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The avocado tree was firmly rooted in the center of Peggy’s back yard. Like Peggy, herself, it provided shelter for me in times of fear, despair, and confusion. While not a particularly athletic child, I climbed the tree with a sure-footed confidence that I lacked on the ground at twelve.
No one could climb the tree for me. I had to reach for the limb, pull myself to the next branch and place my foot in just the right position to hoist myself up up further up so that I became a part of the tree.
Like the Swiss Family Robinson, I imagined parts of the tree being different rooms in my house. I loved climbing that tree. Peggy allowed me the freedom to climb the tree without the overbearing worries of my mother. In fact, I don’t think Mother ever knew how much time I spent in the tree. It was my world.
Until I fell out.
It was a summer night. I was babysitting my two nephews and at twelve years of age, I had every kid in the neighborhood over. We were playing a game of some sort. I perched myself in the tree, when, showing off – I jumped to grab a lower limb intending to swing like Tarzan.
Instead, my hands slipped like the gymnast on the uneven bars, and I fell, slamming my arm on the ground below – breaking it.
My summer trips to the beach for bodysurfing ended.
And so did my climbing of trees.
Now I am fifty. It has been a very long time since I’ve gone out on a limb.
Perhaps it is time again to risk the fall.
Monday, November 30, 2009
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Memoir Workshop
New class begins Tuesday, December 8th at St. Paul Lutheran in Fullerton. 3:30 - 5:30 p.m.
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Mother this Thanksgiving
Yesterday, I spent the day with Mother. Polishing her silver. Wiping her crystal. We went to the grocery store as always. I pushed the cart. I bought the Mrs. Cubbison's bread crumbs for the stuffing, the Jimmy Dean sausage and the yams. I decided to hit Costco for the pies this year, deviating from tradition. We spent the day together as I pushed the grocery cart and remembered hundreds of trips to Von's, Albertson's, Ralph's or Alpha Beta, (depending on the year.)
I talked to Mother while I set the table. This morning, I put the green beans in the red pot with the ham hocks and sprinkled minced onion, salt and pepper into the mix. Chopped the onion and celery and sauteed them with the sausage. The Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade played on the TV in the background and I dreamed as I do every year of being there. Maybe next year.
Mother is fading - she is becoming a memory - distant - I reach out for her and pull her back into my consciousness like a child stretching into the heavens for an escaping balloon. I don't want to lose her.
Right now the turkey is in the oven. The aroma just beginning to permeate the house. Soon, my home will be filled with my family just as it was once upon a time - when Bob would bring the wine and Mother would stay to the bitter end, washing up my dishes and cleaning my kitchen like a scullery maid. This year it will be his grandchildren and her great grandchildren gathered round the table.
And we will remember them.
I talked to Mother while I set the table. This morning, I put the green beans in the red pot with the ham hocks and sprinkled minced onion, salt and pepper into the mix. Chopped the onion and celery and sauteed them with the sausage. The Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade played on the TV in the background and I dreamed as I do every year of being there. Maybe next year.
Mother is fading - she is becoming a memory - distant - I reach out for her and pull her back into my consciousness like a child stretching into the heavens for an escaping balloon. I don't want to lose her.
Right now the turkey is in the oven. The aroma just beginning to permeate the house. Soon, my home will be filled with my family just as it was once upon a time - when Bob would bring the wine and Mother would stay to the bitter end, washing up my dishes and cleaning my kitchen like a scullery maid. This year it will be his grandchildren and her great grandchildren gathered round the table.
And we will remember them.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
The Shattering Quest
Recently I attended a production of The Man of La Mancha at Candlelight Pavilion in Claremont, California. I went with my daughter to see a former student and talented actor, Frankie Marrone, newly returned from New York, who was appearing in the ensemble. Honestly, I went without much anticipation. I had, only the week before, seen a sorely disappointing community theatre production of White Christmas, and mistakenly assumed I was in for another evening of mediocre musical theatre.
I could not have been more wrong.
