2 August 1999 -- Another idle moment
I have found myself again in my rustic living room, content with merely
sinking my weight into the abundant upholstery of the sofa, putting my
feet up on a coffee table that is in no danger of losing its finish.
Why would I want to "see myself in it", anyway? I would just be reminded
that I need to get those stray hairs back into place before I can show
myself again in the society of the many.
A more nagging question on some of these visits is why I do not spend
more time out exploring the hinter country, finding more of what there
is to be found on these thousands of empty acres. Why, there could
be whole overgrown farmsteads from ages past, with their share of intriguing
archaeological artifacts. I could only tell so much from the initial
aerial observations that produced the topographic map.
Of course, plundering such a site would not be fair to future generations,
I remind myself, and I should let real archaeologists in first. I
have an excuse to get out of everything these days.
I wonder, though, if I should be forcing myself into more activities
I really don't care for, if for no other reason than the wonderful feeling
when I stop. Perhaps I'm losing my resilience, sitting here day after
day when I come up the road and park amongst the tall grass by the outhouse.
I certainly do get my share of tension, working that office job.
Why do I need more involvement in enterprises of exploration up here in
the hollow? The imperative that "I should"; "I have to"; "I must"
just never leaves me. Worse yet, it has started to lose some of its
focus in recent times, so that even if "I could" (or if "I wanted to"),
I wouldn't know what would constitute success.
It occurs to me at this point in the desperation that maybe I'm doing
enough just by holding on through these times; maybe there really is heroism
after all in nominal mediocrity. Right here, without doing a thing,
there are many things I am not doing. I let myself slacken
and sink a little deeper, feeling the soft breeze enter through the wood-framed
front screens behind me. On the scale that includes negative numbers,
zero is right in the middle. Indeed, the whole matter of assigning
valuations to who I am and what I do is a little specious when I come to
think of it. Is not God the one who does that, and does he not take
me however I happen to be? I suspect that this dual-entry accounting
of myself is a result of too much activity within the private realm of
my inner conversation. I should like to know how many words I say
to myself as opposed to others. I'm sure it's a much larger number.
Sitting here with the river-noise outside the back window, I take a
ringside seat in that Arena inside my head, watching this life-and-death
war of words. I wonder why it is so entertaining to watch
myself being violated and immolated and ravaged by all of that unwarranted
criticism. Am I, like some of the modern-day preachers say, like
one of those apathetic Romans, oblivious to the consequences of my moral
decay? I realize, in light of such an image, that there are real
forces entirely external to this theatre of controlled, though deadly sport.
One day I'll come face to face with adversaries I cannot watch from this
vantage point of relative security. I must be making ready.
There it is again--"I must". But now, I see myself face-down in the
sand, and I can only hope the Emperor and the crowds spare me this time.
No, it is far from "nothing" that I do, when I come up here to rest.
"Bo"
8 August 1999 -- I still hear the noise
I'm stretched out on top of the soft depth of my bedcovers, looking
up at the slanting pine-panel ceiling of the alcove set into the wall opposite
the fireplace. I still wonder about why I added that particular feature
to the floor plan. It looks more like it should be an attached shed, accessed
from the outdoors, rather than a part of the living room/bedroom area.
Maybe it just seems like the way to have the maximum of shelter from the
outside world; a place that concentrates my thoughts inwards, like camping
in a small tent in the cold or rain.
I have noticed a personal trend recently towards constructing explicit
barriers to the annoyances of others in my midst, rather than tuning them
out as need be. Those with nerves of greater fortitude can satisfy their
need for social grace by sitting there, appearing to take it, while their
minds are really off somewhere else.
I am probably dealing once again with a problem I've noted in the past;
that my sensitivity level to the outside is set far too high and it only
appears to sound as loud as it does when others conduct their business
all around. So much of it does not really concern me, or can be answered
with simple, terse replies, but I take every bit of it right to heart.
This serves as a reminder that I should take control of my own inadvertencies
of the tongue, if I wish to continue making such a complaint about living
among others.
