Walker's gone now.

Oh my Walker’s gone, my Walker’s gone and how it hurts me through and through. The love that he has given me for so many years is at an end now, and I’ll have to be content with my memories for the future. The feel of his silky fur, the shape of his body as I rub his back, the big hips, his curved spine; I’ll forget them all in time. The look of his eyes, his connection to me, is already a little hard to remember. For the past few weeks his gaze has been clouded by illness.

This is what it means to love – not endless joy, but joy with an end. To love is to love for a time only. I have loved other people and pets before, but right now I am in the middle of losing this one, this love. It seems like the worst loss and I know it will be hard for the near future.

There is some thankfulness in me though. I am thankful that his suffering isn’t going on as ill as he was. I’m thankful that our connection was a good, deep connection. We bonded so tightly and he looked to me as I looked to him for companionship and love. I’m thankful that we spent much of the last two weeks of his life at home with him. I’m thankful that the saline solution re-hydrated him enough to make him more alert for one final day. I’m so glad that his last hour and a half was spent on the couch with me where he wasn’t supposed to be, but where he so loved to be. I'm thankful that when death came it took him swiftly. And I’m grateful that I was touching him and calming him during his final brief struggle. I hope it helped to lessen his confusion and fear.

I’d give anything to think that his spirit is prancing free somewhere right now, sniffing and trotting, the way he did with his toenails clicking on the pavement, ears flopping and a little sideways in the rear end. It seems unbelievably foolish to think of his silky, furry ghost in the room with me, nuzzling my arm or maybe just standing patiently beside me as he would do for a moment before checking out some nearby attraction. God it’s crazy what the mind in mourning will come up with in an attempt to provide comfort. Maybe these fantasies are the way I’ll make the memories that I carry with me into the future. Maybe I need to make a few more Walker memories to wean me off of his companionship.

I’m going to bury him under the locust tree tomorrow. Even though we don’t really plan to stay in this house for too many more years, this house was his home for most of his life. Our back yard was his territory. It’s right that he should go into the ground here. This spring when the trees leaf out and bloom, we’ll have some of him back in those beautiful pink blossoms. I’m going to sit out there under that tree and think about him. And who knows where our future lies anyway? Maybe we will be here for a while.

In the meantime, there’ll, be no more pills in the mornings, no more infected ears to clean, no more monitoring of diet and stools, no more worry about costly foods and treatments. From this moment forward my time with Walker will be only about love. And god how I love that boy of mine.

Youtube ate my bluetooth!

Reflecting on life during a rainy pre-dawn moment

Well, opportunities come and go, don't they? One closes up and just as you begin moving forward again another falls into your lap. Maybe that's what keeps life fresh as we age - that constant movement forward through time and circumstance.

I just finished a huge project that took me away from much of my life for four months. I don't want to do that again. After finishing up last Sunday I took another entire week to just catch my breath and begin to relax. Now that we have had rain all weekend and I have been forced to spend most of that time in doors at home, I am feeling more like myself. I feel a peace that should come with this time of the day. A bird is singing beautifully in the dark outside my window. The potatoes and the lettuce and the locust tree and the lavender in my garden are all growing and waiting quietly for daybreak and a slim chance of some sunshine.

The things that have happened to me over the past decade should have broken me. I should have been pulled into many small pieces, or at least have been lost to eternal aimless drifting. Instead I feel a firm grounding that runs through me from my head to my feet. For the first time in my life I know what that grounding is and what it has always been. It is the people who love me. It is the people in my life who no matter what have my back and do not shrink from my experience of life.

The knowledge that a corps of family and friends supports my existance is deeply satisfying. This knowledge sits in my belly, in my soul, and it is a warm lump of love that keeps my humanity thawed out, prevents me from freezing over and cracking apart. The older I get the more I need that love and the more I can sense it. I can feel it right now even though every person who makes up that love is probably asleep and only one of those sleepers is here with me now.

No one should ever have to live a life without this kind of connection to the rest of humanity. No one who has it should die before they can identify it and put a name to it. It means something. No, it means totally everything.

When you're faced with occassions to lie, cheat, use the people near you, you must decide whether you should risk it. The immediate gain is visible and perhaps there does not seem to be any real reason to be honest, good, truthful. Well, this is the reason. Preserve your grounding. Cultivate a network of love that will keep you alive through your life.

