o paradiso

“O paradiso, dal onda uscito;
Fiorente suol, splendido suol.
In voi rapito io son.
Tu m'appartieni.
O nuovo mondo.”

{“O Paradise, emerging from the sea,
Flowering earth, brilliant sun,
You entrance me.
You belong to me.
Oh new world.”}

~ Giacomo Meyerbeer, L’Africaine.

1
It has been extraordinarily difficult to write. Indeed, there are no shortages of ideas, structured thoughts, and experiences. Arnold Toynbee famously (and infamously) observed how people in places like northern New England must consume so much energy and time grappling with protracted winters, their innovations and industriousness are severely limited. As a Mainer, I’ve typically taken exception to such underestimation. At the same time, the harshness of my surrounding culture has driven me to the brink. Housing and sustaining employment have never been as tenuous as they are presently. Globally, we’ve all become accustomed with the concept of sustainability; there are also surely personal implications and applications. Individually, I am making every honest effort to search for better situations, networking and offering marketable skills. Parallel to Toynbee’s observation, when I’m not fulfilling commitments, I’m tailoring credentials in response to announcements. And praying with my every ounce for welcoming developments. All of which prevents me from being as innovative and industrious as I’d like.

My father gave me a life’s worth of anecdotes and consolations for the journey. From that ethereal encyclopedia is a story he loved about how legendary operatic tenor Enrico Caruso sang for convicts in prisons to console them. The prisoners would ask Caruso to sing the poignant aria O Paradiso for them. It is an impassioned song of longing, of heartache for better places and times. The sense of incarceration can take a variety of forms and even places. We become aware of this, as we find ourselves driven by the longings of our hearts. The Welsh expression, hiraeth, represents yearning for the place of one’s home. There is surely a homesickness for the kind of welcome and belonging one has yet to see, but faith says that it exists. Or, it will exist. I would not be so driven from within, if I did not believe an as-yet-elusive welcome will really find me.

Spending five-sevenths of my time working in windowless confines, I make sure to be outdoors as much as possible, even if just to read or write on the tiny steps of the cramped and rackety apartment house. Waiting twice-daily for buses always includes gazing to the skies. O Paradiso, when do things finally let up and improve? The bus commute is short in duration, and I’ve taken to reading brief essays during the rides. Through the past year, I’ve been studying the books I collected called In Conversation with God, by Francisco Fernandez-Carvajal. Each of his lectionary day’s reflections are divided into thirds; they are substantial and thought-provoking. Good reading always helps me stretch my mind, transcending the numbing tedium. One recent doldrummy morning, I read Carvajal’s sendup of the pearl of great value (Matthew 13), and immediately recognized how he, as I do- interprets this as being about one’s vocational calling. The realm of God, as the Gospel reads, compares to a field whose buried treasure inspires a person to sell everything they have to purchase that land- just as a merchant of pearls sold all he had to buy the pearl of great value he recognized. In Carvajal’s words:

The discovery of the pearl presupposes a great amount of effort, a search, while the treasure buried in the field seems to have been discovered almost by accident... Many find their vocation almost without looking. Other people are restless in their hearts until they find the pearl of great value... After the pearl has been discovered or the treasure found, one more step is required. It is the personal response- identical in both parables. The man “went and sold all that he had and bought it.” Generosity and detachment are indispensable conditions for perseverance in a vocation.

A discovery so profound brings together all the disparate parts of a person’s life. It’s why I’ve never stopped hunting and applying- ever since I was still in graduate school. Walking from the bus to the workplace, I saw two colleagues, and we spoke about the biblical parables. Beyond their intrigue that I read such things on the bus, we had a great chat about what each of us considers to be the pearl of great value in our lives. But we all agreed that one must be “all in,” and dive headfirst toward our highest priorities. We all want to practice our best gifts.

