Category: Prose

Where does your mind wander? Have you ever witnessed your consciousness extending out beyond yourself, becoming lost in the world of what you see, and what you hear, taste, touch or smell? Have you noticed? Have you watched this as it happens, been attentive to the way you lose yourself in your thoughts throughout the day?

And what happens when you pray, can you find yourself again? Have you felt your consciousness return to you when you walk alone beneath the trees, or when you meditate upon the truth of Love? What peace do you feel, when all that you’ve scattered abroad in this wide world comes back to you and rests safely again within your heart? You are yours once more…

I saw myself leave myself today; extending my thoughts to the objects of my love, reaching out with my soul, dissipating my concentration and my energy just a little bit; so I prayed with thanks to God for all things, and called upon His mercy.  As I prayed, I felt myself returning to myself, and I felt peace; and I saw more clearly the objects of my love, as they exist outside of myself, but didn’t allow myself to be drawn out of my heart by any of them. As I prayed, I could love them without strings attached; simply with freedom and in purity.

When you lose yourself, if you do, have you ever tried to make prayer your constant companion; letting the words of your prayer and the meaning beneath the words permeate you, protect you, and draw you back in again? Do you call upon God’s grace continually, or struggle towards that goal? It is a difficult habit to inculcate but one that promises to add peace to our steps.

~FS

Paths of Desire

God is love. Man essentially desires love more than anything else. Therefore, when in his right mind, man will seek God before all other things.

This sums up the basic equation of my life. Everything about me is a corollary to this; either acting rationally seeking to dwell with my God, or acting irrationally seeking love in other quarters.

I am an Orthodox Christian, having come to the Orthodox Faith several years ago, after a lifetime journey through the Protestant milieu, an adolescence spent in study and meditation on The Bhagavad-Gita, and meditations with Buddhist monks, college years searching for truth as explained by Taoism, applying my own hermeneutics using critical thinking, fighting my way through the battlefield of contemporary university intellectual arrogance and hubris, coming out on the other side of academia with a desire for something real and adventurous, and joining a small group of spiritual seekers following a spiritual leader on a four-year inner journey of discovery and revelation; which opened doors for me into the truths of the spiritual warfare, which all of us are fighting every moment of every day, whether we are aware of it or not, which is spoken about by our Lord Jesus Christ and all of his followers from Paul, Peter and James, to all the great teachers which came after them.

There are faith, hope, and love. There are virtue and vice, truth and deception, and a myriad of paths extending into the future, waiting to be trod upon. And a smaller number of paths which have already been taken, which if traced back to their origins, make for an interesting tale.

To my memory, the first steps I took along these paths of desire were initiated by my admiration for my pastor. He was a tall, intellectual man, a former Bishop in the Methodist Church. His sermons were serious and challenging, and stirred me inside. I didn’t really understand much of what he said, as I was still in grade-school and lacked the vocabulary at my early age, but my soul understood him, and I loved him for this. He inspired me to make my faith real and to act upon it, and to approach it rationally with sincerity. He believed I would become a pastor myself someday and he invested some time in me to help me along this way. I remember him taking several of us up into the church loft to examine more closely the circular stain-glass window there, with the symbols of the four evangelists at the cardinal points: the winged man which symbolizes Matthew, the winged lion which symbolizes Mark, and the winged Ox for Luke and the Eagle for John.  I think he envisioned a straight and narrow path for me, perhaps hoping these winged evangelists would help speed me on my way. But my path, as for many of us, would not be all that straight or narrow.

Several years later I became a confirmed member of the Methodist Church. I wanted to do this, but I also couldn’t imagine an alternate decision. After our confirmation class a couple of my friends decided at the time not to be confirmed. I remember being perplexed by this and also a little scandalized. If I loved God, which I did, how could I not choose to be confirmed? I didn’t know of any other options at the time, it seemed a rather binary decision, yes or no. I didn’t know there could also be a yes…but, or a no…and, or a yes but over there instead. My world was still fairly small, but that was about to change in many significant ways.

It was around the same time as I was confirmed, in ninth grade, that my pastor retired and was replaced by a different type of pastor. He was also a very nice person, but he preferred a more worldly approach to faith, somehow connecting it to football games. So instead of deep, philosophical questions and challenges from the pulpit we now got football scores and statistics from the weekend’s slew of games. Perhaps there was something to this, I could see that others liked it, but whatever the connection between football and faith, it was lost on me and soon I lost my interest in church.

I stopped attending church in tenth grade and that was the year I discovered the writer Hermann Hesse. I devoured his books: Narcissus and Goldmund, Siddhartha, and The Glass Bead Game. He described the worlds that I sensed existing someplace; the inner turmoil of a life lived in the world in contrast to the life lived for God, the individual’s determined effort, exertion and sacrifice on the path to enlightenment, and the refined, sublime world on a hill, Castalia, where men could pursue intellectual pursuits unabated, apart from the mundanity of the world, but for the world’s benefit.

I began thinking about monasticism and monks. Why didn’t my church tradition have monks? I didn’t know anything at the time about church history, the great schism, the protestant reformation, so I had no knowledge of the context that my form of Christianity was born from, and the misunderstandings or even open hostility it had towards monasticism. To me it just seemed like such a great idea; to dedicate one’s life to God living out the struggle like Jesus did in the desert, or following the example of John the Baptist as he lived, ascetically, eating locusts and honey, or as Paul described when he talked about the two ways of living; married in the world, or single in order to dedicate oneself wholly to Christ. It didn’t make any sense to me why we wouldn’t avail ourselves of this noble path and all that it could offer, and I began to idealize this way of life. I wrote short homages on the walls of my bedroom extolling the virtue of celibacy and began to pray every night. I made a small altar in my room and I formed the habit before bed of praying in this way: I lit a candle and I wrote on a small slip of paper something to focus on in my prayer—perhaps a virtue one night, an intercession for someone another night, and I would put this slip in a little metal box which I stored under my altar and then I would sit on the floor with my legs crossed and gaze at the candle and contemplate whatever it was I had written.

I also felt inspired to try some ascetic disciplines, inspired by Siddhartha from Hesse’s book of the same name, I attempted to stand all night downstairs in our family room. I think the character in the book did it as an act of defiance against his parents, which I’m ashamed to say I also found agreeable and inspiring. I don’t remember if the character in the book also tried to stand through the night on one leg or if that was my own innovation, but in either case I was emulating that character, or in my pride, trying to outdo him. I attempted my first all-night vigil in this way, standing on one leg in the dark in the middle of our family room. I did not make it very long and soon found my way back up into my bed.