Pow Wow 2011 St. Louis, MO

It feels like spring has sprung

As the trees and shrubs begin to leaf out and flower, the back yard has become a bird haven once again. This morning as I sit out with my coffee I can hear the drumming of a woodpecker across the alley. Doves are cooing as they hunt for seeds under the hanging bird feeders. The house finches are perching and flitting in the purple robe locust tree. The females are drab brown but the males have a bright red cap and when they fly off you get a flash of red from under the wings. I didn't notice these finches in the back yard uuntil this past summer, but now we have four pairs visiting our feeders. We also have purple finches coming around ocassionally.

A family of starlings has returned to their perennial home in the neighbor's attic. They go in and out of the attic between the bricks that make up the attic vent screen. One of the bricks has a chip in it and they can just squeeze through there. The male is perched at his front door right now and is going through his song repertoire. I always think of the movie Serial Mom when I see starlings. I know it is silly, but it is memerable. Beverley has a favorite starling she calls Dee Dee.

The English weavers are checking the feeders - they are nearly empty - and a robin just lit in the arborvitae. I haven't seen the cardinals yet today. A pair lives in a large honeysuckle bush behind the nearby apartment building and they will no doubt be here soon.

Just two days ago I came home from work and stretched out in the hammock to read. I was engrossed in My Life as an Indian until a frantic flapping sound caught my attention. At the same time I noticed the general bird population of the back yard scattering and heard Dudley (the rooster) screech his warning cry to the hens. I looked up in time to see a pigeon flying across the yard as fast as he could go. I barely had time to register what was going on when a peregrine falcon, wings locked, streaked across my field of vision in pursuit of the pigeon.

I have read about the peregrine's great speed and diving attacks but have never had the privilege of seeing it before. It was awesome. She came in at the bottom of her dive looking looking like a jet fighter - wings held stationary with one wing up and the other down at about 30 degrees to horizontal. It was all over in the blink of an eye.

Peregrines were revered by the ancient Native Americans who lived around St. Louis. Their art includes images of warriors with the eye markings of a peregrine. The markings, or "eye surround" in these pictures is stylized but the reference is unmistakable. Perhaps Mississippian warriors wore this symbol as a reference to the peregrine's great speed and power in attack. By the way, the pigeon got away this time.

Time and changes

I've been thinking a lot lately about why I am here; why my life is going in this particular direction. I started out so excited and full of drive. I was going to conquer the world. Somewhere I just got off track. I've come to the conclusion that I may have paid too high a price for my education.

Working in that factory really killed my soul. I took the job to save money for college. I knew I could make the life I wanted if I could just get the degree. Well, I hunkered down there and went to work everyday. The bastards did exactly what I knew they would. As soon as they found out I was gay they proceeded to eat me alive. I was boxed in. I couldn't defend myself or I would lose my job. Losing the job meant giving up the dream and starting over somewhere else - different place, same story. So I just sucked it up and kept my mouth shut and went through three years of total hell. Some days I wanted to blow the whole fucking factory up. Some days I didn't want to be alive. I ended up being numb.

I got through it. I got the degree. I got into grad school. Then it all fell apart. I couldn't sleep; I couldn't focus. I couldn't study, I couldn't get any happiness. I tried everything I could to get through. Now I know. Post traumatic stress or something like it is still gripping my life. I still can't sleep. I haven't done so many of the things I should have done over the past few years. I can't take care of my finances properly. I can't go to bed at night. I can't get up in the morning. my best laid plans molder unfinished in a pile in the corner of the room. I am so fucking miserable of being miserable. I really need to get some relief.

Now that the crushing depression of being cast out of the graduate program has lifted I am beginning to catch my breath. During the past several months I began to feel alive again. However, at the same time I have started acting out in other unacceptable ways; in ways that are not matching my vision of my own life. It is all coming back to those years in that factory. Within a month of being hired I knew that it was a bad place for me. I went ahead and rolled the dice. I believed it was the best option I had at the time and maybe it really was. Who knows; but I'm still paying for it.

I must get control of this situation and take my life back to the path I know I must walk. I want peace. I want fulfillment. I want rest and happiness. I think I need to find a therapist.

Jon's point

Ceramics and the psyche

I have been admiring and collecting ceramic vessels for a long time now. If I open the definition of 'ceramic vessel' up enough to include cheap ceramic statues from discount stores I would say that I have been admiring and collecting them since childhood. I was visiting with an old friend this afternoon and discovered that she is now, in her retirement, a potter. One thing lead to another and I was inspired to photograph most of my collection and put it online for her to view. Since she is so enthusiastic on the subject I was hoping that she would enjoy looking at my pictures as I enjoy looking at the pots.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/abbottsvcs/sets/72157623925266635/

I have always considered my aquisitions carefully but the process has often been agonizing because I have been unable to decide EXACTLY which features of the vessels I am most drawn to. I have long been aware that I like simple forms, more earthy colors (especially browns), and things that look somewhat rustic. When I studied Asian art history the Japanese aesthetic of wabi-sabi really resonated with me because of the twin objectives of simplicity and rusticity. In addition, I am drawn to these qualities because they represent to me the opposite of trendy, mass-produced consumer goods. They convey feelings of permanence and connection with the earth. Brightly colored artifacts, plastics, faddish designs all remind me that our time here is short and I am not inspired to collect such things.