2
Within tirelessly searching for a better situation is a staggering need for respite. I toiled at my job throughout the pandemic, even taking on extra duties to stay employed. The recent several years decimated many workplaces, including mine. At my end of things, the covid era continues- albeit with last year’s return of public interactions- yet still as a staff of one person for 43 months and counting. In late-April, after begging for a week’s coverage, I was able to make a long-awaited retreat; I used to do such things twice a year, for spiritual health and to renew creative energies. I used to travel. I used to live comfortably in an apartment I could afford. Those days are past. My accrued 230 hours of earned PTO are essentially made of Monopoly money. The unacceptability of present conditions urges me onward, intensifying my aspirations. Granted, I’m not so self-centered as to be ungrateful for any good that is, because there are blessings to count. But the need for stability and basic peacefulness continues to be urgent. Unable to find respite, or much of any quiet in an oppressively loud and cramped apartment, I find ways to try resetting through contemplation in the liminal spaces between obligations and pursuits. Again, I know enough to be grateful, and in this case it’s for things like books and writing materials. Now spending half my earnings on rent, I’ve invented ways to make toast and coffee more interesting.

It has been requiring all my survival skills, to find that pearl of great value, being fully tilted toward better horizons. Flitting around is not a luxury available to me, or to many other workers. Recently, while answering questions about projects and describing achievements to an administrator, I was asked “What are you doing here?” Though a high compliment, it left me very perplexed. I used to hear that when I was in the art field, as though one can be “too good” for their milieu. It’s reminiscent of the lyric in Billy Joel’s Piano Man, his famous song about his former life as a lounge entertainer: “they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar; And say man what are you doin' here?” As it is my habit, I broke the tension of that comment by quoting the song. Along with the parable about the pearl of great value, a biblical passage that is always at the fore of my thoughts is the exhortation that a light is never meant to be stuffed under a bushel: No one, when they light a candle, puts it in a secret place. It’s put on a lamp-stand so that others can see the light (Luke 11:33). Vocations must be applied to real life. I’ve been living a life of investing all I’ve got into abilities meant to be shared; knowledge meant to be imparted. A powerful sense of vocation redoubles the ferocity of my search.

3
To be professionally connected with places and people that want to use and benefit from my willing energies and abilities is akin to finding the field beneath which there is lifegiving treasure. Perhaps it’s a two-way street: could the opportunities be seeking me? The glutted Northeast has a job market that mirrors its housing market, with too few places for too many people. Here, the term recruitment is a misnomer. Positions dedicated to talent acquisition essentially manage tidal waves. Those in positions of managing applications for both employment and housing do not need to recruit; rather, they are passive recipients of overabundance. Sufficient work and respectable living space are life’s basics. Those who seek improvements are relegated to begging. For readers that are fortunately not in such straits, extreme versions of this can be seen on medians of urban thoroughfares and alongside municipal parking areas. Even applicants who have addresses must paddle in the open oceans of online resumé-parsing upload tools, engaging in games of a perfectionism that may not be statistically attainable. Recruiters and committees that want perfect might not like such individuals who don’t want to be taught anything. Indeed, imperfect has its qualities! Data-slurping analytics cannot account for a person’s character, which in real life, is everyone’s lasting impression.

Indeed, a crossroads is no place to root oneself and take up residence. Since losing my housing last year, along with witnessing similarities among many people, I’ve really seen in an intensely troubling way how temporal life becomes. Living in a poorly-governed and chronically-depressed city, I’ve surely watched waves of friends and institutions respond to recessions by moving away. Immediately after art college, I went right to work locally and full-time, trading on my photographic printing and teaching skills; from that peculiar vantage point, I saw my former classmates leave. I managed to continue working straight through the post-stock-market-crash 1990s, even paying off my student loans. Graduate school followed, requiring the first 15 years of the 2000s to completely pay off my masters degree loans, also amidst more recessions and broadbased downsizes and departures around me. Wholesale gentrification is the worst scourge I’ve seen, in comparison to forty years of constant recession I’ve lived through in Maine. Smallmindedness looks quaint to visitors, but to locals it is a merciless betrayal. Indeed, it’s a big world, a short life, and I join numerous surviving neighbors on vigilant lookout for what’s next and where the welcoming fields and pearls of great value may be found. Today I helped a man with his research and books; he described to me how he had been living in his car for 14 years. I asked him about how he dealt with the winters, and he responded by saying he has several sleeping bags. “It’s all about hunkering down,” he said, “and praying to fall asleep.” O Paradiso, may God’s will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.

watchful

“The eternal fount its source has never show’d,
But well I know wherein is its abode,
Although ‘tis night.

