Recluse

Even for me, I realize I've been more reclusive than usual around blogland. I feel like I'm neither here nor there, that I am living in a state of duality. My brain is a mess of daily chores and "life"; and my chaotic imagination, weaving stories, obsessing over problematic sequences of plot, challenging the plausibility of the behavior of my characters. I am, as you may have guessed by now, trying to write a novel.

The end result, however, is that I can't lose myself in the world of my story deeply enough to make those characters and those places come alive enough that I can read what I've written and have that visceral reaction that tells me I've done something right...that I've written something powerful.

That internal power is still there...latent. At times it shows itself, like when I pull off a what I call a “glam” (summoning the fabulous power goddess within that is usually seen more commonly in drag queens). The glam works for a variety of purposes...it can quell potential arguments with a look, initiate admiring stares from strangers (when I was younger...I wonder if I could still pull it off), let me cross insanely busy intersections. My glare and my hand are enough to stop that interminable flow of traffic that INSISTS on turning that corner at over 50 miles an hour. The look that says, Yes, I WILL hurt you if you don't stop right now, because I will pulverize your pristine gas guzzling SUV with the sheer obstinacy of my body, and my evil bitch-will-take-no-prisoners glare.

The sense of self awareness that comes with these moments is almost palpable. I know at that moment I have a memory that will last forever. I can count on one hand how many times I've had them.

They haven't all been moments of wishing the wrath of the gods upon others, which hopefully says something positive about my character. I have vivid memories; of the first time I meditated...although I hadn't the faintest idea that I was doing so; of being swept away by a river current, terrified toddler clutching at my neck; memories of the long walk down the corridor to the international jet that represented my “leaving home”; of my first real kiss that sent rockets and fireworks exploding in my brain and goosebumps over my body, and then saying “no”; of the moment I decided what I would go to school for; memories of the feeling of exhausted nausea as I stared at the critique wall of black and white modular images after pulling an all-nighter; of talking and talking late into the night, with the man who would someday marry me; memories of eating shaved parmesan and wild mushrooms at Vetri for an anniversary dinner and of sipping a smooth and satiny chianti; of touching my baby's hairy, bloody scalp as she fought her way into the world.

But what kind of person puts almost at the top of her list of memorable moments the space of time that it took to begin to cross Broad Street in Philadelphia, at the intersection of Spruce. I was going no where in particular, coming from nowhere I can distinctly remember. There was no reason for it to happen. But there it was. The moment was nothing more...or less...than a total clarity of my senses. Every sound and sight, smell and taste, the feel of the pavement through my socks and shoes, and the catch of my breath as I suddenly knew how alive I was, how present, how vital. My heart beat and blood pulsed in my ears and I watched the world around me. It seemed like a completely different universe...one in which all the parts of that cityscape I knew so well became almost a living entity, and I was wholly a part of it. I didn't want it to end...but as soon as the thought came, I knew it would. A few more steps, and I was through that amazing space and back in my own universe, with the sense that I was altered, and that somehow, I would never be quite the same person.

And no. I wasn't on anything.

Whenever I bring that memory back, I know I am not the same person I was, in part, because of that moment. Maybe I need to just stop trying to make that universe appear again, and just let it come to me.

A Zen Buddhist calligrapher I once had the privilege to watch at is craft said to me: ”you must remember to breathe".

I watched him carefully to see when he took a breath. Did he inhale as he dipped his brush in the ink? Exhale as he made those marvelous strokes? I couldn't tell. Overcome with curiosity, I asked: "how do you breathe?"

He replied with a smile: "You think too much."