More Forgetting

It was a memorable class on forgetting—beginning with an error on my part that had me waiting outside of the metaphorical school building long before school started. My brother and I used to do this. In junior high school, we somehow decided that it was important to be near the head of the line when the bell rang and the school building opened.

We would walk the half-mile to school and wait in the parking lot with a gathering horde of youth while the teachers, including Mr. Levernight, my 7^th grade English teacher, drove up and walked past us into the school.

Mr. Levernight was a scary man who used to yell at us when we misbehaved, and I mean red-in-the-face yelling. Once, early in the year, he had to leave the class on some important matter and told us all to wait quietly for him. As twelve year olds, we did our best but naturally fell into unruly chatter. He came back suddenly and was furious that we had disobeyed. He asked everyone who had talked to raise their hands. They did and then were given some kind of punishment which I can’t remember. All I remember is not raising my hand, because of course I would never disobey or do something to make an adult so angry. Later on, one of my friends said ‘Why didn’t you raise your hand?’ I said, ‘Because I wasn’t talking.’ He said, ‘Yes you were.’ I was shocked that he would say that. But then I thought back and realized I had both talked and then, in the moment of confrontation, I had utterly convinced myself in an instant and without even knowing that I had done so, that I had not talked. I can’t remember whether I could admit this to my friend or not, but I was shaken by my own duplicity and capacity for self-deception.

But each day, my brother and I would wait with friends. I think we sometimes played handball against the side of the building. We would be there a good ten or fifteen minutes every morning, in our freshly ironed shirts (thanks Mom) and partially combed hair. It’s not that I liked school so much, but I guess we liked the waiting. A little before everything started, we got into lines according to our homeroom. Then, precisely on the hour, a loud bell would ring, the doors would open and we would file, into the building and our school day would begin with me near the head of the line.

Yesterday I waited with the one friend who I had told about the forgetting course. We both, on our separate computers, clicked the link and appeared together on the screen. At the top of the hour, when the class was supposed to start, we were still the only two people waiting. I was about to email the teachers to see if we had the right link when my friend realized that the course, which began at noon Pacific time would actually begin at 3:00 Eastern time, not 9:00 as I had told them.

It was quite a moment. Of course I know that the west coast is three hours behind us, not ahead of us. I have regular meetings and conversations with people out there and never have any problem with adding the three hours. This time, however, was different. I had reversed the formula. It was an ‘aha!’ and an ‘oh no!’ moment at the same time.

On the one hand, realizing my mistake made sense of a confusing situation. Why was no one else in the Zoom room? I felt a sense of relief as the situation suddenly made sense again. On the other hand, I was embarrassed and apologetic. I had been so sure in my mind that the class began at 9:00. I had read the information, sent in the registration and relayed the information to my friend. We had both rearranged our schedules to be free for these two hours—beginning at 9:00.

And now, it turned out that I had gotten it all wrong. What I thought was the obvious truth was now evidence of my incompetence. My friend and I were both upset that I had gotten it wrong and that we both now had to re-arrange our schedules to be available for the class that began six hours later. It took some time, but we managed to reschedule our afternoons and did indeed appreciate the class that began at 3:00.

In the class we talked about our forgetting, and our parents’ forgetting—about the challenges of communicating when communication through the normal channels is not available. We spoke of the fears of our own growing incompetence and our natural irritation when others don’t behave like they used to or like we would like them to. All of this is normal and natural.

The invitation of the class was to make a bigger space in our hearts for ourselves and others as we go through the stage of life called growing old or when any of us move into altered states of confusion and disconnection. Consensual reality—all our appointments and shared understandings—will always be breaking down. Misunderstandings, mistakes and miscommunication are woven into the fabric of our days. Can we meet these moments of disorientation with kindness? Can we trust our connection even when the words are no longer there?

One of the teachers suggested that these challenging moments are actually opportunities to enter into the sacred ground of life. All we have to do is stay present and learn to follow whatever is happening. That’s a big ask, but it’s reassuring to know that even in extreme states, the heart can be the bridge.

The Possibilities of Forgetting

I’m taking a class on forgetfulness later this morning. Not that I need much help because I’m already getting better and better at it. Over these years of my mid-60’s, I’m noticing a natural loosening of my mind. I still care about everything, but I can’t seem to hold it all quite so tightly. Mostly, this feels good, as I can’t contain enough details in my head to worry quite as much as I used to. But sometimes it’s a little inconvenient and embarrassing.

