I suspect if I had been walking through it, I would have found it rather beautiful.  Perhaps if I had stopped and stood quite still out in the midst of it, I could have seen its veiled shapes and outlines, watched it move about, heard its secrets, smelled the scent of things hidden in its pockets.  I might even have seen others seeking their way as well.  But I was driving a car, and it was not quite dawn, and so the fog that was enveloping me just felt thick and ominous, unnerving and unending, and terribly lonely. more “A season of fog and change.” …

We were walking as we often do in the early morning sun and shadows, down narrow roads that wind.  We were physically separate from each other.  I was carrying the leash, and dog Liam was walking close by but pausing occasionally for a deeper sniff, a longer view, a more nuanced listening into the quiet.

But then, rather suddenly, we came to a corner where a lawn was being mowed and manicured, edged and trimmed, loudly blown free of left behinds.  And, just as abruptly, on the opposite side of the road, a car engine was started and the vehicle was backing out into the road, into our space.  And further down the way ahead of us there was a dog, barking.  Behind us, two runners appeared, and they were coming nearer.   more “A thousand fibers and sympathetic threads” …

“There will be no meditation in your life unless you put it there.”

For one who came late to the practice of meditation – and who is still woefully inconsistent about it – I understand that statement.  I believe in its truth:  “There will be no meditation in your life unless you put it there.”

It’s odd that I don’t remember where I read that or who wrote it, because it has definitely stopped to stay awhile in my head.  It has walked around up there quite a bit lately.  And then it began to move some of the furniture around.

In the attic of my thoughts and beliefs, this particular way of looking at life started rearranging things … like the old vintage footstool where I’ve rested my feet after walking around in the world until I’m absolutely worn out … or like the chest of drawers where I’ve stored my truths and beliefs and customized conclusions for so long they have dust bunnies … and like the shelves where my pictures of reality sit in neat, carefully aligned, albeit crusty, rows.  This one idea sort of kicked them all askew.  And I began to stub my toes on them.

To be honest, it wasn’t that phrase itself so much as what happened when I looked at it the other way around – changing it from: “There will be no meditation in your life unless you put it there;” to: “There will be meditation in your life, if you put it there.”

I liked that slight shift in meaning … that subtle slip in its reality and perspective.  And from there the idea began to take hold of other states of being, like:  “There will be joy in your life, if you put it there.”  And “there will be kindness in your life, if you put it there.”  And “there will be compassion in your life, if you put it there.”

I looked for other things that were obvious – stacked up, if you will, right there in the corners of my mind’s attic and hanging from the rafters – and I found this trick of phrase worked well with such things as:  joy and hope and generosity, integrity and understanding, faith and forgiveness, mercy and acceptance, humility and patience, happiness and beauty.  All would be in my life … if I put them there.  (Even the idea that “there will always be dogs and cats in my life, if I put them there” fit in nicely.)

But then some other things began to crawl out of the shadows and from under the rugs of that mind-room where they were being stored – and they were also true and evident and undeniable:  “There will be fear in your life, if you put it there.”  “There will be ugliness in your life, if you put it there.”  “There will be anger in your life … and hate … and loneliness … and jealousy … and isolation … and indecency … if you put it there.”

I suspect a great deal of ourselves and our memories, our experiences and expectations, do get stored away in the hidden places of our hearts and minds – in metaphorical scrapbooks and locked-tight suitcases.  And it’s up to us to decide what we keep fresh and useful and living today; and what gets forgotten, left to fade in the dark or dry up with time.  And, sometimes, a new idea – or an old idea simply seen in a mirror-image – helps us shift it all around and move it from there to here.  

“There will be no meditation in your life unless you put it there.” “There will be meditation in your life, if you put it there.”  A change in reflection that makes all the difference.

As for me, I want to hold more pure hope and blind kindness in my life … to seek more beauty and greater peace.  And, for me, there will have to be all manner of dogs and cats, and perhaps a small flower or two.  And there must be friendships to share in it.  And proper meditation to appreciate every bit of it.  

And now I suspect it is simply up to me to put it there.

I’ve cut them down to the ground.  But I can’t convince myself to pull up their roots.  They were leggy and black spotted, chewed on and curled up.  But at one time they had been so beautiful.  Now they were nothing more than brown sticks with thorns.  They were no longer blossoming deep red and heady with fragrance.  They were no longer my lovely roses.

