The Eyes Have It

This is one of those days when I end up writing something different than I planned to. It's going to be kind of "an ode to my eyes."

So, I'm quite nearsighted. It started when I was five, in first grade. The teacher had placed me in the back of the room and I couldn't read the blackboard. When I still couldn't read it from the front row, she contacted my parents. I saw an eye doctor and started wearing glasses. By about eight or nine, I wore them all the time, and when I was a teenager, it was scary because my eyes worsened so quickly that I needed new glasses every six months or so. I was sure I would be blind by 20, but things levelled off when I reached college. My eyesight was 20/800, which was apparently my being able to see at twenty feet what a 20/20 person would see at 800 feet. That is, not much. In those days, I think glasses were still literally made of glass, and mine were thick and ugly, since only the most unattractive frames were thick enough to fit my prescription.

However, my vision was corrected to a sufficient degree to allow a lifetime of wonders...three advanced degrees, ten years working at a newsmagazine, living and travelling to the U.K. and elsewhere in Europe. I have visually taken in everything from Georgia O'Keefe's beloved northern New Mexico mountains to Herbert Howells's stone at Westminster Abbey, Lake Superior to the Scottish highlands. I have sight read complex choral and organ music. I have painted in oils, mixed colors, and taught color theory. I have driven automobiles for over 45 years without accident. Just navigating the first hour of any day of the year (walking around a house, making breakfast, reading emails, watching the news) would be impossible without my glasses.

From time to time, I think of what my life would have been like prior to twentieth century glasses. The fact is, I probably would have been literally "discarded" by my parents, whether they were poor or rich. If I had been poor, I would not have been able to safely do almost any moving around, much less manual labor, indoors or outdoors. While I certainly could have borne children, I could not have raised them, unable to see in any detail what they were doing or where they were. I couldn't have cooked over fires or sewn or picked herbs. If I had been born in the upper crust, I would not have been considered good social and dynastic material, being unable to see people's faces enough to function socially. I would not have been able to supervise the running of my household, walk unaided around my house, arrange social events, or be any kind of real world asset to my husband. Not surprisingly, the only milieu that I think I might have thrived in is a convent, seeing as I memorize music so easily. Gregorian chant would have been a cinch, as would prayers and Bible readings once I heard them a few times. A religious community might also have had the patience to find out what I was good at (and assign a scribe to write out all my deep thoughts!) So it would have been the nunnery if I had been lucky, being thrown off a cliff if I wasn't.

Seven or eight years ago, a number of important things happened. I went through menopause. I went through bankruptcy. I remembered that I loved English church music. And my eyesight started to improve. My current eyeglasses, bought five years ago, were an even weaker prescription. However, about three years ago, I realized that something was going on again with my eyesight, and the combination of my old fears of going blind, unbelievably low income, and using what little income I had to take trips to England, prevented me from going for an eye exam and getting new glasses. By last week, the lenses on this pair were so scratched and buffed, I couldn't see much of anything at all and I knew I could put it off no longer. Yesterday, the eye doctor told me that my baseline eyesight has improved significantly -- my problems seeing small print and distant signs is due to a prescription that is now far too strong! After he patiently recommended yearly eye exams, I chose new (light, attractive) frames and cannot wait to see properly again.

I agree with Louise Hay's and Esther Hicks's perspectives on health issues, that all of them stem from a spiritual source (and like Hay, I think there is usually a symbolic link -- heart problems to love, back problems to things you cannot bear, etc.) So I find it not only interesting, but validating, to consider that at a point in my life when I just could not stand to look at things that were hard, unfair and inexplicable, my eyesight worsened. Now, after a seven-year process of facing the past, feeling the old feelings, and making up a little for lost time in the area of church music, my eyesight has significantly improved! No eye exercises, vitamins or special foods, just becoming more whole. I'm not really surprised, yet it still stuns me that one's physical body can improve in any way at my age. 

Like most people, I have often taken my eyesight for granted or have lamented its imperfections. But I'm not sure I can ever be so cavalier again. My eyes are a marvel and a miracle, and the loving, creative divine force that made them is awesome. And here's a shout-out, too, to all the scientists, doctors and technicians who make modern eyeglasses possible. Even with my improved vision, I'd be unable to function without you. 

The calling

There was something about Duluth back in the nineties, and there is something today as I hang upside down to dry, that continues to encourage this mystic to simply be herself. 

Of course, back then, I was reluctant to call myself a mystic, and when I did, I did so self-deprecatingly, or half-jokingly ("I'm a wandering mystic, ha-ha.") And have I ever wandered, as most of you know. A friend forwarded me an article recently indicating that homelessness has been a factor for several noted mystics, and of course even anchoresses and nuns don't usually have homes in the usual sense. "Home" for committed mystics is less a physical place than a connection with the divine, however it is defined. Home is a feeling of unity with divine Love. Home is in our invisible and ever-changing relationship to All-that-is. 