I read a wonderful book last year about forgetting. I’d like to look up my notes on the book this morning, but I can’t remember who wrote it or what the title was. Let me try the old trick of waiting. These days my mind has less interest in performing on command. Synapses need to warm up a little—to do a few stretching exercises and jogging in place—before they’re ready to fire up and go looking for that book or word or thing I’m trying to locate.

Sometimes I have to find another path to the destination. When one word is lost for the moment, usually there is another nearby that will suffice. It’s an odd feeling. Familiar terrain shifts and is suddenly askew in the tiniest way—a gap or bit of fog appears in an area that used to be quite unambiguous. Life used to be fully continuous, or so I like to imagine. Now there are clearly patches in the continuum that are slightly frayed or missing altogether. Sometimes I go around these problematic gaps. Sometimes I just wait a few moments and terra firma reappears to cover over the missing material.

Now I remember! The book on forgetting was written by a man named Hyde. This is enough for me to look up the notes and quotes I made because I was so moved by the wisdom and insights from the book. The book is: A PRIMER FOR FORGETTING and the author is Lewis Hyde. As I look over my notes, I find a wonderful few paragraphs that I copied out in full:

         Writing about the cosmology of the Trobriand islanders, the anthropologist Susan Montague tells us that the Trobriand universe is a vast disembodied space filled with both minds and energy. Cosmic minds are all-seeing, all-knowing, and all-powerful, able to manipulate the energy of the universe toward whatever end they desire.
            But in spite of, or rather because of, these remarkable endowments, cosmic minds have a problem: cosmic boredom… they sit around bored to death or, rather, bored to life, because as it happens, they have invented a way to relieve cosmic boredom: it is to play the amusing game of life.
            To play, you must be born into a human body, and to be born as such, you must forget the fullness of what you knew and work only with what can be known through the body. A human being is someone who has abandoned the boring surfeit of knowledge so as to come alive. 

What a delightful image—that we have forgotten the fullness of what we knew in order to play the amusing game of life. Perhaps our limitations—our forgetfulness—are not the problem but rather the source. This perspective turns our fantasies of power and control upside down. Usually when I come up against evidence that I am not ruler of the universe, I am disappointed and irritated. But maybe it’s the gods, who have everything they want, who wish to incarnate as limited living beings in order to know the fullness of life.

I suspect we’ll all be continuing our study of this topic of forgetfulness as we move forward on our life journeys. As long as I remember, I’ll keep passing on whatever I learn about forgetting.

Disturbing Dream

In my dream I felt so bad I started asking my friends for names of psychologists and psychiatrists I could go to for help. And I couldn’t figure out how to get from the first floor to the second floor of the house I was in. You could walk part way up the stairs, but then you had to reach high and pull yourself up over the wall. I could do this, but others in the house seemed to have a way to go between the floors that didn’t seem to be a struggle for them. And I couldn’t find my two little daughters. And I wasn’t sure if the two little toddlers were mine or I was just supposed to take care of them. They were on the second floor, but in childcare sometimes. I wanted to see them and see how they were doing, but I couldn’t.

It was one of those really believable dreams. In the middle of it, I wasn’t even suspicious that I was in a dream. It all seemed quite plausible. There were lots of people in the house. The woman in the room next to mine was being interviewed by a magazine writer. I tried to look busy so they wouldn’t notice how sad I was. I was trying to find a studio where I could work with clay. I didn’t have a job and I knew I was going to need money soon. I wandered around a studio and found a few old pieces of clay that I had worked on. One of them looked like a rock so I decided I must have been trying to make it look like a rock. I tried to put the finishing touches on it, but it broke into smaller pieces while I worked on it. I put it back in the water bucket with the rest of the recycling clay. I wanted to make some mugs but there was no wheel and the studio was closing down anyway. I didn’t know where to go or what to do.

The anxiety of our times touches us both in waking and sleeping. The disturbance is intensely personal, appearing in the shape of our particular demons and unearthing our primal issues of trust, competence and safety. But the source is not just personal. The zeitgeist of the moment finds expression and seeks resolution through each one of us. The fear many of us feel is not just our own. Our society is going through a period of deep disturbance. Our carefully curated sense of ourselves as a reasonable people of good will and fairness has been shattered.

Hence my jumbled and anxious dream. What to make of these bubblings up from the deeper regions? How can we dream into our dreams and receive the messages from the unknown?

