Archive for the Category »Memory «

Writing a Book

07 Mar 2012 -
Glass Hearts

Follow Your Heart

 

“You ask whether your verses are any good. You ask me. You have asked others before this. You send them to magazines. You compare them with other poems, and you are upset when certain editors reject your work. Now (since you have said you want my advice) I beg you to stop doing that sort of thing.

You are looking outside, and that is what you should most avoid right now. No one can advise or help you – no one. There is only one thing you should do. Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write.

This most of all: ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I write? Dig into yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question with a strong, simple “I must”, then build your life in accordance with this necessity; your whole life, even into its humblest and most indifferent hour, must become a sign and witness to this impulse.”

- Rainer Maria Rilke

I love that I am taking comfort from words penned in 1903. But this is such wise and timeless advice, that is so obviously applicable far beyond the subject of writing. This line in particular, really resonates,

“You are looking outside, and that is what you should most avoid right now. No one can advise or help you – no one. There is only one thing you should do. Go into yourself. “

I spent so much of life hoping that someone or something outside of me would have the answer(s) to all my questions. Someone else could ‘fix’ things. There is something quite lovely about being on the other side of 50…and being able to see that there are no real authorities to send me in the right direction.

Tag. I’m it.

And so I continue down this rabbit hole that is this process called writing a book, which, like anything we pursue, is really about the process of creating our lives. There is no one to ask for assistance. It is the ultimate in solo travel.

But these other words of Rainer Maria Wilke let me know this is hardly new. My hope is that they might help you on whatever path you may be on…

“A work of art is good if it has arisen out of necessity. That is the only way one can judge it. So, dear Sir, I can’t give you any advice but this: to go into yourself and see how deep the place is from which your life flows; at its source you will find the answer to, the question of whether you must create. Accept that answer, just as it is given to you, without trying to interpret it. Perhaps you will discover that you are called to be an artist. Then take that destiny upon yourself, and bear it, its burden and its greatness, without ever asking what reward might come from outside.”  

Category: Books, Memory, Musings, Photos, Writing  Tags: , , , , , , ,  10 Comments

Dance with Death

22 Feb 2012 -
P1030891

All Dressed Up

 

One of the things I’ve always adored about the culture of Mexico is their colourful way of dancing with death.  The skeleton bride and groom, the fashionista skeleton, all of them, dark-humoured memento moris.

It’s refreshing to me for many reasons, but mostly it’s a poignant way to remember to not take myself too seriously.

I think too, that in Canada and the U.S., we love nothing better than to deny the entire process. We shuffle and hide people away the second they look like they might make that big leap into the great abyss.

We’ve institutionalized every second of the process, from the medicalization of dying to the industrialization of funerals.

Back home, I have a tiny Mexican skeleton that dangles from my desk light. It’s my own quirky reminder.

Each moment counts.

 

 

Category: Memory, Photos  Tags: , , , , ,  2 Comments

Poppies and Aperol

24 Jun 2011 -

 

Recently I was in Italy. To clarify a little…I use the word recently in a fairly liberal sense. It might have been a few years ago, maybe four, even five?  It’s a funny thing about losing one’s mind eh?

Doesn’t really matter. What matters is that today I bought a bottle of Aperol. What also matters is today there are zillions of diamonds sparkling on the sea outside my window. What matters is that there are poppies in glowing orange and red formations, invincible in their flaming colours as they flutter and glow and scream their vibrancy and those poppies make me think of Turkish fields and Italian meadows and happiness.

It was in Italy that I discovered Aperol. It occurs to me right this second, that it wasn’t on that most recent trip at all. In fact, it was on that other trip to Italy…one almost ten years ago. But it matters not.

It is an aperitif; an infusion of herbs and roots. It is slightly bitter and a nuclear colour that resembles poppies in the sunlight. It looks like it could do harm or might even have a half-life of 48,000 years. How can we really know?

But it makes me think of summer. And today I bought some so I could sit on the deck with the delicate chinking of ice on glass with the radioactive swirl of that Italian infusion. I want to sit with my memories, make some plans to create some new ones this summer and be happy in the sunshine.

That is how I’m starting my weekend. Hope you have a similar great start to yours…

Category: Memory, Musings, Photos  Tags:  Leave a Comment

Discipline or Ladies Who Lunch

21 Jun 2011 -

Discipline

Don’t avoid discipline.

