Showing posts with label moments. Show all posts
Showing posts with label moments. Show all posts

Monday, July 1, 2013

with a view

Today I woke slowly. It's summer and for the first time since I've lived here I'm enjoying having the curtains drawn and my windows open. At this time of night you can hear grasshoppers and sounds from the 405. In the morning you can still hear the 405, but the grasshoppers are replaced by crows and occasionally a scream or two from the macaw that lives in the house behind ours. My view is of our neighbor's roof and the tops of the trees that line our street. The way the trees move is lovely and when you're beneath them you get the sense that their branches, similar to a weeping willow's, are reaching gently for you.

My room, having these last few days been slowly relieved of its mess, seems so large to me now.  Lately I've been too busy to pay it much mind. Now it feels strangely large. Large and quiet, as though it accepts me and I, in seeing, accept it. Perhaps these last days are the first I've really felt at home here. At home I'm allowed to feel simple and plain. I haven't felt this way, this strongly, in a while. It's wonderful. It occurs to me that simplicity and plainness are virtues, or can be, and I realize that I want to feel them more often. 

Sunday, June 30, 2013

driving home

I saw the sun rise today. It's pink hues backlit the San Gabriel Mountains. I remember mornings when I was younger, laying in bed and watching the light (the miracle of light) gradually give shape, color and texture to the objects around me. How strangely they emerged from obscurity, carved out of darkness.

There's something beautiful about the world at rest, before the house stirs and the mechanics of our daily lives are set in motion. The streets are empty and the birds have not yet begun their chirruping. It was like that this morning. Driving home with the windows down I could feel the moisture in the air. Cool and clingy, it was dew settling on every still-calm or sleeping thing.

Sunday, March 24, 2013

On this day I was forced to ride a creaky-ass bicycle to Abbott Kinney where I had brunch with another under a canopy of bougainvillea whilst sitting on a milk crate next to a leaky faucet and about 15 hungry finches eyeing my grub. It was a lovely day.

Saturday, March 23, 2013

the fool

On this day I renewed my wish to keep an open heart in the face of things shifting and uncertain. If I stay present with myself and with others, if I trust what I've learned and who I am, things tend to work out. If, in the course of following my heart, I appear foolish to others, this is a consequence I am ready to accept. Today.

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

On this day I knelt in someone's lawn and prayed in the moonlight.

Wednesday, January 9, 2013

motorcycle diaries

I went out for a ride with a friend the night before last. It was already a tad late, but I like L.A. best when the city is just settling down - the last tango dancers in a studio on Washington have the floor to themselves, the lights in a fast-food restaurant flicker off while we wait at a red light (one worker, backlit by the fluorescent glow of the kitchen, remains sweeping up). Wood burning in a fireplace somewhere spices the air. Farther down, we pass a 24-hour Winchell's and are tempted by the almost-irresistible waft of freshly baked doughnuts. I kid myself I can feel the warmth of the ovens, but it's more likely the road.

There is something undeniably romantic about motorcycles. Most people talk as though it's purely sexual. I know my friend likes the feel me on his bike, the way my legs squeeze when he hits the brakes and the comfort of my arms around his waist. I'm not naive, but something transcends all this when we're flying down the highway. My friend and I are simple in these moments; simple people with simple needs. We've both been single long enough even these few small comforts seem to really mean something.

Sunday, December 2, 2012

little lives 3

About a week ago some men came and chopped off all the beautiful limbs of the maple tree in my front yard just before its five-fingered leaves would have turned red, then gold and carpeted our walkway. I complained. When another set of men showed up the very next day and spread manure around I was equally unhappy. The odor was nothing short of an olfactory assault and lasted for days. This was insult to injury. The cold-wets moved in shortly after, infecting the house with a chill, with general sogginess and misery.

Returning home last night I was stopped in my tracks by the sudden appearance of grass in the once-bare dirt patch beneath our stubby tree. Seeds had sprouted there as if by magic, coming up in tender shoots, every spear it's own small miracle. Some impulses you just have to give yourself to, accept the invitation as if it were a blessing. I got down on my haunches and, like a child, ran my palm across the top of this glistening, virgin carpet. It became clear then how short-sighted I've been, I am, but the moment was too precious to lose to regret. 

Thursday, November 15, 2012

tenderness comes

An inchworm
on your windshield
rescued by your palm
crawled the length
of your finger
before set free
on the lawn.

Monday, September 3, 2012

gig harbor

Walking back from the dock with my guitar
fingers numb from practice
in the cold, wet Washington fall
I almost stepped on you, slug.

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Santa Monica Farmer's Market

A strawberry vendor offered me one of his wares. It left a quarter-sized hickey of red juice on my blouse. I didn't mind. This particular berry elicited a squeal of delight when I bit into it. Tongues alive! Surely that's worth a little stain-remover. 