One of the strongest images in my dream was feeling I was supposed to take care of these two young toddling daughters, but not being able to find them or even really know what my relationship was to them. So I wonder about the tender and feminine parts of myself—the parts that are not competent and responsible – but innocent and vulnerable. They need protection and care. In the dream that they did not seem to be in any danger, they were doing fine. It was me, the responsible one, who did not understand the system of care that was already established. Maybe the tip is to trust that even in these times of unrest, my inner daughters are doing just fine – being cared for by the daycare of the universe.

The other powerful feeling for me in the dream was being in the studio and not being able to find good clay or a potter’s wheel and wanting to make mugs. Over the months of my writing, I have often felt that these small essays are like mugs. They are small products of the moment that rise from my wheeling fingers on the keyboard. I spend time with each one, shaping and appreciating, then I let it go. Not a big production. Not perfect, but something nice to pass on to someone else. Maybe this dream is a reminder of the importance of these small acts of creation. When so much is out of my control, to continue to craft things of interest and beauty is a solace to me.

Perhaps this dream is about the book I am trying to put together. The first floor is the blog – all these disconnected pieces and the second floor is another published book that can go out to many more. Hard to get from here to there. Is it just another collection of these morning writings? What is the organizing principle? And who are the professional helpers (editors and writers) I might need to help me find my way? Maybe these are the psychologist and psychiatrists I need to consult.

Homework: (optional) Write down what you remember from the last dream you had. I hope you may be inspired and relieved by the disorganization of my dream—bits and fragments are fine. Then give yourself ten or fifteen minutes with a cup of tea to dream into your dream. What touched you? What is most alive as you remember? And what tips might this dream have for your waking self? Trust whatever arises and enjoy a little break from it all with a cup of tea.

The Stakes Just Got Higher

Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s death is a great loss to lovers of a liberal interpretation of freedom and individual rights of expression and choice. But there are others who may be slightly sad but are mostly quite pleased with the possibility of creating a six to three conservative majority on the US Supreme Court.

Personally, I am most upset by Mitch McConnell’s immediate assertion that he would use his position as Majority Leader to ensure that the Senate confirms any candidate that Trump proposes before the November elections. The is the same Mitch McConnell who held up the appointment of a Supreme Court justice for a year and a half at the end of Obama’s presidency under the rationale that ‘the people’s voice’ should be heard through the elections before a new justice is appointed. Now he has decided that it should be different.

I don’t expect our politicians to be saints, but I had thought that there was some decency, fairness and commitment to the system of checks and balances—some adherence to underlying shared assumptions. With the Trump/McConnell Republicans, this seems to have totally vanished. Is Trump’s self-dealing and fear-mongering just the logical extension of the party of Nixon, Reagan, Cheney and McConnell?

I am so reluctant to label them bad and self-serving while asserting the goodness of my side. Yet when Attorney General Barr compares stay-at-home orders to stop the spread of COVID-19 to slavery, I can’t find any other explanation except willful blindness and a willingness to do whatever it takes to stay in power.

Are we all as blind as that? Are we all simply opportunists who cloak our self-interest in whatever convenient rationale is available at the moment? Of course we are all subject to our human limitations, none of us are perfectly congruent with our actions and our words. But we can and should act with integrity and honesty against those who actively spread rumors and lies to maintain their power and position. We should use whatever power we have to stop or limit forces of oppression, division and destruction.

Sometimes there are not two equal sides. Worshipping the gods of self-interest and privilege for a few is both morally wrong and ultimately self-defeating. As Dr. King said, we are all ‘caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny.’ Those who willfully ignore our interdependence tear at the fabric of our future and should be actively opposed.

I don’t yet know exactly what this means for me. I feel the urgency and momentousness of these next few months. The death of this champion of liberty, Ruth Bader Ginsberg, and the opening on the Supreme Court has pushed the stakes of this moment even higher than they already were. How do we oppose bigotry and stand for justice and equal rights? How do we add our voices and our energies to tip the balance toward restoring and healing this divided country?

P.S. after completing this entry, I found the link to Heather Cox Richardson’s wonderful piece on RBG.  One of the comments to Richardson’s piece was the following suggestion:

Both Heron and Koi

There’s a simple brush painting scroll on the wall of my room that shows two abstract fish. The black one is swimming down and the red one is swimming up. Melissa gave it to me for some past occasion and said it symbolizes prosperity. I’m wondering this morning what it might mean.

