When push comes to shove

I’ve been taking new routes on my forays about town lately. Well, they’re really not drives about town; they’re short treks around the neighborhood running errands for my elderly companion or, just recently, driving to my friend’s where I’m house sitting.

It maybe grew out of one part irritation in the beginning.

You know how you go to make a right turn on a red light and the street is so narrow you can’t get around the people going straight or making lefts? I had this great idea of taking the side street a block before the light and then turning more easily onto the street that was my destination. In this case, I was turning on Haskell, a very low-traffic neighborhoody-looking street with a small white house on the corner. The house is for sale. It also has a short white picket fence and a narrow white garage. Everything white – not a dot of trim painted green or black. I got kind of enamored by the little house and then noticed another all-white house down the way where even the steps and cinder blocks were painted white. It was another small, older home and I was, in a word, charmed by this short block I began to take toward the major intersection and thoroughfare of Robert Street.

Generally, I’d get to the corner of Robert and Haskell and make a right-hand turn onto the busier street, but today, there was no traffic in either direction, so I scooted across Robert and continued on Haskell.

The reason, generally, that these small side-streets aren’t taken, is that there’s a stop sign on every corner. But today I drove slowly and savored the new view. It was almost as if I’d entered a small town. I noticed the names of the streets at each stop sign and began to enjoy the flavor of the corner at Winslow and the one at Bidwell.

Just before the street dead-ended at Charlton, I saw a skinny elderly man setting his push lawnmower on the curb with a Free sign on it.

I’ve wanted a push lawnmower for a long time. Don’t ask me why.

I drove on by and continued to my friend’s house, fed the cats, did the litter, and wiped up a few anxiety messes on the floor. I walked through the downstairs and then went up, where I had spent two days this week taking a nap on her loveseat while meaning to read in the peace and quiet of an empty house.

I’d slept as if drugged. I kept trying to keep my eyes open and appreciate my chance to read undisturbed, but my body simply would not cooperate. It was a woozy sleep that felt tremendously deep even though I felt as if I’d been wakeful enough to keep trying to open my eyes. But today was the first time I’d been by in the early part of day, (it’s my day off), and I ended up passing on the couch and its invitation to sleep if not read.

I headed home.

I had already driven past Haskell as I started off going my more usual route on auto-pilot, when I started thinking about that push lawnmower and doubled back.

From the opposite side of the street I saw it had mint green handlebars and a yellow blade. I kept straining to see how rusty the blade was, and finally got out of the car. On closer observation, the yellow blades were speckled with orange spots of rust and I turned around, even though I could see grass in the blades and a narrow swath where the man had cut a little as a demonstration. I got back in my car, but I hesitated.

Haven’t you always wanted one, I asked myself? The Free sign, written on a piece of typing paper, and taped between the handlebars with their black rubber grips, waved in the breeze. The sun shown. I told myself that Donny would call it a piece of junk, look at me over his glasses, and ask me when I was going to cut the grass. I asked myself, “Do you really plan to cut the grass?”

Then I got out of the car as if it was inevitable. I mouthed a thank you toward the windows where I imagined the old man watching, then wheeled the thing across the street. Already in love with it, I hefted it into the back of the Cruiser and the grass fell from the blades. Some maneuvering was required before I could get the trunk to close. The Free sign, hanging from the handlebars, waved jauntily over the back seat.

When I got home I forgot it was there and didn’t take it out until coming home with Henry later in the afternoon with the handlebars resting not too far from his head in his car seat. I told him he could help Grandpa cut the grass and he was eager. Grandpa came out the door as I took it from the trunk and seeing the sign asked, “Where did you get that for free? These sell for $75.” The neighbor, Mr. Mooney was out, and he said, “I might have to get one of those.” I wasn’t totally sure if they were kidding me or not as Henry and I attempted to push the thing. We weren’t doing so good. Donny got behind the bars and made a visible path, like shoveling through the snow. Then it started to rain and we left the poor old girl there in the grass. Tomorrow I’ll find her a home in the garage.

I never did tell him I got my push mower on Haskell Street.