Farther down a few potatoes. Ted said he thought they were better than Yukon Gold, but threw in a bunch of green onions anyway to sweeten the deal. Shiny purple eggplants added weight to my bag. Fresh thyme. A trio of onions still caked with dirt. A stop at the dried fruit stall. Shall I taste the cherries? Do I like sweet or tarte things? A handfull of currants. A sliver of mango. My day completes with a dozen fresh brown eggs and small jar of honey. 

Friday, March 9, 2012

what I know

I know the jasmine bushes on May St. are in bloom but, there's nothing quite like catching their scent from the back of a motorcycle after an evening of darts and drinking at the King's Head Saloon.

Monday, December 19, 2011

14th and Pearl

I pass things on my way to school, sometimes beautiful things. Friday I saw an elderly man standing next to a fence cup the reddish-orange bloom of a trumpet flower in one hand while he ran his fingers tenderly down its fuzzy stem with the other. That the alien fruit and foliage of this city still inspires it's aging resident. That there is always so much wonder in this world worth stopping and reaching out for.

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

lesser things

How many fears and insecurities we bump up against in just a day. Am I able to bear myself up? Will I meet the demands placed on me physically, mentally, emotionally? How afraid I am that I cannot!

Last night these melted away. I sat outside on the bricks, smoked a cigarette (I know it's unhealthy), and took myself in. I am not so bad - even though I am not transformed into some higher or brighter thing. This waist, these legs, my critical mind and nagging desire to get closer to others. I am not always gentle, but I am mostly good-willed.

I am reminded that it is ok to begin again, to always begin again from where I am at. I sometimes find myself crawling back to my center, pride in hand, after having been distracted by some lesser thing. But as long as my return is sincere, I have yet to be turned away from that source of self-acceptance and benevolent comfort.  

Saturday, August 6, 2011

Sitting at Library Alehouse, drinking a Rochefort. On the television a Red Sox game is on. The score is 2/2 and it's the top of the third, but none of this really matters; I came in to distract myself. I only glance up at the screen because that's what you do at a bar. But I realize all of a sudden, from a previous text, that my sister (who recently moved to Boston) is waiting outside this game to get in. Although I am far more comfortable on my bar stool than she is in line, that we are in some way sharing this moment is the first truly happy thought I've had all miserable day. My thoughts return to last night and how A.L. told me he was and is still with me. My God how we are always, always, all with each other.

Thursday, August 4, 2011

Last night Abe told me I am the painter.
And I believe him. So today I must start painting.

Sunday, May 8, 2011

evening news

At 10:30 this evening you could see the moon straight through my bedroom window sitting exactly where I am.

Sunday, November 28, 2010

christmas in venice

The holiday season has finally caught up with Venice. It's raining and cold outside. I'm sitting on a bar stool at Hinano's listening to live blues, waiting for the moment when I'll have to get up and dance. I've seen Satin Blue perform before. They're usually on fire by the end of the first set. Until then, I nurse my Guinness and take stock of my surroundings. Christmas lights dangle from the awning across the street. People coming in have wet hair, pause to brush off their shoulders and take in the warmth. In the corner a couple are locked in an open-mouthed kiss. They have a small, protective entourage of beautiful people with them. At the table beside them two regulars in dirty jeans and plaid flannel shirts play pool. One of them bobs his head approvingly to the music while the other, taking a shot, exposes his fuzzy plumber's crack. I appreciate the juxtaposition. At the end of the bar a woman with braided hair, grinning madly, looks up from her notebook as the white-haired musician to her close right bends a note plaintively on his guitar...

Sunday, October 3, 2010

Sitting at the window of Cow's End, coffee in hand, looking out the window. A man runs his fingers through his white/yellow hair seven times. He's not facing me, but I can tell he must be a few pounds overweight. Behind me a tupperware container holding loose tea scrapes against wood as it's removed then replaced on the top shelf. Outside a chubby toddler reaches out to touch a rainbow-colored macaw. He reaches with his right while holding a red plastic rake somewhat threateningly in his left. The owner of the bird, wearing khaki cargo pants, loafers with ankle socks, a Son of a Son of a Sailor Jimmy Buffet shirt and one large, gold-colored eagle buckle, rises from his chair and returns the bird, protectively, back to its perch on his shoulder.

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Today I am exceedingly common.

Friday, July 23, 2010

night fishing

The tide was high tonight. I could feel the waves break against the bottom of the pier and almost touch the surf. I often stop short of walking out to the end. There are always fisherman down there with smelly bait. Pieces of dried seaweed and white bird splatter line the railing. Every corner is a leaky trash can and the smell of piss. Tonight the fisherman had edged inland. I suppose it's natural that they should follow the water. They intrigue me. I've never seen any of them catch anything, but they must.