Out back, in the temple pond, we have three beautiful koi.  There used to be five, but two of them disappeared shortly after I sighted a great blue heron flying away from the pond. I was on the porch and the great blue must have been right by the waterfall. I heard some commotion and looked down in time to see him flying low over the pond and grass and into the trees. He was big and I was surprised.

I have always loved great blue herons. They look like flying dinosaurs who have survived from ancient times to wander the watery landscape of the northeast. They are large birds, with wingspans of five to six feet. Great blue herons fly with a soaring ease but are most often found standing still in the shallow edge water of lakes and streams and estuary shores of this area.

I remember a surprising sighting one morning when my sister and I were camped on an island off the coast of Maine. We had woken up that morning totally engulfed in the dense fog that sometimes descends up there. The fog was so thick, we couldn’t see the shore that was twenty feet away from our campsite. Though we had our trusty compasses and charts, we had no urgent place to be so we decided to leave our kayaks on shore and sit tight till the fog lifted. While we were eating our morning ambrosia of oatmeal, raisins and maple syrup, we were startled by the sound of birds overhead. We looked up, and right over our heads appeared first one, then another and another huge blue herons.

We sat in our camp chairs, looking in silent awe. They flew with such large ease. Great blue herons are generally solitary and shy birds that like to keep their distance from us humans. But these herons were just ten or fifteen feet over our heads and they kept coming as we sat still. Each one appeared out of nowhere, coming from over the open water to the southwest, headed together up the coast. It was a few minutes and many many heron later that the quiet stillness of the dense fog returned.

We later surmised that this siege of great blue heron were using the tip of our island to verify their internal navigation as they flew to their morning hunting grounds. They flew effortlessly together for support and safety in the middle of the disorienting fog. We were surprised and delighted by their collective visit and were certain we had been graced by this flight of ancient angels.

I wasn’t so pleased, however, to see the single heron near the Temple pond a few years later. I suspected he was checking out the menu at this out-of-the way fish joint. After he flew away, we didn’t see any of the koi for a number of days. We were afraid he had eaten them all. But eventually the three uneaten fish gathered their courage to swim out of their cave and re-inhabit the pond. Ever since this time, they have been much more cautious. People or shadow or sounds will send them quickly back into hiding.

I wonder if they think back to the good old days when they didn’t have to take heron precautions—when they could swim near the surface without fear? Do they mutter among themselves in the dark of their caves about feeling cooped up and missing how it used to be? I suppose not, but their new normal is a far cry from how it used to be.

In spite of this, most mornings they eagerly wait by the corner of the pond for Melissa and I to come down with our tablespoon of fish food. We scatter it on the surface of the water and they quickly gobble it up. They only take a minute or two, sucking up the little pellets of nutrition like candy, then quickly head back to the deep water as if they were being chased by the heron that flew away long ago.

Through all this, the koi are growing noticeably bigger. Their elegant and brightly colored bodies swim through the water with ease and power. I could watch them for hours. They remind me of the fish on my painting swimming both up and down.

Perhaps prosperity comes as we learn to navigate through the fog and appreciate both the ups and the downs—the cycles of fear and ease. Sometimes we carefully hide in the cave of our solitude. Sometimes we join with others for safety and encouragement. All of this beauty, loss and surprise is necessary and included, no need to hold back.

Exhaustion and Opportunity

I’ve seen a number of articles in the Times and the Globe that have focused on the rising concerns about the mental health of our nation. The days are getting shorter and cooler as winter approaches. Those of us in the northern climes will begin having to spend more time inside—and this is just after some of us had begun feeling comfortable with socially distanced backyard visits with friends. The meager semblance of normal we have created will have to change. Again!

Our President is now touting a vaccine that will be a game-changer and will certainly be ready for mass distribution within the next few weeks. But he also touted a health care plan that would be better and cheaper than the one his predecessor created. That was four years ago and nothing has materialized on that front so most of us don’t expect his promise of a widely available vaccine is anything other than the continued ranting of a delusional authoritarian strongman.

Colleges and universities are struggling to keep students safely on campus. (I do think the reckless partying behavior of a significant percentage of the students is verification that the full reasoning capacity of the human brain does not come on line, especially in young men, until the early twenties.) I heard yesterday of a school district in California that has already decided they will be in virtual mode through the entire school year. More restaurants and businesses shutter their operations daily. THIS is our new abnormal and it just drags on and on.