I had not planted these roses.  They didn’t just come with the house, either.  In fact, they hadn’t poked their heads above ground until I’d lived here for almost six years.  They had simply shown up – wonderfully unexpected and graciously timed, the very spring after my mother died.  That was almost fourteen years ago now. more “A liminal time and place.” …

“But see how the strings of the piano attach to the hitch pins on the frame at the far end, and then they’re stretched – with great tension – across the bridges to the tuning pins at this end.  There is tremendous compression between those points.  So much so that it creates and holds a sort of bulge in the soundboard, which is called the crown.  I love that image of a crown.  Because it really is the crowning glory of the sound itself.  It gives the music incredible beauty because of that strength – because it bears the tension, the compression, the stress of it all, with such integrity.  Beauty has a lot of sources, Quinn.  Not all of them are easy or pleasant.  Some are almost unbearable.  But the beauty that comes out of it can be exceptional because of it.”

I’ve been studying the piano lately.  Not how to play it.  But studying the instrument itself (more specifically, the grand piano) – its design and makeup, its pieces and parts, its materials and internal workings.  It’s for a new book I’m writing (the paragraph above is from one of the chapters).  And for reasons of plot development, I’ve had to learn about the functionality of all the hidden bits of the piano – how they interact with each other, how they build on each other for a greater purpose.  It’s turning into a rather remarkable life metaphor I’m finding. more “Be more piano” …

The massage therapist placed a small cotton ball that was dabbed with eucalyptus oil into my hand and said, “Here, breathe this … it will refresh you, it will open up your breathing.”  And I held it under my nose, and I did feel refreshed and my breathing was renewed.  And I considered how compelling it would be if I could place myself softly under a eucalyptus tree and have it feel refreshed and renewed because of my human scent.

I suspect that I was reacting to having recently read that June is the month when trees begin to breathe.  It has to do with the seasonal reawakening of the carbon dioxide/oxygen exchange that trees and other green plant lives do with us and for us on earth.  And I loved the imagery of it:  trees breathing in June.   more “It’s June: The trees are breathing.” …

They said you could taste it – when it was the real thing. It was back in the 1970s. And it was the marketing theme of a soft drink competing in a jumble of other similar products all claiming to be just as good as “the real thing.” And, suddenly, I began to even hear the catchy little song that went along with it (“It’s the real thing … la de da, la de da …“).

It came back to me during church a couple of Sundays ago, when our minister, Reverend Christopher Erde, was making a significant point by using an example he had learned about counterfeit money. He said that U.S. Secret Service agents – those who are tasked with being able to discern counterfeit currency from the real thing – don’t actually study counterfeit money. Rather, they study real money. They don’t spend their time trying to memorize all the possible fake and false variations of our currency. They focus on everything they can possibly learn about our real currency: how it looks sideways and upside down, how it smells, how it feels and sounds when it’s touched and crinkled up, how it reacts to light and shadow and appears under a magnifying glass … even how it tastes. Because when we know a lot about what’s real – know it well and intimately and intentionally – we can recognize all the false and counterfeit competition intuitively. We will instinctively recognize “the real thing.” more “It’s the real thing.” …

It was black velvet.  With a deep, thick, shiny nap.  The softest dress I had ever felt.  Of course, I was only about three or four years old at the time, so my experience with dresses of any material was rather limited.  And yet, out of my sense-memory, I can still feel it beneath my hands – glossy, smooth, incredibly luxurious.  I loved my black velvet dress.  I loved its sparkly buttons and its ties at the gathered neckline and its two patch pockets on either side of its skirt.

I wanted to wear my black velvet dress inside out.  I wanted the beautiful softness of it to be against my own skin, where I could feel it best.  I didn’t want to waste all its loveliness on the side facing away from me.  It made perfect sense to my three-or-four-year-old self. more “Always wear your velvet side out.” …

“It is either thrilling or terrifying and a bit of both, I suppose.  And it is inevitable.  We have already opened that door – and irrevocably closed it behind us.”

Almost exactly five years ago, I wrote the above paragraph in a column about the advancement of AI (artificial intelligence) into the reality of our daily lives.

I suppose I am a bit surprised that it has taken less than five years for it to actually move in.  But bidden or unbidden, AI has already taken a chair in the room, vying somewhat stealthily, with questionable maturity and motivation, for an actual seat at the table.  more “AI won’t be hatching my eggs” …

more “On the other side of the mirror.” …