Really, it would be quite tolerable to have a couple hundred yards between
the Cabin and other dwellings similar to it, whose families could then
share these woods with me yet stay out of earshot. A good half-dozen Cabins
could stand on this clearing, and there could be communal campfire meetings
out in the clearing, for those who choose to come. Of course, I would not
be party to the blood ties that were present within the village clans in
earlier times, where common ancestry added to the solemnity of place.
Still, something "seems wrong with that idea". I would never feel like
I could truly be alone when I wanted to be. I suspect this matter of over-sensitivity
is a bottomless pit, for as I sit in the silence that does not seem silent,
I keep straining, more and more, to hear. I continue to turn that knob
clockwise, not realizing that I have sealed myself into an anechoic chamber.
I weaken myself all the more by removing those factors that reflect back
my imagined and real repugnancies in living. Then, something comes along
I'm not expecting, and I am bowled over by the distorted blast from those
overdriven amplifiers.
While I'm off by myself, then, I should not be thinking so much about
the formidable barriers behind which I have retreated, for I can only stay
out here so long. I should not launch into some heretical internal tirade,
in which this life is a meaningless crock that humans endure only for a
better seat in the next. I merely happen to have the inconvenient truth
of being a man who gains strength from within, not without, in the way
of all proper introverts. Thus, I have undeniable need for my many getaways
to this land of the mind up here in the hollow.
As has often been the case, I am tired as evening approaches. I do not
seem to see an easy answer to the tradeoff between the balm of quiet and
isolation and the invigorating tonic of social exposure. That's how tradeoffs
work, I suppose, and God must be sitting there watching just how I ply
my course. There is a bit of justice in the scriptural view of things,
for when I get what I'm after, i.e., relaxation of a kind that is truly
relaxing to me, then I'm reaping the rewards of a well-lived life. However,
when I go back down into that mob and expose myself to things that "get
to me" in the interest of learning from mistakes and not taking everything
so seriously, why, that can be chalked up to the Kingdom as well, as in
Paul's images of thorns, chains and shipwrecks. All is good and worthy...I
wonder if it is that simple. I suppose it depends upon whose "all" we're
talking about.
"Bo"
12 August 1999 -- Letting the campfire burn
Evening approaches, after another sun-filled day amid the grass, the
rocks, and the trees of the clearing. I chance a look at my watch
to see that it is 6:15 PM, a time when I typically start shutting down
for the day in real life city life, to the inevitable draw of cable television
and the spell of the "one-eyed monster". There is still plenty of
good daylight left, of course--the sun isn't even behind the trees on the
ridge opposite the ravine. I step out into the place where twilight
is arriving, now that I don't need to look for shade, and get the idea
of building another campfire. I drag my old metal chair from the
porch, out to a proper distance from the stone ring for fire-tending, then
get a few armfuls of wood from the shed.
It is indeed good when I can lose some of the feeling of being trapped
by the schedule of the hours; of when things have to happen that
aren't mission-critical in my life. After splitting enough kindling,
I get the fire under way, to begin accumulating a coals base from the first
pieces of seasoned hardwood. I sit in the metal chair and simply
think about things--it is a hard habit to dispel--as I watch the
chaotic motion and pseudo-rhythm of the flames. I have to admit that the
campfire (and the fireplace) are sources of contemplation I use here as
a crutch to get past my seemingly-vital requirements for immersion in information
content. It amazes me, though, that a simple fire can hold my attention
as well as a television program. I may be one of those people who
just "like the noise" of a broadcast, not necessarily finding lasting edification
in the subject matter.
The flame continues in its progress, as I add more pieces where the
first few are now beginning to fragment. I have a feeling of control
when I realize that I could take the nearby 5-gallon water bucket and end
the fire now, or in the alternative, stoke it so high it would begin to
light up the entire clearing. I can understand "King Louie's" longing
for the "power of man's red 'flower'" in Disney's The Jungle Book,
a staple of my 1960's youth. It will live as I see fit, conforming
to the size of my initial wood-pile and my practices in stoking and tending
it.
Now, darkness has descended and an orange-yellow coals collection glows
fiercely at the base. The crickets and frogs join along with the
crackling of the wood. A short while later, I decide to finish feeding
new wood and watch the "end game", where the embers become the main attraction.
