Road Trip Story: Indianapolis, Part II

I didn't know -- until I traveled to Indianapolis this time -- that the writer Kurt Vonnegut (a writer I admire) was from Indiana. He is purported to have once said: "All my jokes are Indianapolis. All my attitudes are Indianapolis. My adenoids are Indianapolis. If I ever severed myself from Indianapolis, I would be out of business. What people like about me is Indianapolis."

Where we are born does shape us though I'm sure the fact he was a prisoner of war in World War II and saw the firebombing of Dresden shaped him as well... so it will also be where you GO in life. And the point is to get OUT there.

There is a wonderful short story in Vonnegut's collection, Welcome to the Monkey House, which is called "The Kid Nobody Could Handle". What is so lovely about this story is the way it focuses on a teacher who imagines the BEST in his students (and will subsequently GET the best). George M. Helmholtz is a band instructor.

Here is a brief excerpt:

     Helmholtz's first class of the morning was C Band, where beginners thumped and wheezed and tooted as best they could, and looked down the long, long, long road through B Band to A Band, the Lincoln High School Ten Square Band, the finest band in the world.

Helmholtz stepped onto the podium and raised his baton.

"You are better than you think," he said. "A-one, a-two, a-three." Down came the baton.

C Band set out in its quest for beauty -- set out like a rusty switch engine, with valves stuck, pipes clogged, unions leaking, bearings dry.

Helmholtz was still smiling at the end of the hour, because he'd heard in his mind the music as it was going to be someday.

Kurt Vonnegut could be a dark and darkly comic writer and still have a sort of jelly donut core of sentimentality to him.

But I love that line by Helmholtz: "You are better than you think." This is true of many things in life. (Though there are sadly, some folks who think they are far better than OTHERS, a whole 'nother thing.)

It's the end of the story though, after he manages to bring a particularly challenging student, Jim Donnini, into band, I wanted to share:

     "Think of it this way," said Helmholtz. "Our aim is to make the world more beautiful than it was when we came into it. It can be done. You can do it."

A small cry of despair came from Jim Donnini. It was meant to be private, but it pierced every ear with its poignancy.

"How?" said Jim.

"Love yourself," said Helmholtz, "and make your instrument sing about it. A-one, a-two, a-three." Down came the baton.

And so it goes.

Road Trip Story: Indianapolis, Part I

This weekend your mother and I were in Indianapolis for the Indianapolis International Film Festival for the film you'll probably hear about before you ever read this blog: CASS.

Here's a wonderful picture of your mother at the festival:

And at the festival was one of the actors in the film, my friend, David Dastmalchian (whom I'm hoping you'll have met by now.)

My thought for today: you don't get to make a movie like "CASS" without help from people like this.

Matthew 6:21

When you are older, I hope you are exposed to all sorts of wisdom from all sorts of places: the Bhagavad Gita, the Upanishads, the Bible and many other texts -- religious and non-religious.

But as I think about what I might want to share with you first, it might be a single line that Jesus speaks in the Gospel of Matthew. Further down, I'll give you the whole passage -- and like most of the things that Jesus teaches, the full teaching (just like the full life of Jesus) is a difficult one to follow, but one of such deep connection to the world, His life and His words serve as a source of constant inspiration.

If there is one line to memorize from the Bible (and there are many), it is this:

For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

Where will you put your work, your passion, your commitment? This is something I still struggle with as an adult. And as I contemplate your arrival, I think of it more and more, because I want you to ensure you have what you need to realize the greatness within you.

But when you read the full passage, you realize that this "treasuring", this "work of the heart" is difficult business. And this is true: it cannot be bought.


Matthew 6:19-24
“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
     “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are unhealthy,  your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!
     “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money."

Your Highness....

Dear Prince/Princess-of-Human-Protoplasm,

Well, THIS happened today....
















That lady is Kate Middleton and she is married to the guy who has been unceremoniously cropped out of the photo to the right, Prince William. No, William is not his last name. He got the title "Prince" because he was born to two people... Oh, never mind. It's complicated and beside my point anyway.

By the time you're old enough to read this, you'll have learned my take on so-called "Royalty" which is something here in the early part of the 21st century we call a "collective delusion"by which a bunch of people get together and agree that certain people who have NOT A SINGLE SUPERIOR quality save having been born to a certain line of people who stretch back to a time when OTHER people shared a "collective delusion" about their great-great-great-great grandparents. (And if you go far enough back,  you're connected to them too.) It's all kind of silly, really.