The Candlelight production was stellar with its tightly honed ensemble led by John Lalonde as Cervantes and Jackie Lorenzo Cox as Aldonza. The prison in which Miguel Cervantes and his manservant, Sancho, impeccably played by Tony Pinzzotto, find themselves acting out the idealist, Don Quixote's quest, felt like an intense cauldron in which every glance, move and gesture by the ensemble was fierce, hot, and committed. Beautifully nuanced performances by the cast, seamlessly directed by George Stratton, in a dungeon prison made all the more effective by its serviceable and creative set design by Chuck Ketter and Greg Hinrichsen, and light design by Jean Yves Tessier, provided a surprisingly fulfilling evening's entertainment. The excellent sound design, uncredited in the program, was made possible only by Candlelight's owner, Ben D. Bollinger's obvious investment in quality equipment, something, as a director myself, I especially appreciated.
While the Candlelight production was nothing short of stunning, it was ultimately, the book itself, written by Dale Wasserman and its lyrics, by Joe Darion, that I found myself running over and over in my mind. I realized that, while I was intimately familiar with the score, I had only the faintest recollection of the story from a high school production I'd seen years earlier at a thespian festival. It was the intricacies of the plot, the thematic layers and heart wrenching characters that have continued to haunt me.
The poignant madness of Cervante's character, Alonzo Quijana, who, after having read too many books on chivalry, believes himself to be the errant knight Don Quixote, resonated with me. Always fascinated by the line between denial and reality, sanity and insanity, Quixote's view of his world that transforms a windmill into his enemy, the enchanter, and the wench, Aldonza into Dulcinea struck me not so much as psychological break down, but as a tender, uncynical embrace of beauty. It is how Don Quixote sees the world that makes his world real. It is how Quixote treats Aldonza that transforms her into Dulcinea and begs the question, who is hurt by such a transformation? In the name of sanity, is Aldonza actually better off in the cruel world in which she is beaten and abused for her station or, as she seems to realize at Alonzo's death bed, by begging to remain, Dulcinea?
The climactic scene in which Don Quixote is forced by the Enchanter/Dr. Carrasco, played by Christopher Van Etten, to look into the shields of mirrors tore at my heart. What a brilliant device - the metaphor of the mirror as shields - the tangible symbol of protection transforming into the weapon that shatters the idealist's illusion of himself by stripping away the mask of Quixote that we, at the beginning of the play, have watched author, Miguel Cervantes, don through the application of makeup - the mask of the theatre. I was left breathless by the stunning clarity of such a complex plot and characterization.
It was refreshing for me, whose own life experience includes a Don Quixote-like brother who left a family drowning in the consequences of his denial, to reflect on the potential upside of such idealism. While I stand in my conviction that we are all far better off owning the reality of our lives, I somehow found myself, through this story, wondering if my brother, hadn't in some way gotten it right? Am I really better off facing the painful truths of my existence? Am I more noble by having held up the shattering shield of mirrors? Or is there more grace in the fictional life- story- construct, that allows Aldonza to become Dulcinea? Which is real? Is the "either or" I have fiercely defended the only way? Or might it be more merciful to say, it is indeed "both and". At the death bed, who will be better off? My brother, who refused the mirror and was known to say that "truth is overrated?" Or me, who has suffered from a relentless quest, not to dream the impossible dream, but rather to speak the unspeakable truth?
Only a superbly interpreted production as Candlelight's, Man of La Mancha could have led me to such poignant self-discovery. This is theatre at its best and an example of its power to transform.
I could not have been more wrong.
The Candlelight production was stellar with its tightly honed ensemble led by John Lalonde as Cervantes and Jackie Lorenzo Cox as Aldonza. The prison in which Miguel Cervantes and his manservant, Sancho, impeccably played by Tony Pinzzotto, find themselves acting out the idealist, Don Quixote's quest, felt like an intense cauldron in which every glance, move and gesture by the ensemble was fierce, hot, and committed. Beautifully nuanced performances by the cast, seamlessly directed by George Stratton, in a dungeon prison made all the more effective by its serviceable and creative set design by Chuck Ketter and Greg Hinrichsen, and light design by Jean Yves Tessier, provided a surprisingly fulfilling evening's entertainment. The excellent sound design, uncredited in the program, was made possible only by Candlelight's owner, Ben D. Bollinger's obvious investment in quality equipment, something, as a director myself, I especially appreciated.
While the Candlelight production was nothing short of stunning, it was ultimately, the book itself, written by Dale Wasserman and its lyrics, by Joe Darion, that I found myself running over and over in my mind. I realized that, while I was intimately familiar with the score, I had only the faintest recollection of the story from a high school production I'd seen years earlier at a thespian festival. It was the intricacies of the plot, the thematic layers and heart wrenching characters that have continued to haunt me.