Tellers of Time

Went to a church festival yesterday. Any of you do that? Or remember them? Raffles, games of chance, bake sales, a familiar face or two from the past? I bought an Oliver Towne book circa 1958 for me and six books for Henry (most on fish – “Finding Nemo” instilled an avid interest); small yellow and orange rooster salt and pepper shakers; a choir boy figurine, and a necklace. At $2.00, the vintage necklace was the most expensive item. My mom was with me. She bought a paperback or two and a glass shoe for her shoe collection.

We bid on a few items at the silent auction, with numbers 13 and 14. I bought her the taco dinner because her birthday’s this week. Father walked through, smiling; the deacon cut in front of me in the taco line; the one old friend I ran into waited a few people behind me and the woman between us joined in our conversation.

Here in St. Paul, there are fall festivals (at least two at a time) every weekend for six weeks or so. It’s a very Catholic city and most, but not all, are hosted by Catholic churches. There was a full-page spread on them in the paper last week. My sister-in-law said she was disappointed she’d miss the one associated with her grade school, because she could give the kids money to go play the games and just stand and talk to one old friend after another.

The Saturday night crowd that Mom and I encountered last night is not what the Sunday crowd will be today and the crowd today will not be what it was a few years ago, at least not at my inner-city parish where music played in an almost deserted parking lot, few took advantage of the brats and beer, and cop cars dotted the curbs. The last newsletter bore testimony to the change with a picture on the front that challenged readers to guess what year it was taken. One of those giant bubbles where kids jump amongst colored balls was in the parking lot and it teamed with people. Mainly by the hairstyles of the women I’d guess it was from the 70’s. I’m at that age when that doesn’t seem all that long ago.

It was a beautiful night with a half a moon wavering in the cloudy sky and it got me reminiscing about changes. A few years ago I was all for such things ending. Okay, it wasn’t a few years ago, it was in the 80’s when I felt overly involved in festivals at my husband’s church and thought to myself that all of us volunteering would be better off to just give money.

But you become aware, through such events, of the changes in atmosphere and culture and climate that you can miss much more easily without them. It’s not all dismal. There’s a sweetness to the pie booth with only four pretty sad looking pies set out, and the garage-sale nature of the stuffed animals awaiting kids, and the memories of the desire to win the bike or the doll being raffled and the way the impressions of your youth stay with you.

Likewise in church, the nature of the sermons change. A week or so ago I wondered what I was missing in the news when Father spoke of how communion is the right of everyone. I wondered what ornery cleric was refusing communion to a politician known to be pro-abortion, or to obvious gays.

And likewise in books.

The Oliver Towne book, a collection of the stories written in the “Oliver Towne” column of the St. Paul Dispatch between 1954 and 1958 feels familiar even though I’ve only seen the yellowed copies stuck in the photo albums and cook books (where all clippings seem to eventually end up) of mothers and grandmothers around town. I opened to a page where Oliver cleared up the mystery of my side of town, know as the West Side, being not west but south, and how it came to be called that because of old steamboat captains for whom, he said, there were only two directions – the west bank and the east bank – of a river.

So there you are, living on a side of town called “west” all your life, only giving it a little thought when an occasional visitor from Minneapolis asks “What’s “west” about it?” and then you find out that it was steamboat captains who were the source of this name that is a lie to us (directionally speaking) and a truth to them.

It is strange and pertinent to me this morning where you can find tellers of the times and the truth, and how even the truth, given your view of it, and your language, and the way you interact with it…changes.

Small puddles and Big characters

These are the only photos I've taken recently that made me think of the beautiful in the ugly (besides the dozens I've posted of the freeway fence). I was just going to do the one, but Alec is famous for his "people" photography and so, in that spirit, you also get this one of me, taken on a cool day in the cabin in my hoodie.

My favorite photographer, Alec Soth, was on the front page of the paper Sunday. Not the "Sunday Life" section that is devoted to books, music, art and entertainment, but the Front Page. I guess he’s now the most sought after American photographer, the equivalent, the article said, to “an art rock star.” I was beaming with pride over having discovered him before he was all the rage, and felt as if I knew him when. His studio is just a bit up from where we had our coffee shop, and…gosh…it must be five years ago now when I wanted to use one of his photographs in a presentation I was giving and actually exchanged e-mails with him. He was so gracious.

I felt such a thrill of discovery and delight to find him in the first place and then again to see him on my front page. And that’s before I read the article, which reminded me of what drew me to him in the first place, which was a previous article and the words he spoke as much as his art.