But most of society's definitions in this area are so colored by traditional notions of a transcendent God that I have to be a little skeptical. I don't think continual physical wandering or unsettledness or lack of groundedness is absolutely necessary to this calling. Yes, I am in such personal energetic disunity with our economic system that it is almost torture to engage with it, making "settling down" difficult. Yes, that makes me appear nonfunctional, and literally makes it a miracle that I am still alive. But rather than see an economy as the measuring stick for functionality, I'm starting to realize that "being myself" has always been my guide. "Being true to myself" is my home. And even more than that, "being true to the Divine Feminine" is my reason for being. From that standpoint, I suppose I have never wandered at all, and have been richer than I know.

What I think may be changing right now is my willingness to just simply call myself a mystic. As people recommend art activities and music activities, and as I become aware of local jobs and educational and living resources, I just need to remember that the truth of my reality is not "in" them, it is in me. For that matter, it is not "in" a cathedral or lake or landscape or person or institution or activity, even singing choral evensong. I am a mystic, first and foremost. That, along with my deep need for beauty, is the common thread running through everything I love and am good at. I'm ready to sign the word "mystic" on forms or applications. I'm ready to be a "resident mystic" in some setting that specifically needs me and my unique wisdom. I am ready to be a strong, rooted mystic, whether it is ultimately here or in England or elsewhere. It's time to accept my calling, embrace my calling, and see it as an asset and a form of power, not an embarrassment. I've come so close to doing it before, but backed away. I think finally now it will stick.

A New Creature

Having seen any number of butterflies over this last week on the shores of Lake Superior, I am reminded again of Martha Beck's riff on butterflies (see her blog "Growing Wings: The Power of Change"). A caterpillar doesn't just walk along, decide to grow wings, and then fly away. It is a far more complex process involving hanging upside down, becoming a chrysalis, having its innards turn to goo, then finally transforming into an entirely new, winged creature. Once the butterfly is well-formed enough to slough off its delicate skin, it continues to hang upside down while its wings dry and it acclimates to its new form and environment. It takes some time before it is ready to fly.

Your metaphor queen is resonating with this right now. I am not sure which side of the line I am on -- chrysalis "goo" or brand new butterfly hanging out to dry. In a sense, like a baby nearly born and baby just born, they are effectively one and the same. More than ever, my past and my former creative vehicles are just "goo," and I'm hanging upside down waiting to see how it all, literally, unfolds and solidifies. My new/old city is spread out before me, active in all its mid-summer glory, but I am not ready to fully explore or even to take it in visually. I am relying on my other senses, noticing when the wind shifts and the temperature drops twenty degrees, the smell of the lake contrasting with the dry grass, the sounds of airplanes, bridge horns and birds, and the aroma of wildflowers. 

There is only one thing clear to me; this new creature's main purpose will be to tell her story, only in a new way. My blog will continue for now, chronicling my process, but I sense that old-fashioned typing out of words, and pulling out of oil paints and brushes, and musical scores to sing from, may just be too bulky for this butterfly. Some form of expression, light, powerful and unified, is percolating. Until it has fully brewed, I'm just hanging out, thankful to be where I am.

PS: For some reason, each time I read my sentence above, "your metaphor queen is resonating with this," I seem to be seeing the word "resounding." And heck, maybe that is true too.

Going Back

For most of my journey, I have tried to avoid "going back," at least in any literal sense. When I was doing a lot of driving across country, if I missed an exit on the highway, I just kept going. I haven't felt led to attend many college reunions ("re-live the fun times of the '70s!") or to move somewhere just because I lived there before. However, I have "gone back" -- to the east coast, to England -- usually with a specific goal in mind. Life is a series of crisscrosses and spirals, and it's my linear, left-brained self that may be trying so hard to avoid duplication.

And in this blog, I have rarely made specific reference to place, probably because the three years since starting it have been so constantly transitional. I've identified places I love, such as King's College, Cambridge and Westminster Abbey but not the places in-between. It may be a measure of how non-transitional I hope this step will be, and how much I love this area, that I say that I have "come back" to Duluth, Minnesota, where I lived in the nineties and about which I wrote back in October. 