This ascetic failure gave me a healthier respect for Siddhartha and it humbled me a little bit. But I had at some point in my young life grabbed with both hands from the tree of pride, and unfortunately I wasn’t humbled for long. I still recall reading at some point from some spiritual elder of some faith, how, in his opinion, it wasn’t a good idea for people to pursue advanced spiritual disciplines at too early an age, but instead this should be left for later in life, not earlier than middle age. In my youthful exuberance (stupidity) I didn’t take this as an admonition or a caution but instead as a challenge. I was determined to be the youngest person ever to find enlightenment and show this old codger how it’s done. It is with some amusement that I write this now, at the age of forty-eight, being now the old codger I sought then to teach a lesson, also with gratefulness that my youthful haste didn’t leave me with any lasting damage, but also it leaves me a little sad that I was so arrogant then, and also so alone and without good guidance.

Spiritually I was very alone throughout adolescence. On occasion I went to the church I grew up attending, but they weren’t serious; they only wanted us to play games and essentially waste time. There were no real answers there for me. My mom was very loving and had a strong faith and was very encouraging to me, but she wasn’t able to guide me; we were in many ways living in different worlds. My dad had moved out years ago when my parents divorced while I was in seventh grade, and while he also was a very loving parent, and had good advice when it came to the things of this world, he didn’t understand spiritual things, matters of faith, and we were likewise distant in these essential things.

So, the following year, when I was in eleventh grade, I was thirsty for some kind of spiritual guidance. I was surprised to find it from my honors biology teacher. He enjoyed talking with students after class and at some point he learned that I enjoyed Hermann Hesse, and because of this, he thought I might enjoy something in a similar vein, so he recommended that I read The Bhagavad-Gita, a classic and pillar of the Hindu religious canon. So I bought a copy and it became my new bible for several years. Among other things it describes the battlefield of the inner spiritual war that we face; our battle between virtue and vice. I found this very appealing and studied it nightly, adding it as part of my prayer discipline.

This same year I found further spiritual direction from another seemingly unlikely place, the high school drama department. For me, this was the place to put spiritual theory into practice; it was an experimental lab for the inner person, a place where the primary question asked over and over again is: ‘what is your motivation?’, and a place to explore authentically our feelings and come to understand ourselves better, and also to transform ourselves. Though not at all overtly religious, I found that it was a facsimile of it, in that it sought truth by asking sincere questions about our inner drives, motivations and desires, and though it didn’t have as its goal the transformation of the soul, I found that I could use it for this purpose within me. I could practice transforming vices into virtues, I could practice watching my inner thoughts and bringing these supposedly hidden things out to the surface where they could be of benefit to me, or be transformed by me, and I could, over time, become a more empathetic person, coming to a better understanding of others by accessing the root causes of their moral and ethical strengths and weaknesses, by way of the struggle and practice of discovering and acting out my own. My ego loved the attention of the stage, but more importantly my soul loved the inner exploration encouraged during rehearsal, and this is what kept me coming back to acting and the theater for many years.

This was also the year my nascent promiscuity came into full bloom. I can’t blame the theater for my own inner proclivities, but it was an environment that encouraged creativity in many forms, and didn’t discourage many at the same time. On this topic, my first friend in this way told me, ‘once you’ve tried it you will only want more, and there is no turning back’. It sounded so foreboding when she said it, and while I disagree with her conclusions, I have to say she wasn’t lying that it would be a difficult struggle for me from that time forward. So much for my homage to celibacy which I had written so brightly on my bedroom wall only a couple years earlier. It was from this time that I began to understand the inner struggles first-hand, although it would take me many years before I could say I gained any ability or power to overcome this, and only then by the grace of God.

We can find and experience oneness in spirit with God. St Paul writes about this in First Corinthians. This is the goal, the teleology of our entire life here on earth in preparation for the next life. But nobody told me about this back then. I had heard the phrase, ‘you have a friend in Jesus’, or that ‘Jesus is my best friend’, things like that, but to me, then, they were just words without meaning. I didn’t know anyone that understood how to have a real relationship with God, a meaningful one, one that actually could fill the emptiness, the loneliness that I felt in my soul. So I looked for oneness in a more tangible, bodily way; a way that made sense to me, which I could understand and actually feel erase the loneliness within me, at least briefly.

God knows how strong the desire for love, and for oneness is within us. He placed it there, so I believe this is also why He says, again through St Paul, to flee sexual immorality.  Because if we don’t flee from it as quickly as we can, if we linger with it even for a short time, we come to believe that it is right and natural because, of course it is based on our natural inherent desire, and very soon we can be overcome and make it our natural course of life, our habit, and ultimately it will draw us further away from God. This is certainly what I did, and over the course of my late teens and early twenties, while on the surface I sought for a relationship with God, actually in my depths I sunk deeper and deeper into depravity, further and further from God, without even recognizing it.

The summer between my junior and senior years of high school I travelled to South Africa. It was 1986 and the unrest in that country due to apartheid and the growing resistance to those policies was at a boiling point. I had recently discovered that Mahatma Gandhi was an ardent reader of The Bhagavad Gita, which I also loved, and he had spent part of his life in South Africa. I had a deepening sense of meaninglessness over my own life at this time, and I decided to try to assuage this emptiness within me through an adventure. Somehow the connection I felt to Gandhi, and the excitement of the unrest drew me to South Africa.  I wanted to experience this for myself and see it with my own eyes.

The trip did not disappoint. I visited Soweto with a black police officer I met. He also escorted me through the dark underbelly of Johannesberg one night and kept me close so I wouldn’t be hurt. I swam by moonlight in the Indian Ocean, kicked soccer balls around with kids in Kwa Zulu, visited Lesotho and just generally had an amazing time. But when I returned home, and to my senior year in school, I was overcome with boredom; and the feeling of meaninglessness that the trip was intended to repair was only exacerbated by it. I wanted to travel, I wanted to be anywhere but in school and my grades showed it. I had been a very good student up until that time but I barely attended classes my senior year and by the end I only managed to graduate by the good graces of the school administration whom I had ingratiated myself to using charm, persuasion and some luck.

I have always believed that God is my help, even when I haven’t been aware of Him, and He has always given me a lifeline, so to speak, to get through even the most difficult times. And so it was, in my senior year; though I struggled with boredom and meaninglessness, I had the good fortune to audition and join the school Chamber Singers group. For me this was heaven on earth, because we sang the most beautiful music, practicing every morning at 7am for an hour before school started. This was my reason for getting up in the morning. I still remember many of the hymns and madrigals that we sang that year, but the one that has stayed with me most strongly over the years, and which soothed me then and gave me hope in that dark time, was the hymn, “Ubi Caritas”. Here are the lyrics, good to read at any stage in life:

Where charity and love are, God is there.

Christ’s love has gathered us into one.

Let us rejoice and be pleased in Him.

Let us fear, and let us love the living God.

And may we love each other with a sincere heart.

Where charity and love are, God is there.

