July 2023 – Picking Up Roots

Thunder

The drumbeat of the downpour pummeled the roof of the house. It came in a hurry, with a huge flash of lightning and a crash of thunder. We couldn’t hear anything else above the raindrops exploding upon the roof.

No one heard the bolt of lightning that split the huge oak out front. When we woke up in the morning, the pattern of sunlight coming through the front window was different. Jo was the first to go to the window and she let out a huge cry at the discovery. The rest of us rushed to her, staring in disbelief at the naked flesh of the tree staring back at us.

The tree had been in our family for generations. Our great-great-great-grandparents had carved their initials in it when they were courting. After their marriage, they’d built the house near it.

It had grown thick and strong. It’s trunk was the size of a monster truck tire. Huge arms spread over one another providing a cool canopy from the summer heat. Each generation had had swings attached to the lower branches and every child in the family was married beneath those outstretched arms.

The oak was as much a part of our family as any pet could have been. We’d taken it for granted, assuming it would be in the family for generations after we’d gone. It’s indestructibleness obvious to all of us. Now it lay before us, split open by the anger of Mother Nature.

The fault lines had been growing within us for some time. Jo, Sam and I were struggling to come to grips with our parents’ aging, while trying to allow them to do so with dignity. As the rain was beating on the house last night, Jo was trying to convince our parents that a retirement community might be a better solution than staying out at the house.

They’d been resistant to the idea, still feeling able – which they were – and not wanting to upset the routine of their lives. Sam had sided with our folks. I was somewhere in the middle. Angry words had been spoken and no one went to sleep happy.

I’m not sure if we all recognized the tree as a metaphor of sorts for the tumult we were going through, but Ma pulled us all together for a group hug. With tears in her eyes, she said it wasn’t time yet, but when it was they’d be ready.

That was as close as we’d come to peace in quite some time.

Painting

how do I paint
a picture of the natural world
within the confines
of inadequate words;

how do I make real
its vast and intricate beauties;
how do I show it
stealing your breath away
as it fills you with life;

perhaps, it is to encourage you
to open your senses;
to hear the songs of the birds,
to feel the summer breeze kiss your skin,
to open your eyes to the life that surrounds -
to see

Dancing

He could no longer dance. His fingers wouldn’t trip across the keys to producing magic the way they had in his youth. It was more work now. He had to think; to grind out each idea to ensure it came across.

It wasn’t better or worse – it just was, the new way of his world. He understood things slowed over time. It was inevitable. In younger days he had tried to fight it, but he hated losing. He’d figured out a few tweaks to make himself more viable as the years fell away. Staying able was at the forefront of his mind.

His mind still raced. New ideas, new thoughts – more mature now – still caromed around the inside of his head. He didn’t worry about time. What was supposed to come out would come out. His endurance was front of mind. With all the distractions in his world – both of his own making and from without – he wondered if he’d find the focus required to sit long enough to finish. It was a real concern.

Laughter surrounded him. What was serious anymore? The chaos and the noise of the world. It felt like precious few believed in the power of the story. Maybe that wasn’t it. Maybe they didn’t understand. Today everything was so clipped, so mindless, in such a hurry. It seemed no one recognized how much impact a handful of words formed into a story could have.

It made him question his efforts; why he continued to try. He felt the tug of distraction – even at his age. The whole system was wired for ease, but he still fought against it to do the hard thing; to try to capture the world in words.

The questions were his biggest distraction. He kept coming back to the one: is this all worth it?

He still read. And it was in his reading that he found his answer. Each time a story made tears well in his eyes, or made him ache at the humanity of its characters, or understand the world anew, he knew it was worth it.

He’d go back to his keys and begin the slow two-step that was now his form of creation.