the chatter

These days I am sick of my voice. I have grown tired and displeased with the voice in my head, the one with me at all hours: in bed in the morning, at work through the day, in the car, in the shower, on my runs, in the studio, and again in bed at night.

It's there.

It's loud.

It repeats similar thoughts and questions and conundrums at near nauseum. These days, I am sick of my voice.

I feel trapped inside a tar bubble that will not free this heart and mind so consumed, and manifested here in this little soprano pitch. She just keeps pontificating and talking through the same circuitous dialogues... well, monologues. There seems to be no current escape.

And nothing I write can be committed to substantially. I cannot finish a piece of prose to save my life and it's driving me nearly mad. I am conflicted it seems. Words are failing again and again. And sadly, it seems I've lost trust in them. I've misplaced the great value I once bestowed upon words as they keep getting abused in the world around me. The words keep getting tossed around like mere playthings. As if they hardly matter. As if we can all say whatever we want without consequence. Not so.

I've been making attempts for the past few hours at a blog entry and some work in my journals... seemingly futile. Or maybe I'm just overly critical in my own analysis tonight. Thankfully, as I sought true inspiration in Lamott's Bird by Bird, I came upon this:


"Sometimes this human stuff is slimy and pathetic... but better to feel it and talk about it and walk through it than to spend a lifetime being silently poisoned."


The voice is still there. And the words, still slightly infuriating. But I'll take the frustrating chatter over silence any day. Because at least then, I know I'm really living. Feeling something. Making an attempt at this whole human experience thing.

So there's that.

the magic realm

Last night I had a dream. I was sitting in a large meadow of tall grass and sunflowers piling stacks of books into wooden boxes. I flipped through pages of Whitman and Dickens, recalling favorite passages, reading aloud into the great sun filled expanse. A young boy came and sat beside me, smiling, presenting a basket of paper cranes. The little birds were strung together with a piece of gray thread, and the little boy told me, "they're connected by silver filaments of chance and circumstance... like you and me." The boy then walked away. And I woke up.

It wasn't until tonight that I could recall where those words came from.

Connected by silver filaments of chance and circumstance

I can't quite place the moment I came across Robert McCammon's work Boy's Life. At some point in this life of wandering my way through library's and book stores I sifted through it and stored a particular passage in the deep recesses of memory. Now it's literally come to me in a dream and I've been thinking that it's no coincidence. It goes something like this:

You know, I do believe in magic. I was born and raised in a magic time, in a magic town, among magicians. Oh, most everybody else didn’t realize we lived in that web of magic, connected by silver filaments of chance and circumstance. But I knew it all along. When I was twelve years old, the world was my magic lantern, and by its green spirit glow I saw the past, the present and into the future. You probably did too; you just don’t recall it. See, this is my opinion: we all start out knowing magic. We are born with whirlwinds, forest fires, and comets inside us. We are born able to sing to birds and read the clouds and see our destiny in grains of sand. But then we get the magic educated right out of our souls. We get it churched out, spanked out, washed out, and combed out. We get put on the straight and narrow and told to be responsible. Told to act our age. Told to grow up, for God’s sake. And you know why we were told that? Because the people doing the telling were afraid of our wildness and youth, and because the magic we knew made them ashamed and sad of what they’d allowed to wither in themselves.

After you go so far away from it, though, you can’t really get it back. You can have seconds of it. Just seconds of knowing and remembering. When people get weepy at movies, it’s because in that dark theater the golden pool of magic is touched, just briefly. Then they come out into the hard sun of logic and reason again and it dries up, and they’re left feeling a little heartsad and not knowing why. When a song stirs a memory, when motes of dust turning in a shaft of light takes your attention from the world, when you listen to a train passing on a track at night in the distance and wonder where it might be going, you step beyond who you are and where you are. For the briefest of instants, you have stepped into the magic realm.

That’s what I believe.

The truth of life is that every year we get farther away from the essence that is born within us. We get shouldered with burdens, some of them good, some of them not so good. Things happen to us. Loved ones die. People get in wrecks and get crippled. People lose their way, for one reason or another. It’s not hard to do, in this world of crazy mazes. Life itself does its best to take that memory of magic away from us. You don’t know it’s happening until one day you feel you’ve lost something but you’re not sure what it is. It’s like smiling at a pretty girl and she calls you “sir.” It just happens.