In the course of arranging these pictures on the web page I experienced an unexpected realization: most of my pottery is either brown or blue, but the ones that provoke a strong emotional response in me have both brown and blue colors in the glaze. I went back through the pictures and, sure enough, my favorites all have the two colors. For some pieces, one color was dominant and the other was only barely visible on a small portion of the pot. On closer inspection, it turns out that a full 60% of the ceramics I photographed have some combination of blue and brown!

Several of the items in my collection do not at first glance fit with the more serious art studio-produced pieces. These include some inexpensive "decorator" ceramics that I purchased from department stores and junk shops, a pair of small free-form dishes with very fancy glaze treatments that I purchased from a gallery while I was in my 20's, and a small dime store reproduction of a Tang Dynasty horse sculpture that belonged to my grandmother. As I was photographing these items I was wondering how I could incorporate them into the web page with the more artistic works.

As I reviewed the slides I came to the conclusion that the blue/ brown combination must be the main organizing principle of my collecting impulse. Perhaps these colors are even more important for me than the actual artifacts. Why else would I place such different ceramics into one collection?

I know that serious collectors do not include department store merchandise in their collections but I have consciously made an exception for these few items. They have the blue and brown combination and their simple but sophisticated forms make them beautiful to me.

The small free-form dishes differ from the rest of the collection because their crystalline glaze is anything but rustic. The glittery starburst patterns of the glaze were what drew me to them when I was a young man but now I find them garish. Even so, I have kept them around. Apparently the color combination does something for me that outweights the glaze.

The Tang horse belonged to my grandmother and I remember being in love with it as a child. I would stare at it whenever we would visit. After she died the little statue made its way to me and I have treasured it ever since as a keepsake to remind me of her. I photographed it and put it on the web page, but I felt a bit sheepish about including it until I saw it through new eyes: beautiful, nonsensical blue splotches on a brown horse!

I remember as a 7 year old that it was those blue spots on the brown that seemed so marvelous. Thirty-five years later I am still being provoked and soothed by those same colors. As much as my tastes have changed over the years, there is still this thread of continuity.

I just Googled "blue and brown psychology" and came to a page that discusses the meanings and symbolisms of colors: http://www.squidoo.com/colorexpert.
According to this source, blue is calming, cooling, trustworthy and dependable. Brown is stable, reliable, wholesome and connected with the earth. Maybe its a bunch of hooey, but when I look at these pots I relax, I exhale, and I often smile - even when I'm alone. In my turbulent life is it really so farfetched that ceramics incorporating both colors have a beneficial effect on me?

Since a few of my ceramics also have splashes of green or orange I thought it would be fun to see what the web page has to say about those colors. Green is relaxing, refreshing and harmonious. Orange stimulates activity and radiates energy and warmth. Perhaps this gives my collection some variety. I also have several white pieces. White brings purity and mental clarity.

So what about the colors that do not figure significantly in my collection? Yellow stimulates the nervous system; red encourages action and stimulates energy; purple uplifts and offers a sense of spirituality; black is authoritative and powerful.

When I have chosen pots in the past I have done so carefully, feeling around for how the pot matches my feelings, for lack of a clearer explanation. I think this means that I have been using my pottery collection as a psychological aid, a form of therapy. Since I have so consistently chosen the blue and the brown, apparently the goal of that therapy is to relax and ground me. I have not chosen colors that would excite or motivate me to go forth and conquer the world.

Interesting thread...

John Shore recently posted to his blog titled;
Christians; when it comes to homosexuality, man up
http://johnshore.com/2010/03/13/christians-when-it-comes-to-homosexuality-man-up/
The article has called up some old memories and I have organized some of my thoughts on the topic in my response to this post. I copied and pasted my comments below, complete with typos!

I read this post with great interest and have followed the comments for the past few days. I was originally impressed with the dispassionate tone of the post and with the level, calm comments that came in during the first couple of days. Some of the later ones are a bit charged, but I guess that is to be expected.

