lenten lands

“By the waters of Babylon,
there we sat down and wept,
when we remembered Zion...
How shall we sing the Lord’s song
in a foreign land?”

~ Psalm 137


indefinite lent

As with any season of commemoration, Lent is equal parts remembrance and lived practice which points ahead. Both aspects, as they may be internalized, envelop our own references. For example, an observer of this season, which by definition concludes on Easter may be compelled to inhabit the time of year, may be compelled to inhabit the time of year and match their daily lives’ paces with the forty days whose start is Ash Wednesday. Speaking from my continuum, last year during Lent my landlords of many years notified all of us in the building to be ready to leave due to an impending sale. It’s been a protracted season of purgation and penitence ever since. In Lenten fashion, the season is one of mournful anticipation and persistent reach. Unable to find a sliver of mercy in my own hometown through four months of nonstop, full-bore searching and personal campaigning, the desperation move I had to make was to a cramped, remote, and oppressively loud hovel. Neither peace, nor comfort, nor space to unpack. Life by the Babylonian waters now slogs through its eighth month. Alongside the Psalmist, how do I sing the Lord’s song in an unwelcoming place? Applying the self-talk I wrote about earlier this year, there is a lifeline in my insisting that the current and painful exile is finite. This is transitional and something has got to give, considering all this unwavering effort. Yet at the same time, I’m careful not to presume to be owed anything. My intention is to press on.

spring takes shape

“Hell is the place of unsatisfied cravings,” Warren Weirsbe astutely observed in one of his broadcasts. I am intimately aware of this, vigilantly navigating a wilderness replete with roadblocks. En route to crosstown errands and to work, it is impossible not to notice the juxtaposition of elite waterfront construction and desperate homelessness along sidewalks and highway ramps. Both extremes of the housing scale are in vividly plain sight. The work I do requires extemporaneously helping the public, joining together learning and people; that means maintaining grounded and positive perspectives. And to be sure, genuineness and compassion must go together. After all, I must practice what I preach, implementing this for myself, too. Daylight extends, and I’m better able to run away from the invasive and shellshocking racket from immediately above those oppressively low ceilings. The best way out I can imagine is by perseverance, physically and spiritually, despite not having results in view. The present imperative is to hoist my spirits into spring. Last weekend, while Le Cirque des Éléphants upstairs was at full blast, with chair and journal out on the sidewalk, my exasperated stare probed the skies. Then I noticed sparrows collecting twigs, flying off with them, up toward their burgeoning abodes. Creatures such as these- including humans- have yearning instincts aimed toward survival. I’m reading the signs and taking notes.

expectations and exodus season

There is an Eastertide because there is a Passover season. Few really understand this. The chronology of purging and displacement must give way to resurrection and new promise, biblically and personally. Perhaps your own penitential season has also run off the calendar; you’re far from alone. Exodus is a search and an offer away. There’s nothing passive about it, to be sure. Easier said than done. How near I am to significant discovery cannot be forecasted. But while all my efforts, strength, soul, and savvy are pointed toward tangible improvements, I’m toiling away and keeping watch. At work, tenuous and temporary as it’s always felt, my industrious engagement unquestionably continues, as well as refining my innovations. During this pandemic era, many workers have had to compromise dreams, possessions- even homes and jobs. At times it takes twisting both arms to try counting blessings. An effective distraction (and a useful one, too) has been to help others succeed at their projects. A praying person intercedes for those in need. Turning within is necessary, but there are dangers: there are haunting reams of denied dreams, rejected applications, and elusive housing opportunities. At least I know enough to persevere in forward directions and dare to expect improvement. Every day, heaven help me. Too many evenings, after long workdays, returning to the compartment sends me back outside again to escape the building’s noise. Lengthened daylight provides expansive visibility, and the higher temperatures allow me to perch in the open air for longer periods of time. Pedestrians are more apt to stop and chat. By being seen, a friendly cat- who happens to be my favorite neighbor- can easily find me and ask for treats. Albeit on a shoestring, how about being hopeful just for its own sake? This is also the season of Divine Mercy.

pursuits

“Naturally, we desire knowledge, happiness, and peace;
knowledge, since we see our thoughts curiously investigating
the sources of things: happiness, since each person
and indeed each animal acts with a view to procuring good
or avoiding evil: peace since the pursuit of knowledge
or that of happiness are not followed simply for
the sake of the pursuit but in order that the desire
in which it is born may be appeased by calm and repose.”