It must be pretty late, 9:00 PM or so. The first hour of prime time
is already done. I should be in bed, to beat the early morning traffic
and get to work on time.
I start to consider the processes of my life over which I have far less
control than this flame, inside a 5-1/2 foot ring of granite stones.
I am getting old, and I suppose I should be trying to tend myself the way
I tend this fire. But many times, such intervention is unwarranted
and things work out better if I just let them be. I should also be
getting after more things at work--or so it seems, until such time as I
get those performance reviews pointing out how far I exceeded goals in
my quest for perfection. But I need to be doing something--that's
obvious.
I think to the various controls I have before me still, at age 37, and
at the point I have reached in my career in the city. I always picture
that control panel as being unstable, requiring seat-of-the-pants manipulation.
But then I look at this fire. If I let it be (which of course I won't,
since the face of Smokey will be in my mind's eye for all times), it will
tend towards stability in a burned out ash pile. What else can it
do, inside that charred ring? I sit back in the chair and let the
flames continue, on a trajectory for which I have supplied initial conditions
but whose governing laws are out of my hands. Though I've heard of
novelty videos of a fireplace with flames, I doubt this "programming" would
do well during ratings sweeps. Yet it is far from a re-run.
This is my fire, just for tonight.
"Bo"
16 August 1999 -- Gazing down familiar pathways
Though things were not to the point of getting out of hand in the real
world today, I was compelled to come back up into the woods and hide out
for awhile. I have concluded that it is a frivolous luxury to spend
too much time here alone, since I have seen where the life of endless introspection
can take me--it is rather like an aircraft entering a terminal spin.
Certainly, few of the things I've ever thought or said from within my private
world have not been thought, said, written, codified, and made into liberal
arts university lectures, long before I was even born. It is still
a strange matter, though; one's own personal awakening, and worth noting
even if it is the same old story of the ages.
I'm sitting on the back porch right now, where the shade of the tall
trees at the top of the ravine increases as the sun passes more and more
towards the ridge. I look at the dusty area near the back step, and
the foot-worn path leading down to the water collection point along the
river. Something of a breeze is stirring today, more so than it had
been in the main part of the summer.
I still feel a bit of apprehension over the approach of "September"
from the many years I spent as a student, even though 15 years of claiming
to be a "professional" should have dampened the effect. I realize
I'm following the riverbed of a very old platitude when I start seeing
autumn as a symbol for loss of freedom and indulgences of the flesh.
I probably heard that when I was 9 or 10 years old and just shrugged it
off as the kind of thing adults like to say for some funny reason.
September, quite literally, was September, time to rejoin the collective
and be reminded of my failure to "fit in" on a daily basis.
I stand up from the porch and walk around the back side of the cabin,
looking at the state of the exterior finish. It looks pretty good,
still, after two years and with the additional caulking I did last year.
The sun is now well behind the trees and evening approaches once again.
I begin to feel decidedly cold in just a short-sleeve cotton tee.
It appears to be time to get a jacket or at least work for awhile over
the stove to make dinner.
I still can't get rid of this sense of regret over what I am not,
when so many tell me to celebrate what I am. This is probably
beyond the power, even, of religious cults to remove from me. I live
in a bunker impervious to the most intense of saturation love-bombing.
No, I shall endure as a stoic, and one day walk away a free man.
That's an encouraging thought--that freedom could be so close and all I
need do is reach out in the feeblest way and hold on. If I go grabbing
at the hems of garments, though, I want to be sure I'm getting the right
one.
It is indeed a hard time when I perform too much introspection, but
I still don't want to enter the fullness of "normal" life without cautious
deliberation. I am always afraid of coming up short in a pinch, and
it is safer not to try. Of course, people are rarely as mean-spirited
as I imagine. I have realized that about others nearly from the start,
but has it done any good? No, thoughts and words are not enough.
They're dime a dozen, and even a kid in the early 1970's had his share
of dimes.
It is time to get some chow under way here. I have done enough
thinking for now.