The poignant madness of Cervante's character, Alonzo Quijana, who, after having read too many books on chivalry, believes himself to be the errant knight Don Quixote, resonated with me. Always fascinated by the line between denial and reality, sanity and insanity, Quixote's view of his world that transforms a windmill into his enemy, the enchanter, and the wench, Aldonza into Dulcinea struck me not so much as psychological break down, but as a tender, uncynical embrace of beauty. It is how Don Quixote sees the world that makes his world real. It is how Quixote treats Aldonza that transforms her into Dulcinea and begs the question, who is hurt by such a transformation? In the name of sanity, is Aldonza actually better off in the cruel world in which she is beaten and abused for her station or, as she seems to realize at Alonzo's death bed, by begging to remain, Dulcinea?
The climactic scene in which Don Quixote is forced by the Enchanter/Dr. Carrasco, played by Christopher Van Etten, to look into the shields of mirrors tore at my heart. What a brilliant device - the metaphor of the mirror as shields - the tangible symbol of protection transforming into the weapon that shatters the idealist's illusion of himself by stripping away the mask of Quixote that we, at the beginning of the play, have watched author, Miguel Cervantes, don through the application of makeup - the mask of the theatre. I was left breathless by the stunning clarity of such a complex plot and characterization.
It was refreshing for me, whose own life experience includes a Don Quixote-like brother who left a family drowning in the consequences of his denial, to reflect on the potential upside of such idealism. While I stand in my conviction that we are all far better off owning the reality of our lives, I somehow found myself, through this story, wondering if my brother, hadn't in some way gotten it right? Am I really better off facing the painful truths of my existence? Am I more noble by having held up the shattering shield of mirrors? Or is there more grace in the fictional life- story- construct, that allows Aldonza to become Dulcinea? Which is real? Is the "either or" I have fiercely defended the only way? Or might it be more merciful to say, it is indeed "both and". At the death bed, who will be better off? My brother, who refused the mirror and was known to say that "truth is overrated?" Or me, who has suffered from a relentless quest, not to dream the impossible dream, but rather to speak the unspeakable truth?
Only a superbly interpreted production as Candlelight's, Man of La Mancha could have led me to such poignant self-discovery. This is theatre at its best and an example of its power to transform.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Man in the Moon
Sorrowful eyes cast up to the moon
Sorrowful boy in blue
A winter sky
streams of light
swirling clouds
starlit night
Sorrowful boy in blue
Searching for answers
a moment beneath the moon
Secrets dark
haunting and hidden
pain burns in his soul
Reminders, pieces, parts of his past
scattered in the velvet night
Sorrowful eyes
cast up to the moon
Sorrowful boy in blue
The mourning
that evening
the depth of his being
the torture of becoming
a shape in the chrysalis
of grief's tight grip
the gentleness of its embrace
Rest easy
Rest easy
the moon shines its light
on heart's hibernation
sorrow surrounds you now
Sleep
Sleep
and wait for the dawn
in your winter's moonlit sky
Sorrowful eyes cast up to the moon
Sorrowful boy in blue.
Sorrowful boy in blue
A winter sky
streams of light
swirling clouds
starlit night
Sorrowful boy in blue
Searching for answers
a moment beneath the moon
Secrets dark
haunting and hidden
pain burns in his soul
Reminders, pieces, parts of his past
scattered in the velvet night
Sorrowful eyes
cast up to the moon
Sorrowful boy in blue
The mourning
that evening
the depth of his being
the torture of becoming
a shape in the chrysalis
of grief's tight grip
the gentleness of its embrace
Rest easy
Rest easy
the moon shines its light
on heart's hibernation
sorrow surrounds you now
Sleep
Sleep
and wait for the dawn
in your winter's moonlit sky
Sorrowful eyes cast up to the moon
Sorrowful boy in blue.
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Saints and Poets
A few weeks ago I watched the movie Titanic on an airplane coming home from New York. Rather incongruous, this gigantic story on a tiny screen 35,000 feet in the air. Never a big fan of the film, but, too tired to read, I opted for the three hour distraction.
The proximity of my seat to the screen brought the epic tragedy into tighter focus. I found myself thinking about the desperation of the poor souls whose lives came to an ironic end that fateful night. I grew up with this story, frequently recounted by my mother, whose distant relative gave up her seat in a lifeboat for her maid in order to remain aboard to die with her husband. But that story was always told in conjunction with the one about the courageous musicians who continued to play until just before the ship sank.
