Okay…my first post of this type! If you want to share a link to either your latest or greatest post, please leave a link in the comments. If you want to leave a blurb about the post, please do.
My most liked post was about the first hug my son gave me: https://erichmichaels.wordpress.com/2015/04/22/a-hug/
Let’s show some love for our fellow explorers of the human condition!
The imprints of little feet in sand
Around a bucket built sandcastle
Snow-covered trees, snowflakes on your face
You stand and look at your first snow angel
Walking out into the field at dusk and
Experiencing firefly magic the first time
Giddy anxiousness keeping you awake
Wondering what Santa was bringing you
The perfect rock, the perfect throw
It skips across the water…finally
Knowing with the utmost certainty
That you were meant to be a firefighter
That tv show you watched with grandma
As a child, her laughter was the best sound
The cool night breeze off of the bay and
The best fireworks you’d ever seen
Sneaking around the grownups stealthily
Slurping the foam off their drinks until dizzy
A sunburn, the pain, the sleepless nights
The skin sloughing off in strips
Jr. High warm-belly-feeling from friends
Relaying info that your crush likes you too
That first self-induced, full-body-orgasm
Lightening in your veins…did I break it?
Bagged groceries all week with your best smile
The owner hands you your first check
Approaching high school graduation
The feeling that the world was yours
Your hands grip the steering wheel
You drive off the lot in your brand new car
You walk up to the counter, fingers touch glass
You ask where the engagement rings are
Filling out paperwork at HR
Five percent you put into a 401K…for the future
You keep the indicator covered by your hand
So you both can see if it’s positive together
The Rent-A-Center salesperson
Greets you with a smile and calls you Sir/Ma’am
Sitting across the desk, little arrow stickers
You initial for the 100th time…homeowner
You place the beer on the counter
They take your money and don’t ID you
You hear a couple punk kids laughing
Your muffin-top the punchline, you’re Teflon
You let a bright-faced salesperson in
You sign up for supplemental life insurance
You order a do-it-yourself kit
Catalog everything and make a will
A twenty-something smiles at you at the store
They move their cart and let you cut in line
Your manager gives you a little box
Inside is a pin commemorating your retirement
The family reunion you have the place of honor
As the oldest in your family
All your loved ones eagerly visit you
As you lie in a hospital bed
You feel an immense amount of weight lifted off
Then nothingness
In the distance you see a light
A doctor pulls you out and cleans you up
The imprints of little feet in sand
Around a bucket built sandcastle…
In an earlier post, Closer to Home, Father I Roam, I talked about the loss of my father. I talked about our relationship, about his being supportive of my writing and how his passing affected me.
I talked about how I am embarking on an inward journey, in attempts to better understand him, creating some of the same neural connections…through reading the same books he had read. He left a map of his adventures–his Nook reader and a library of titles.
I picked The Shannara Trilogy and was not disappointed. I’ll be the first to admit that I moved through the first two books slowly. It was as if I was subconsciously coming up with excuses to not buckle in and read, at least not nearly as often as I had in the past. However, I did really enjoy them, as they are definitely in a genre that I love. Now I’m not going to do anything close to an in depth book review, but simply say how the journey went and what I took away from it.
I’m currently about 100 pages away from finishing the third book. I take it with me to work and inevitably I end up going down an internet-search-wormhole and make no use of my breaks, whatsoever. Irritated with myself I’ll return to work, vowing to read the next time. Some part of me doesn’t want the story to end, just like I wish my father’s story was still going on, I guess.
My takeaway, at this point, is simply my seeing a parallel between my father and the Druid Allanon. He wasn’t really there at the beginning and until later in life he was kind of a mysterious figure that moved in and out of my life. Most importantly, he gave me my love for reading, which blossomed into writing and is the most powerful magic I know.
I will try to push through the last 100 pages and then see what’s next. I hope to report back on this pilgrimage. I miss him sorely, but these breadcrumbs I’m following will not only bring about a deeper understanding, but will also take time…putting me closer to him in a more final way.
To me, sharing a book with someone is probably one of the most intimate things you can do. It was, for a time, a life you lived and now, through your actions, they share that life. Share your lives with those you care about, my friends.