As we are gathered into one body,

Beware, lest we be divided in mind.

Let evil impulses stop, let controversy cease,

And may Christ our God be in our midst.

Where charity and love are, God is there.

And may we with the saints also,

See Thy face in glory, O Christ our God:

The joy that is immense and good,

Unto the ages through infinite ages. Amen.

I first set foot into an Orthodox Church later that year after I decided to make a survey of some alternatives to the church of my youth. I was struck by the beauty of the golden onion domes on the exterior of the building and it was this that drew me in for the service; and once inside I was awed by the iconography and the quality of light as it penetrated through the windows above. The service was in Russian so I didn’t understand anything, but I remember being very impressed with the beauty of the liturgy. As a complete contrast to this I also attended meetings with the Quakers. Here there was a complete absence of anything I could recognize as a church; they met in a community hall and sat on chairs in a large circle. I appreciated the stillness and silence of their gathering but after a few visits I could see that the group was dominated by a few very vocal individuals, and the topics of their monologues veered from politics to all variations of strange things having nothing to do with God. I also visited a Mormon temple since I had several Mormon friends in school and all of them were incredibly sweet and kind and I very much enjoyed them; and their parents were also always very thoughtful and loving to me. The service was fine, I don’t remember a lot about it actually, but I didn’t feel as if I was drawn in any way towards that faith. I did out of respect take a copy of the Book of Mormon, at their request, and leafed through it for several weeks to gain a general overview and understanding of where they were coming from.

That summer, after graduating from high school, a friend and I began regularly attending the early morning meditation at the Sonoma Mountain Zen Center. The location was beautiful, near the summit of a nearby mountain, surrounded by large oak trees and grassy slopes. The meditation center was large and spacious and filled with light, and doors which opened out onto a large deck in the midst of the oaks. We would begin with about an hour of sitting meditation and then there was optional walking meditation out on the deck and then an opportunity to share some soup with the resident monks. I looked forward to this morning routine and liked learning words like ‘zazen’, which is the practice of letting judgmental thoughts pass through the mind without engaging them, and ‘zafu’, which is the firm little round cushions we sat on during meditation. I also came to enjoy the resonant and hollow sound of the bell, which announced the beginning and ending of the meditation sessions. Over time I discovered that while I enjoyed so many of the aesthetic aspects of this place and also appreciated developing skills in observing my thoughts and letting them go, I didn’t find answers to my loneliness or the emptiness I felt inside, and so, I eventually stopped visiting the Zen monks, but was grateful to them for what they had taught me.

 

To Be Continued…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Money Giver

I know a man in town who’s habit it is to carry in his wallet, money which he gives to those he meets that are in need. He rarely leaves his home without checking a special pocket in the back of his leather billfold to ensure that there is some assortment of ones, fives, tens and twenties available for those who ask.

When asked how he determines who is worthy of these special dispensations he will reply that anyone who asks him is worthy. It makes no difference their appearance, or circumstance, for who is he to judge another human being? If they are in need and he can help he sees this simply as his obligation, his opportunity, and, he would add, his benefit and blessing. “For what gift can we give that we don’t receive as much in return, to our own benefit, in the way of spiritual rewards: joy, peace, goodwill…”

It had been some time since he had crossed paths with anyone in need on the street corners or parking lot exits where one typically finds them, and he was feeling sorrow because of this, and a great need to find someone to help. So on this particular day he drove north to the Trader Joes parking lot where there is usually a man, or a woman or even a whole family waiting for someone to help them. Today he found a young man, bundled in blankets, sitting on the sidewalk in the rain, rocking back and forth and muttering unknown things to himself. He was clutching in his hands a pipe and lighter and looking up at the sky. When the man approached him and offered him the money, he barely took notice but just continued rocking back and forth and staring into the distance. He wished the young man a peaceful day and hopes for a warm bed tonight, gave him the money, and returned to his truck.

As he told it to me later, while approaching the young man, he considered how much of his money to give him, and while he doesn’t withhold money from anyone in need, he also doesn’t want his contributions to be used by others to hurt themselves. This young man clearly looked like he could choose to use the money for drugs rather than food. Perhaps he should have bought the boy food instead, as he sometimes does, but in this case he thought it better to give eleven dollars, enough for a warm meal, but not so much that it could be too harmful should the child choose to go that route. He prayed that the young man would make a wise choice with the money he had been given.

I asked him if this was the end of his adventures for the day and he replied that no, in fact there was a second part of his calculation when deciding what to give the young man: how much to hold back, to have ready to give the next person who he felt certain he would find that day. The next person would need quite a bit more, he believed, so he kept closer to eighty dollars ready in his wallet after leaving the young man.

“This is very generous,” I exclaimed.

“Don’t get the wrong impression. I am a selfish man,” he replied. “I really am, my wife has reminded me of this many times and it is true. For all the good you seem to think you see me doing here, there are plenty more occasions where I display complete disregard for anyone but myself. In fact, in truth, this is how I live most of my life. But hopefully I will change.”

He continued his story, “the next person I found a bit farther south, standing on the corner near Costco, holding a sign and clutching a crutch under each arm. His legs were badly deformed and he had trouble maneuvering in the rain, as his crutches slipped on the concrete.  As I approached him I could see he had a fighting spirit and also a gentle spirit. I was immediately impressed with him, and wanted to know more about him. I introduced myself and suggested he might have better luck up the street on the corner near the Seventy-Six gas station because there was a pull-out there where cars could get out of traffic and more easily give him money. He didn’t know the area well, and hadn’t stood asking for money in quite a while but he had sudden expenses and not enough for rent and he was in danger of losing his home. His roommate was too afraid to stand asking for money because of bad experiences with others yelling at him and throwing things at him in the past. But he didn’t mind these things, one just does what they have to do. I gave him the handful of money and he pocketed it gratefully.”

“What was the matter with his legs, did you ever find out?” I asked.

“Yes. He has cerebral palsy. His eyes are also very crossed and as he explained to me he has troubles with incontinence and therefore has to wear ‘Depends’ all the time.  And I must tell you when he confessed this I almost wept. He said it so plainly, without shame and also without any self-consciousness whatsoever. He might as well have been telling me what he had for breakfast. I can’t explain it but the simplicity of that humbled me tremendously and my admiration for him grew. ‘The body does what the body does, you just have to take care of it’ he said to me. I wish I could have conveyed the naturalness of this statement in the way he said it. It was truly tremendous, no artifice, no mannerism that would suggest any of the issues I might have, were I the one needing the diapers. I’ve heard it said that humility is just being who we are honestly, naturally. I have rarely, if ever seen a clearer example of genuine humility and it was beautiful. He then commented that in fact he had used his diaper there and needed to find a bathroom soon where he could change it for a new pair and this is why, he explained, that he kept an extra pair of pants with him and additional ‘Depends’ in the bag he carried while he asked for money on the street corner.”

