Remember “ROCKY” ‘. . . its Thanksgiving to you but just Thursday to me . . . “
This date thirty-five years ago broke overcast cold and typical of Rhode Island in winter it had been so for days and would continue as such. I don’t remember the day of the week but somehow I knew it would be today that our son Randy would die. I intuited his leaving long before, at his diagnoses (Leukemia @ four) yet in this instance while cradled in mother’s arms. Remembering the pietà I photographed them together and it was in that capture the pain roared into consciousness. Sometimes, especially when I photograph the people I love, or even those I care deeply about, I see things I don’t want to know.
This is just one of several reasons I’ve trashed or abandoned all my work prior to 2000. That is instead of simply killing my self in grief. It wasn’t just December 10th 1976 but the day is memorable for Thomas Merton’s death, different year, and now for the astonishing discovery that it is Emily Dickinson’s birthday.
I was working as a carpenter then and tarried the day longer than usual; last man on site. He waited and I am forever grateful that he did. He hugged my legs and said; “I love you Daddy” then turned, lay upon his bed and twitched as he drown in his own blood. I’d heard the Dragon of Terror all my life, burping noxious gases and occasional belches of flames searing my eyes into blindness but especially so that black Advent day.
Everyday has become Nativity, Crucifixion and, now, Resurrection. What will we call this ‘resurrection’ day, Epiphany!? It just now occurs to me that our resurrection, or that of the great teachers whose lives incarnate The Collective Consciousness of enlightenment for which some were murdered by their culture while most passed of old age. They did not “Preach” so much as teach. Jesus was called Rabbi in his time, not Christ, a latter title and not his surname.
Recently I discovered a quote, one of hundreds collected, that suggest and defines a personal perception, or concept, of a Collective Conscious Mindfulness we all need attend. First in our hearts experience, then one-to-another that we survive as a species. The quote--I will not give you verbatim--since it suggest that I attempt to voice my own “Preaching with a paint brush.”
I loath being preached at. The “Shoulds & Oughts” infuriate me so I’ve hidden behind a camera and the images begot. All the while weeping inwardly for the joy of soaring through the stars alone with words, theirs and mine. Thank you Emily D!
Robert Frank said it best; “It’s astonishing all the crap you have take to make a living.” Politicians, Bankers and Stock Brokers have stolen all my money and retired I subsist on sub poverty social security . . . yet am happier and richer than anyone else I know in the entire world.
Poetic! Isn’t it! Think about all the rich folks who profit from the sweat of your brow while stealing the future for our children.
I digress, it is the nature of my mind: The relates to that and implies . . . etc.
The tragedy of my children’s deaths--not at the same time--is now--as it should be--eventually, celebrated as were their births and lives. Here I am tempted to pitch volunteering at hospice, a primary source of my healing/reconciliation, but I am too consciously aware that charity and love are synonymous.
We all die, it is dying we fear, but Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Jesus come to mind--St. Francis (imagined) too. Faced their passage with equanimity leaving the world as they would have it not as their executioners desired. The love we give to those who cannot, or will not love themselves, is our truth and our greatest gift. Be fearless in that beloved.
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