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Title : Watch the Bannister
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Watch the Bannister

    Those of you who peek at this now and then may have noticed a bit of a gap since the last post; and this one now has taken quite a turn from a few other posts that began and sputtered as things came up.  For one thing I've been gathering a few dozen art prints to donate to various causes as their fundraising efforts near; on my side this involves shrink-wrapping the pieces (or having it done for the larger pieces), pricing them out and writing the descriptions, then delivering them well ahead of the auction date so that they can be posted onto their sites.  The values of these prints range from $50 to well over $1000 if purchased from a gallery, but for bidding purposes, they'll be priced from $20 to $200 in the hopes that other bidders will recognize the chance to not only get a signed & numbered, limited edition print (some of them being canvas giclees) at a bargain price, but also to help the struggling groups in the process.  So far, there's been a dedicated group of nurses helping victims of sexual abuse, a recycling community that is quite progressive, and our local humane shelter...and in the coming months there will be many more to come, all struggling for funds for the most part and yet all brimming with passionate and dedicated volunteers mixed with a few employees (those were shameless plugs for those groups but also a chance to bid on their auction pieces if you want).

   Then came the dang computer stuff, a modem going haywire and me heading out to find a replacement only to discover that I'm already behind the times.  A DSL modem?, I was asked at store after store (even the large office supply stores).  Everything is now cable only (Costco, Wal-Mart, Best Buy, and on and on) since you either succumbed to the large monopoly of cable (Comcast in my area, owner or Universal Studios among other entities and now one of the largest media groups in the world) or you purchase a now-rather rare DSL modem from your landline provider (those who still even have a landline); and after a few hours of delay with my landline phone company, I asked if my VPI code had changed (this may sound like gibberish to most of you but I had already gone through much of this several times before so I had it all written down...except for how to get to where I needed to go to check those VPI settings).  The phone company assured me that no, they would do the checking and that my VPI setting was fine and that my modem was indeed dead...so it was off to Amazon which sent one out.  I then called the modem company once it arrived and they right off the bat asked me to check my VPI setting (it had indeed changed; DSL modems have a tendency to do that now and then, jumping from a non-standard setting --which was the one my phone company was using-- back to the "normal" setting that most every other carrier uses).  A quick change by me and my new modem was up and running; did I really need a new modem I asked the technician...probably not, he grimly replied, just the setting jumped.  Oh well, but then there was my router.  I had shifted to the new Core router which blasts out protection to everything from refrigerators to televisions, as well as mobile phones and computers (every time someone outside accesses my network now I receive a notification, letting me know which device is trying get in and whether to allow it).  But getting all of that set up was no walk in the park either (that technician took two hours remotely guiding me through two separate problems with my laptop and mobile phone...but got it fixed).  All of this made me feel that the world was going by me like a riptide only from my viewpoint standing on the shore I couldn't see a thing (Core just blocked an attack by a fake Mozilla "critical repair" site...as I write this).

    So there were those things, then came a bit of stuff from my mom still to be settled, then taxes to be done and paid.  Auugghh.  But somehow, in going through my Take Five cleaning of discarding five of my things each day, I came across some music by Carol Rosenberger and threw one of her discs into my car to see if I wanted to part with it, this particular compilation being something she called a "lullaby album" and titling it ...perhance to Dream (I think that her wording and capitalization of the title was done deliberately).  But here's what she wrote inside: In our high-tech, computer-programmed, accelerating age, the need for a time of relaxation --a period to reflect, or simply experience a sense of calm-- is more important than ever.  Work and other responsibilities have a way of overtaking more elemental pleasures -- like time spent with loved ones, or in solitude.  Yet finding this "quiet time" need not be difficult; and it is partly with this in mind that this musical program is offered...The selections chosen here --accessible, melodious pieces by great composers-- speak to all ages.  For children, they may form a gateway to a world not yet explored -- that of concert music.  For their elders, they may generate fond recollections, like old friends who have not lost their power to inspire or comfort.  They also may act as a bond between parents and children, providing a peaceful background for a time of intimacy, storytelling, and shared experience.  The end of the day is a time when we are open to whatever is around us...if we listen to great music at this time, it becomes part of us at a deep level.  In a subtle way, such music helps us to form personal reserves that we can draw upon in times of emotional or physical need.  It is a wonderful way of learning to center ourselves...As an encouragement for such self-healing, the experiencing of great music, when one is most receptive to it, is a priceless gift. 

