Trey's Days No. 21

Remembering

    Remembering the page numbers as an exercise, no book mark

37, 57, 78,

    The "Memory of Old Jack" flashing back and forth, 1888, today, 1892, today, the tobacco field

the barber shop, the old house with the new bride, standing on the porch then, standing on the porch now

remembering

     "He was like on old silver back ape, transferring his anxiety onto the women he dominated, enjoyed, sired"

Insulted, knowing it's true, made a stink about it, realized it was true, remembered how true it was.

     Told old Ed about it, who didn't know what a silver back ape was, and told him about "The Memory of Old Jack" and about the work thing, and about the times that excellence had given way to indolence, and he told a story about teaching and anxiety and change and finding a place; much good crying is done there.

     This is a time for late pregnancy, for fecundity, for the moment before Isaac's rain, a time before, a time between, after the silver back has gone his miserable way, a time after baking, a time after the Handel and the Bach, a time before something unknown; Lord knows, always, the Lord knows, but he ain't tellin'.

     The little red stuffed dinosaur reminds, the feed sack cookie jar reminds, Old Jack reminds, Wendell Berry reminds, old Ed reminds, that remembering, it is not too late.

      In their unqualified love, in their obedience, in their rapt attention, in the sweet smell of tender memory, Hope makes her silent presence known, and she hovers like an angel, like a mother over a crib, like a cloud of expectant energy, like a hurricane a day and a half away, coming but yet a clear sky, patient, imminent, yet unknown, expected.  Believe my child.  Soon enough you will know.

Trey's Days No. 20

Eleanor, Ella, Moses, Momma, Daddy, Silence

Eleanor

         

Faithful, strong, fearful, loving

In her eyes love and fear

Black and tan, perfect marks

"That's a beautiful dog" she held her head as if she knew

Ten years on she died quickly, panicked, not wanting to go

Ella

Quick, strong, itchy, striving

In her eyes love and patience

perfect black, shiny, mixed marks

"What kind of dog is that?" she holds her head high, knows it doesn't matter

Going strong, surviving what she has to survive, takes her medicine with peanut butter

Moses

Heaven sent, came at Christmas time

In his eyes pure love, ever pleasing, dumb faith, the sweetie

Chocolate and cinnamon, perfect marks, otter tail

"That's a beautiful dog" he dances with glee, knowing it is true and he is too

The breath of life, sent as he was by angels to cheer a lonely man

Momma

Faithful, strong, fearful, tired, loving to the last

In her eyes love and sadness, joy and silliness, cheering against all odds

"She was a beauty" she never knew it, settled too early, she was a true beauty in the old way

Sixty two years, died hard, twenty-three days struggling against the angel of death, went in a bath of blood

Love softly singing, sweet smelling, gently guiding toward home

Daddy

Fierce, fearful, intense, self absorbed

In his eyes the exactitude of one who punishes details

Short but ponderous, loving but broken

"That son-of-a-bitch" he came to be known to the one he left holding the bag

Went out with a bang

Wake of confusion, cacophony of pain, mystery legacy

Silence

Faithful, eternal, pure love, intense passion, giving, peaceful

In the space, strength, sadness, joy, silliness, cheering against all odds

Perfect, beautiful, knowing, true, it holds itself in stillness, imperturbable

Softly singing, sweet smelling, gently guiding, home

Trey's Days No. 19

Daddy

There is a place unknown I have no doubt made for us with love sown all about
They go there those who leave us to wait on sofas woven grievous
Whether by sudden bang or quiet whimper their exit all the same love erects it
Makes it perfect through solace and forgiveness with salving balm to erase the mess
And guided there by smell and memory we go through hell until eternity
Catches up with us and leads us in as shepherds crooks o'er darkness win
We find them then as they were before no wound without nor pain within
Shining babies glowing mothers tenders fathers all the others
Who went before and left us we thought through a door with darkness fraught
Only to discover they were right beside us still like tender lovers just across the sill
Through that window we called death a soft warm bed of happy rest
And there we stay with them forever and know that then nothing can sever
Us from those we love

Trey's Days No. 18

"Little Ashes" is a tale of two men of Spain, Frederico Garcia Lorca and Salvidor Dali, once lovers. Dali goes to Paris to join Picasso, to marry a woman, to become famous and to love money and America. Lorca stays in Madrid and joins the Revolution, plays the piano, drinks with men and women, dances the new dances and smokes, writes revolutionary treatises and gets shot in the head by fascist thugs. Lying in a field, his chin quivering, a little white blossom wobbles in the wind as the blood of genius soaks the earth. Fascism is like that.