Yes, in a life so sad and dark as this,
By faith I know the wellspring of bliss.
Although ‘tis night.”

~ San Juan de la Cruz,
Song of the Soul That Rejoices to Know God by Faith.

It would be a conflict of definitions to say that vigilance takes a vacation. The nature of perseverance is the very ceaselessness that distinguishes keeping vigil, from passive waiting. Keeping watch becomes something of a default state of being for anyone in a constant state of anticipation, over a long span of years. Corresponding with crises and desires, watchfulness intensifies. Expectancy manifesting with embedded, abiding embers is not hypervigilant. The latter is a disruptive form of anxiety, subversive to balancing thoughts. As for the former, watchfulness is a longing for transcendence. It is an awareness of past and presence, with an alertness for improvement, for ascendance. Watchfulness tends naturally toward impatience, and must be tempered creatively and constructively. But theory and practice are threads that do not always entwine.

Watchfulness takes many forms, and has reasons as specific as an individual life. For many, it is the animal-like alertness to avert danger. Our instincts show themselves. Just the other day, I stopped my errands to look after an injured cat in front of a store. Incredulous that neither pedestrians nor shop workers would intercede, I made the shelter phone calls, and stayed with the troubled cat until help arrived. Trying to console and to keep a watchful eye on a distressed animal, I remembered my childhood’s vulnerable years on mean inner-city streets. Watchfulness takes shape as the insomniac’s procession moves through such nighttime stations of the cross as windows, kitchens, inanimate desks, and darkened corridors. It’s tuning for hospitable radio broadcasts, trying to pull something hopeful out of the air, from unknown distances. It’s the drive toward an invisible goal, by way of an unsatisfactory status quo. It’s the via dolorosa of web sites in an impersonal and threadbare job market. It’s the persistent anticipation of mercy, while standing on the ashes of forsakenness. As with the cat’s plaintiveness on the dismissive sidewalk, my petitions seek watchful and helpful eyes- and those of Divine providence. Parallel to the incredulity of unrequitedness is the insistence upon purpose. The two are tied together by dignity. By purpose, the intention is to redeem the present: to take stock of what is useful and to find significance in the immediate- while fully expecting fruition. Seedlings beneath the forest floors must think such thoughts. Watchfulness is surely a means; it is not the goal.

It is known that San Juan de la Cruz penned the ideas of some of his canticles and themes, while incarcerated in a cramped dungeon. He had not committed any crime, but was perceived as an enemy of anti-reformist churchmen in Spain. It was expected that he would die of the deprivation, torture, and starvation inflicted upon him. Juan seemed to be fueled by a transcendent sense of purpose. He managed to beg for a piece of paper, which he folded into a tiny booklet for his sketched thoughts. With every possible moment, he picked away at the lock of his cell; this may have gone on for months. In his emaciated state, he skillfully broke out of the dungeon and escaped to safety. Among the inspired ideas he scratched on the piece of paper were those leading to The Living Flame of Love. This mystical prayer begins with tenderly you wound my soul’s deepest center, reconciling at once anguish and salvation. He concluded with this stanza:

How gently and lovingly you wake in my heart, where in secret you dwell alone; and in your sweet breathing, filled with good and glory, how tenderly you swell my heart with love.

Together with his larger works, The Ascent of Mount Carmel, and Dark Night of the Soul, San Juan de la Cruz exemplified steadfast faith in the face of desolation. He implored his readers to continue the ascent, amidst perceived stagnation. In the poem, Song of the Soul That Rejoices to Know God by Faith, his refrain following his expressions of aspiration amidst abandonment is “although it is night.” He was sure of his belief, of his Source, even though he was plunged into obscurity. He remained more pronouncedly assured, the more he noticed reasons not to be assured. Studying biographical works about San Juan gives me increasingly greater appreciation of his poetry and philosophy. For him, watchfulness is readiness and openness to the stirrings of the Holy Spirit. In the gospel, to be watchful is to take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be weighed down with consumption and the problems of this life, as well as the consistent followthrough that we watch therefore, and pray always, that we may continue worthy of our calling. San Juan instructed his readers to see light in the night, despite the perceived and convincing darkness in our days.