“How horrible,” I exclaimed, “I feel so badly for him.”

“That’s just it. He didn’t need my pity. And he didn’t feel badly for himself either. He seemed to take all of this in stride, with a calm and peace I have only seen in animals. Have you noticed your pet, or a deer for instance when it has been injured, they don’t complain, in fact you hardly will know if your puppy has an ailment, he doesn’t tell you and he takes it all patiently. Have you noticed that? I have, and it always impresses me. Of course this man is not an animal, and I don’t want this comparison to be taken the wrong way. I mean it as high praise. He seemed to transcend the common man’s turmoils and complaints about his daily life, and bear them all, including great insult, with amazing patience and endurance. But what I wanted to tell you is that while we stood there together on the corner, I told him that I hoped he’d be able to get enough money for his rent, so that he could keep his home. And do you know what he said? He said, ‘Oh, I will. God will provide for me.’ Well, that in itself isn’t surprising, you hear that often enough, but he said it with a faith unfeigned, and as a simple statement of fact, as I was beginning to understand was his custom. Now, I hear this statement fairly often, and, in fact, I’ve said it myself many times, but he said it in a different way than I usually hear it said, not in order to convince himself, or to convince his audience at all, in fact there was absolutely no convincing needed at all. He merely said what was so, and what would happen. That’s it. He would get the money and God would provide, and there wasn’t any reason for concern. Bravo! Oh, how I admired him in almost every way! And, I envied him, unfortunately. I’m ashamed to say it, but I did envy him his faith. I wish I could have only admired him, and found inspiration by him, because envy is a nasty thing, isn’t it? I say it is a nasty sand-trap on the golf course of life, you don’t want to hit yourself into that. No, it is more like quicksand, envy is; before you know it you’re in over your head and you can lose yourself.”

“Was that it then? Did you both go your own ways? You must have had to get back to work by this time, and you had already spent quite a bit of time with this man and also the young man in the blanket,” I said.

“Well he asked to be pointed to a nearby restaurant if I knew one, as he was getting hungry and needed to sit and rest his legs. And he also asked if I knew where he could get new rubber points for the ends of his crutches as he went through those every few days and the current ones he had were worn through. I happily offered him a ride to a medical supply store I knew of just a couple miles up the road, so we drove off together.”

“Did you feel like he was using you a little by this time?” I asked.

“Not at all! And so what if he was. But no I didn’t.”

“I might have felt uncomfortable having him in my car, and also taking so much time now out of my day.”

“Yes, well, he said he trusted me, so he was comfortable getting in the truck with me. I was looking at the time though and raced through, in my mind, all of the things I still needed to do for the day, and how far behind I had already become. Could I afford to take him to get these supplies? Oh how dreadful I am sometimes. This man could barely walk, hardly had a dime to his name, has to suffer the ignominy of wearing diapers, and is clearly socially outcast in most of life’s social settings, and I’m worried about my errands. I became nauseous then, literally sick to my stomach, because I saw myself and how narrow and small I was…contrasts are terrible aren’t they, helping us to see and understand; I mean, a light is brighter at night, isn’t it, and sound travels so well through silence. Well, performing this act of caring for him was highlighting how little I do for others, most of the time. And the worst thing is even with this realization, I hardly wanted to change. I still wanted to focus on my espressos, enjoying lunch with friends, surrounding myself with luxuries and beautiful things. I didn’t want to enter into his life for very long. It scared me, and depressed me, and overwhelmed me actually.”

“That is understandable.”

“Yes, well, so we went to the medical supply store and I bought him the new rubber tips he needed for his crutches, and also new rubber handles that went over the metal posts where he gripped the crutches and a packet of ‘Depends’. And he used the bathroom at the store to change himself and then I took him to the hamburger place across the street and dropped him off so he could get a meal and then he called and arranged for a friend to come pick him up there so I could go on my way. As he got out of my truck and we said our farewells I thanked him. This seemed to take him aback and he asked why I was thanking him. I couldn’t really explain to him why, but you understand.”

“And so that was it then? A good day I’d say by any measure. You helped two people in need and had quite an adventure at the same time.”

With that, we finished our espressos, the man and I, and we agreed to meet again soon, perhaps next week, to share another coffee and maybe a new adventure or two. He paid our tab and walked out the door into the rainy evening and I also began my walk home. Thinking over the story the man had just shared with me, I hoped to find someone myself to help. I had a few bucks in my pocket. But the streets were empty as I made my way, with nobody huddled under the streetlamps hoping for change, just the falling rain flickering under the golden lamplight. As the raindrops pattered overhead, onto my umbrella, I vowed to myself that if I had the good fortune to find someone in need tomorrow, I wouldn’t overlook or pass by my opportunity to help them.

The End.

 

~FS

 

The Money Giver—Part I

I know a man in town who’s habit it is to carry in his wallet, money which he gives to those he meets that are in need. He rarely leaves his home without checking a special pocket in the back of his leather billfold to ensure that there is some assortment of ones, fives, tens and twenties available for those who ask.

When asked how he determines who is worthy of these special dispensations he will reply that anyone who asks him is worthy. It makes no difference their appearance, or circumstance, for who is he to judge another human being? If they are in need and he can help he sees this simply as his obligation, his opportunity, and, he would add, his benefit and blessing. “For what gift can we give that we don’t receive as much in return, to our own benefit, in the way of spiritual rewards: joy, peace, goodwill…”

It had been some time since he had crossed paths with anyone in need on the street corners or parking lot exits where one can typically be found, and he was feeling sorrow because of this, and a great need to find someone to help. So on this particular day he drove north to the Trader Joes parking lot where there is usually a man, or a woman or even a whole family waiting for someone to help them. Today he found a young man, bundled in blankets, sitting on the sidewalk in the rain, rocking back and forth and muttering unknown things to only himself. He was clutching in his hands a pipe and lighter and looking up at the sky. When the man approached him and offered him the money, he barely took notice but just continued rocking back and forth and staring into the distance. He wished the young man a peaceful day and hopes for a warm bed tonight, gave him the money, and returned to his truck.

As he told it to me later, while approaching the young man, he considered how much of his money to give him, and while he doesn’t withhold money from anyone in need, he also doesn’t want his contributions to be used by others to hurt themselves. This young man clearly looked like he could choose to use the money for drugs rather than food. Perhaps he should have bought the boy food instead, as he sometimes does, but in this case he thought it better to give eleven dollars, enough for a warm meal, but not so much that it could be too harmful should the child choose to go that route. He prayed that the young man would make a wise choice with the money he had been given.

