There was a cartoon in the New Yorker decades ago, that Ive never forgotten, of two men chained at the wrists and ankles to the wall, off the ground, in a jail cell, in a cave. One man turns to the other, and says, Okay, heres my plan. When the guard comes in to bring us our meals.... Thats how I feel about the last two weeks of holidays, the days of death by cookie, bad nerves, tight smiles and overwhelm. Doomed, like a prisoner, or space alien, but you know what? Also full of hope. Hope? What a nut huh? I did my last Small Victories reading at my beloved Book Depot in Mill Valley last night, with my eyes nearly swollen shut from an injection I had to get in my SCALP Friday, (dont ask) that also caused my face to puff up like an apple pie. If youve read anything Ive ever written, you know exactly how hard it was for me to show up looking like Apple Pie Head in front of a crowd. But it was one of the happiest nights of the year. There were so many close friends, one from when I was six years old, with whom I still hike most days. Three were also dear friends of my fathers, from fifty & sixty years ago, during the heyday of the Beats, when they all worked at an avant-garde literary quarterly of the arts called Contact, when they felt the call to poetry and Truth in the same way monks feel called to the monastery. Theyre my friends, too. People who still show up to rally for justice and peace, like poets and do-good always will, against the myriad and endless wars, and oppression, for civil rights and womens right and the environment. Thank God for environmental activists and peaceniks and poets. They fill me with hope. And because we are people who show up for peace and each other, this gives me hope and faith Before I turned on Woody Allen, he said that 80% of life was just showing up, and its the truest thing I know. So one thing I will do in the next 10 days is to show up, for friends, family, the poor, the aged, and for little kids in shelters, with arms full of presents and art supplies. My closest people, my motley crew, are the reason I believe so deeply in Goodness. They are what make these into holy days. So yes, I have hope. It is not based on circumstances. Its based on paying attention. At this same tiny bookstore, thirty years ago, I got to have tea with Wendell Berry, who was signing his books there in a mid-December storm. He looked out the window and said, It gets darker and darker and darker; and then baby Jesus is born. I read the people who were at the Depot last night the story from Small Victories called Barn Raising, from 20 years ago, when the two year old sister of Sams kindergarten fiancee, named Olivia, was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis. It was the end of the world, and I told the story of how her parents friends and I built an Amish barn around them, of love, and time, money and casseroles, childcare and chocolate, so that there would always be shelter. THEN I got to tell everyone about the book Olivia and I have been working on together, because she is not only still here--she is healing. She went to college, and shes changing the world. So yeah, I have hope. Emily Dickinson said that hope causes the Good to reveal itself. So bring it on. When I bring people hope--cups of tea, poetry and art supplies--then Im holding hope in my hands, but I can only receive it by giving it away, to you, and to me; to us. Here, have some; its on me. Just dont give up before you get the miracle.
Posted on: Tue, 16 Dec 2014 20:16:12 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015