Our perceptions can play tricks on us, and traversing the night of sense confronts gauntlets that threaten to deceive the faithful. Keeping watch becomes a delicate balance between real and assumed limitations. Yet another needed balance is that which blends spartan discipline with a sensitivity that discerns when to let up on the throttle. Is a less-aggressive vigilance a healthful form of surrender? Perhaps only experience will tell.

In that fine art of patient recollection is the wisdom of reaching out to mentors and friends. As I am a trusted ally to many, I know that my closest kindred spirits reciprocate by intending the best for me. An elder friend who is close to retirement provides plenty of welcome encouragement. When we have time to catch up, she tells me to “look for a miracle” in a very affirmative voice. Indeed, I do this- hastening the discovery with all the vigilant ingenuity possible, thinking of that unflappable San Juan de la Cruz. After all, when you’ve been given a message, that inspiration must go forth. As the pray without ceasing of St. Paul is watchful vigilance, then it must be a rotation of physical progress and interior contemplation. San Juan was wrestling with the lock and chains, while making the most of his one piece of writing paper. Watchfulness, alas, needs its own checks and balances: Care must be taken so that vigilance does not upstage savouring what is good. While hungrily and constantly watching online for opportunities and developments, it’s important to remember they do not change on a minute-by-minute basis (certainly not in the pre-dawn hours). Such things operate at excruciating tempi, and there is little more one can do beyond conscientiously trying and keeping faith. There are many rejections, because there are many attempts, and these amount to many teachable moments. Wondering about why, and how, and when seems only to plague any good progress. Inhabiting San Juan’s purgative night of sense teaches a surrender of the what-ifs. If anything, the better musing is to consider potential improvements and what direction may be noticed among the elements.

In the second section of The Ascent of Mount Carmel, San Juan de la Cruz wrote, “The less the soul works with its own ability, the more securely it journeys, because it journeys more in faith.” Speaking as a calligrapher, there is something to be said about the steadiest line paradoxically drawn with a slightly loosened grip. San Juan is advocating against over-calculation, even if it means navigating through darkness. His expression of disciplined faith is that of resolve amidst unresolve; head-knowledge must be refined as heart-knowledge.

Exemplary as it is, his life is one among those which could be fermented only through life-threatening trials. A crucible is defined by its very indefiniteness. It’s in not knowing the extent of an ordeal, or what endurance requires. But that very instability becomes a place of uneasy residence, hoping tenuous conditions are temporary, amidst the proactivity of striving. For the example of San Juan, the foraging is by a spirit of trust. Strength of trust is bolstered by cultivated preparedness. A very strong spirit is needed to engage the battle for sustenance and improvement. Within this strength, it is vital to be as lucid and discerning as possible. Equally critical is the life-force of inspiration. There must be such ready resources as good reading, access to natural light and fresh air, alongside vigorously reflective creative practices. Study is a form of watchfulness, and for me it is an enjoyable exercise that helps redeem the time and expand my sights. All the while, I stretch and watch for better times, open doors, and fewer limitations, insisting that I do not wait in vain. In the Easter vigil is a model of expectant hope, of watching for the liberating moment. It is also a pattern for the anticipatory life that proceeds in a one-way pilgrimage of trust for which vigilance becomes subconscious.

inclinate aurem vestram

“Preserve the watch, make way for the glorious operations of the Spirit.”

~ Richard Phillips (Quaker, 18th c.), On Watchfulness and Silence.