I watched the James Cameron film and thought about this act of bravery and love. What else was there to do? With their own watery grave beneath their feet, these musicians performed a transcendent final act of beauty and mercy, serenading the passengers to their death. One witness reported that their final song was "Nearer my God to Thee."
In the Catholic church, there is the tradition of canonization - the elevation of an ordinary individual to the level of sainthood. Among the criteria for this recognition is proof that the person being considered for sainthood performed a miraculous act. As I watched the depiction in Cameron's film of these musicians aboard the sinking Titanic, I couldn't help but think that what those musicians did was nothing short of miraculous. Generous with their gifts and talents to their hopeless end, they kept playing.
Art and music as a transcendent force in the face of human suffering has always interested me. No story so clearly exemplifies this as the story of Theresenstadt (Terezin) - the town outside of Prague in the Czeck Republic, that was converted by the Nazi's to a Jewish ghetto during the Holocaust. Music and art thrived there in spite of inhumane conditions and near certain death. Children were encouraged by teachers to write poems and draw pictures of their experiences in order that they not be forgotten. They buried the poems and pictures throughout the town only to be discovered by survivors after the liberation. Theresenstadt housed many artists and musicians before their transport to Auschwitz. While hopelessness engulfed the ghetto, music brought a sense of humanity and joy. In the face of death, beauty.
Our capacity as human beings to create in the face of the greatest horror and tragic circumstances is one of our greatest gifts. These two extreme examples should provide us with an important lesson. Artistic expression should be nurtured, encouraged and valued. As the German playwright, Bertolt Brecht said, "In the dark times, will there also be singing? Yes, there will be singing. About the dark times."
Or, as Emily in Our Town asks of the Stage Manager, "Do any human beings ever realize life as they live it every, every minute?"
"No. Saints and Poets, maybe. They do some."
The musicians aboard the Titanic. The teachers in Terezin. The writers. The artists.
Saints and Poets all. Their stories live on.
The proximity of my seat to the screen brought the epic tragedy into tighter focus. I found myself thinking about the desperation of the poor souls whose lives came to an ironic end that fateful night. I grew up with this story, frequently recounted by my mother, whose distant relative gave up her seat in a lifeboat for her maid in order to remain aboard to die with her husband. But that story was always told in conjunction with the one about the courageous musicians who continued to play until just before the ship sank.
I watched the James Cameron film and thought about this act of bravery and love. What else was there to do? With their own watery grave beneath their feet, these musicians performed a transcendent final act of beauty and mercy, serenading the passengers to their death. One witness reported that their final song was "Nearer my God to Thee."
In the Catholic church, there is the tradition of canonization - the elevation of an ordinary individual to the level of sainthood. Among the criteria for this recognition is proof that the person being considered for sainthood performed a miraculous act. As I watched the depiction in Cameron's film of these musicians aboard the sinking Titanic, I couldn't help but think that what those musicians did was nothing short of miraculous. Generous with their gifts and talents to their hopeless end, they kept playing.
Art and music as a transcendent force in the face of human suffering has always interested me. No story so clearly exemplifies this as the story of Theresenstadt (Terezin) - the town outside of Prague in the Czeck Republic, that was converted by the Nazi's to a Jewish ghetto during the Holocaust. Music and art thrived there in spite of inhumane conditions and near certain death. Children were encouraged by teachers to write poems and draw pictures of their experiences in order that they not be forgotten. They buried the poems and pictures throughout the town only to be discovered by survivors after the liberation. Theresenstadt housed many artists and musicians before their transport to Auschwitz. While hopelessness engulfed the ghetto, music brought a sense of humanity and joy. In the face of death, beauty.
Our capacity as human beings to create in the face of the greatest horror and tragic circumstances is one of our greatest gifts. These two extreme examples should provide us with an important lesson. Artistic expression should be nurtured, encouraged and valued. As the German playwright, Bertolt Brecht said, "In the dark times, will there also be singing? Yes, there will be singing. About the dark times."
Or, as Emily in Our Town asks of the Stage Manager, "Do any human beings ever realize life as they live it every, every minute?"
"No. Saints and Poets, maybe. They do some."
