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LETTER FROM MOAB
While I’m away my house here sits empty of human activity - silent by day and dark at night. Word gets around: “The Big Thing is gone.” Wild things move in: pack rats in one season, mice in another. The deer and rabbits adjust their daily trails to cross the patio. Even a few cautious bats hang from the outside rafters of the house during my absence.
All of these creatures leave their fecal matter as calling cards. Hello.
The itinerant population has recently increased. This fall a flock of wild turkeys apparently chose to roost on my roof. And during the big September rain, their crap washed off the roof onto the porches. The guano supply is getting deep.
Not only here but wherever I abide. In Crete it’s the goats and sheep that contribute. In Seattle, it’s the geese and otters and other people’s dogs and cats that provide. Free-ranging feculence.
At least I don’t have to change baby diapers any more or deal with outhouse sanitation. (Though a guest plugged up the bathroom toilet last night and Plunger Man had to swing into action once more.)
“Shit happens. Get used to it.” The first century Stoic philosophers explained that a long time ago. I know, but it’s a conflicted conclusion. The child I will always be doesn’t want to deal with anything icky. The adult I’ve become knows that coping with icky is a test of my ability to engage the rational, experienced, and competent part of my character. Doing what must be done is how I know I’m a grownup now and not a child. I wish I enjoyed the results of the transition a little more sometimes.
The trick is to go the next step and see feces as fertilizer and put all the dry stuff out on the fields where the wild flowers bloom in spring. I don’t know if it really makes any difference to the flower supply, but it keeps my mind inclined toward seeing a problem as an opportunity. And that’s always a good thing. The hard part is transferring that principle over into dealing with the nasty ordure of some human relations. It collects – but to see it as compost and to know where to put it where it will do any good tests the imagination. But that’s another story for another time.
In town early for a dinner, I stopped by a local bar for a beer. Two middle-aged bewhiskered men – one skinny, one fat – both wearing beat-up cowboy hats and boots and jeans sat at a nearby table. They were speculating on how many people at this very moment in the entire world were having sex. Any kind – straight, gay, kinky, group – whatever. “Billions, probably,” said one. And they wondered how come they were not included in the action.
(If I showed you a picture of the two men you would easily be able to suggest an answer to why they were not getting laid at the moment and would like not be any time soon.)
Driving home after midnight their conversation came to mind. I wondered how many people were in bed asleep at this very moment. Roughly a third of us. Billions. Hard to get my mind around that. So when I got home I pulled down the big atlas off the shelf and tried to figure out just who would be asleep in my longitude – either side of 110 degrees, from pole to pole. Here’s a partial sample of possible sleepers:
Artic peoples of the Beaufort Sea shore, Canadians in Yellow Knife and Medicine Hat, cowboys and Indians in Montana and Wyoming and Arizona,
Mexicans and tourists in Cabo San Lucas at the tip of Baja California, and way on out into the Pacific Ocean to include only the natives of Easter Island and finally ending up with a few scientists in a research station in Marie Byrd Land in the Artic.
Recalling those books of photographs of people outside their houses with all their possessions or in their kitchens with all the food they eat in a year, I wondered what a sample of people asleep in my longitude would be like.
Most would be in some kind of bed, wearing some kind of pajamas or night dresses or their underwear. Some naked, I suppose. And some asleep in their clothes too exhausted to undress or even get up off the couch. Some in a tent or trailer. Some on a floor or under a bridge – too poor or too homeless to have a bed to call their own.
I imagine people asleep on water beds, concrete floors, haylofts, vibrating beds, quilts, blow-up beds, hammocks, and Lazy-Boy chairs. In the back seats of cars, zonked out in airplane seats on a red-eye to somewhere or restlessly trying to get comfortable on a motel mattress.
But all asleep, eyes closed, in what Shakespeare called “the death of each day’s life.”
At this moment some people who have been sleeping are awake again. The Mid-night Ramblers – roused regularly by bladder demands or hot flashes or hunger for something - which may or may not be in the refrigerator. Perhaps awakened by a nightmare or a strange sound coming from somewhere in the house – or the cry of a child in another room.
I wonder how many people are still in bed in the middle of the night but wide awake just now because the tune of a song or the lines of a poem has just been delivered to them from the workshop at the back of their mind. Eureka! And they are about to get up and go into kitchen and write it down. Or maybe they’re a comedian and they just thought of a funny joke to use onstage tonight: “A giraffe and a goat walk into a bar . . .” And they’re lying there in bed laughing.
I imagine people sleeping alone. Or spooned up with a companion. Whole families in one bed because it’s cold and it’s the only bed in the house. People sleeping with animals – real cats and dogs – and stuffed animals – their Teddy bears or security blankies. Some are talking in their sleep, deep in the land of dreams, while an awakened companion tries to break the code.
Yawn. Now I’m sleepy. “Give it up,” says a voice in my head. “Go to bed.”