How do we make new lives with what we have when what we have is not what we want? I suppose this is the perennial human question. If you’ve been paying attention, you’ve probably already noticed that everything always keeps changing and the things we have, we have only temporarily. This is just the universe appears to be constructed.   But in a culture such as America’s where the meaning of life is tied in to endless growth and accumulation, these changes and losses provokes a crisis of meaning.

But maybe I am being too doctrinaire. Maybe it’s not just our pernicious capitalist culture that is our problem. Our current crisis is also about the unprecedented challenge of living with less physical and in person social contact. We are, after all, mammals who are genetically programmed to live in herds and tribes. We like to sniff around and check out each other. Who’s here with me? Who’s our leader? What’s our task? We love to be part of a team with a clear mission. We are hard wired to orient around purpose and collaboration. When the direction is clear and our relationships are in order, we are happy.

People who study physical and social systems sometimes say that a system can only make fundamental change when it is far from equilibrium. When things are going well, the inertia of the status quo prevents any significant deviation from the usual. When things are deeply disturbed, then the endless experiments that arise gain new significance and can influence the whole system.

The time of break-down is also the time of new life. Though many people I talk to are struggling with exhaustion and discouragement, many of them are also reporting their new necessity of living in deeper alignment with what is most important. ‘Being nice’ and just ‘going along’ are not viable options in a time of crisis. This disturbing time both allows and forces us to do a new kind of work within ourselves. With our usual coping strategies taken away, we have no choice but to find something deeper.

We are all swimming in the deep end of the pool now—no more splashing around in the shallows. Drowning is a real possibility, but so is discovering some natural buoyancy of things that we had not trusted before. It’s exhausting but also exhilarating.

Now that everything is different, what do YOU want to make of your life? What is most important? And though you can never know the outcome of your actions, what is the next step that you’re willing to take?

Finding Fulfillment

One of the useful definitions I learned in my life-coaching training was: Fulfillment is what happens when we act in alignment with our values.

We all want to be fulfilled in this life and it is easy to think of fulfillment as some place we will arrive when certain conditions are met. Once I get that job or find the right partner or get my second book published—then I’ll be fulfilled. But fulfillment is often the carrot on the stick that is dangled in front of (and tied to) the donkey. Every step the donkey takes, the carrot moves forward too—ever temptingly dangling just out of reach.

Even when we accomplish our goals, our sense of fulfillment is short-lived. With the new job come new problems. With a new relationship come all the issues of actually being with another human being. After the second book is published, then there is the third and the fourth. Accomplishments and achievements are wonderful things, but they do not create a lasting sense of fulfillment.

Fulfillment is not a destination. It’s not a place you can ever arrive and settle into. That’s the bad news. But the good news is that fulfillment is available in whatever situation we find ourselves—even when our goals and dreams seem impossibly far off. We are fulfilled when we our actions align with what is deepest in our hearts.

If this is true, then our first work is to clarify what we care about. It’s difficult to act in alignment with something that is unclear. This ‘what we care about’ is not the same as what we think we should do. Clarifying our values is a process of uncovering of some deeper part of who we already are. Some of us love to work in the garden, some love to solve problems, some to work with our hands, some to organize spaces. Fulfillment begins by noticing what brings us alive.

One of my values, something that brings me alive, has to do with exploring and following and shaping things. I might call this value improvisational creation or following aliveness. For some reason, piling a few rocks on top of each other in just the right in some corner of the garden way delights me. Sitting down each morning with no particular plan and then following whatever comes to mind and shaping it all into sentences and paragraphs, is a pleasurable and meaningful activity to me.

I do hope that my improvisational creations bring some joy or understanding or comfort to others. But I try to keep my focus on what is happening in the moment, the balance of the stones, the feeling and the shape of the paragraphs as they appear on my screen. I play and fiddle and shape as best I can, then I let them be—sitting quietly under a tree or off to my blog page in cyberspace to settle in with the other reflections from the past days.

With this focus on fulfillment as alignment with something deeper, we are not hostage to the outcomes that are beyond our control. When east is our clear direction of travel, though we will never arrive, each step we take is the fulfillment of our intention and can be a full expression of our love.

