The year is 1967, and I am surreptitiously carving quotes from John Kerouac's On the Road into the school desk while the teacher drones on. Many things have been carved into the desk before, but not by me. It is, however, the end of my senior year, and it is now or never. Now or never not just for carving words into the desk, but for breaking away, for going On the Road, for defying convention, for being a writer. But how can I write, without writing about sex and longing, feelings and hating, loneliness, and passion? And how can I write about those things, knowing that my parents will read them? No, I think, I don't have the guts. I will never be a writer. I will just go home, and eat scrambled eggs for breakfast.
Flash forward:
I have just had my sixtieth birthday, and I am now writing a blog. Judging by the reactions of my readers (friends and family), I'm not that good at getting my point across. Maybe not becoming a writer was a good decision after all. Still, I'm convinced that there is some universality to what I am trying to say, and that the story of my life is not so different from other people's stories. I want to talk about my view of what the things are that are really important and what the things are that matter.
Thus the blog about shoes wasn't really about shoes, it was about these things: that feeling happy about something doesn't depend on whether or not it is expensive (t-shirt vs. expensive shoes) or whether you are old or young (flashback vs. flash forward) but on your attitude that the particular thing is a treat, or a good buy, or a luxury, or just something that you wanted. It's also about making the best of a bad situation (wearing hand-me-downs or needing to wear orthodics) to the point where you see it as a good situation. So it's about relativity, but also about longing, and longing fulfilled (the nice shoes), and longing that will never be fulfilled (wearing high heels again).
The blog about Halloween may have sounded like a lot of venting, and in a way maybe it was, but it was also about this: that even when you feel low and discouraged, you can suddenly feel again that kind of pure happiness that you felt in childhood. I tried to honestly describe my low not to get pity, but to try to make the point stronger that you can be feeling pretty low and discouraged, but still experience that pleasure of just feeling happy. It's harder, in a way, to describe the happiness. Do I flash forward to fireworks as a symbol for passion? Do I come out and say that I know a thousand things may be going wrong in my life, and I understand that a thousand things may be going wrong in your life, but let's all try to get past that and just feel good when we get the chance, and try to appreciate each other? Do I just come out and say that rather than trying to say it through a story?
What do you do if you can't write like F. Scott Fitzgerald? How do you describe the fact that incredible pain and incredible happiness sometimes go hand in hand. How do you say that sometimes something that might be viewed as sorrowful isn't all that bad, and that something that society seems to view as a good thing isn't so good for you.
My view of life may be naive, because I've never lived through a sorrow that was so horrific that it crushed my very soul. Yet, my observation of knowing people who have lived through such sorrow is that they survived by actively seeking out and appreciating what remained in their lives that was good and beautiful in the truest sense. My Grandmother grew up in poverty, fled persecution, worked in sweatshops, was widowed at 46, and then lost a 23 year old son in World War II. Yet she was truly happy being with her family or good friends. She loved having her grandchildren visit. She was always ready with a cake in the freezer in case company dropped in.
It follows that my Dad lost his Dad as a teenager, and his brother shortly after that. My mother also lost her mother when she was a teenager. Both of my parents grew up in poverty. Yet their smiles when we went on a picnic, or a day at the beach, were filled with joy. They appreciated the prosperity that let them have a comfortable home, clothes, plenty to eat, now and then a day or a week at the beach, and bicycles for the kids. My mom loved to swim. My Dad played catch with us in the back yard. They had lived through a lot, but their love of life, and their joy in their family gave them so much.
My Aunt Nettie never had financial problems, but she married late, and never had children. She had been a teacher, and she loved children, and she must have longed for a family of her own. Instead, she took that love and she spread it around to all of her nieces and her nephews. She came for visits, and I though of her as the maternal Grandmother I had never met. When she was gone, and I was an adult, I met an adult from our congregation that at best would be categorized as "slow", though I never knew the real diagnosis. She told me that my Aunt Nettie had befriended their family, and had given her a confirmation present. In tribute to Aunt Nettie I befriended her too.
Her name was Emily, and she inspired me. She was slow, and annoyed people, she needed social workers, and suffered from paranoia. Despite that, or maybe because of it, she appreciated any little kindness that anyone showed her. At first, we drove her to the bus so she could have a day at the beach. Then, when that bus stopped, we took her to the beach now and then. Finally, we took her once a year to Elizabeth Park, had her over for some holidays, and drove her now and then to services. She wrote a thank you note for every ride and every outing, no matter how small. She never forgot a hostess gift. She enjoyed life whenever she had the chance, as narrow as her life was.
I feel humbled to have known such courageous people. They were not rich or famous, well-educated or well-known. But, in my opinion, they lived life brilliantly. They knew who they were, and what mattered to them. They never apologized for who they were or for who they weren't. They appreciated sunshine and fresh air, being with friends and playing with children, praying and celebrating. They complained, they got angry, they had frustrations, they mourned. But in the end, to me, their overriding quality was an unabashed love of life.
I once thought that you could only write about life if you could somehow write simultaneously in a thousand different colors, to capture the richness and the nuance in every situation. I want to try to write like that. I am now sixty, if I am going to do it ever, I must do it now.
I think I will continue to blog. I am, at last, an author.
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