On a recent raw-cold morning, while paying for the day’s newspaper, the cashier said to me, “stay in a while and warm up; it’s a frozen wasteland out there.” Pocketing my change and bunching up my gloves with the folded paper, I repeated, “frozen wasteland? It’s not that bad.” From there, I heard more about how forbidding the way to work had been, and how this is just the beginning of a helplessly interminable winter. In short, I was reminded to brace myself. It’s easy to understand this view of the world, and even easier to be governed by it. Building upon a chassis of apprehension is as tempting as it is stifling. Bad news is abundant and free for the taking; a dish of victuals that never empties. Problems are more visible than solutions. Focus naturally fixes itself on the foreground. Somehow, I’m slow to be swayed by these offerings; still instinctively straining forward. Insistently, somehow, always with ear and eye inclined to listen and read for wisdom.

The pursuing love of wisdom is known as philosophia. Bernard of Chartres (12th c.) described wisdom as “the comprehension of the truth of things as they are.” If any things are to be gained in this pursuit, they may be clarity of thought and perception, along with some degree of peace of mind. This quest is a form of watchfulness. It takes cultivated readiness to be able to discern the true and the good amidst slag heaps. To be watchful is to be studiously prepared while navigating somber obscurity, ever alert for signs of graces.

Several days after traversing the frozen wasteland, as described by the store clerk, I was sauntering along Charles Street in Boston, admiring the shopwindow Christmas decorations. The colorful street was funneling a cold wind. In the middle of tinsel, glitter, red ribbons, and gift displays, I saw a crate of flower bulbs for sale in front of a small hardware store. The sight of these brown, dry, onionlike bulbs caused me to stop and look closer. A couple of pedestrians also stopped, perhaps to look at what drew my attention. “You know what these are,” I said to my fellow browsers; “these are signs of hope. There will be spring again.”

Those dormant, dessicated bulbs were my favorite decorations, perhaps because of the way I encountered them. Wind tunnels and frozen wastelands are valid descriptions for realities of northern winters that might be expressed with different imagery. But harsh conditions are real, and we live amidst increasingly hostile times. How things are perceived doesn’t alter them, and we cannot always, or easily, change situations. If transformation is from within, then an individual can adjust to circumstances, repositioning sight and listening ear, en route to action. As the Lenten season is dedicated to reckoning, so the Advent season is one of expectation and inquiry. Both traditions are expressions of pilgrimage and the succession of a soul’s development. Rather than dwell upon one day, we proceed along strings of unfolding weeks as portions of the year. The Advent is a hungered waiting, the kind that aches to the brink of giving up- like an indefinite winter’s darkness. At its depth is a fine line between the certitude that something good will come to pass, and desolation that the good is but forgotten futility. The comfort ye my people of Isaiah is a declaration of assurance in the desert that verdant heights await.

Not having grown up with Christmas customs, they were quite new to me as a young adult. My way into the narrative, and still most fascinating to me, are the mysterious Magi. They are known as the scholars- or the Wise Men- in the biblical text. Some commentators have called them astronomers, as they made note of the night skies. They also demonstrated knowledge of the Torah. Their place of origin was no more specific than east of the land of Israel- which could have been as far away as India. Evidently, they were extraordinary enough as visiting strangers to be summoned by Herod. Little else was recorded, aside from having reached the stable in Bethlehem, and that came to be commemorated later as the Epiphany. These unusual pilgrim scholars were also clever and perceptive enough not to report back to Herod, and to slip away instead. They had been convinced to do so through warnings they had dreamt about. Where did they go afterward, and did they recount their voyage to anyone? The scholars were integral to the Adventus, which is also to say, proceeding to the arrival.

For those of us postdating the Magi, postdating Easter, Pentecost, and many other events, the Advent season continues to be one of awaiting. The earthly journey is perilous and unstable; it is a tremendous test of faith, and its duration is unknown. The search for guidance and assurance is continuous, often a weary awaiting while persisting ahead. Perhaps those scholars and Israelite peasants were also haggard with hard times, emperors, and the longing to see better days and tangible justice. Looking up at the night skies, whether from the window near my writing table, or from across the lot in front of a neighborhood convenience store, the vigil is upheld with an ache for improvement and peaceful respite. There remain too many unfulfilled aspirations; too many squandered efforts. Yet, even now, keeping faith means collecting my wits over and again, at times with fumes for fuel, and tell myself to hold course and look forward. It also means a determination of heading in the right direction. On overcast starless winter nights, it’s blind faith. But senses are ever inclined with expectation.

writing pilgrim

“Give me my scallop shell of quiet,
My staff of faith to walk upon,
My scrip of joy, immortal diet,
My bottle of salvation,
My gown of glory, hope’s true gage,
And thus I’ll take my pilgrimage...