I asked him if this was the end of his adventures for the day and he replied that no, in fact there was a second part of his calculation when deciding what to give the young man: how much to hold back to have ready to give to the next person he felt certain he would find that day. The next person would need quite a bit more, he believed, so he kept closer to eighty dollars ready in his wallet after leaving the young man.

“This is very generous,” I exclaimed.

“Don’t get the wrong impression. I am a selfish man,” he replied. “I really am, my wife has reminded me of this many times and it is true. For all the good you seem to think you see me doing here, there are plenty more occasions where I display complete disregard for anyone but myself. In fact, in truth, this is how I live most of my life. But hopefully I will change.”

He continued his story, “the next person I found a bit farther south, standing on the corner near Costco, holding a sign and clutching a crutch under each arm. His legs were badly deformed and he had trouble maneuvering in the rain, as his crutches slipped on the concrete.  As I approached him I could see he had a fighting spirit and also a gentle spirit. I was immediately impressed with him, and wanted to know more about him. I introduced myself and suggested he might have better luck up the street on the corner near the Seventy-Six gas station because there was a pull-out there where cars could get out of traffic and more easily give him money. He didn’t know the area well, and hadn’t stood asking for money in quite a while but he had sudden expenses and not enough for rent and he was in danger of losing his home. His roommate was too afraid to stand asking for money because of bad experiences with others yelling at him and throwing things at him in the past. But he didn’t mind these things, one just does what they have to do. I gave him the handful of money and he pocketed it gratefully.”

“What was the matter with his legs, did you ever find out?” I asked.

“Yes. He has cerebral palsy. His eyes are also very crossed and as he explained to me he has troubles with incontinence and therefore has to wear ‘Depends’ all the time.  And I must tell you when he confessed this I almost wept. He said it so plainly, without shame and also without any self-consciousness whatsoever. He might as well have been telling me what he had for breakfast. I can’t explain it but the simplicity of that humbled me tremendously and my admiration for him grew. ‘The body does what the body does, you just have to take care of it’ he said to me. I wish I could have conveyed the naturalness of this statement in the way he said it. It was truly tremendous, no artifice, no mannerism that would suggest any of the issues I might have were I the one needing the diapers. I’ve heard it said that humility is just being who we are honestly, naturally. I have rarely, if ever seen a clearer example of genuine humility and it was beautiful. He then commented that in fact he had used his diaper there and needed to find a bathroom soon where he could change it for a new pair and this is why, he explained, that he kept an extra pair of pants with him and additional ‘Depends’ in the bag he carried while he asked for money on the street corner.”

To Be Continued…

 

~FS

 

 

 

We’re anthropowhimsical,

humans are puzzles,

labyrinths and enigmas—

we’re homomercurial.

Who of us will find lasting peace while on the earth?

Or the deeper question is, I think:

will we the anthropocentric,

accept deification?

 

~FS

Dear Mom:

I’m so very sorry I have to say goodbye; that I have to let you go, and move on, myself, to wherever I am going.

You see, I couldn’t live, yearning for your flesh, hoping for your touch once more, to hold you, to give you a kiss.

When the sun sets, its warmth with it, dissolves into the deepening night, overcome by mists and dew. So too my knowledge of you, it seems, must fade into a deepening past.

When your body and blood transforms into memories, into beautiful stories of who you were while here with me, it allows me, though hollow now, to live again.

You’ve had to fade, though I didn’t want it, and I fought it, I promise you, but in the end, my life only solidifies now as yours dissolves.

But please know, that I love you just as much as I ever have, and am grateful to you for everything, and even now you are a gift to me; by taking your place in my past, you have given me my present.

With all the love I can muster,

your son,

Francis

           “I just finished the painting. It was so scary to begin. Before I had even

            squirted any of the paint out, I was paralyzed—I might waste some paint,

            and one of my canvasses—but it was more than the fear of wasting five

            dollars worth of materials; this would be an expression of me. It would be

            my best attempt at art. There is always this fear before beginning any

            creative process, the fear that it might not be good enough, that I might

            not be good enough; it is only a little harder now since I’m not working

            with all of my faculties. The funny thing is however, even though I couldn’t

            see the art I knew I would still automatically assume it wasn’t quite right.

            Sure I’d be excited to see it but, I knew I’d also be telling everyone how much

            better could do. All of this was automatic in me even before seeing the results.

            With this painting though I was paranoid knowing that my hands could never

            equal the grandeur of the visions created by my mind. But then I realized and

            accepted this fact, that a hand is not a mind, and it works within its own

            limitations. At this point I felt free to paint and have a good time regardless

            of the outcome.”

 

As I read this I think how all of our life is a creative process, not just specifically painting or writing etc, and how easy it is to be paralyzed with this same fear of not measuring up, of failing, so to speak, and how effective these fears are at keeping us from even beginning to know who we are, and then, from exploring and practicing our art; the art of our lives. There is a method I now use to combat these fears, which is very effective; it is using fear to combat fear. I use the knowledge and fear that I will die one day as a counter to the fear of failing. Each day I meditate on the fact that my time here in this life is very limited, I will die, and I don’t have the luxury of waiting to do whatever it is I want to accomplish. None of us are guaranteed tomorrow.  Somehow these thoughts give me clarity and are very encouraging, and motivating to my getting on with this creative process which is my life.

            “Later in the afternoon Tanya and Nicole were over and we played hide and

            seek in the backyard. Finding Nicole was easy as I was concentrating on the

            sounds she made as she hid. But finding Tanya was nearly impossible. I knew

            which part of the yard she was in because she let out a sound when I found

            Nicole, but finding her was very difficult. I kept hearing things that I was

            sure was her: up in the trees, next to the fence. But I couldn’t find her. After

            a long time she gave me a hint, a scratch on wood, and I was able to catch her.

 

            There is less than an hour now until I take the bandages off and I’m feeling

            kind of down. I almost don’t want to take them off. I’ve grown to like it dark.

            I don’t know why I would want to stay in this darkness but it has been new

            and I like the strange newness. It gets me out of a rut in a beautiful way. I

            don’t have to go out of town to do this, I can just cover my eyes and I am

            transported to another place; the most mundane things suddenly become

            important. It makes me really live this life, and not just drift through it.”

 

Blindness is like a break for the eyes, at least for someone only experimenting briefly with it as I was. Back in the late 1980s when I did the experiment we didn’t have the internet and smart phone, so now, even more so, our lives are extremely visually chaotic. Taking a break from all of that stimulation is a good idea.