I wasn’t having the greatest day when I found this article. I’ve been feeling so stuck in a puddle and as if I want to be swimming in a bigger pond. Actually, I seem to go back and forth – looking at the small things in my own back yard as if they are amazingly beautiful and significant – and then pining over feeling fenced in. In other words, it’s not all about the broader picture, but sometimes capturing the small picture, like the small truths, takes you toward bigger stories and finds you wanting to spread your wings.

And then you read about a guy you feel you kind of know.

I saw him give a talk at the Walker Art Center about five years ago, and he set my whole vision of how I wanted to give talks in a new direction because I’d seen something that excited me. I’d seen this way that you get out of “teaching” by simply talking about your process, which for me, with him, was like listening to somebody tell what it was like to climb the mountain from his own experience. I was so utterly fascinated and inspired!

Here’s two of the things I remember from that previous encounter with him. He talked about finding “the beauty in ugliness” and about “the isolation we’re sharing.” Can’t you just see why I’d love him?

What he says in this article about photography itself (which seemed to have little to do with the previous article I read or the talk he gave), was again speaking to me.

“Photography is the opposite of living in the moment. It’s trying to preserve, capture a moment. The act of doing it can be like that, but there’s something desperate about wanting to hold it, and there’s something about being in the world but out of it simultaneously. It’s a big psychological disorder. If I’m good at it, it’s because I can really sink my teeth into that disorder. It suits my character.”

Then he says, “But I’m not proud of that – I’d much rather be a yoga master.”

It’s kind of a joke, but I felt as if I “got” it. Most of the creative stuff I do feels like a psychological disorder. I got (at least in my own way) everything he was saying, and that’s one of the best experiences of life to a person of my character.

A final quote that also resonates with me is this: “I’m interested in weaving an arc – giving things shape and meaning and making connections. Giving people a place to imagine things.”

Oh, yes, yes. What a lovely man. How glad I am to live in that same world…because I do, I really do. In our own small-puddle ways, don’t we all?

St. Paul Pioneer Press, “Art Sensation,” Amy Carlson Gustafson, 10A, 9-12-2010.

New Videos and Small Truths

I really like this Minnesota writer Kevin Kling. His was one of the websites I looked at before developing mine (for The Given Self, www.thegivenself.com). His is kind of whimsical and silly, like he is (in a profound way) and that’s terribly difficult if not impossible to achieve in your work if you’ve got a serious bent (as I do), and just as hard to achieve in a website if it’s not there in your work.

Anyway, he moved from writing, to being on Minnesota Public Radio, to participating in an off-beat theatre venture that goes on here every summer called “The Fringe Festival.”

There’s a way certain people can be a little like “secret mentors” to you, and he’s one of mine. Him and Steve Almond have got that silly obsessiveness that I find profound. Others of my secret mentors are merely profound.

When I saw an article about Kling recently I felt hopeful that doing photography and video might make me a little more playful, and I experimented a little with playfulness here. I call it having some serious fun. (It’s the best I can do for now.)

(Click on the underlined word to go to the video.)

A few weeks ago, Dominic Papatola, who writes a “culture” column I also like reading, reviewed Kling’s Fringe performance:

“It’s difficult not to bifurcate Kling’s work along the fault line of the 2001 motorcycle accident that nearly cost him his life. His pre-crash stories were personal in the sense that they were first-person accounts, but they also spoke to the more universal foibles of Minnesotans and of humanity. After the accident, Kling’s work took a more contemplative and introspective turn, as he delved into realms of spirituality, able-bodiness and the natural world.

Both bodies of work were well-written and well-told, but they sometimes seemed to be the efforts of two different artists. …

Five years ago, he was talking about the difference between the disabilities one is born with and the disabilities acquired on a life journey. In this show, Kling observes that, “some gifts we’re born with; others we find during our life.”

Papatola concludes: “And though Kling retains that essential piece of the kid’s goofy giddiness that propels many of his stories, he’s rediscovered a way to embrace the ambiguities of an adult life.”

Well….

Maybe that’s where my challenge has been…with embracing the ambiguities of adult life. I talk of something similar here as “small truths.”