...Then am I ready, like a palmer fit,
To tread those blest paths which before I writ.”

~ Sir Walter Raleigh, The Passionate Man’s Pilgrimage.

Optimism is an increasingly grave matter. By this, I refer to upholding an earnestly positive perspective. More than that, to do so, full on, through all circumstances- even in these times. With each day, there are more than enough current events stories to erode heart and hope. I try to limit my exposure to news media, and long ago gave away my television. With scarce time to write, I’d rather not be immersed in continuous streams of advertising and superfluous, avoidable noise. Not enough time for reading and writing; too many excuses that lead to fear and a sense of insufficiency. Claiming some safe space, at least enough for a good night’s sleep, takes as much vigilance as the simple- yet vital- will to be creative.

There are many plausible reasons to just give up the effort. During a recent lunch hour’s journal scribbling, my recorded thoughts included the phrase, “why persevere?” Later, that evening, the philosophical discussion forum which I moderate elected to use the question as the shared topic. I listened to a variety of definitions to illustrate the meaning of perseverance. In the usual Socratic fashion, the discussion moved from the human will to live, to continuity, to whether altruism exists. Philosophy tends to beget more philosophy. Hearing so many insights spiral out of the idea of persevering was much more interesting than expressing my own doubts.

Going to work every day, with an insistent drive to see better days, has been my unworded answer to the question. Of course, persevere. If I don’t, I’ll be out of a place to live (if gentrification doesn’t strike first), or employment (if budget cuts don’t strike first). There’s no standing still. That’s a persistence related to survival, and at second thought seems rather shallow. Shouldn’t there be grander goals than water-treading persistence? The great work cannot merely be an ascent to the surface; baselines are not suitable destinations. An enduring image is brought to mind from my adolescence, when my father would take me on long walks. I loved doing this, just tagging along and absorbing his observations. Sometimes we’d stop for a breather at park benches, during which he would tap the bowl of his pipe, to shake out the old tobacco in order to replace it with new. When he’d do this above an ant hill, we would watch how the ants furiously dug out from under the ash. It never mattered how frequent, they would always upwardly clear away their places and paths with the same persistent urgency. I found this really fascinating, and the memory of this has visited me at many of my jobs, and when I have to exhume my car in the winter dark of early-morning.

It was no less than a seasoned monk (in a monastery) that called me a “cockeyed optimist.” Maybe he saw something that I couldn’t. Persevere? Well, of course. Why not? Making some measure of progress, however modest, is vital. When there are no through-paths in sight, looking forward is a foraging for escape hatches. Keep aspiring, stay productive, and continue reaching for a better situation, despite the dead ends in sight. Beneath this activity, within all the improvement attempts and hopes, is the pilgrimage spirit. Reach forth without the solidity of reward.

Excessive thought can become an obstacle to action, especially when it comes to weighing justification for not trying. Blind faith is, admittedly, quite unreasonable. As a pilgrim soul ever explores and navigates, it seems to me that hope often defies reason. And amidst reasonable hopelessness is some kind of unreasonable aspiration. You may not understand this. It doesn’t really make sense, when considering what little is immediately visible. And that’s just it: we have to size up and interpret what we can see, against what we cannot. Consider the contrast between an after-midnight sleepless gaze upon motionless and darkened streets, compared to the same window view to a sunstreamed landscape hours later. To my ears, it seems rather absurd when an athlete on a last-place team says something like, “we’re making great improvements, and with a few adjustments we’ll succeed.” But absurdity, in this case, is in the ears of the beholder. By contrast, how does the athlete perceive their own situation, and the way upward?

