Sunday, May 15, 2011

Familiar Corners

Familiar corners
Open windows
Red. Green. Yellow
Stop. Go. Continue and roam
But I sit still
watching
life
that goes by and by
not once looking
at my open window
where i am invisibly transparent
but solid
as stone
eyes gleaming and streaming
the coming and going
of the city with the lettered streets coffee
and the short red walk way
that also sits on the corner
watching and waiting
for you
who miss the birds diving and soaring
the dogs laying and napping
the buses picking up and dropping
the sun rising and setting
over the bay
and the open sign that welcomes the community of those who do
those you may never know
in your speeding and swerving
typing and talking
running and lifting
sleeping and walking
and starting all over again
For they sit alone
drinking and smelling
writing and listening
smiling and observing
the coming and going
of you
while they learn what it means to learn
to taste
to smell
to breath
and to be
alone
together.

so...thoughtful?

today after church some people played basketball. some new kid was there who i had never met before and when he found out i wasn't going to play he looked at me and asked, "are you handicapped?"

......
"well, no. but thanks for asking" was my response.

Friday, May 13, 2011

As We Silently Dance

It has been almost two weeks and already we are settled in nicely. Ericka and I are roommates in a hotel bedroom on a floor with many other drivers. We enjoy scooting to work when able and walking when not, watching episodes of modern family before bed, eating breakfast upstairs in the kitchen, playing music and sharing life with the boys “upstairs”, and of course telling the tales of Juneau from tourists from around the world.
Today was a wonder. What started as a regular rainy day off (though days off are more irregular than regular) turned into having one of the top ten experiences of life, probably. Had breakfast in the kitchen, went for a 7 ½ mile run in Juneau, ate lunch at the Hanger (yes please and thank you for grilled halibut burgers), napped, and then participated in the experience of a life time. Silent Dance Party.
What is a silent dance party you may ask? I am here to tell you. Someone makes a play list and everyone puts in on their I-pods. Then, at exactly the same time, the whole group plugs in their headphones and presses play. The dancing commences. Today the party was in celebration of the birth of our good friend Dan, so he was appointed the “pied piper” and led us through the halls and stairs of our hotel, out the lobby, down the streets, passed the doors of establishments slowly filling with curious onlookers, some with camera’s, all the way to marine park where the party peaked and finally commenced. Photos were snapped, video was taken, sweat was poured, and energy exerted. Everyone partied in their own little worlds yet out in the open for the whole world to see.
When compared to other things I have experienced, it definitely takes a front seat.

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

And Another Return, Again

And another return,
Again,
And again,
To a place once a stranger and now a best friend. Even as best friends are forever the same, comfortable and ageless but are also contradictorily strangers with many hidden parts we may never know, and always changing though they stay the same.

Familiarity. As though I never left. And yet the changes that have overtaken this town prove to me that for at least a moment I did leave and in my absence we have both continued our lives and are hence different. And like friends separated for a distance I am anxious to dive into the space between us and unveil the new things that lay hidden in the void, to catch up on what has happened since we last spoke, since we last sat across from each other, or walked in step, allowing time to slowly pass between us and through us leaving not a second to scatter in the wind, even as the wind is noted and appreciated for its place here beside the rhythm of our feet.

And as all memories are only a collaboration of moments imbedded imperfectly by a hopeful and imaginative mind, so this town, so vivid in my recollections whenever I call upon it, is in fact also slightly obscured when compared with such previous musing. Even more so difficult to comprehend is the comparison of reality with the vividness of memory, to take the leap outside one’s mind and into the present, remembering that you are here now and every action taken and not taken you are responsible for, with no going back for do-overs, a choose your own adventure without alternate endings. And that those choices have never before taken place for you in reality, that as much as you have remembered and imagined the days to come will be unmistakably diverse from all things conjured.

And even as much as this town is a continuation of a previous collaboration of moments now made memories it is in itself a new beginning. As each moment is. As each journey and each day and each friendship is. A beginning deserving itself of a clean slate, its own personal tabula rosa even as it may be a black page in a bulging book with writing in the margins. And so I vow to take note of every new rhythmic step as it regularly hits the ground, taking none for granted as with the sunrise every morning, realizing each time it is a gift and not promised to us, and I will feel every breeze as it scuttles around me and dear friend as we continue to know each other here and now, in the present.