But if you're reading this, you're also old enough to realize your father is a very conflicted man.

You see, I think it is absolutely wonderful that we call this little creature Kate is holding (who appears to have at least four working fingers, but that's really all we know about him at this point) a PRINCE. We should celebrate this new birth the same way we're going to celebrate yours. (You will have fewer guys in red jackets with hats that look like fur balloons, but trust me, you won't miss 'em.)

I just wish we celebrated everyone's birth as the birth of Royalty. You are working awfully hard to grow and develop and your birth is -- and I don't want you to EVER forget this -- an absolute miracle. It's what we call an "Everyday miracle" something that happens so often we forget just how freaking incredible it is! Because it happens so often all around the world -- more often than the sun rising in the morning which is, yes, you guessed it ANOTHER everyday miracle -- we continue doing our work or the laundry and say: "Oh, yeah. Right. Another birth."

Thing is: as miraculous as the birth itself is, as incredible as you coming out of your mother (long story; we'll talk), the fact is: you -- like that tiny creature whose head we get a glimpse of in the photo above -- will embark on a journey through a lifetime.

The miracle is not any one moment, child o' mine -- it's the whole show. A collection of moments you can embrace as gift or shrug off as burden. And just as you are just one spectacular moment of my own life, you are going to have sunsets and friends and moments when you laugh and cry and start wondering WHY you are alive.

And here's the short answer to a rather complicated WHY question: Love. Your mother and I love each other -- and you wonderful baby, you, are the result of that Love. Love is the miracle. And it's not something you can explain (obviously; I'm doing a pretty lousy job): you have to live it.

You're going to meet people in your life who want to reduce this life of ours to chemicals to random acts of the universe. What I never want you to forget is that Love is behind all of it.

IF you can remember that Love is behind all this, you will understand another truly miraculous thing: the child in the photo above is just seven months older than you. He'll have plenty of nice Things, undoubtedly a pony, in all likelihood a boat, probably a jetpack. (Sorry, we'll see about a jetpack later.)

You are both royalty. You're children of a force greater than I can possibly comprehend. That kid's STUFF doesn't make his life any more miraculous than yours, which means he's no more a Prince than you are a Prince or Princess. AND (this part is the amazing part) both of you are no less of one either.

Accept this miracle and let love shine through you.

Baby Love (with apologies to the Supremes)

Baby love, my baby love

I need you, oh how I need you!

Thirty weeks now seem so long

(Well, 32, we could be wrong)

Tell me, tell me, baby mine,

What to do in the meantime!

‘Cause baby love, my baby love

I’m missing ya, miss kissing ya.

Yeah, sure it’s weird I know,

You’re in your mom and have to grow

Please send a sign anyway:

You’re on your way and all okay:

Need ya, need ya, baby love, baby love.

Baby love, my baby love

Why are dads so sep-uh-rate, my love?

All of my whole life through

I’ll never birth someone like you.

So please tell me what to do

When I get this need….

Need to hold you, in my arms, my love

Feel your warm embrace, my love.

Just know Love is here today

Whenever you decide to come out to play.

Don’t worry: I implore you, love

I’ll sing this song and bore you, love

But…

Sleep safe, my love

Keep safe, my love.

I’ll shut up and let you

Hear mom’s heart, love.

Enough about me....

Let's talk about  you a little bit, shall we?

Looking at one of the many books in your mother's increasingly growing stack of books by the bedside, I learned that all of your vital organs are now formed. We should know if you're a boy or a girl in the next few weeks. And over the course of the next 9 weeks, you're expected to increase in weight 30 times. And triple in length (from your current size about two digits of my index finger, about an inch).

This is some artist's rendition from the Internet. (It's a thing but we can talk about that later.)

Personally, I'm thinking you have much prettier eyes. (But I like thinking you're already reaching out for a big hug.)

Dear Tiny Traveler....

Yesterday, as I was flying back from New York City, I was thinking about you (I seem to be doing this more and more) and before I get on the road to drive to Indianapolis in two hours I wanted to put these thoughts about Traveling down.

No, not because everything has to come around to what I am doing at the moment, but because I've had this notion in my head that you are still on your way, that you're moving towards us right now as I speak, as if your a force building up strength.