There is much to overlook, in order to see straight to the horizon. I have to visualize past numerous daily reminders that are capable of convincing me to simply give up. It is a struggle in itself to protect clear and well-intending vision from exhaustion, resignation, and anger that can easily harden into cynicism. There is a life-threatening, cavernous drop from such a steep precipice. Still more perseverance is needed, as if there’s an endless supply. But how much and how far is unknown, and that is an uneasy dimension of pilgrimage. On this hard journey, perhaps I’ve accomplished much, but admittedly I haven’t done a tenth of what I’m well prepared to do. Time does not stand still, and neither does my patience. Should I see the present as the start of what is yet to fulfill, or as the point from which to measure my time remaining to try correcting my failings? There must be good enough reason to soldier on, better than meeting creditors’ deadlines, making the digging out of the ant hill worthwhile. Without a tidy conclusion to these dilemmas, work commitments demanded that I close book and pen. Retaking the crosstown pavement, I chose to walk along Pleasant Street, and to think about that.

Several evenings ago, while waiting on a long line at a supermarket, the customer in front of me noticed my lapel pin. “Love that typewriter pin.” The next comment was memorable: “Are you a writer by trade, or is it your passion?” Much is implied in a question like that. Sometimes avocation and vocation do coincide. Because I don’t punch a clock as a paid, professional author, I balked in my response. “Oh, it’s a passion, all right,” I replied, righting myself. Within these little interactions is another illustration of the life of a pilgrim of trust. Pilgrimage, by definition, is a one-way voyage through unknown passes, en route to an eternal destination. The way is indefinite and unpredictable. Incorporated into the grand voyage are months, days, and hours of stages in the journey. For the writer, the increments are paragraphs, sentences, and jots. Indeed, there is always something to write about. Our “scrip and staff” relate to the instruments of our craft. With fellow journeying writers, we compare our notes. There are trails, paths, and desert stretches of road; there are tasks and trials. With our companions, we regale one another, continuing the ancient ways of storytelling as we see in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. A writing pilgrim often must create their own maps, and surely the scrolls are of our creation. Among prized instruments that permit us to make our marks, are our collected words. With our words and inspirations come our functional metaphors. In this context, a great example is the word compass.

Places of respite and pauses are sparing, brief, and never quite satiating. Perhaps I must take that to mean I cannot rest long on the sidelines. There is no shrinking back from the continuum. Within this is the most difficult terrain for the pilgrim soul. Proceeding without good reason. Invest the entirety of one’s life and energy in the midst of waste land. Do it anyway, and wholeheartedly. The immediate is tangible, the hereafter is accepted on faith, but the intervening span is the greatest unknown. Uncertainty must be armed with readiness, aimlessness with direction. In motioning forward is the brashest boldness.

wishes wanting

“I prize the cloudy, tearing sky
for the thoughts that flap and fly.
For staying in and reading by.
For sitting under.

This is a day for hearing bagpipes
somewhere playing.
This is a day for hearing sarabands
and hiding away.”

~ The Innocence Mission, And Hiding Away

Writing, when as a quiet verbal witness to each day’s living, bears some valuable review. If our written lines parallel the course charted by personal experience, then a functional archive is subtly being constructed. That archivist’s sense, abiding on and off the job, continually reminds me of the vitality of authentic documentation. An archival document needn’t be of any particular age, neither should it originate from any particular quantity of material. Of far greater importance in manuscript records is their authenticity and connection to their provenance- or source. Our most honest and accurate documentation can reveal actions and emphases. A study of documentation strengthens comprehension and informs present and future.

Within the context of narrative documentation, journal-writing finds its place. After all, for personal journals to be effective, the writing must be honest and as uncensored as possible. Whether an entry takes the form of a task list, a clipped criticism, or a lengthy reflection, the writing stands as a recording of a thought process at a specific time. Several years ago, I began the regular practice of indicating the time of day, as well as the date, of each journal entry. The tones of writing will differ from 6am to 10pm. Preserved thoughts belong as much to their author as to their time of writing. Having made these observations, I must add that I surely spend far more time writing than reading my journal entries. Yet as life’s rhythm warrants, I’ll remember my noted thoughts as both sounding-board and mirror to my state of affairs. Realizations tend to form and solidify between intense stretches of time, when there are bits of space to make notes. Being in full-time service to employment, I’ve long found ways to own thin slivers of my own time for the cause of creativity. Of late, I find that I must interrupt myself so that I can write what must be documented. Of late, as well, I’ve noticed quite a lot of enumerated frustrations. I occurred to me that in my daily written musings, wishes are left wanting. There isn’t enough wishing going on. At least, not as usual.

