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.
Sunday, May 15, 2011
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.
......
"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.
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.
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.
Monday, April 11, 2011
Headed North
Once again I find myself speeding away on a train, gliding gracefully along carefully laid tracks purposefully positioned, or so I lime to think, beside the most beautiful route between here and there. It's just me, my pack, my scattered thoughts, and those other travelers who also chose to go rather than stay.
I can't help but think how often I have been in such a situation with just me, my pack and strangers connected in silent suspended moments of our lives. Each of us in our own point along individual journeys, but for a few hours those points are the same, contained in the 7th car of a twelve car train headed north. The same sun beats on us through the window, the same puget sound lays idle in the window, the same snore of a sleeper floats in the air, an opportunity to be heard by all who have left the openings to their ear canals unrestricted. And although I haven't any plans to speak to any ears, open or not, I know that I am connected with these people we form each others journey. I am a part of their experience just as much as they are a part of mine. And though we sit silent and pacific we have something in common, going north.
And I wonder why it is that my main community constantly consists of such strangers. Why it is I surround myself with them as I am carried to and from friends and family. Why it is my friends and family are constantly asking "where are you now?" or "where are you headed?" my moves so frequent they cannot catch up. "I don't know what comes next" I want to say. "Ask the woman reading post secrets on her lap top next to me or the couple across the aisle who has been traveling all the way from Los Angeles. This is where life has brought us and who are we to know where it will take us tomorrow. Whether this time we stay home, get to be accompanied by a friend, a love, a similar soul, or get called, once again out on our own to be involved in the lives of those yet unknown to us, potential family. We know we are here now. We may know where we would like to be tomorrow or in a year, but above that we know that our lives are a complicated web pelt events and points of view that do not belong to us. How are we to know where the builders have laid the end of these tracks? We just know that, for now, we have to ride. And today, we are headed north."
I can't help but think how often I have been in such a situation with just me, my pack and strangers connected in silent suspended moments of our lives. Each of us in our own point along individual journeys, but for a few hours those points are the same, contained in the 7th car of a twelve car train headed north. The same sun beats on us through the window, the same puget sound lays idle in the window, the same snore of a sleeper floats in the air, an opportunity to be heard by all who have left the openings to their ear canals unrestricted. And although I haven't any plans to speak to any ears, open or not, I know that I am connected with these people we form each others journey. I am a part of their experience just as much as they are a part of mine. And though we sit silent and pacific we have something in common, going north.
And I wonder why it is that my main community constantly consists of such strangers. Why it is I surround myself with them as I am carried to and from friends and family. Why it is my friends and family are constantly asking "where are you now?" or "where are you headed?" my moves so frequent they cannot catch up. "I don't know what comes next" I want to say. "Ask the woman reading post secrets on her lap top next to me or the couple across the aisle who has been traveling all the way from Los Angeles. This is where life has brought us and who are we to know where it will take us tomorrow. Whether this time we stay home, get to be accompanied by a friend, a love, a similar soul, or get called, once again out on our own to be involved in the lives of those yet unknown to us, potential family. We know we are here now. We may know where we would like to be tomorrow or in a year, but above that we know that our lives are a complicated web pelt events and points of view that do not belong to us. How are we to know where the builders have laid the end of these tracks? We just know that, for now, we have to ride. And today, we are headed north."
Friday, April 1, 2011
A day in my life
Yesterday provides a great example of a typical day in my life and why I am jealous of myself...
I slept in till 10 and listened to an hour of "The Geurnsy Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society" on cd before going down to the kitchen and making myself a breakfast of cut up bananas and strawberries on te side of mixed veggies and ground turkey flavoured with cumin. I ate this in my kitchen overlooking the blue Bellingham bay with a scattered cloudy sky.
After resolving a trip to fairhaven was a good way to spend the day I got dressed, sat on the front steps of my house for about 15 minutes soaking up the rare sun and noticing the signs of springs: slowing growing leaves on trees, flies jumping from bush to bush and lady bugs crawling on the ground.
I proceeded to the purple moped I am borrowing, fired her up and scooted a couple miles down the road to fairhaved. My points of interest this trip were village books (I bought used copies of "out of america" and "her fearful symmetry" after purusing all the shelves for about an hour. I can't help myself. I went next door to the paper store and bought a couple presents for family members. Then I took myself to the colophon cafe for lunch where I sat and watched the passers by outside as they reacted to the statue of a man sitting on a bench- one fellow stuck his gum up his nose.. I then walked to the library to finish a CPR and first aid class online and went back to my scooter passing a group of 3 guys getting on their motorcycles that were parked next to me. O walked ny and said, "nice bikes" they grinned , pleased, said "thanks" and proceeded to look astonished as I walked to the parking space right next to them and proceeded to put on my helmet and put my new purchases in the basket. With a grin and a "have fun" overt shoulder Made my way back home.
There I spent half an hour watching the sun slowly set on my porch as I journaled for about half an hour before taking myself on a 3 mile run Which i once again finished by watching the sun set on my deck. After showering I sat in my overstuffed armchair and finished the book on cd while eating a small dinner and looking at my recently finished paintings. I concluded the evening with the first two hours of a documentary on the kennedy's and was asleep by 1 where I continued to adventure in my dreams.
I slept in till 10 and listened to an hour of "The Geurnsy Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society" on cd before going down to the kitchen and making myself a breakfast of cut up bananas and strawberries on te side of mixed veggies and ground turkey flavoured with cumin. I ate this in my kitchen overlooking the blue Bellingham bay with a scattered cloudy sky.
After resolving a trip to fairhaven was a good way to spend the day I got dressed, sat on the front steps of my house for about 15 minutes soaking up the rare sun and noticing the signs of springs: slowing growing leaves on trees, flies jumping from bush to bush and lady bugs crawling on the ground.
I proceeded to the purple moped I am borrowing, fired her up and scooted a couple miles down the road to fairhaved. My points of interest this trip were village books (I bought used copies of "out of america" and "her fearful symmetry" after purusing all the shelves for about an hour. I can't help myself. I went next door to the paper store and bought a couple presents for family members. Then I took myself to the colophon cafe for lunch where I sat and watched the passers by outside as they reacted to the statue of a man sitting on a bench- one fellow stuck his gum up his nose.. I then walked to the library to finish a CPR and first aid class online and went back to my scooter passing a group of 3 guys getting on their motorcycles that were parked next to me. O walked ny and said, "nice bikes" they grinned , pleased, said "thanks" and proceeded to look astonished as I walked to the parking space right next to them and proceeded to put on my helmet and put my new purchases in the basket. With a grin and a "have fun" overt shoulder Made my way back home.
There I spent half an hour watching the sun slowly set on my porch as I journaled for about half an hour before taking myself on a 3 mile run Which i once again finished by watching the sun set on my deck. After showering I sat in my overstuffed armchair and finished the book on cd while eating a small dinner and looking at my recently finished paintings. I concluded the evening with the first two hours of a documentary on the kennedy's and was asleep by 1 where I continued to adventure in my dreams.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
To grandpa busch
My dad told me that my grandpa prints off my blog entries and keeps them in a binder. If that is so, hello grandpa, thank you for your dedication, I love you and I look forward to seeing you next weekend!!!! Glad to hear you are feeling better!! You are in my prayers. And j love the photo of you and grandma you sent us each for christmas, it's on my desk. You two are so cuties!
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