   

    Add to all that, my pups; well not exactly pups now but just as with our kids, our animals seem to stay forever young in our minds and hearts.  The one in the background is now just months away from turning 14, walking a bit slow but still walking for 30-40 minutes each day and sometimes twice a day (the other one, sans lead, is the one born with dislocated hips who recently suffered a bout of paralysis but is now back walking, albeit with the aid of a walking cart designed for dogs).  What they've reminded me is that going slow is often a necessity, for their stopping to smell and bark and basically ignore everything else other than their walk is all an unconscious lesson for me.  Appreciate today they seem to tell me, for that is exactly what it is...a new day and here, now; go check it out.   In her new book When Did Everybody Else Get So Old, author Jennifer Grant writes that it's okay to look back to the past...just don't dwell there: I've begun to recognize my biases and accept my limitations.  I'm more wary about my own emotions, no longer looking to them as unerring guides.  There are loose ends in my life that won't be tied up neatly, shattered relationships I can't repair, and puzzles whose missing pieces will remain lost.  I've also begun to grasp that I am not --for better or worse-- that patchwork quilt of a biography that I've been reciting.  I'm more than the labels I assign to myself...Instead of dwelling on memories that drag me down, I choose to revel in those that build me up.  I go back several decades to feel the grass under my bare feet as I catch fireflies.  I time-travel to an evening when I sat on the edge of the tub as my children played.  I even go back to a day when I stood quietly, graveside, after losing someone I loved.

    So, back to that treasure trove of letters I discovered awhile back.  Yes, I'm still digging through them even as I've sent half of them out to those whom I thought might want them back, all done with the intent expressed above, to bring back a flash of their past life, a glimpse of a time or moment they may have forgotten.  And the biggest surprise, a letter I had written and for some unknown reason, had made a copy of before sending it out (who does that???).  And then I had saved it?  So I began reading this letter from way back, as in the year 1985: What would I return as?  If I had a choice, I don't know how I'd answer.  For every mistake I've made, I think I've forgotten the problem.  And even if I swore I'd live better, I'd get into some accident, get some girl pregnant, total my car, run over a cat, go to war.  Rather I think I might be content to spin the wheel of fortune and take whatever comes up.  I'd love to be an architect, a salesman, a con artist, a female prostitute, a bridge worker, a photographer for National Geographic, a ball player...endless.  I think I'd love any of those, at least for a year or so.  I wish I could spend hours just getting mind-welds of different people; what thoughts, what regrets, what feelings are flowing through them.  A universal voyeur but one born of desire to learn about humans and behavior.  Then onto the animals, the insects, the plants.  The tree that stands against the wind, the spider that watches a raindrop destroy his chances for food, the clam that feels the fatal pull of the starfish, the lava that finds that freedom only brings freedom in stone, the air that cruises the globe as freely as the floating hawk.  I hunger and yearn, and yet feel the ticking of the clock behind me.  I think on mortality now, of time ending and perhaps becoming blackness.  Forever.

   Yikes!  Not sure how much dwelling I want to do on that last thought; but as my friend noted, just look back fondly at what you were.  Was I still that person?  Do we change that much as our life progresses?  For me, having a rare peek into where my head was at nearly 40 years ago has been a rare treat, one that I hope my friends will also enjoy when they receive their own packets of letters from way back, letters somehow buried in my file box for some unknown reason.  Why did I save them, those letters?  Who knows?  But I do know that I think we might be losing something in that mystery that once came regularly from snail mail, lengthy written letters now giving way to short emails and e-texts.  A quick read, a delete, and gone, wiped out as quickly from our readings as it was written.  Forty years later those thoughts probably won't be there; maybe forty years later we won't care.  So, about that bannister.  Give me four minutes to explain, or just slightly less than that.  Back in the day (we're talking the 1950s), the mile stood unbreakable for the human athlete, at least in completing the distance in under four minutes...until the arrival of Roger Bannister.  He just passed away at 88, but in 1954 he broke that four-minute barrier.  His original drive was to actually break the record in the 1500 meter race, which he failed to do, so his sights then turned to the mile.  But after getting his name in the record books as the first sub-four minute miler, he abruptly left the field of sports and followed his love of medicine, becoming a recognized neurologist and a "sir" as well, officially knighted by the Queen.  Perhaps he never found or received a lost trove of letters but if he had he probably wouldn't have dwelled on the past.  On the other hand, he may have looked back fondly at them, much as I was fortunate enough to do.

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