The musicians aboard the Titanic. The teachers in Terezin. The writers. The artists.
Saints and Poets all. Their stories live on.
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Dancing with the Demons
In the Saturday, October 17th edition of the Wall Street Journal, an article by writer Jeanette Winterson entitled "In Praise of the Crack-Up" caught my eye. Next to the text appeared a semi psychedelic graphic imbedded with sketches of writers' faces - the usual suspects - whenever the topic of mental illness and creativity is explored. Silvia Plath, Virginia Woolf, Ernest Hemmingway and others - whose artistic brilliance is matched only by their tragic deaths brought on by manic-depression.
I've read a lot on this topic. Among the most notable books on my shelf is Kay Redfield Jamison's Touched with Fire which explores the seemingly indisputable evidence that a touch of madness produces good art. Of course her book goes far deeper than this over simplification in exploring the psychological causes for both depression and mania but the essence of at least part of the message is clearly that artistic expression is often born out of pain.
Jeanette Winterson illuminates the French origin of the word blessing.
This definition resonated deeply with me. One of my favorite quotes of all times is from St. Augustine, "In my deepest wound, I saw your glory, and it dazzled me." Woundedness, blessing, pain, creativity, transformation, healing - this is the vocabulary of my life. The rich composte of my being - from which my artistic self has grown.
My struggle with depression surfaced in the early nineties after a siege of losses that stripped away my very identity - the death of my brother to AIDS, the loss of our forty-nine year-old family business and near total financial collapse.
Jeanette Winterson, in her Wall Street Journal article writes,
This has most definitely been true for me. Winterson admits that creativity takes its toll - that it often does leave the artist "ravaged." Though I wonder, is it the act of creating that leaves one ravaged, or is it the circumstances and the response to the circumstances based on one's personality that causes the suffering? Might it be that the creative act is in fact, the salvation rather than the damnation?
Ultimately, my creative passion has been the source of my healing. The act of creating has been transformative. And, now, fifteen years after dancing with the demons that defined and re-defined me, I have emerged with greater self-awareness, compassion for those who suffer from depression and grief, and a belief that it is all a continuum.
The artist is the one who feels it all, expresses it all, and yes, suffers it all. Passion. And this, I believe is true blessing.
I've read a lot on this topic. Among the most notable books on my shelf is Kay Redfield Jamison's Touched with Fire which explores the seemingly indisputable evidence that a touch of madness produces good art. Of course her book goes far deeper than this over simplification in exploring the psychological causes for both depression and mania but the essence of at least part of the message is clearly that artistic expression is often born out of pain.
Jeanette Winterson illuminates the French origin of the word blessing.
"The French verb "blesser" means "to wound." Original etymologies from both Hebrew and Anglo-Saxon bind "bless" with a bloodying of some kind - the daubing of the lintel at Passover, the blood smear on the forehead or thigh of a new warrior..."Winterson continues,
" Wounding - real or symbolic - is both mark and marker. It is an opening in the self painful but transformative."
This definition resonated deeply with me. One of my favorite quotes of all times is from St. Augustine, "In my deepest wound, I saw your glory, and it dazzled me." Woundedness, blessing, pain, creativity, transformation, healing - this is the vocabulary of my life. The rich composte of my being - from which my artistic self has grown.
My struggle with depression surfaced in the early nineties after a siege of losses that stripped away my very identity - the death of my brother to AIDS, the loss of our forty-nine year-old family business and near total financial collapse.
Jeanette Winterson, in her Wall Street Journal article writes,
"Longing is painful. Every work of art is an attempt to bring into being the object of loss. The pictures, the music, the poems and the performances are an intense engagement with loss. While one is in the act of making, one is not in loss and one has meaning.... "
This has most definitely been true for me. Winterson admits that creativity takes its toll - that it often does leave the artist "ravaged." Though I wonder, is it the act of creating that leaves one ravaged, or is it the circumstances and the response to the circumstances based on one's personality that causes the suffering? Might it be that the creative act is in fact, the salvation rather than the damnation?
Ultimately, my creative passion has been the source of my healing. The act of creating has been transformative. And, now, fifteen years after dancing with the demons that defined and re-defined me, I have emerged with greater self-awareness, compassion for those who suffer from depression and grief, and a belief that it is all a continuum.
The artist is the one who feels it all, expresses it all, and yes, suffers it all. Passion. And this, I believe is true blessing.
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