These memories of who I was and where I lived are important to me. They make up a large part of who I’m going to be when my journey winds down. I need the memory of magic if I am ever going to conjure magic again. I need to know and remember, and I want to tell you.

i have found what you are like - e.e. cummings

i have found what you are like
the rain

(Who feathers frightened fields
with the superior dust-of-sleep. wields

easily the pale club of the wind
and swirled justly souls of flower strike

the air in utterable coolness

deeds of green thrilling light
with thinned

newfragile yellows

lurch and.press

-in the woods

which
stutter
and
sing

And the coolness of your smile is
stirringofbirds between my arms;but
i should rather than anything
have(almost when hugeness will shut
quietly)almost,
your kiss

World Spins Madly On

Day 7.

It's the Weepies.

Ocean

Day 6 pretty much speaks for itself.

I saw this played live years ago and it's still one of my favorites. It just feels like delicious Springtime.

And a quote for the day thanks to the ever brilliant Emily Dickinson:

Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul
And sings the tune without the words
And never stops at all.

mmmbop

I greeted this beautiful Spring morning with running shoes, a cup of coffee, and some much needed catching up with my mom and our sweet pup Noel. One long walk, two cups, and a tour of all things renovated at my parent's new house later, I had successfully welcomed Friday. On my way home I passed a group of girls playing four square outside school and smiled at their innocent joy. I waved to a group of boaters as I crossed the bridge, and exchanged pleasantries with our neighbor Gary as he headed out for the day. And now, reading the paper and munching on granola and clementines I finally flashed on the perfect tune for Day 5. A song that has lifted my spirits since I was a kid. Maybe it's something to do with the ridiculous simplicity of lyrics, the foot tapping beat, or the all together 90's hunky-ness that was this band of young boys. Regardless, it's just one of those completely cheesy songs that makes me smile, and reminds me that sometimes it's okay to unleash the inner child (even if that means having a spontaneous solo dance party in an empty house on a Friday morning).

I've only got one word: Mmmbop.

Chin up, friends. And happy Friday:
(the video itself is also just all kinds of fantastic. seriously. judge not.)

Rivers and Roads

I so wish that I could talk to you. And tell you about my day. About how I rolled over this morning, hitting the snooze button, choosing the warmth of my bed, listening to the rain, rather than going for my run. About how I got the chance to enjoy a cup of coffee with a dear friend before heading into work. Something about the ritual of coffee and talking makes me feel a little more centered. About how I met a young man with the same profound love of E.E. Cummings. He had a small collection of his work hidden in a messenger bag which was only made visible as he fumbled searching for his wallet. He smiled as I quoted "here's to opening and upward," and even finished my sentence. What a sweet, lovely moment. About how I thought of you as a man passed wearing an East of Maui sweatshirt, another with an orange baseball cap spelling out A Prairie Home Companion. I then watched an entire flat cart I had somewhat precariously stacked, come tumbling down. I held back tears standing in a sea of blueberries and strawberries and cucumbers. Luckily laughter followed and the help of countless crew members reminding me that I rarely have such bad luck. Oh, and I wore my red rain boots today, yet sadly there was no puddle jumping to be had. Hopefully next time.

I so wish that I could talk to you. And tell you that I miss you. About how this time of day, when the distractions of work and the details of other people's lives aren't present, is the hardest part. About how my thoughts turn to you and wishing you were beside me. How I'm hoping you're okay.

And how I have to believe that words still count for something. So I'll keep writing. And hope that somewhere out there, you're reading. And maybe, eventually, it will be enough.

And it's a bit early, but I can't stay up tonight.
For day 4: The Head and the Heart.

Songbird

Day 3: Eva Cassidy.

I woke up with this song in my head.

Turning Tables

Last night after teaching classes I stayed behind in the empty studio to play around with some movement. I had a rather cathartic "dance it out" moment to this jam. Day two I bring you more Adele. After all, I love her.

Rain

It's already May 2nd. I'm not quite sure how that happened. Seems every year I make the same comments about how quickly time passes. And I just wish I could slow everything down. I'm struggling with transition lately too. Currently I'm at a loss for words and find myself playing a game of wastebasket toss with everything I write. So, for this first week of May I come to you with a series of musical selections. One song for each day...a living soundtrack of sorts of where I am in life at this moment. Today I come to you with Patty Griffin. It's a sad song, yes. But sometimes you have to sit inside the sadness before you can do anything else.