Odd that we often say to one another on the way to bed: “Sleep tight.” Not a good idea, really. Better we should say “Sleep Loose and Well.” Which is my wish for you as I wobble off to my own bed. Good night Eskimos and Canadians and cowboys and Indians. Goodnight Moabites and Mexicans and Easter Islanders and friends and family. Sweet, sweet dreams.
___________
Like many people I turned away from the nastiness of electioneering madness the week before the Nov. 7. What offends me is not what the parties or candidates say and do but that the mud-slinging works. Depressing that so many of my fellow citizens are influenced by the warped rhetoric. Bummer. I’d like to feel better at election time.
And then I went to the annual election night dinner put on by the parish of St. Pius Catholic Church in their social hall. An event that’s been going on for years. Anybody’s welcome and everybody comes, whatever or whoever.
I stood back and considered the crowd: Catholics, of course, but also Mormons, Episcopalians, Baptists, Jews, Buddhists, a Lutheran or two and a few heathens. Old and young – blue and white and no collar. Democrat and Republican and Libertarian and Green and Socialist. Left, right, center, and Martian. The whole shebang.
Most people wore a sticker handed out at the polls – “I voted.”
I considered the food: Turkey and dressing and corn and peas and cranberry sauce and two kinds of potatoes – every kind of salad – rolls and milk. And more than thirty kinds of pie and cake. Fundamental food, Moab style, served by the Great Ladies of the Catholic Kitchen.
The only controversy I experienced was with the lady selling tickets. She was bound and determined to give me a senior discount. And I was bound and determined not to take it. She stared hard at me when I refused her charity. I knew what she was thinking. “Poor old man, he’s either in denial or senile or hasn’t been around a mirror lately or is just plain stupid.” She smiled. I smiled. Saying, “Well it’s up to you, honey,” she took my money.
Hundreds of people showed up. The lines were long. But people didn’t stay around. They ate efficiently, gracefully made room for the next batch of eaters, and went on out into the lovely moonlit night – home to bed and tomorrow and whatever comes next.
There were no speeches. No prayers. No shouting. No campaign hooha.
And nobody got up to explain the occasion.
Nobody had to.
I expect people knew why they were there and what was going on.
It was an early Thanksgiving dinner for the citizens of Moab.
A communion occasion, simply blessed by each person’s presence.
An ingathering of people who care about our little town and our world beyond the categories of religion or politics or occupation or life style.
Decent people in a civil society taking care of business.
It’s a straightforward deal: Think.Vote. Eat.
Be there where the good stuff is happening.
And if I’ll just notice what’s going on, I’ll feel better about elections.
Like the lady told me, “Well, it’s up to you, honey.”
LETTER FROM MOAB
While I’m away my house here sits empty of human activity - silent by day and dark at night. Word gets around: “The Big Thing is gone.” Wild things move in: pack rats in one season, mice in another. The deer and rabbits adjust their daily trails to cross the patio. Even a few cautious bats hang from the outside rafters of the house during my absence.
All of these creatures leave their fecal matter as calling cards. Hello.
The itinerant population has recently increased. This fall a flock of wild turkeys apparently chose to roost on my roof. And during the big September rain, their crap washed off the roof onto the porches. The guano supply is getting deep.
Not only here but wherever I abide. In Crete it’s the goats and sheep that contribute. In Seattle, it’s the geese and otters and other people’s dogs and cats that provide. Free-ranging feculence.
At least I don’t have to change baby diapers any more or deal with outhouse sanitation. (Though a guest plugged up the bathroom toilet last night and Plunger Man had to swing into action once more.)
“Shit happens. Get used to it.” The first century Stoic philosophers explained that a long time ago. I know, but it’s a conflicted conclusion. The child I will always be doesn’t want to deal with anything icky. The adult I’ve become knows that coping with icky is a test of my ability to engage the rational, experienced, and competent part of my character. Doing what must be done is how I know I’m a grownup now and not a child. I wish I enjoyed the results of the transition a little more sometimes.
The trick is to go the next step and see feces as fertilizer and put all the dry stuff out on the fields where the wild flowers bloom in spring. I don’t know if it really makes any difference to the flower supply, but it keeps my mind inclined toward seeing a problem as an opportunity. And that’s always a good thing. The hard part is transferring that principle over into dealing with the nasty ordure of some human relations. It collects – but to see it as compost and to know where to put it where it will do any good tests the imagination. But that’s another story for another time.
In town early for a dinner, I stopped by a local bar for a beer. Two middle-aged bewhiskered men – one skinny, one fat – both wearing beat-up cowboy hats and boots and jeans sat at a nearby table. They were speculating on how many people at this very moment in the entire world were having sex. Any kind – straight, gay, kinky, group – whatever. “Billions, probably,” said one. And they wondered how come they were not included in the action.
(If I showed you a picture of the two men you would easily be able to suggest an answer to why they were not getting laid at the moment and would like not be any time soon.)