Collaborators with Injustice

For the first time in my memory, a sitting President of the United States is questioning the legitimacy of our electoral process—the very process that brought him to power in the first place. Trailing Joe Biden in the polls, Trump is beginning to question the results of the election in advance. He is claiming that the only way he will lose this election is if the Democrats commit fraud. And this follows his encouragement to his loyal followers that they vote twice to ‘test the validity of the process’.

Many of us are scared—not just for what will happen if Trump wins again, but what will happen if Trump loses. It appears that he will continue to us the power of his position to hold onto power as long as possible. And, with the Republicans in Congress, he appears to have a loyal cadre of collaborators who will support him against the very fabric of our democratic processes. My first fear is that he will convince just enough voters to swing the electoral map in his favor. (As he did four years ago.) But my bigger fear is the aftermath of the election if Biden wins.

Trump has been operating a hall of mirrors since he was first elected. Immediately after his unpredicted victory, he began telling lies: ‘The crowds at my inauguration were the biggest in history.’ From the outside, this seemed unnecessary and rather insignificant. We could all see that this wasn’t true. But Trump’s utter insistence of his alternate reality and his requirement that the people around him repeat his lies has been the pattern of his Presidency.

In a powerful article in the Atlantic Monthly with a long and descriptive title (History Will Judge the Complicit: Why have Republican leaders abandoned their principles in support of an immoral and dangerous president), Anne Applebaum explores the psychology of collaborators. Looking at Vichy France in the 40’s, East Germany in the ‘50’s and the Trump impeachment process, she looks at how people make the decision to go along with immoral and repressive regimes, even when it goes against their basic human values.

She lists a number of ‘familiar justifications of collaboration’ that Republicans have used to justify their support for our self-dealing and self-consumed President even has he attacks the very foundation of our political system:

• We can use this moment to achieve great things.
• We can protect the country from the president.
• I, personally, will benefit.
• I must remain close to power.
• LOL nothing matters.
• My side might be flawed, but the political opposition is much worse.
• I am afraid to speak out.

Of course it is easy to sit in judgment of others and I feel compelled to continue into the uneasy extension of the righteous talk of others’ collaboration. We are all collaborators. We all live in a system that denies basic justice and opportunity to a wide range of people, especially those with black and brown skin. While many of us are quite comfortable with our current economic and ‘democratic’ political system, this system is clearly based on a violence against black people that has its roots in the very founding of our country. With the ever-increasing gap between the rich and poor, our society oppresses the many for the benefit of the few. Children go hungry. Basic medical and housing needs are only provided to certain of us.

So while I will work to expose the dangerous collaboration of people supporting Trump lies and lust for power, I feel obligated to also work to expose my own collaboration with the very system that has made my life so comfortable.

These are not easy times but are, I believe, times of great possibility. In the disturbances of the moment, we can all begin see what has been hidden from so many of us. We can acknowledge our blindnesses and perhaps begin to work toward truth and healing for ourselves, each other and our burning world.

Complete Presence

The other day, through the demanding wizardry of Google photos, I saw a picture of my grandson a year ago, when he was seven months old. I was surprised at how much like a baby he looked. And I remembered that at the time the photo was taken, though of course I knew he was a baby, I did think of him as a baby. He was just Isaiah to me. I mean, I knew that he was little and rather incompetent in a number of areas, but being with him, I was most aware of the fullness of his presence as he engaged in his endless explorations of life. 100% alive.

Now that he’s definitely a toddler—running around, digging in whatever dirt he can find, learning new words daily, (yesterday ‘duck’ replaced ‘gaga’ as the referent to the white aquatic bird that says ‘quack’) and almost always sporting at least one band-aid on his knees as evidence of his exuberance—I feel the same completeness about him. To me, he is definitely not some smaller version of who he will become. He is fully himself.

Of course, I’m thrilled and amazed by his ongoing learning. Being with him (and with any young human being) is to witness the capacity of us human beings to grow into a physical and symbolic world of extraordinary complexity. I could sit for hours and watch him play with his three wooden wheeled ‘trains’. They travel as a set and each one explores the edges of his environment. Going back and forth, they slowly then quickly traverse the various transition points in the room: where one carpet meets the other, from the arm of the couch to the floor, the corner of where the flat top of a table becomes the vertical side. Over and over, with great absorption, he studies the problem. And I journey along with him—wondering what is going on in his mind, seeing his incremental improvement in motor skills and understanding and marveling at his delight in the ever-expanding world in which he finds himself.