"Bo"
20 August 1999 -- Taking another "time out"
I have driven the 4.1 miles of two-track road into the enclosure of
woodland surrounding the clearing, knowing I needed some time out from
real life. The phrase "time out", of course, has gained a secondary
meaning in more recent times; that of a punitive sanction imposed upon
misbehaving children. It is certainly not my intention today
to distance myself from others out of a sense of guilt or shame, though
I often discover that to be the case. More often, my initial need
appears to be one of keeping the maddening urban rush from sweeping me
away, since I just don't know when to quit on overcommitment and overindulgence
in various stimulating pastimes.
Indeed, coming up here to the Cabin seems to be just another excess
sometimes, something for which I should be ashamed and seek proper methods
for making amends. Clearly, though, I cannot be wrong in everything
I do. I know a great many practitioners of life down there in the
city who do not even burden themselves with passing judgment on their behavior,
though someone usually ends up doing it for them from time to time.
Perhaps if I am so intent on policing myself, I should find out what "the
law" really is, then cooperate with the proper authorities in extending
that order by means of my own vigilance. Thinking of a moral "law",
of course, immediately fires off a conditioned reflex from Scripture.
"Yes, yes," I say to myself, "I know. Love God, then my neighbor
as myself." The hard part, as usual, is incorporating that simple
set of guidelines into my moment-to-moment decision making.
Sitting on the living room sofa today, in the simple silence of the
wood-themed decor of my rustic living room, I am temporarily relieved of
the ongoing burden of that responsibility for rendering decisions.
But as I look over to the kitchen and observe the vacant table that could
seat four for dinner, I am reminded that the only party I have removed
from the scene is "my neighbor". God and myself are still here, and
that's a 2/3 majority. That's how it will be, as long as I live.
There is no escape from the need to love.
I try to remind myself that I am making an attempt at marshaling personal
strength today by stepping out of the line of activity down in that real
city life. I don't think I needed to make this retreat because I
was doing too much that was "wrong"--if anything, it was probably too much
that, in proper moderation, could be viewed as "good". The others
in my life want me to hold out for the long term, and they do not need
full-time heroics. That is how a man works himself into an early
grave.
Still, it is so hard to sit up here and just be, within the grass,
the wildflowers with which it is decorated, and the still-green trees;
that larger "room" containing this modest living space. The verb
"be" is always a word I see as auxiliary to another verb. Okay, I'll
be, but be doing what? I think to the activity I perceive
as correct in the interest of "neighbor" in my regular life and realize
that a lot of the time I'm probably missing the mark. The population
I term "normal" is typically more intimately involved than I am in obligations
tied to those for whom they bear direct responsibility. My actions,
on the other hand, look miserly in comparison to these. They seem
to be matters of arms-length business, rather than anything resembling
the "love" I should rightfully have.
The hollow has become a bit more habitable, now that the more intense
heat of summer has finally broken. I realize that I should make the
most of my time alone, which I guard with care from those entanglements
that involve "real" emotional commitment. Am I really "to blame"
for not seeking things more in keeping with the Kingdom? Probably
not, I assure myself, for it was not a sense of true shame that sent me
up here today. I fully intend to return to what I do have in that
city life; I will make good where I can. That is all I think God
wants of me; the best I can do. I do not know what else there is.
"Bo"
23 August 1999 -- A vast and open space within
As I walk about in the many open acres of low scrub in the clearing
this morning, I get a sense of the relative permanence and stability of
this one-man enclave. So much changes on a daily basis down in the
urban hustle, but the hollow will stay just this way, for as long as I
keep it alive in my mind's eye. It is a rather "cozy" feeling, having
4 miles of buffer region between here and my nearest neighbors in the village.
I do not have to defend against showing weakness here, and neither must
I put on a show that tries to approximate decorum. Just as in the
gospel lyrics concerning "joy", "the world didn't give this / the world
can't take it away".
I realize that when I envision "the world", I usually lump in many of
its aspects that are the derivatives of "love", "peace", "righteousness",
etc. The ones who get joy amid the others, the nearest I can figure,
have learned to thrive on these more excellent ways. The division
between the worldly and the spiritual is not for me what it is for them.
It must be something, I think to myself, to see the bright line between
the two like some people can, rather than the continuum of grey set before
me. It almost seems like cheating, this cherry-picking of what life
has to offer and to exact as tribute.