I grew up Pentecostal, dad was a preacher, I played the piano for several years. I struggled with same sex attraction from the time of my earliest memories. As an adolescent and teenager I would fast for days at a time, spend hours prostrate in prayer, basically droving myself into a neurotic state over my inability to be attracted to women and to avoid looking at men. Two things saved me from total self destruction.

1. My mother caught me masturbating one day and since I knew it was a sin, I thought I was in big trouble. She just smiled, said, "Well, it won't kill you", and left the room. That told me that some actions can be considered sins but are still a normal part of growing up.

2. When I was 15 years old I confided my problem with a man in the church who was in his 60's. I trusted this man and during a prayer service I approached him and asked for a confidential discussion. I revealed my problem to him through my tears and his response blew me away. He said that he too had struggled with the same thing for his entire life. He said he didn't have any answers about how to deal with it. He said he could only tell me one thing - never forget that Jesus loves you; no matter what you are going through Jesus' love for you is more powerful than that. We prayed together for a while and I thanked him and we never spoke about it again.

I learned several things from this encounter. The first thing was that, quite apart from what I had been told about gay people previous to this event, they were not all predators out for a bit of anonymous sex. This man never touched me except with a brotherly hug (very common in our church), never acted inappropriate in any way, and never made me feel uncomfortable before or after our discussion. I learned that someone I trusted as a prayer warrior was actually gay AND on fire for God (as we called it in our congregation).

The final lesson really troubled me though. I got my first hint that reconcilling the teachings of my religion with my soul might take longer than I was expecting. Indeed, God never did deliver me from homosexuality. I ended up flat on my back in bed a few years later, crying for three days, praying for God to save me or take my life. It seems so ridiculous now, but it became impossible to live an honest life in that state of conflict, and I was not willing to live a dishonest life. During the evening of that last day I realized that I was hyperventilating and I came to my senses. I thought this is just too stupid. I have to get up and get on with my life. No God worth his salt would mandate this kind of BS for someone like me who has never touched a cigarette, drink, or drugs, reads the bible daily, tries really hard to be a good person, etc.

I prayed my last prayer of the day then. I prayed something like this: 'God I have done all I know to do. You have not answered so maybe I'm not praying for the right thing. Maybe I need to take control of my life and see if you can meet me there. I'm going to find a gay bar and one way or another I'm going to have sex with a man. If that satisfies my desires and curiosity then I'll come back and pray, and hope that you forgive me then. If I really am a homosexual I'll just see you when I see you.'

I did have sex with a man that night and it connected me to a part of my soul that I had been trying to kill for so many years, It wasn't the sex; it was the intimacy. I didn't think of my actions that night as a leaf of faith, I felt like I was abandoning God, albeit a god with whom I was no longer able to connect. I have since come to see my decision differently. I was totally stepping out in faith. I made that decision hoping, but not knowing, that it was the right one. I had faith that I could live through it and come out better on the other side.

I am so happy that I did not take the route that so many young people in that situation take - suicide. My will to live was too strong I suppose.

That was about 1988. I have since found God in my life. I don't find much meaning in the Biblical proscriptions to not do this or to do that. Life is not so simple that any code or book can ever be the final answer for all people at all times. That's such a childish and unlived approach. The Brother's advice from my church has carried me for many years beyond his own death. I don't believe in angels as real supernatural beings but his words to me have lingered in my ears for almost 30 years like my own guiding angel. I can still feel his arm around me and his whispered words "Never forget that Jesus loves you." I can't help but cry now as I write this because his tenderness and understanding (that should have come from my father but didn't) still sustains my spirit in hard times.

I don't know what it all means. I don't even know if there is a real god. I do pray to him from time to time but I trust in my own self now and give God thanks when I feel its necessary.

As I have read some of these long winded comments that appear to have been written by divinity students I have thought back to a scripture I remember from church as a child. I can't recite it word for word anymore, but it says trust no in thine own understanding.

You might have it all worked out on paper, but human experience trumps logic every time. When you have lived a while you'll see. If you have difficulty reconciling homosexuality with God's word I suggest you read the word then put it aside. Talk to a few homosexuals. Give us the benefit of a doubt. You may get all worked up when you hear about the gay agenda, etc., etc., but we are the ones living with these issues day in and day out. We are the ones working this out in our hearts and through our blood and tears. You might pray for us and think about us, but we are praying through our gay souls and trying to reach god. Stop talking and listen for a while. You might learn something new.

Is homosexuality a sin? When you live it, the actual question becomes a triviality, a single dimensional proposition that stands in for millions of real humans, real lives, real humanity.

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