I have a couple of couches in my living room. One is positioned lengthwise across the front of the space, directly beneath my large, bay window. The other is on the wall opposite it, lengthwise so that if I lay on it, my feet are pointing directly at the window and the other couch. Said second couch is, actually a loveseat so please, enjoy the mental picture of me, a 6′ 2″ beast of a man lying in a V, with my pale, white legs hanging over the side of my loveseat.
Actually? Here you go. For posterity:
My apologies for the ankle socks. Old feet are cold feet, and I am proverbially wearing socks at the ripe, old age of 49.
I had to take that with my Night Sight setting on my camera because presently, I’m watching a thunderstorm, and it’s prematurely dark out at two minutes until 8 on a Wednesday night in July. For some reason, I’ve grown accustomed to this view over the last, few years. Even when my minions are here, and I make them unplug their always charging phones and turn off all the electricity that we can in the house to avoid electrocution, I assume this position and they… Begrudgingly engage in “conversation” with their dear old, almost 50-year-old, overly paranoid Dad, much of which centers on their complaint that they cannot plug their phones in for the duration of the storm.
I should note herein that I know the possibility of electrocution while on computers, phones and electrical devices in a thunderstorm is very minimal. Surge protectors help. But my own mother, God love her, conditioned the fear of horrific, flaming electrocution while watching TV in a thunderstorm into me at a very young age. And we couldn’t afford surge protectors. So, I’m simply keeping tradition alive with my own kiddos. Thank you, Mom, and your granddaughters thank you too…
Begrudgingly.
Believe it or not, it wasn’t the storm, raging outside that drove me to unplug my own, charging phone, stop watching “William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet (1996)” and start blogging. It was this view… The view beyond my pale, white legs and ankle socks that did. You see friends and family, I love my home in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania. I love it despite the constant headache and oft times money pit it has grown into. This is the place where I started over, after my separation and eventual divorce. This was the first home that I, not my now ex-wife and I but me… That I created for the two most important people in my life: My Biggish Bear, and her not-so-smallish, little sister. This place is my ride or die as a single dad. Despite the leaks, the occasional carpenter ants etc., I cannot see myself nor my kiddos anyplace else.
For now.
And that leads me to the point of this piece… This freestyle, First Person composition, drafted in premature darkness to the sound of the rain hitting my bay window and the thunder rumbling nearby. As much as I love this place… This home, there’s one thing missing, and over the last few years, as I’ve inched closer and closer to the half century mark, I’ve felt a longing that I’ve not felt in a long time.
The ocean. A lake. A bay. An inlet. Water, and I’m not talking about the rain running down my street currently like a mini river. I miss water. Whether near a city, in the mountains or down the shore, I want to be able to look out my big, bay window and see water. Flowing, crashing… Or just sitting stoically, unmoving. I want to open my window and hear waves, lapping or crashing against a shoreline/lakeside/riverside.
When I drew up my dream existence, many moons ago in a piece of Mental Flatulence that referenced a little town in Florida called Weeki Wachee, there were kids… Two of them, and a thunderstorm raging outside. I’d just stopped working on my latest WIP: A book long prologue to the trilogy of books I’d penned and published… Something about Halcyon Days and eternal youth. I’d turned off my computer to avoid electrocution as my mother had taught me and was watching the storm from my front, bay window as its shelf cloud rolled in over the ocean/lake/river, a bit worried that my kids–who had been outside playing–had gotten caught in it. But my fear was quickly allayed as they ran soaking, screaming and laughing down the shoreline in my direction. I opened the door for them, and they ran inside, dripping water and carrying something in their hands. They showed it to me: A freshly formed piece of glass where lightning had struck the sand. They’d gathered it quickly so as to avoid electrocution and ran all the way home to me, enamored with their new treasure. I celebrated with them before cautioning them too never do it again. Satisfied at not being reprimanded or rebuked (for who would reprimand or rebuke two children for being children in the summertime?), they ran off into the house to dry off and grab a snack, leaving me to silently marvel at Nature’s Fury outside. Awe-inspiring. Beautiful. Serendipitous.
A perfect moment.
That was my dream then and apparently, it is still my dream now. I can picture that beach/shoreline/lakeside in all its many variations. I could draw it if I wanted to and have many times before this. I don’t consider myself good at drawing–I’m more of a pencil sketch guy–but I still do it. Because part of being an Artist with a capital A is being able to express yourself and your emotions in something palatable. Concrete. I chose writing, guys and gals, but I could have gone in a number of other directions. And in dreams? Emotion. Not palatable or concrete but can it be? Can I at this juncture of my life, on the cusp of 50 make my dream a reality? Is there enough power in my pen or pencil to write/draw it into existence. Survey says?
Probably not. But that’s not really tenable for anyone, is it? No one save for God or whatever deity or deities you believe in–I still dig the Roman Catholic one myself–has that power. Wishing something into existence is impossible. But willing it into existence? Working towards it… Grinding a 9-5, routine existence for it… That, I believe is attainable. And that’s what I need to be focusing on.
If everything goes well, I’ll retire in about 15-16 years. That is, of course wishful thinking because inevitably in my life on this side of the proverbial wormhole of existence something or many things will not go well. But hypothetically, let’s say that 15-16 years until retirement is feasible. Come that day, when I turn in my 9-5 polos for a Bermuda hat and a pair of Birkenstocks, I want… No, I need to be near my dream. At least in the vicinity of it. I need to keep the plot and not lose it because those kids on the beach/shoreline/lakeside may not be my Biggish Bear and Smallish Bear anymore, but their kids… My one-day grand minions could easily assume that role.
I like that plan.
One thing remains however. There’s one part of my aforementioned dream existence that I haven’t addressed yet. Shortly after the kids have left and the storm has slackened (as summer storms generally do within minutes), I hear the front door open. I turn from the rainbow that is materializing over the water and there see her. She is the last piece of my vision. Once upon a time, I could see her face. Her faces. Because in lock step with my ever-changing and ever-evolving life, her face has changed and evolved. These days? I don’t recognize it. It’s a new face… A stranger one, and somehow unlike any other incarnation of her former faces. Her hair is white or maybe gray and not as easily distinguishable as brown, blonde, black or red hair is. She has crow’s feet at the corners of her colorless eyes, colorless because I, the Artist with a capital A haven’t written or drawn them yet and remain open to the possibility that they could be any color. Blue, brown, green or hazel… Any color that you like. Yet her smile folks… Her smile is distinguishable, not because I recognize it, but because it beams happiness. Peace. Contentment. I see it in her smile, and I smile the same smile back. How can I not?
The moment is perfect.
That is my past, present and future dream my oft times casual readers. Rebooted a bit for 2025 but in essence the same. Disclaimer: I’ve written this entire post in a bit of a fugue state. Somewhere between Stream of Consciousness and the state I used to lapse into when I smoked too much weed. I’m not stoned right now and have no plans to get stoned anytime soon. But for once I didn’t think. I just let my chosen art form do its thing. I let my words flow like water without thought or purpose and that is something I have not done for a very, very long time. It feels good. It feels freeing. It feels like Truth with a capital T. My Truth.
What’s yours?
Winky emoticon. Smiley Face.
FM.
Random Musings of a Pseudo-Madman, Version 2.0 