Driving home after midnight their conversation came to mind. I wondered how many people were in bed asleep at this very moment. Roughly a third of us. Billions. Hard to get my mind around that. So when I got home I pulled down the big atlas off the shelf and tried to figure out just who would be asleep in my longitude – either side of 110 degrees, from pole to pole. Here’s a partial sample of possible sleepers:
Artic peoples of the Beaufort Sea shore, Canadians in Yellow Knife and Medicine Hat, cowboys and Indians in Montana and Wyoming and Arizona,
Mexicans and tourists in Cabo San Lucas at the tip of Baja California, and way on out into the Pacific Ocean to include only the natives of Easter Island and finally ending up with a few scientists in a research station in Marie Byrd Land in the Artic.
Recalling those books of photographs of people outside their houses with all their possessions or in their kitchens with all the food they eat in a year, I wondered what a sample of people asleep in my longitude would be like.
Most would be in some kind of bed, wearing some kind of pajamas or night dresses or their underwear. Some naked, I suppose. And some asleep in their clothes too exhausted to undress or even get up off the couch. Some in a tent or trailer. Some on a floor or under a bridge – too poor or too homeless to have a bed to call their own.
I imagine people asleep on water beds, concrete floors, haylofts, vibrating beds, quilts, blow-up beds, hammocks, and Lazy-Boy chairs. In the back seats of cars, zonked out in airplane seats on a red-eye to somewhere or restlessly trying to get comfortable on a motel mattress.
But all asleep, eyes closed, in what Shakespeare called “the death of each day’s life.”
At this moment some people who have been sleeping are awake again. The Mid-night Ramblers – roused regularly by bladder demands or hot flashes or hunger for something - which may or may not be in the refrigerator. Perhaps awakened by a nightmare or a strange sound coming from somewhere in the house – or the cry of a child in another room.
I wonder how many people are still in bed in the middle of the night but wide awake just now because the tune of a song or the lines of a poem has just been delivered to them from the workshop at the back of their mind. Eureka! And they are about to get up and go into kitchen and write it down. Or maybe they’re a comedian and they just thought of a funny joke to use onstage tonight: “A giraffe and a goat walk into a bar . . .” And they’re lying there in bed laughing.
I imagine people sleeping alone. Or spooned up with a companion. Whole families in one bed because it’s cold and it’s the only bed in the house. People sleeping with animals – real cats and dogs – and stuffed animals – their Teddy bears or security blankies. Some are talking in their sleep, deep in the land of dreams, while an awakened companion tries to break the code.
Yawn. Now I’m sleepy. “Give it up,” says a voice in my head. “Go to bed.”
Odd that we often say to one another on the way to bed: “Sleep tight.” Not a good idea, really. Better we should say “Sleep Loose and Well.” Which is my wish for you as I wobble off to my own bed. Good night Eskimos and Canadians and cowboys and Indians. Goodnight Moabites and Mexicans and Easter Islanders and friends and family. Sweet, sweet dreams.
___________
Like many people I turned away from the nastiness of electioneering madness the week before the Nov. 7. What offends me is not what the parties or candidates say and do but that the mud-slinging works. Depressing that so many of my fellow citizens are influenced by the warped rhetoric. Bummer. I’d like to feel better at election time.
And then I went to the annual election night dinner put on by the parish of St. Pius Catholic Church in their social hall. An event that’s been going on for years. Anybody’s welcome and everybody comes, whatever or whoever.
I stood back and considered the crowd: Catholics, of course, but also Mormons, Episcopalians, Baptists, Jews, Buddhists, a Lutheran or two and a few heathens. Old and young – blue and white and no collar. Democrat and Republican and Libertarian and Green and Socialist. Left, right, center, and Martian. The whole shebang.
Most people wore a sticker handed out at the polls – “I voted.”
I considered the food: Turkey and dressing and corn and peas and cranberry sauce and two kinds of potatoes – every kind of salad – rolls and milk. And more than thirty kinds of pie and cake. Fundamental food, Moab style, served by the Great Ladies of the Catholic Kitchen.
The only controversy I experienced was with the lady selling tickets. She was bound and determined to give me a senior discount. And I was bound and determined not to take it. She stared hard at me when I refused her charity. I knew what she was thinking. “Poor old man, he’s either in denial or senile or hasn’t been around a mirror lately or is just plain stupid.” She smiled. I smiled. Saying, “Well it’s up to you, honey,” she took my money.
Hundreds of people showed up. The lines were long. But people didn’t stay around. They ate efficiently, gracefully made room for the next batch of eaters, and went on out into the lovely moonlit night – home to bed and tomorrow and whatever comes next.
There were no speeches. No prayers. No shouting. No campaign hooha.
And nobody got up to explain the occasion.
Nobody had to.
I expect people knew why they were there and what was going on.
It was an early Thanksgiving dinner for the citizens of Moab.
A communion occasion, simply blessed by each person’s presence.
An ingathering of people who care about our little town and our world beyond the categories of religion or politics or occupation or life style.
Decent people in a civil society taking care of business.
It’s a straightforward deal: Think.Vote. Eat.
Be there where the good stuff is happening.
And if I’ll just notice what’s going on, I’ll feel better about elections.
Like the lady told me, “Well, it’s up to you, honey.”