            “What a drug sight can be; I just took the bandages off. I indulge in the visual

            now and almost fry my brain! Taking them off and seeing the sunset was some-

            thing I couldn’t have foreseen. It was more real and vivid and wonderful than

            anything I’ve ever seen. It was the ultimate in perception! I know that I won’t

            be able to aptly describe it on these pages but this is my best attempt. At first

            everything before me was blurred but only for a short time, and then I saw

            the tree against the background of the sky. Each small branch shimmered

            with its own life, an entity of its own. Deep, dark, blackness, so rich and deep

            like nothing I’ve seen before. Every twig, every limb, burnt savagely into the

            soft blue sky. And then the sun…the sun ducked down behind the trees and the

            bright halo arose from the dark mountain and filled the sky. It then began to

            shrink and as it shrunk it gained intensity until it burst and spurt brilliant

            light across the sky, across the valley, filling my vision with brilliance. What

            remained was a pastel yellow globe of light just above the horizon. To either

            side of the globe, just above the treeline, shot out a bright red line of light; it

            flickered and suddenly vanished. The blue and orange of the sky turned pas-

            tel. The air gained new life from the light of the sinking sun. A bird arose from

            the shimmering tree and shot past me. Then I turned to my left and saw the

            deepest, most crisp shades of purples and blues of the distant and not so dis-

            tant hills. And the hill I was on was pure also; it was green but it was also

            blue. It was both at the same time but it wasn’t confused or muddy; it was

            clarity. I had the feeling about my eyes as if the sights I was should be out of

            focus but all that I saw was crisper and richer than it had ever been. My eyes

            hurt but I kept looking. It struck be that everything I saw was alive and had

            just been born—the world was starting over, afresh! I then turned and looked

            behind me. There I saw my hill, the one I sit on all the time. The trees were

            black and green, all shades and hues, full and real; I was drunk with what

            I saw. Everything reached out and touched me, nothing stayed still, it all

            reached out to me: the purple hills, the dark green trees, my hill, the burnt

            black tree, the sky, and the light of the disappearing sun. All these reached

            out and stung my eyes. I turned to my right and there was a girl. She was

            so small it seemed but also so big. She was beautiful. Her eyes light blue,

            dark blue rimmed, and happy. She was so close but she also seemed very

            far away. I couldn’t touch her but I was glad she was there and I know I

            talked to her but I don’t know what I said, something about the beauty

            around us. This feeling didn’t go away as it seems it would, like so many ter-

            rific things do, but it stayed with me and surrounded me and caressed me

            for a long time. I saw in this way and I felt complete.”

  

Conclusion of My Experiment with Three Days of Blindness:

            “It was an overwhelming experience. I am so glad I got to ‘see’ it. I feel very

            lucky. Now I can see and I don’t know if I care. Sure I don’t run into walls

            or trucks anymore, and I think that’s a good thing, but I feel as if I’ve lost

            something important. I look at my painting and it looks so different than

            I had intended it. It is very beautiful to me. The colors aren’t exactly what

            I thought they would be but it’s a bubbly surprise. Now I reenter the com-

            plicated world of sight where it isn’t good enough to spend an hour making

            breakfast. Things like that are miniscule in this world. They don’t matter,

            they are the mundane, the ‘so what’ of this world. How could I justify

            spending an hour touching the canvas and the paint of my art? Just drink-

            ing in the texture and communing with the colors—realizing the import-

            ance, the relevance it has in my life. Sure, what I think about it is the most

            important thing, and if I think it is alright to do this than it is. Although,

            what other people think is important as well. For many, this isn’t a univer-

           sally acceptable way to spend one’s time. So it is therefore hard to feel

           entirely good about doing it. But while blind, all of these supposedly unim-

            portant things become and are important, meaningful and worthwhile.

            No-one can say otherwise and I feel content with this simplicity. Now I’m

            in the harried world of sight where we are stimulated by too many things.

            We must rush off to school or to work, I have work to get done, I must be

            in certain places at certain times, and there is television and newspapers

            and books to read, shows to see, and sports to enjoy. I think that there is

            too much to think about, too much stimulation. I’m not entirely glad to

            have my sight back. It means jumping back into this whirlwind that we’ve

            all been spinning around in so long. A whirlwind that’s got us dizzy and

            confused, and that stirs up the dust and leaves us with tears in our eyes.

            The tears of our souls crying to escape this tormenting tempest.

 

            I wonder if I’ll still have the vivid visions of the eagles and the beautiful

            pictures that my mind created during these past few days. I would hate to

            lose that.

 

            What satisfaction I felt from making my meals or making some cookies.

            It seems it would be the same, the feeling of fulfillment, if I had a plot of

            land somewhere and I could wake in the morning and build maybe a part

            of my home, maybe the bathroom today or a windmill for energy. What

            satisfaction that would be, and to plant the seeds that would sometime

            later be my food, and to write and paint and cook—how simple. How

            meaningless and wasteful…but it isn’t. It is simple and it is pure, and whole

            and unscattered, and unhurried, and easy to keep everything in front of

            me. Not confusing; just peaceful…

 

            It was a wonderful experiment and a great ‘vacationland’. Instead of

            travelling far away I travelled within and found a whole world of mir-

            aculous sights and breathtaking beauty—a land that reached farther

            than the eye can see, and that holds more to do than the greatest family

            amusement park. It is a land whose limits exceed infinity and whose

            treasures I’ve only just begun to dig up. This land of wonder is my mind.”

Humility is such a simple friend, sitting patiently, always at our side. He holds the key to our freedom and will open every door. When we’ve done wrong, he is there to ease the shame; tossing copious flower petals thick upon the ground, and softening the pain when we fall to our knees. He turns the abhorrent word, repentance, into a beautiful action that makes all things pure again. Some men, in their foolishness, imagine him to be a doormat, which others will wipe their shoes on, or trample across as they go about their business. But they don’t see, and can’t understand, that humility is the strength which gives us the power to face any challenge, find victory in any difficulty, and to soften any blow. Humility is an outstretched net, catching us softly when we fall from the heights of our pride. He is like a beautiful butterfly, with outstretched wings carrying us to safety from the depths of an abyss. And if we fall into an abyss, and find ourselves in despair, humility is also a ladder by which we climb up and out and back into the sunlight. Humility is an open door and such a simple, loving friend, always ready to help and loyal to the end.

~FS

It was getting dark as we finally pulled into the parking lot. In the van with me were a group of fifteen college students from Colorado State University who had come to Seattle for a week to work on a service project over their spring break.  They were excited to be here but were also tired from their flight, and ready to see where they were going to be staying for the coming week.

 

Their accommodations were on the second floor of the Mennonite church building in town.  The church is situated in an urban environment amidst low-rent apartment buildings, thrift stores and car dealerships. At night, it is probably safe, especially if you are in a group of fifteen, but it is still a good idea to keep an eye out for potential trouble.

 

This particular year I was working for the church, coordinating service programs. So it was my job to welcome this group, show them around, and be available if they needed anything.

 

We piled out of the van, loaded ourselves with duffle bags, suitcases, and sleeping bags and trekked across the parking lot to the church.