But then I consider where you are, deep in your mother's belly, like some bite-sized Buddha sitting there contemplating your next move. Yes, you take on more cells everyday. Yes, your brain is developing at a pace that (thankfully) outpaces my own brain's DEcomposition. But you are here and at the risk of sounding strange -- that scare me.

That thought: that you are hear then starts me thinking of how to protect you, how to ensure that nothing upsets your development.

You see how crazy things are on this side of life? We worry about traveling and we worry about being protected in one place. (Or at least, I do; I'm sure your mother is more sensible about these sorts of things.)

These days, when I get on the road to drive to Indianapolis, I find that you are on my mind. And when I am here, in town, at a coffeeshop with your mother or just watching TV, you are on my mind.

But like that light coming to us from distant stars, we are all in motion because EVERYTHING is in motion, through space AND time. So, instead of offering any advice, I think I'm going to take a hint from you and find my own place to contemplate this incredible life and journey, and let the great world spin around me.

Advice from anyone but ME

Dear Long-Distance Swimmer,

It is the height of presumption for me to be putting down these recommendations, reading lists and thoughts.

You, of course, are going to find your own way through this "vale of soul-making" (that's Keats' term for this life, in contrast to some wag calling it a "vale of tears".)

Like a gorgeous cosmic mirror, I hope you polish that soul and make it gleam.

If there is one term I will try to stay away from it is: God. There is just so much noise out there (do you hear it already?) -- so much in fact, that any signal that may be coming from God gets lost. As an imperfect -- and often ungrateful -- praiser of that Higher Power, let me just offer some thoughts you may want to consider from someone who knew/knows far more than me: Meister Eckhart, a fourteenth-century monk.

Like many Buddhists, Meister Eckhart wrote about our need to get out of the way of God....

Know then that God is bound to act, to pour himself out into thee as soon as ever he shall find thee ready.... Finding thee ready he is obliged to act, to overflow into thee; just as the sun must needs burst forth when the air is bright and clear, and is unable to contain itself. Forsooth, it were a very grave defect in God if, finding thee so empty and so bar, he wrought no excellent work in thee nor primed thee with glorious gifts.

Thou needest not seek him here or there, he is no further off than at the door of thy heart; there he stands lingering, awaiting whoever is ready to open and let him in.... He longs for thee a thousandfold more urgently than thou for him: one point the opening and the entering.


I pray that someday you are able to take this thought and make more of it in your life than I have in mine. But know that your father here on Earth longs for you more than he can say... I can only imagine how much your Heavenly father/mother does.

(I say "only imagine" because it is all quite beyond me, yet it feels my heart knows some things it's not telling my head.)

Telling Stories

Dear soul-traveling-on-a-beam-of-light:

I look forward to the day I can tell you stories of Robin Hood, of Cinderella, of King Arthur, Lancelot and Guinevere.

Then again there are going to be stories that I don't want to tell you but you will need to hear. Because you are being borne into a world of Harry Potters and Trayvon Martins.

Last night, a jury in Florida acquitted the man who shot and killed Trayvon Martin. I won't mention the man's name because, as in all fairy tales, stating someone's name gives them a certain power -- and this man who shot Trayvon was a sad, scared person who wanted to be a cowboy, a tough guy, someone with power.

While I pray that in my lifetime we might eradicate the racism that causes men like this young man's killer, God works in mysterious ways and it probably won't happen in mine, but perhaps in yours.

In our language, we have a phrase "Telling stories..." that often means something is made up or untrue.

One of the things I hope I can show you is that telling stories is one of the most important things we can do. What made this teenager's killer afraid was that he imagined his own story about Trayvon; but the truth is: he didn't know him at all. He imagined a story of criminals and bad people because Trayvon's skin was a darker color than his. (You will find there are some pretty silly, stupid things in this world (but there are far more beautiful, wonderful things so please keep coming.))

My prayer for you today is that when you find yourself scared (and I know you will, because fear often comes along when we're moving into new places and I want you to be a lover of new places and new people) -- I pray that you will take a deep breath and look with your eyes, listen with your ears, smell with that beautiful nose of yours, taste and touch if you think that will help, but then ask your heart what to do, because your heart will be where you can find Compassion and Love.

And after you take that breath, decide whether you need to run, to stay put, or more often than not, ask the stranger you encounter: What is your name?