remember

Informed by my own archival record, I was able to see my own aspiration deficit. Along my persistent quest for what I need to know, I found myself reaching through some matters I’d already acknowledged in writing. Often, I hear myself say that “I want to know what I don’t know.” What is being overlooked? There must surely be explanations for my lack of success, yet in spite of that, through a combination of the air and light of early spring I saw the absence of wishes in my words. This is to say hopes, wishes, aspirations; essentially an active transcending of earthbound limitations. And thus, a distinction between the longings of the spirit and material ambition arises. As much as the latter aspect remains a motivation, I found the former neglected and unfocused in recent months’ entries. With my attention drawn, while writing under windblown skies, it was evident to me that we are prone to prevent ourselves from aspiring beyond today’s trenches.

A wise friend once advised that, given the choice, it is preferable to “write what you want to write, not what you have to write.” Often, in my mind, the two are the same, but the context of our banter had to do with the idea that repeatedly writing about abiding troubles may not be the most enjoyable thing with which to be occupied. Well, indeed, and duly noted. Writing about the uncontrollables runs its course, and a world of prospects must follow suit. So, I set about trying to articulate my wishes. Easier said than done. Day followed day, with the final task at my desk being a procrastinated, unwritten list. This is supposed to be easy to do- especially for a dreamer. Finally, my journal entries began to include wishes for places to go, and ways to be. My wonder turned from an incredulity at the absence of wishes, to yet another puzzlement at my reluctance to articulate wishes. With some pencil-twisting, I returned to recording some wishes, some aspirations with hopes of fulfillment. Some were smaller and simpler, to balance the hopes for better days, fruits of persistent labors, that aspirations may come to actuality. My experience has been to aspire and then to act. Yet, a beginning comprises the speaking forth of wishes- even in simple written words, or in wordless prayer.

aspire

In this gradual learning, across trackless time, the appreciating value of self-discipline cannot be overestimated. Part of that is to pray unceasingly, and not lose sight of wishing. Arid and dark deserted stretches must be lit by hopes. Paths and chambers are to be decorated with found eloquence. While trying to determine the controllable elements within reach, there remains great worth in wishing irrationally. Pascal once commented that wisdom sends us to childhood. He was quite right. Children are generally the ones preoccupied with trusting wish-lists, fantastic stories, and magic. I must know to not distance myself from such virtues. Respect and love toward neighbor as to oneself must surely also mean wishing goodness to oneself equally as wishing the best for neighbors. Wish for goodness, and do so with irrational generosity.

To aspire is to reach from the depths of memory, as well as against its tidal currents. The reach requires strength, as well as ability to distinguish matters of past, future, and present. When hopes are hindered by leaning back upon past events and notions, it becomes too easy to become entangled by incomplete histories. Past unsolved matters remain too close to the forefronts of thoughts. When wishes fixate exclusively upon the future, it is a revolving meander into air-wrought castles that neglects today. But the present, inadequate as it may be, does provide crossroads for memory conduits and future prospects. Temporal links such as intersections and highway ramps are inherently transitional and liminal. These are not dwelling places. Temporary passes permit for the collecting of thoughts. Incongruence can be rerouted from embittering to emboldening, as discontent fuels the reach forward. And in that sense of direction there must be a grounding in the immediate, a tending of rooted plants of this day. Progress, as it presently appears to me, indicates a composting of past to fuel future efforts. The ongoing written record continues in its role as creative witness, and as my evolving cartographic documentation. Fulfillment remains to be written. Or perhaps it is slowly forming, and cannot be seen in this present perspective. Nevertheless, with instruments and pages at the ready, the pilgrim scribe attends.

translucence