Swimming in the moonlight, drops of water dripping off their fingers glow like stars; they kiss. Lovers in a land where love between men is forbidden, they dare, beg forgiveness, fight themselves, love again, run away. Forbidden love is like that. Lying on pillows, reciting poetry, wearing turbans, their forbidden love makes the dormitory gay. My heart hurts.

Stalking Lorca, Dali finds himself. Loving Dali, Lorca scares Dali and he runs off to Paris. Lorca is left to fight Franco all by himself. Loving Lorca, his girlfriend knows. All Spain knows. The bloody thuggish regime knows. The bulls in the ring know. The blood of babies in the streets knows. Love will not be silenced, not by guns, not by smothering thugs. Neither time nor death can kill it. Love is like that.

Lorca and Dali live, their love lives, their art, their poetry live. Their story is told and retold. Hear it? Tell it. Love is like that. My heart hurts. Arise and tell the story, oh you of blood, of poetry, of art and music, of drops of stars in the moonlight, swimming, dancing, glowing. Live on sweet Lorca, strange Dali, your men, your women, your guns, your blood, your swimming dancing glowing moonlight. Death cannot kill it; love is like that.

Trey's Days No. 17

"Think about the last time you were stressed out – I mean really stressed out – I mean 'I have four papers due on Monday and I washed a red shirt with the whites and I’ve been stuck on the tarmac at Logan for two hours for no discernible reason' stressed out. What did your friends do? They took you for coffee or for ice cream or, perhaps, for coffee ice cream. They told you to take a couple deep breaths. They told you to focus on breathing. Everything will be alright, they said. They knew that breathing, like God’s presence, is a constant in our lives. They knew that we don’t have to focus on constant things in order for those constant things to continue happening. But they also knew that when we do focus on those constant things, we often find peace – peace and new beginnings." The Rev. Adam Thomas

Once when I was in a real crisis, my therapist Anna took me on a little spiritual journey that began with the words "I want you to become aware of your breathing." That commenced a little trip to a place inside myself that I'll call my conscious contact with God. It's always been there and does not depend on my awareness. Each time I remember Anna's words in that still quiet place, it re-emerges, unchanged by time and neglect. And each time I renew my conscious contact with it, its nourishing power, its salving balm is just as sweet as it was the first time. My God is like that. Unchanging, not dependent on me, ever salving, calming, saving.

The story of "Jacob's Ladder" to which the Adam Thomas piece refers, begins with a dream. Many stories in Scripture begin with dreams. Like dreams, our unconscious and the synchronistic nature of things, always lie just beneath the surface of our conscious busyness, and when we get stressed out, frantic, afraid, tired, they are there to remind us, "I want you to become aware of your breathing." And when we return, in an instant it reappears, that connection with something greater than self, greater than circumstances, greater than the world, greater than death. Yes, greater than death! That clear clean cool well of pure spiritual awareness that is our God is waiting for us, and all we have to do is breathe. Amen.

Now check out Adam Thomas' blog for a slightly more coherent hint of what I'm talking about.

http://wherethewind.com/2011/07/18/the-autonomic-spiritual-system/

Trey's Days No. 16

Betty Ford and Julia Hagerman: a legacy of recovery

by Trey Merritt on Tuesday, July 12, 2011 at 7:49am

"I'm having an eclipse of my own!" The living room was completely dark. I wouldn't have known she was there except for the orange glow coming from the tip of her Kent. "C'mon granny, we're going outside to see the lunar eclipse!" Her reply was startling to me as a young child, but now I understand it completely.

Betty Ford died on July 8th, and left a legacy of recovery. When I was growing up in the era of Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, our family didn't talk about addiction or alcoholism. It was a dirty little secret, like being gay, or having a mental illness. There were lots of dirty little secrets that families suffered with in silence, or more likely, with whispers.