Yesterday
I sat on your bench
I tried
To feel your resonance
I didn’t know you
I saw you on my walks
Apparently no town
Is too small
For homelessness
You’d disappear
During the day
Leaving behind your
Belongings
A ratty backpack and
Your tattered sleeping bag
Returning in the dark
To lay your head down
To sleep
The article said
Your heart gave up
The fight
Enjoy your rest
As I lie in bed
Hating myself
For never even
Saying
Hello
Get in line
Toe the line
Walk the line
Fall in line
Take a hard line
Draw a line in the sand
Color inside the lines
Someone has fed you a line
So I’m gonna drop you a line
It’s time to be out of line
Time to cross the line
That’s right…I’m laying it all on the line
Take the line of MOST resistance
We are on the frontline
You may be next in line
And that’s the bottom line
We are the creatives, so color outside the lines
Before you…flatline
My father, who I think about all the time, used to go nature walking at some local trails (Beaver Lake Nature Center). It’s where I laid his ashes to rest.
I now take my little man there as often as I can. I need him to see these trails as sacred, as our church.
These are the stained glass windows that hold more solemnity than anything man made.
These are the waters that should hold reverence, be sanctified like the entire natural world…protected.
I’m trying to raise an eco-warrior.
Early this morning, hours before our normal wake up time, he woke up crying. His crying had peaks and valleys of sobbing and screaming. I picked him up and drew him close.
I spoke soothingly, “Did you have a bad dream?”
“Yes.”
“It’s okay baby, you’re bubba is here,” I assured him, as I rubbed his back. His crying quieted and I could see he was starting to drift off.
Then, just before dozing back off, he brought his face forward and kissed my chest. I smiled and was overwhelmed by a mix of emotions. Tears rolled down my cheeks.
In that moment I felt whole, that I could be the father he needed, and simultaneously I felt the loss of my father, who passed just a couple years ago. I also felt the gratitude from my little man and knew that, despite typical two-year-old behavior, he was becoming the kind of person I’d hoped he would.
Every day is an adventure that I look forward to.
I just want to thank you all for bearing with me on this journey. I appreciate every one of you. I celebrate the number only as a milestone of connections of likeminded people…all on a journey of self exploration and sharing the human experience!
Please take a seat and fasten your seatbelt as it’s probably going to be a bumpy ride!
Thanks again!
We are won, when we are one
Second verse, same as the universe
Shared consciousness from a unified source
Sheared from subconscious the rarified voice
Conservation of matter:
recycle, reuse…reduce
Preservation matters:
empathy, sympathy…compassion
Sharing the same mind like the many facets on a beautiful gemstone, that looks like the universe observed from the nil-space beyond.
There should be limits.
He smiled as he placed the 50 count, brown, lunch bags on the checkout conveyor.
Driving through town, on the way to his first day at his new job, he glanced at various shops and restaurants that he had worked at previously.
Everyone always cheered as he entered a former place of employment, and always the question of if he would be coming back to work there came up.
It felt amazing to be missed and wanted and he was known by everyone.
His new job was at a bottle sorting facility, that took in the redemptions and made sure the different types were sorted appropriately.
He drove home from work that night reeking of skunky, rotten alcohol…hoping he wouldn’t get pulled over.
49.
The next day he was completely up to speed and was able to participate in the idle chitchat with the other sorters, but quickly the conversation degraded into the typical misogynistic blathering of the clueless.
Tomorrow his lunch would require 2 bags.
48.
He heard murmurs of his outperforming the other sorters and caught sideways glances, so he kept in pace with the others, but started eating his lunch at a decrepit picnic table that sat under a maple tree.
46.
The best that could be said was that today was Friday and he made a three bag lunch that would take the entire half hour lunch period to eat.
43.
He almost went to the local nature trail over the weekend, just so he could pack a lunch, but had thought better of it.
Monday he put his deep fryer through its paces, making goodies for all his coworkers, making it necessary to double-bag the greasy contents…for a total of 6 bags.
Friends were made. 37.
The next week went by in a blur, as he continued to bring treats in for his coworkers and he inwardly felt himself speeding towards the light at the end of the tunnel…a fresh start.
He walked in Monday loaded for bear, looking to kill what was left of his brown bags throughout the week, already having spent time combing the help wanted ads, and heard the murmurs of a new start going through HR on boarding.
He sat beneath his maple tree, on his rickety picnic table, and just as he was sinking his teeth into his sandwich the new sorter walked over and she took his breath away.
5.
By the end of the week he alienated himself from most coworkers by not bringing in any more deep fried treats, he had taped a bag over the course of a couple days and by Friday he walked in with a bag completely covered, inside and out, with duct tape, but to his surprise when he got to lunch she had brought food for the both of them…and would do so for now on–without limits.
0.