Maybe meeting that challenge is what turns disabilities into gifts and most importantly (probably) lightens your heart…makes you light-hearted and not so serious. There are times I feel that’s the alchemy of the spiritual path…the blessing of a life well lived…and yet, I don’t know.

Since starting this experimentation with video I did a personal movie of Henry’s spring and summer. I could see things in the people I captured that I hadn’t seen before. I began to understand my friend Mary’s fascination with video for seeing the way a person’s heart can speak to you in a look when you’re moving slowly, frame by frame.

The whole gist of why I did the “seriously fun” video was wanting to be honest somehow about what I’d seen in myself as I’ve done these things. I am light and serious and peaceful and confused…and not one of those images is my “true self.” That doesn’t mean I’m being false or that I am incapable of being true. It’s more like viewing a moment-by-moment or at least week-by-week exploration of various encounters with life and the feelings and movement they produce.

St. Paul Pioneer Press, “Kevin Kling does it again,” by Dominic P. Papatola. 9-13-2010, 9A.

Joy

Fahrenheat, the friendly little heater



The only picture I could find with a glimpse of the cabin's peak



The winter ceiling

Donny put up Styrofoam to seal off the cabin peak yesterday. I stood under him and handed screws. I think it’s made a difference. We were losing heat through the top.

Man, all these things going on are such metaphors. Everything rising to a peak and going through the top.

I can report with joy about sealing off the leak. The energy drain is leaving. I didn’t want to do it. I liked my peak(s). I wanted heat without losing the heights. Now it seems that life is about keeping the heat closer to the ground.

I’ve switched back to the desk today. It fits my body better than the table. I can feel it already. I’m once again gazing out at the Mooney pines. Just a spot of rooftop keeps the family abode in view. The freeway fence is off to the side, dull anyway this morning without the sun. We slept in and the sun is already high in the sky, the earth standing still.

Donny’s making breakfast. He says, “You’re going out?”

I say, “It’s my morning practice.”

Words are getting put on things never before uttered.

What’s important to you? Heat in the cabin.

It has begun. The Fahrenheat’s days are numbered. Next there will be a furnace. I have declared myself. This is what’s important to me. I am claiming my life.

Joy. Joy.

Pumped up

Oh hell, who cares about anything else? I’m inspired again this morning! Oh, the long dearth through which I’ve sat so impatiently. I’m already feeling it in the kitchen, as I begin making pancakes, see there isn’t any milk, and then chuckle about why I’d be making pancakes anyway on a day when no one’s around. Next I’m eyeing the paper and start reading it. I don’t have to rush to get my time because, as far as I know, there will not be anyone home ALL DAY. Then I read about the Twin’s latest win that came from a pitcher making his major league debut. I love debut games. Love debut stories of any kind.

Matt Fox left in the sixth inning after giving up a run-scoring single that tied the game. He was upset and he slammed his glove around.

I still don’t know much about the 27 year-old pitcher – his history or any of that, but I was bowled over by what coach Ron Gardenhire said about him:

“A lot of young guys in their first start would probably sit back and go, ‘Wow, I’m glad I’m out of there.’ But he was frustrated because he gave up that run and that tells you a little bit about his character and that tells you a little bit about his heart.”

Man. How cool it would be to have a coach like that. To have your frustration seen as character and heart. That frustration that comes of really, really wanting to do your personal best.

Mia, bless her heart, is the reason no one’s home. Angie and Henry spent the night at her place last night, and she’s babysitting there, keeping Henry for the day. She was over yesterday to pick some things up in preparation for the weekend stay, and told me she’d been crabby. I said, “Me too.” I said, “I think you get crabby when things aren’t right in your life and you want to set them right.” She didn’t seem too excited about that observation; thinks her life is going along pretty well at the moment. Maybe it’s just me.

But I let Coach Gardenhire pump me up and I’m not going to fret over the need of it today. Don’t we all need to get pumped once in a while?

I can just imagine how this rookie had to get pumped up for his debut game, how he would have that feeling in him of all the preparation he’d done, and of his own readiness, and how he’d feel he wouldn’t know if he was ready until he did the thing, and then how frustrated he’d feel about giving up that run that got him pulled…not because he failed…but because he’d seen what he could do.

This is what I love about baseball and life (sometimes).

St. Paul Pioneer Press, Fill-in gives Twins a lift. Kelsie Smith, 9-4-2010, 5B.