 

In my mind I was running through everything I needed to show them about the building; the location of the shower, the bathrooms, the kitchen, which door to enter through and which one to leave closed and locked…when I saw, coming out of this very same door, someone who shouldn’t have been.  In his arms he was carrying a microwave oven and stuffed poorly into his backpack was a portable stereo.

 

He glanced our way and then hustled quickly around the corner of the building with his new acquisitions.

 

It is a rare thing to catch someone in the act of stealing so my mind didn’t immediately register what I had just seen. Was he really stealing from us? I asked myself. Maybe I know him. He probably attends the church and I just didn’t recognize him in the fading light. I rationalized. But then, why did he scuttle off so quickly in the opposite direction after seeing us coming towards him?

 

I decided he was definitely a thief so I sprang into action. I quickly told the students that we were being robbed, handed them the keys to the building and told them to go inside and make themselves comfortable as I dashed off after the intruder.

 

I caught up with him not far down the street and confronted him. “What are you doing? Those are our things you are taking from the church.”

 

“No they aren’t,” he replied.

“Of course they are. I can tell you exactly where they came from. That microwave in your hands is out of the youth room, and the stereo is also.”

 

“They’re mine.”

 

“But I just saw you coming out of the door of the church.”

 

“No I didn’t.”

 

“I see those things everyday. I know you took them.”

 

As the conversation proceeds we continue to walk down the darkened street.

 

“Look”, he said as he turned to face me. “Do you want me to just smash this over your head?” He gestured to the microwave.

 

He looked menacingly at me and I took him at his word.

 

“No. I just want you to return them.”

 

He started walking again and I followed alongside. “Okay. I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt. Maybe they are yours and it is just a crazy coincidence. Come back to the church with me and we’ll look at the location I think they belong. If the microwave and stereo are there then I apologize.”

 

“I’m not going back,” he snapped. “Just leave me alone.”

 

“I’m not going to leave you alone. You have our things.”

 

No reply. We walked a moment in silence. Who knows what he was thinking, but my mind was racing trying to come up with the key to unlock this situation. The line I was taking wasn’t working.

 

“What do you need?” I asked him.

 

“Money.”

 

“I understand…look,” I said, “I don’t want you to have to steal for it and you don’t want to steal either.”

 

He didn’t answer.

 

“I know you don’t want to steal. Not really.”

 

We walked a little further and he stopped. We were standing under a dim streetlight, at a corner where two roads met. I pulled out my wallet, opened it, and counted to myself what I had.

 

“I have forty dollars. You can have it.”

 

His expression changed, softening for a moment. Then he looked suspicious.

 

“Why would you give me that?”

 

I thought for a moment, and in that space of time, God gave me love for him.

 

“Because I love you. God loves you too. I don’t want you to have to steal.”

 

He looked at me for a moment, evaluating me in some way unknown to me. And then he asked, “If I didn’t give these things back would you still give me the money?”

 

That was a great question. I paused to think about it. The answer had to be yes or my ‘love’ was going to look pretty cheap. But the answer also had to be true because I was sure he would have seen right through me if it wasn’t. In any case I didn’t want to cheapen this brief relationship with a lie.

 

I imagined the possibility that I gave him the money and he kept the stolen property. I didn’t know how that would eventually turn out but I made myself okay with that chance and told him so.

 

He considered my response. I offered him the money, reaching out to him. He thought a bit further and then really surprised me with what he said next.

 

“Let me carry these things back for you.”

 

“Really!? I asked, “I can take the microwave for you.”

 

“No. I want to carry them all back for you.”

 

So he turned around and began walking back the way he had come, retracing his steps back to the door of the church. I turned and walked alongside him yet again. On the way back he began talking, and talking, and he didn’t stop talking for a long time.

 

“Nobody has ever loved me. No one says they love me. My dad never loved me. I can’t believe it, that you love me. I’m just passing through town. I don’t have a home and I don’t know anyone here. You know if someone just would have loved me. That was really cool. Thank you so much for the money. I really need it.”

 

“No problem.”

We stopped in view of the church and he looked at me. “Can I give you these now? I don’t want to go back there.”

 

“Sure.”

 

He handed the microwave to me and then took off his backpack and pulled the stereo out and placed it on top of the microwave in my arms.

 

“You’re welcome to come and join us while you are in town. I won’t tell anyone who did this so if you come in on Sunday no one will know you. It’ll be fine.”

 

“Thanks. I probably won’t be around.”

 

We exchanged a few more pleasantries and then he waved goodbye, turned and walked into the darkness.

 

I watched him go and then walked back to the church. I thought to myself, I’ve met several thieves in my life but I’ve never before met a thief that gave it all back.

 

I felt that God really taught us both a lot that evening. I was surprised to find the person that emerged when he was treated with kindness instead of anger. Though he acted despicably at first by stealing, he was treated with dignity, and in the end this allowed him to respond with dignity and with grace.

 

I praise God for teaching us the value of love, and the practical way that it can make a bad situation good.

 

~FS

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Day Two of My Experiment with Three Days of Blindness:

            “I can’t believe I’m doing this. I woke up blind again this morning and today I

            feel left out. I feel like I’m missing out on a lot of things everyone else can enjoy.

            It’s a beautiful day, I can feel it, but I can’t see it. I’m listening to a record and

            feeling good right now though. But I do feel less human. There is no doubt I’m

            experiencing a different reality then either Shannon or Nicole. The three of

            us are in my room and it feels nice. I try to smell the flowers I got for Valentine’s

            Day today but I can’t smell either; I’ve got a cold. I try covering my ears for

            a moment—complete darkness and silence. No way! That is intense, I don’t

            want to try that. I’m glad I can hear, the music gives me power. I can feel

            powerful listening to the music. It fills me with some kind of reality—commun-

            ication. Not with eye contact, but through the voice. Music is the same whether

            you can see or not.”

 

This entry reminds me how important communication and sharing together is to our mental and emotional health. It is easy to take for granted, while we have it so available to us, but when we are deprived of the opportunity to communicate and share, even silently perhaps as we sit together in a room listening to music, the isolation we can feel is very intense and demoralizing. I expect we all know someone in an isolated place, in a convalescent home hoping for a visitor, or shut-in at home for health reasons, or just socially unable to relate with others very well. There are so many cases and so many opportunities for those of us who are enjoying our healthy lives to reach out and communicate with those who aren’t enjoying the same state of wholeness and who need our communication.

Now it is their need, but it will likely be us someday, in the future, that will be in need, and I can assure you, when that time comes, we will hope that somebody cares enough, and has thought enough about this, to reach out and communicate with us when we are alone, or blind, or shut in. The truth is we are all in this together, we are all of the same fabric, the same blood, two sides of the same coin, and we need to care for one another with the same concern we give ourselves.