Last night...

Dear deep womb swimmer,

You were probably wondering what that commotion was last night, shivering through your amniotic space. That was your first rock concert.

Before you heard the clip above, you heard a band called My Morning Jacket (not quite as loud as we were standing farther away), this was followed by one of your mother's favorite bands Wilco (more on them later).

The clip above? Well, you may never be impressed by this bit of information but let me tell you, it's pretty amazing: your first concert was with Bob Dylan! Dylan is a man who (as of this writing) has been writing, performing and recording music for half a century. (Remind me to tell you the story of hearing him do "Leopard-Skin Pillbox Hat" four decades after performing it at the Royal Albert Hall in London.... Come to think of it, don't bother. I'll probably have bored you with the story dozens of times before you're able to read this blog.)

Listen carefully to this clip, my child. If you've listened to his music before, you may not recognize this version of the song, but it's one of my favorites of his:  "Tangled Up in Blue". 

When I was a kid, my mother would say: "You'll understand when you get older." That phrase always bugged me. It seemed to imply that I was too DUMB to understand whatever the issue/song/idea was. But there are some things in this life, that you sort of wish your child will avoid, like the heartache that Dylan writes about in this song. Both the "tangled" and the "blue" part.

If you listen to the lyrics I've captured here, he has met a woman who takes him back to her place. In the original version, it's "a book of poems/written by an Italian poet from the thirteenth century". (I always wondered if that was Dante (maybe La Vita Nuova, which is a lovely (and true) love story (please read it) (or maybe it was Petrarch, who I know less about, but wrote love sonnets in the fourteenth century, I dunno.))

But if you listen closely he seems to have changed the lyrics slightly, but brings us to the same place he wrote originally:

"And every one of them words rang true/And glowed like burning coal/Pouring off of every page/Like it was written on my soul from me to you/Tangled up in blue."

My prayer today is that this song, these lyrics -- or others by Mr. Dylan -- will glow like burning coal, like they were written on my soul from me to you.

How many centimeters?

"Let's see how many centimeters..." the doctor says, clicking and scrolling the mouse on the screen where you are floating like an astronaut in space.

 

Eight months from now: "How many centimeters?" will be a whole different discussion when you are getting ready to enter the world.

 

But right now, as much as we're intrigued by the numbers -- centimeters and heartbeat -- I'm just fascinated by YOU there, like a knot in the wood, like a space in the universe that is opening up for us to view into something BEYOND you. And when you're born, (just try and imagine THAT!) that space will close and we'll all probably go on about our lives forgetting that place you came FROM. But for right now, I love seeing your there, on your way over here.

 

I want to shout out words of encouragement as if calling out to some long distance swimmer who has yet to make it to the shallow waters here. (You're still a long way out and I'm the one who seems to be holding my breath!)

 

Rather than shout (which seems downright rude and a little hysterical at the moment), perhaps I'll read to you. It's from the poem "Genie" by Arthur Rimbaud -- and is actually the poem your mother and I chose for this blog. (Sometimes "coincidence" simply means you're not looking hard enough for the connections.... Other times, you'll see that Mr. Freud was right (more on him MUCH later): "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.")

 

But reading this from Rimbaud's "Illuminations" reminds me of you, though you're so new there's no re- to that mind. You're just in my mind now.

 

He is love, perfect measure reinvented, marvelous and unlooked-for reason, and eternity.

 

(Or she. We don't know, do we?)



 

Heartbeat like a knock at the door

July 10, 2013.

Are you there?

This sonogram gave us the sound of the heartbeat. On the tinny computer speakers, amplified from somewhere 20,000 leagues into the womb, it came across like a steady knock at the door.

(There it is, the doctor said, matter-of-factly. As if OF COURSE there is a living creature living inside you. OF COURSE, your body has merged with another and brought some spark out of a primordial fire we all sit around.... If we had not all been so well-informed, so well-prepared, so, well, Intellectual, perhaps we might shout: THERE IT IS!!!! A heartbeat, a steady rhythm that will follow this creature even when he/she is unaware of it.... THERE IT IS... that steady pulse of life in the background.)

I found myself asking the doctor about the gap in the regular beat... the silence... She attributed it to a shift in the recording device.

Only afterwards did I realize it was my own heart stopping at the idea now that this one might not keep beating forever.