"Your grandmother is an alcoholic. She's had too much to drink. She doesn't mean what she's saying and she won't remember it tomorrow." My mother knew enough to tell me as a child that Granny's behavior had a cause. Her rants, her ramblings, her nonsensical goings on came after an afternoon of drinking Scotch and smoking cigarettes, a daily event that began with an oh so gentile, "I believe I'll have a highball. Would anyone else like one?" That highball was followed by a succession of "patches" which consisted of an ice cube or two and a splash of Scotch. Her glasses were etched with pink elephants. Her stories were of things that happened long ago, or never.

"I wish you could have known my mother before she got like this. She used to be a lot of fun." We had gone to the coast for the day. We had family in Pass Christian, and the beach was not far away from my grandparents' South Mississippi home. Granny had not gone with us that day, preferring to stay home and drink and visit with the maid, which is how she spent every day. Upon returning at dark thirty, we found my grandmother, walking in circles in the kitchen, the floor covered with smudges of blood and broken glass. One more patch was too many and the pink elephants had shattered all over the floor. Too drunk to clean up her mess, she had walked around in broken glass for who knows how long. My mother spent the rest of the evening picking glass out of her feet. "I wish you could have know my mother before she got like this."

No one ever suggested to my grandmother that she might have a problem with alcohol. Betty Ford hadn't sobered up yet, hadn't founded her famous hospital. AA had been around for decades, but in that small Mississippi town such things were far far away, or at least not mentioned. It was Betty Ford who changed all that. What Bill W. had started in 1935, Mrs. Ford took public in the 1980s. Suddenly it was not only okay to get help, it seemed like addicts and alcoholics were coming out of the woodwork, their disease to expose. Recovery happened. As a society we started to get well together.

So when it came time for my family's disease to manifest itself in me, help was everywhere. At work, at my church, at school, in the grocery store, on facebook, everywhere I go, there are people who walk the walk of recovery with me, and we see each other getting better, we listen to each other's stories and hear ourselves there. We see a fellowship growing up around us like a miracle we never could have imagined while in our disease.

So rest in peace Betty and Julia, and thank you a million times thank you for your legacy of disease and recovery. Things will never be the same for those of us who get a second chance, and we can never repay the gift you have left us. May we ever have the Grace to keep passing it on.

Trey's Days No. 15

Life is Good

I read an article about a dude who hiked the Appalachian Trial from way down south to way up north, and realized there that all his big thoughts crystallized into "warm dry place to sleep, food to eat." My Appalachian Trial at the moment is many sheet pans of cookie dough, great bowls of strawberry bread batter, and many repetitions of attempting the best brownie recipe ever (if you haven't tried the Boulevard brownies, you must!). I didn't go to school to scoop cookies and attempt to perfect brownies. I went to school to think big thoughts and write about them for people who critique big thoughts and writing about them. But somewhere in the third attempt to make the brownies, in the reading of an Appalachian Trial tale, in the bone tiredness of working all night, comes my crystallization.

I recently was temporarily kicked off Facebook pending an investigation of an allegation of abuse. It was resolved in my favor, for which I am very grateful. I didn't realized how much I would miss my Facebook friends, our little interactions here, the sites I see and read here. The human community if so great. The love we share with each other is powerful, nourishing and life giving. Yes, I know, it's on-line, and it's Facebook, but it's also human. We touch each other with our little words, our posts, our poems, our pictures of our lives unfolding, and somewhere in there is a crystallization of love between real human beings, connected, even if it is with computers.

Just as I was coming back to Facebook there was an article from "elephantjournal" by a guy who is a Buddhist meditation teacher, about how Jesus is God, and like seeing a wave in the ocean, if you've seen him you've seen the Father. And so it is with us. The article is about Buddhism, meditation and the Bodhisattva way, but it says something powerful too about who Jesus is. He's God! And we, through the magic of the human connection can see God through His fearless giving. And this coming from a dude who is not a Christian! And there too, a crystallization! I realized how much I love Jesus and His Church while I was sitting on a cushion meditating with some Buddhist friends. I thought I was getting away for a while, only to realize I was always moving toward Home. We all are always moving toward Home, no matter how far away we may feel now. Trust that!

Whether we're hiking the Appalachian Trial, making cookies, sitting on a Buddhist meditation cushion, kneeling in an Episcopal Church, rocking out to heavy metal or drinking beer by the pool, we're all being called Home by a God who loves us, and after all the big thoughts and complicated words are thought and said, it's all crystallizing down to a warm dry place to sleep, some food to eat, and a loving human community to be a part of. For that I am very grateful. Life is Good! Amen.