I have to wonder sometimes if I'm really that far off the mark.
I seem spontaneously inclined to reach out the way the others do, but my
memories of failure are just too strong, and I am hesitant to follow through.
Maybe the problem is that 37 years of furnishing my internal hiding place
has made it too comfortable. There could actually be others who suffer
as much from being alone as I do when I'm around crowds. It is not
much of a real "gift" to be able to entertain myself with extravagances
of fancy such as these woods, but a strong internal dialogue has been one
of my lifelong defining features.
I try for a moment to stop listening to myself, much as I want myself
to listen. The cicadas have become unusually loud at this advanced
stage of the season, and the ground has become rather dry in the absence
of rain. The brier vines nearly encircle me at times as I go bushwhacking
towards the high southeastern end of the clearing. There are few
things as annoying as being scratched by thorns and nettles when I'm in
any state of real perspiration. I gaze down the shallow slope of
the hollow towards the Cabin compound, once I've reached one of the higher
sitting rocks.
There is such freedom to wander in this country, the thorns aside.
I go to a different style of timekeeping and service of obligations, the
moment I get to stop putting on a social act. Lately I've come to
see that such freedom can be a rather nasty vice, when taken to the extremes
I take it. All of the challenge and sense of excitement and achievement
start to fade when I get what I want. That is the critically-defining
phrase: "what I want". The relaxation I find when I'm alone,
however, cannot be as bad for me as the apathy and complacency that go
with it. It just isn't transferrable, that's all. It is like
getting earmarked funds that cannot be used for equivalent endeavors where
they count, in the service of others.
I notice myself drifting into my familiar defeatist tone about the "big
problems" I have with living. I try to quiet things down again inside
my head. It occurs to me that such a practice will serve me well
when I have to go back and live again with friends, family and co-workers.
That could very well be part of the answer the others never had to discover.
They might not have had the non-stop din of internal conversation, listening
instead to others and getting more involved in their surroundings.
For them, the world of private introspection might be as small as my living
and working quarters in real city life. They get to live under spacious
skies such as these, but for real.
"Bo"
26 August 1999 -- Not much else to do tonight
I have left behind the loud streets and bustling corridors that define
my daily circuits towards the brink at work, to be in the stillness of
the Cabin for the night. I should not speak so miserably of my job,
I remind myself, for I tend to get more respect there than in my bungled
and inevitably aborted attempts at "getting a life". Because I demonstrate
erudition in that one small corner of human business affairs, I am continually
offered a place to sign in the next morning. I shall have to leave
early, I remind myself, if I want to make it on time tomorrow. I
do not celebrate Friday so much as I mourn a lost Monday through Thursday
when I might have done more. It is the strangest of contradictions
that I need to work so much, yet also need to get away from work to an
almost equal extent. I should think the person of greater optimism
would appreciate having such a life, since all hours contribute their sense
of reward.
It is growing dark now and the combined noises of the crickets and the
river are my replacements for traffic and the voices of humans milling
about. A chill begins to settle in and I step inside the wood plank
door from the chair on the front porch to get my jacket. The descent
of evening is always a comfort to me, whether I'm in my real life sleeping
quarters or camping out here in the woods. I hear the occasional
call of an owl at the far side of the clearing and the crackle of underbrush
near the building when a raccoon or a squirrel or a rabbit decides to find
a better place amid the trees.
I know I shall soon need to go inside and light up the kerosene lamps,
since my list of "things to do" out here on the porch is rather limited.
Maybe I'll look some more at my old WWII-era magazines, from the time before
my time that couldn't have been as simple as it looks. In those days,
I can imagine the average American worker aspiring to a more magnificent
home and estate than what's left for single wage-earners in the Eastern
cities of the 1990's. One of the main appeals of the Cabin as I picture
it is the open country surrounding it.
Still, it is hard to tell how long I can keep my window open upon this
place, since it is so contrary to the way a life like mine should
be led. I grew up as a city boy, and I'm used to city ways.
The crisis-mode of 1997 that sent me here could very well be through, leaving
me to pursue other thoughts of how life would be better prosecuted.
