaps too active, too many-sided… .
But to me you were true.

You were never masters, but friends. I was your friend.
I loved you well, and was loved. Deep love endures
To the end and far past the end. If this is my end,
I am not lonely. I am not afraid. I am still yours.


Robinson Jeffers, 1941

From Childhood's Hour

“From childhood’s hour I have not been
As others were; I have not seen
As others saw; I could not bring
My passions from a common spring.
From the same source I have not taken
My sorrow; I could not awaken
My heart to joy at the same tone;
And all I loved, I loved alone.”

—	Edgar Allan Poe