Every new skill, new word, new behavior meets with great delight from his ‘Baba’. (That’s my semi-made-up name for Granddad.) I’m reminded of a city-wide task force on enhancing resilience in young people that I was part of many years ago. One of the directors of a large youth-serving non-profit summed up the current research on what young people need for healthy development when he said: ‘Every child needs someone who thinks they are the greatest thing since Moby Dick.’ Well, I am certain that Isaiah fits into this category.

We human beings seem to grow and learn best when we are fully appreciated right where we are. The point is not who young people will become when they grow up. I suspect that this applies to grown-ups as well as to knee-huggers. Though we may wish our colleagues, bosses, students and partners were a little wiser and more mature, the best way to support their natural learning and growth is to appreciate them right where they are. So I try to learn from my time with my grandson to delight in the world as it is and to treasure whatever and whoever is right in front of me.

Learning and growing are the nature of being alive. Other than paying attention, very little extra effort is required. Something is always happening and we don’t even have to know what it is. Isaiah has no awareness of the position of being ‘a toddler’. He doesn’t need to and can’t possibly know (nor can I) what will happen next. He is already fully competent to be present in his life. Like all of us, he needs a little help with some of the aspects of life he hasn’t yet mastered. But like all of us, he lives his full life in each moment. My job is not to help him grow up, but to meet and support and delight in him right where he is.

Mission accomplished!

Working Problems

My computer is not feeling well. Or it may be feeling quite well and just be engaged in a work slow-down action. Perhaps a protest against these early mornings? It was one thing when the sun was up, but now in mid-September might as well be the middle of the night when we begin to write. Perhaps my computer has reported me to the Labor Relations Board for violating some unspoken agreement about working hours between computers and humans. Or perhaps it’s trying to teach me a lesson about who’s in charge. Or it might be something to do with how Word doesn’t quite work right on this laptop and doesn’t close documents properly and when I reboot I often end up with twenty or thirty documents piled on top of each other that I have to sort through to find out which is the most current version of each.

Whatever the cause, things are not normal this morning. I tried closing programs and documents. Everything was very slow. Word documents were not willing even to be moved around without a great delay (which leads me toward the work slow-down theory). At first, even the words I typed onto this current document were hesitating before they came onto the page. Now it’s better. Maybe it was just a sleepiness thing?

Funny how the mind loves to make associations. Poetry and science are both products of this wondrous and troublesome human necessity. We observe something and we immediately tap into what we ‘know’ about it. Where does this event fit into the world as I know it? The mind instantly filters and shapes what it sees to find how this fits into the ongoing puzzle of my world.

One perspective says that poets make stuff up while scientists observe what is actually there. But maybe it’s more accurate to talk about different ways to look closely. As I examine my life and the world around me, I am equally interested in the things outside of me and the things inside of me. Perhaps I am most interested in the relationship of the two. How is it that I see and understand? What do I understand? Who even does this ‘understanding’ I speak of?

Scientists do tend to favor uncovering causality. Mere description is not as interesting as what leads to what? How does this happen?   The proximity of two events does not prove that one causes the other. But can we do experiments that might lead to more certainty about the relationship between two different things? Can we say with some degree of certainty that every time x happens y follows? We humans deeply reassured by the predictability of causality.

Gardening is a causality practice. I buy packets of seed with specific names that go with specific pictures I have seen on-line or in my head or in my garden. French Sophia marigold seeds produce small ruffled pom-poms of deep variegated orange and gold, not the silky powder blue funnels of morning glories. I count on this dependable world. Plant the seeds under the right conditions, give them water, sunlight and good soil, and voila – the intricate and wondrous blossoms are just like the pictures.

Gardening reaffirms my sense that the world is reliable and predictable. The results of the upcoming Presidential election are not in this category, nor is what will happen in this polarized and angry country when the election results are announced. Just turning my mind to the reality of this uncertainty, I feel unsettled and slightly fearful. I’m reminded of my desire to do what I can to nudge the results toward the outcome that I want. (note to self: do something today)

There is so much to observe—both within and without. How to live in the amazing world of causality—to do my part but not get lost in the angst of it all? How to be serious and playful at the same time? Response-able and unencumbered?

I don’t believe that a fixed position will suffice. I tell silly stories about my computer even as I know it’s time to reboot and may even be time to get the assistance of someone who knows more than I do. Still, I try to appreciate my life and its many meanings in the biggest view I can.

Nothing is fixed or needs to be fixed—except maybe my computer.