You have learned ways to make a living

Lunch...

for your body. Now learn to support

your soul. You wear fine clothing.

How do you dress your spirit?

 

This world is a playground

where children pretend to have shops.

 

Sometimes when they wrestle,

it may look like sex,

but none of it is real.

 

They exchange imaginary money.

Night comes, and they go home tired

with nothing in their hands.

-Rumi

 

Good ol’ Rumi was at it again with this poem…You wear fine clothing. How do you dress your spirit?
I’m going to guess Rumi wasn’t a guy you would want to take shopping.

I think it’s back to that balance between the Laughing Pink Buddha and the Serene One. My tendency is to tip deeply into the meditation and thinking and reflecting and writing and generally retreating into the cave when I think I need to regroup and try to make sense of what’s happening. Too often I feel the injustice of the world, my having while the rest have not.

But what if all a girl needs is a little material restoration? Yes it’s frivolous. It’s materialistic and shallow. I get that. But aren’t we supposed to embrace our duality? Be one with complexity?

I mean truly…at some point, isn’t it all about the right shade of lipstick?

I want to go to lunch and buy something silly and fun and not in the least bit practical. I want to go shopping and not think about the world.

But here’s what I don’t want to do. I do not want to wear red and purple. Save me from a fate worse than death. I may be over fifty, but you can’t make me wear one of those hats.

Category: Memory, Photos  Tags:  4 Comments

It Was the Best of Times

03 Jun 2011 -
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way…” - Charles Dickens

Last night we went to Vancouver’s Rogers Arena to watch Supertramp. I know. We’re old.

I was heavily immersed in 1976 memories of my eight-track. I do believe I wore Crime of the Century right out, couldn’t even spin that thin black tape back into its case using my HB pencil and finally had to give it up.(Is this time to also mention that this heathen music was contraband in my Mennonite home and was smuggled in and out of the house in my big bag? We’re not even going to talk about what happened to my favourite eight-track of Santana Abraxas).

Before the concert, we’d had a magnificent dinner at L’Abattoir .  The servers were attentive and knowledgeable, the food was to die for, our friends were warm and wonderful dinner companions and the ambiance was hip without making me feel like I was too old to walk in the groovin’ doors. You know those places that are so stuffed with the young and insanely beautiful that you may as well go toss yourself on an iceberg? Not like that.

At the end of the evening, Kevin & I hailed a cab as some fresh hell in my hip has recently rendered me unable to walk too swiftly. (see the aforementioned old versus young above). The cabbie that picked us up had a fedora pitched back on his dark skin. I thought of 70% organic chocolate… He asked us what the concert had been about.

“Supertramp?” He said with a very foreign accent. He hadn’t heard of them. He scrolled through his iPhone while dodging traffic and soon we were hearing Bloody Well Right through the taxi speakers, and then the Logical Song, and he said, “Hey!, I know these tunes.”

But then he said, “Now listen to this…” I figured he would now blast us with something new and happening, something as funky and cool as he was. 

Nope. It’s Gerry Rafferty crooning Right Down the Line. “When I was a young boy, I would spend so much time at my uncle’s house and this is what he played…” He sounded so wistful. “Where did you grow up?” I asked. “Cameroon.” He played us more oldie tunes and we laughed together all the way back to the apartment.

I felt blessed by his shared memory. That tune is playing as I write this and I’m trying to imagine the story of a young black man making his way from Africa to  Canada to Vancouver to the exact moment of driving us home last night and sharing the bittersweet memories of playing his uncle’s favourite song from a far-away homeland.

And in between each of these events? I’ve cried for all that I feel I’m losing. The kind of crying that hits at stupid and inopportune times, like in the middle of a Supertramp concert.

But in between those moments? I have laughed and laughed, and am laughing still, for all that I gain each day.

It’s a crazy mixed-up world. And with any luck it will keep coming at me; the sacred and the profane, the bright and the dark, intensely and with big hits of colour and sound.

I may not be moving too fast today, but I promise to feel everything that comes my way. Because I get it. I get that my life is exactly perfect. Just the way it is. All of it.

Category: Food/Restaurants, Memory, Musings, Writing  Tags: ,  5 Comments
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