Far From The Madness of Crowds
Friday, March 26Ð
9:30 p.m.-
Went outside looking for EZ. She was sitting in the dark yard gazing away through the night woods, then looked up at me as I stopped by her side. We watched the moon and listened to the quiet, the dark, dogs barking far off. I recalled the ride she and I took in December, north up past Farmdale. It found us, for an hour or two, out there in the midst of distant wilderness, far beyond civilization and noise and electrical pleasure. All we had was the truck and its heater in fifteen-degree darkness, and the introspections that edge in when I am detached from the diversions and ease of domestic indulgences purchased day to day.
I thought, "my soul needs times like this, being reminded what reality looks like far away from rock radio and casinos, and the distortions of pleasure-chase as the all-of-it purpose of life."
That sort of experience raises its cymbals and clangs them near the ear. Ten miles from another human, twenty-five miles from the cabin, eighteen miles from the nearest town. Town is a hundred miles from the Twin Cities and seventy-five from Duluth. An unexpected symphony plays to the soul out there where it's so solitary. It's not alone. It's solitude. Times are rare to find oneself so removed, far from the madness of crowds.
Back inside the cabin now. I am at peace sitting in this molded plastic chair. My head, six feet from the open door of the fire ... stretched out. Feet inches from the lip of the stove. How peaceful and utterly un-shamed I am to be here. To be doing this. There was a time when I don't think I could've, without feeling like I was letting somebody down. Or hearing ... "this is an irresponsible thing for you to be doing."
The wood I've burned tonight is dry, not sizzling. Come to think of it, it's been here inside for the last four months. So maybe what had once been wet has finally dried.
Hard to imagine something frozen drying out.
Coming here I'm often overwhelmed with the thought, "if this is so necessary for me, there've got to be others in this world, like Yassar Arafat, who would benefit by having times of this sort of solitude. A period of undistraction to let the muse run unimpeded. Nothing elbowing in to short-circuit the unbroken contemplation. Inklings don't come crashing in all at once. Nor are they the point. It's more about fallow periods, allowing the mind to just be. No agendas, no shouting, no demands that you be what you don't want to be, or do. It seems like this world would be a hell of a lot better off if people had times to find themselves in this circumstance. Quiet, no hurry. Nothing to do. Vegetating the mind.
Then listening to what the inner voice had been murmuring just under the surface, but could never be heard over the din. Ponder however you want. Throw out whatever you don't like. Think on it, chew it, swear at it, roll on the floor and laugh at it, then throw it all out if you want. If nothing else you will have had a time when it's okay to throw everything all-the-hell out.
I ache for souls in this world who never ever have silence, who don't know what it can do. To accept the friendly voice they will hear from within if they can only get out and away, to be alone and quiet.
I sound pissed and I guess I am, just a bit. It seems like this is such a right thing. And it ought to be as much common knowledge as the lechery of Bill Clinton. I mean it oughta' be shouted from rooftops and whispered in private. "Have you had a chance in the past several months to be alone and quiet with nothing to do? So you can subdue yourself enough to hear what it is yourself is trying to say?"
Saturday--
9:10 a.m.-
I am watching a tiny spider at the cool end of a chunk of firewood, just loaded into the stove. Zipping back and forth across the cool end of the log, becoming frantic, no where to escape the heat. Why does this bother me so? Why is this so frightening, watching him run from one side to the other, faster and faster as the log begins to heat. He's doomed. Does he know it?
I do.
Now he's right in the center. Must be a hundred degrees where he's at. Now he's beginning to falter. His stride is becoming a bit erratic, slowing down. Now running ... up to the fire side, around back toward the middle ... now up to the top where it's the hottest. How can he still be surviving in there? End of the log is beginning to darken around the cracks. Now he's slowing ... now stopped. Dead? No. There, he's movin' again. I want to put my fingertip in there and squash his torment away. End it. But I might burn myself. Now the flames are grazing the corners at the end of his log. Now he's walking near the edge where the flames are ... now a crippling walk ... now he's, stopped, and going, going in circles now ... stopped, moving again. Now gone into the coals.
Why does that stir mournful melancholy? To not interfere, do nothing but watch a bug circling and running in terror.
"That was something."
Now move on to whatever is more fun. I cross my legs and pick up a book.
9:25-
Refusing through habit and history to use a porta-potty, I still plunge me behind on the shuddering trundling chair with a hole in the middle and a cracked toilet seat on top, which pinches sometimes.
Always able to rid myself of shit more quickly at the woods than at home, especially at night; the pair of eyes reflecting my flashlight beam out there in the woods might not be EZ.
9:40-
I'm reminded again how picking up firewood is like picking up Biblical mana from heaven. God throws down enough firewood for the next day. When there's an especially urgent need He whips up a storm to stir things up and thrash more deadwood down.
Wandering around the clearing lighting a new cigarette to smoke, I realized I hadn't lately seen EZ. I whistled. No response, which tells me she's probably somewhere in the direction of the biffy. When I whistled again, and looked in that direction, here she came with a shit-eating grin. I yelled "NO!" then "kennel." Her idea of "kennel" is anywhere she's not at that moment. She, free to choose, lowers her head and slinks off to lay down somewhere and exhibit a phony show of contrition.
Sunday--
7:55 a.m.-
Laying in bed. Watching back-lighted cigarette smoke arise through a slash of sunlight. Beautiful forms. Brown, bluey Bar Harbor Grey. Rising, the first 8-10 inches is a straight pillar of threads, flat two-dimensional sheets rising smooth. Coppery browns, stormy greys rising, rising. Perpetual motion. Then it breaks and swirls, flattening into a broad haze throughout the room.
11:20 a.m.-
Surrounded in a Bird Chirpery. Redwing blackbirds, Robins and Sparrows and Wrens all around. One of the birds is producing a metallic "clack," like it's tapping a high-tension fence wire with a ballpoint pen.
You know, why is it we have to feel guilty or at blame if relationships don't work out? As though somebody did wrong. Or somebody was evil, or scheming or scurilous. It's amazing when relationships do work out. Why is it when a guy and a gal are no longer together there's a tendency for prigs to investigate which one was the malefactor. Or who did what wrong.
Everything has an expiration date. Library books, salad dressing, laughter, and relationships. And the beating of our heart.