There is no question that my experience here will not be the same as my experience twenty to thirty years ago. The place has both changed and not changed. The same is true with me. I won't lie -- there is a part of me still wishing that I could have figured out that ideal existence in London. I don't think in this lifetime I will ever get over my intense feeling of exile. But two months ago after my dad's death, I found myself mulling over that sense of love being reciprocated. What place had its metaphorical arms open to me? What place was big enough for me to "rise rooted" (to use Sharon Blackie's term)? Where was the ideal place for me to bring together a life experience as varied as mine? Where might I be most uninhibitedly creative? I think I could literally feel the welcoming waters of Lake Superior beckoning. After all these water, beach and harbor metaphors, a literal harbor.

I went swimming in the lake two days ago. Well, swimming is a bit of a misnomer for the dunking and splashing around that I did. It was cold, but not unbearably so. I rejoiced that I was still alive to feel these waters baptizing me. Later that day, I played C. H. H. Parry's "I was glad" at full volume. I guess I have covered all my bases. I will slowly but surely rise, and, in "going back," move forward.

A Trip

All my metaphors look like they are in the process of breaking down. After about two weeks of travel, I've made my way to a new safe harbor (which I will talk about more in future posts) but in a sense, I expect this period of my life to be far more fluid than the last, far more a case of "flowing in the stream of life while rooted." Paradox. Agh! Worse than metaphor, but it seems to be the backbone of my life experience.

It took two weeks to reach my destination, and it's a marvel, in retrospect, that the trip went so very smoothly. It involved cars, buses and trains. It involved one friend handing me to another, handing me to another, and so forth, with several angelic bus drivers and train conductors and fellow passengers thrown in for good measure. Yes, one four-hour layover morphed into a four-minute one, and there was a super stressful connection-making, careening-down-the-platform moment, but all in all, it was a satisfying and smooth journey. I am thankful to say, it feels right. Leaving the east coast, sloughing off a lot of figurative baggage, and putting my feet on solid ground that feels richer and more supportive of growth -- it is, as they say, "all good." 

I am exhausted, though. Truly, if you had asked me almost any moment of the last two weeks if I had the energy to take even one more step, I would have said, "no." I don't know whether it is the 62 effect, the "having moved one too many times" effect, the "death in the family" effect, or all of the above. It may take some time to bring body and soul back into alignment. And I have no idea whatsoever what life from this point on will look like. But I guess my message to my fellow 62-ers is, if there is a trip you need to take, and you don't think you have the energy to do it, just buy the ticket, get as much help as you can, then take that first step. You'll land somewhere new, and as you always have, you'll do your best. We have all done our best all along, and I am proud of myself and of all of us.

Rootedness

This notion of rootedness has, ahem, "taken hold," even as I metaphorically start to make my way by boat down the new stretch of river. It is particularly poignant as I spend a few days in my hometown.

You know how it is, people blithely ask, "Where are you from?" What I think they mean is, "where do you live?" I usually tell them where I was born, then say, I've lived several dozen places, most recently "X," kind of thing. But right now, I am looking at the landscape of where I am literally from, and it continues to mystify me how foreign it seems. I think it did when I was a child as well. I do not feel a sense of rootedness here now, nor did I then. I watched a British show on PBS last night, and was struck once again by how a landscape on television or an online photograph grabs me as "home" far more than being feet-on-the-ground in America's northeast. But for the moment, I am letting go of this, not as I did thirty-five years ago in a snarky, irritated way, but more in a tired, "I'm 62 and have the scars to prove it" kind of way. I'm heading for the one place that I think this battered but proud American female pioneer in the field of English church music can find the space to creatively express her passions and experiences, every single one of them.

Yesterday, I picked some black raspberries at a friend's house. I've learned to look beneath the canopy of leaves; all the ripe, luscious berries seem to cluster under the horizontal green camouflage You have to lean over and peer up from below to find the best ones. I continue to trust that this same kind of "looking at life from an unexpected perspective" thing will reap a bountiful harvest for me, too.

From the road

Just two quick notes from the road. 

I really, really recommend a little prayer or affirmation before each day, giving thanks in advance for safe and smooth travel. Yesterday, not only for about two safe hours in cars, but also being one of literally a small handful of riders on one cool intercity bus; the second bus was full, but mysteriously, even though I was one of the last ones on, I got two seats to myself near the front without elbowing people aside or anything! Grateful, grateful.

Secondly, I have this observation, having seen a large swath of the northeast in one day; if human beings were to disappear from the scene tomorrow, I estimate that it would take a mere decade or two for every last trace of humanity to be covered over by trees and plants. It seems to me that every single roadside was far more densely "tree-y" than I ever remember, and plants and weeds are encroaching on roads. Probably less money is being spent on grass-mowing, giving nature a chance...

I'm in a wonderful temporary "harbor" and like everyone, trying to stay cool. Have a safe fourth, and keep the fireworks at a distance (in every respect)!