Tonight, as I head inside and step about carefully in the dark to light
the lamps, my sense of isolation is simply a fact of how I choose to be,
and not some great "answer" to the roughness I see in everyday urban living.
I will do well to get some solid sleep tonight, I tell myself, as I
sink into the muslin slipcover and deep upholstery of the living room sofa.
I have the windows closed to small slits tonight, since it looks like it
will get cold later on. I'm here for another night; there didn't
seem to be much else to do. I defend my calendar well against evening
events, out of the enjoyment I get from settling in and taking my time
doing it. The Cabin and the woods will be here, day after day, whether
I am here or not--I've been visiting too long to forget it. I'm looking
at these stories about the great faith and trust people had in American
"democracy" during the War. What is "free speech" today was "treason"
in those dire times. The folks who went 1-1/2 generations before
me just kept right at it, for five years. One day I hope to have
such a vision for my future, so that I work towards something on the far
horizon, rather than muddle through it with zero visibility.
"Bo"
30 August 1999 -- The activity of my own making
I am driving my truck through the hills, headed
south, to the "intersection" by the village and the stone culvert where
"my" dirt track heads off its own way from State Highway 735. Just
beyond the final high pass before the river-cut, I reach the familiar point
at 2700 feet elevation where I can see the entire village below.
One day, no doubt, I'll have to call on them for more than just supplies
and repair work. I haven't the time to get too involved in that
community, though, for my list of commitments in my real city life comprises
most of my schedule away from being at the Cabin.
After I stand gazing upon the settlement for a few moments, I climb
back into the truck. I drive down the hill and try the best I can
to enter through the discreet gate on the riverbank without being seen.
This is the moment I feel most like a fugitive, before I've fully entered
the zone marked off as "safe". I have recently come to realize that
it is probably one of my nobler regrets to feel I'm slighting people when
I run away from them and their affairs. It is not cowardice and a
concession to peer pressure when I make another one of those commitments.
Still, when I need to dispose of a weighty item on that docket of doings,
I wonder why I didn't just keep my mouth shut. I thought I had answered
for all times which state I prefer more--isolation, not entanglement.
With the transmission shifted down from the overdrive cruise of all
those highway miles, I begin climbing the dirt track, with the river on
my right. As the lower branches brush along a now-decimated clearcoat
finish, I try not to see egregious wrong in getting away like this.
I've done my share of time at their various activities, and I'm not really
hurting anyone, with the possible exception of myself. After 15 minutes
of rough travel, I finally pull into the clearing. Though it cannot
in any sense be called my "home", the few buildings nestled alongside the
clearing near the river's source have a centeredness like nowhere else,
real or imagined. My best trips to the Cabin are those in which I
know unreserved solace and a true sense of rest, so I try to ditch my lingering
resentments about abandoning the others as I park and step down from the
cab.
It has cooled some in the last few days, and a person can enjoy being
outside again. I walk on out to the area near the fire-pit, looking
at the remains of the various campfires I've burned this summer.
I then scan across the randomly-tufted green tops of the brush, which fills
the areas between those granite rocks large enough to be seen above it.
I notice the overcast skies above, realizing I should probably get inside
soon. Perhaps I shall have that wondrous sensation of being kept
indoors by the rain, amid all the dripping and fragrant wild greenery.
In city living, I feel confined and imprisoned by the rain, but here it
is something of a comforting, enclosing presence, just like the hollow
itself.
I grab a few pieces of fuel from the woodshed and go into the darkened
living space, which has waited for my return. It was not offended
the last time I left. This setting offers something of a "congeniality"
that others might only be able to find in social acquaintances. I
know it to be a low-value objective, the protection of my time alone.
Though I thought it strange at the time I first heard them, I realize now
the truth in those old sayings about love and kindness and compassion,
which are only felt when they are given away. I realize at this point
that I must keep my options open for whatever activity I might reasonably
survive amid the others. The whole deliberation suddenly seems a
little strange at this point--what person in his right mind would not
believe such things? I'm thinking ahead now, to my next commitments
in real life, as the rain begins to fall upon the broad rooftop. There
is more than just these times alone.
"Bo"
Ahead to September 1999