            “I went to hear ‘Little Shop of Horrors’, a play being done at the high school.

            My friends Zaidi and Galen picked me up and we went together. ‘I don’t think

            it would be this lighthearted if you were going to be blind forever,’ said Zaidi,

            ‘but it should be. It seems like you could just take it one day at a time, like you

            are now, and keep a light heart.’  It does seem like it should be that way. I sup-

            pose that is enlightenment. I don’t know if I’d have such a positive outlook if

            this was my forever future. It’s a novelty right now, but it wouldn’t be novel if

            it were permanent.

             Inside the theater I spoke with many people before the show, and could recognize

            most voices: John’s calm, methodical and rhythmic voice, Randy’s grainy voice,

           Arwen’s musical voice. I hug Mia; she gives great hugs. At intermission I met Arnold.

          Arnold has a handicap, a speech impediment and maybe some other things,

          I’m not sure. I’m lucky to run into people like him.

 

         We had a talk about handicaps and what I’ve learned from this experience so far.

         I told him how scared I’ve been at times, and how alone I’ve felt, and my feeling

         that people didn’t want me around, like I was intruding on their little romantic view

         of a perfect and clean life. No ugliness.

 

            I relayed to Arnold my experience at the grocery store and how when I said hello

            to the check-out lady, she barely acknowledged me and uttered a forced response.

            It happened though that the bagger was a friend and he recognized me and asked

            me what I was doing. After I explained my experiment, the cashier then asked me,

            ‘So are you into forced torture?’

 

            I told Arnold that it seemed to me when people thought I had a permanent disability

            it scared them and they treated me poorly, like I had a contagious disease, but once

            they understood I was just pretending, then they treated me slightly better, but still

            considered me to be a strange person.

 

            Arnold advised me, ‘You have to see the people’s fear, you mustn’t see their anger

            and their hatred, you must see that they are afraid. They are frightened when they

            see something that isn’t like them. They don’t understand.’

 

            I agreed with him, but lamented that they are also afraid to try to understand and

            to bridge their differences. I guess everyone lives in the darkness of fear. Well, no,

            not everyone.

 

            After the show is a good time. Everyone is always in a good mood. Jeff picks me up

            by the legs, Tanya takes my arms, and others lift me up and onto their shoulders.

            They transport me through a maze of rooms and around groups of people. Once

            again, I almost feel like I can see. I visualize some rooms are well lit, others are dark

            and cold, some are intimate and others larger. I can feel the shadows, I can touch

            and hear my friends.”

 

Day Three of My Experiment with Three Days of Blindness:

            “I’m still blind. This is the last day. Tonight I take the bandages off. I’ve been having

            the most beautiful images in my head. They are so colorful and vivid. Pictures of

            skies drawn along by the tails of eagles. Illuminated rock walls, shimmering golden

            alongside the deep reds of fallen leaves. An eagles head stares me in the eyes, a

            faint vision before me. A translucent image but strong and full; it comforts me

            and calms me. Another eagle swoops down out of the sky. Full, thick cumulous

            clouds in pastel colors, things I’ve never seen in this way before. I hope I still

            see these things after I regain my other sight. These new visions are wonderful

            although I still run into walls.

 

            Yesterday I went to the beach with mom. We drove up to Goat Rock near Jenner.

            It was a great day. The sun was warm and the kids of the beach were having fun.

            The sounds of the beach travelled so well, I could hear things a hundred feet

            away as if they were right beside me. The crackling of a plastic bag, the shuffling

            of the sand by a walking seagull, and the roar of the ocean.

 

            The birds are chirping right now outside my window and a plane is flying overhead.

           It is still morning. My breath is calm and rhythmic like you might expect your breath

         to be on a morning with no worries. There were planes at the beach also, four of them.

            They flew low, I think they were searching for something. The faint roar of their

            engines slowly closing in over me and flooding my ears, then subsiding, allowing

            the crashing of the waves to once again take center stage. The yell of a Frisbee or

            beach ball player explodes from my left. Mom and I eat yogurt and bananas and

            enjoy the warmth of the sun. Before leaving we walk to the edge of the sea. I hear

            it in front of me. It starts with a soft but full-bodied gush which builds up to a

            crackle, something like the static on a radio, and grows into an entity all its own—

            the powerful roar of the ocean and the crashing of the water as the waves pound

            against the sand. Then the fizzling of the foam as it sneaks its way up to my feet.

            It sounds like hamburgers cooking on the grill and I see this in all its red glory,

            the grease bubbling and frying in my mind, sizzle, the meat redder than the red-

            dest red of the sighted world.

 

            What accounts for this extra color in my minds-eye?

            Does God feel guilty? Is this his way of making it up to the blind? I wonder if all

            blind people can see colors in their minds like I can? (Note: Several days after

            writing this I met a blind man named Ken at the Junior College and I asked him

            about visualization and his perception of colors. Did he see colors, magnificent

            colors, brighter than life? Yes, he did. From what he remembers of how the

            world looks and from the visions he holds now in his mind he said yes, that his

            images are probably a lot more beautiful and colorful than they would be if

            he could see. He was blinded six years ago. I wonder what the blind from birth

            see. I bet they can visualize colors too.)

 

            I made chocolate chip cookies last night and they came out good. It is really

            not all that difficult to do. Last night I also felt the helplessness of the sightless.

            Alone in the house, having just made my tofu and bean burrito, I sat in the

            darkness of the livingroom. I listened to the music filling the room from the open

            balcony door above. What is someone was in the house? I would be completely

            at their mercy, even if it were a friend, they could still play with me and scare me.

            It sounds like footsteps upstairs as the music ends. I can’t take these band-

            ages off. I’m really blind. A clanking sound from the kitchen adds to my fear

            and my breath grows deeper and louder. The stillness enters my body and

            freezes there, stiffly. I hear crunching, a crack, and another crunch. It’s the cat.

            I hear a tongue in motion and reach out to feel the fur of our kitten. ‘Meow.’

            What defense did I have if it was someone? I couldn’t even run away.

 

            From my experience, in regards to eating and drinking, I think blind people

            should use plastic cups and no utensils. The hands work perfectly well for

            eating. It might seem primitive and barbaric but its also utilitarian and that’s

            what matters.

 

            I’m going to paint one of the images in my head using the new acrylics I

            bought. It should be interesting and exciting! I memorized the order of the

            paints before I put the bandages on so I would know what colors I’m using.

            In the front row, from right to left, they go: white, black, yellow, magenta,

            scarlet red, deep brilliant red. In the back row from left to right: bronze

            yellow, light blue, dark blue, light green, dark green and purple.

 

            To use the telephone I center my three middle fingers on the center row of

            numbers, with the middle finger on the five, then using the relationship I

            know between this and the others I make the call.”

 

To Be Continued…