~ Etienne Gilson, The Philosophy of Saint Bonaventure, p.87


1

During difficult winter months, more energy than usual is needed for the basics. Getting from place to place is impaired by weather conditions, and overcoming such variables requires added time for car excavation, window-scraping, and idling the engine. Indeed, all symbolic to this writer. Trying to find hope amidst instability and unease tests all systems. It’s been taking a real stretch of the imagination to stay creative, ambitious, and sharp. There’s plenty to dull the senses and wits, in this present situation. Often, while I’m defrosting my windshield, I stare beyond treelines and rooftops- much as my aspirations set sights beyond the bland anguish of this winter in the East End. Where are the sources of cheer? Certainly not in the news. As much as I want to know the currents, I’ll wade in just enough, avoiding the misery of immersion. Without more than a pertinent acknowledgment, as I want to focus these words upon pursuits that raise my sense of vision, I’ll mention how my housing displacement (and continuing search for a place to live) prompts me to monitor economic news. Well, upon the ground of living in a perpetually depressed and intensely stratified region, the term recession is hardly distant; it’s been here a painfully long time. Atop years of toiling and producing in educational nonprofits, last year shoved me to this present brink. When articles ask readers to compare now with 12 months ago, I needn’t look far to recall living in 40% more space at 30% less rent in a beautiful place that was in a better neighborhood. Alas, it was sold and everyone had to leave. I know to avoid dwelling upon this much further, as trauma runs its course. This type of thing has been happening all over this city. I’m daring for something even better, while as yet unaware of its location.


2

Survival is more than necessary in order to settle here-and-now responsibilities; it’s also the way to steer toward better horizons. Having to keep on working and contending with expenses, while making an emergency relocation, served to maintain focus. Fear, however, does little to nurture creative energy. Threatening, litigious language abounds- reminding me of how meanness can trickle all the way down to simple transactions and what could otherwise be good-faith agreements. Once more, it is vital to keep finding ways to be motivated by a vision of goodness, over and above the baser goading by impersonal threat. Some of us, even now, continue in our idealism. My previous landlord, may he rest in peace, was a dentist whose office was below my apartment. He was born in that building and my predecessor in “apartment 2" was his mother. When he handed the keys to my twenty year old self, he said to me: “We have one rule in this building; it’s the Golden Rule. You know what that is, right?” I quoted it to him, “Do unto others as you’d have them do unto you,” to which he responded, “that’s right, you know it,” patting my shoulder. That’s all that was needed, and in so many ways it’s the most essential of ethical rules.

A less-ancient saying goes as follows: “Everything is a teachable moment, if we’re willing to be taught.” Though it’s been a strain, dear readers, I’ve been wrenching myself through daily uncertainties, discomfort, and desolation at all hands to learn what I can in this. Revealing how relative these things can be, several months ago during a mid-workday cancellation my director told me I could go home any time I wanted. I replied that I preferred being at work. “The Compartment” is no home to me, and I described that to him. We had a good and relaxed conversation in the empty hallway, and I gratefully kept on working. Better things are surely ahead, and each day is a day closer. Even my mustard seed’s worth of faith is enough to convince me of that. Keep the pursuits in mind. I’m in this life to create, to inspire, to foster the Golden Rule. And that’s just for starters, just like persevering in my work and sanctifying each task and interaction.


3

As severely as the city of Portland has hollowed itself with its gentrification, I still manage to bump into friends on the streets. “Whatcha reading?” a fellow West End refugee asked, stopping to greet me at my spartan bus stop. Closing my book, I held it up, and my friend said “Philosophy. That’s heavy.” I defended my vice by saying, “Saint Bonaventure; he’s keeping me from jumping off the bridge.” There must be pursuits to raise sights and spirits. Creative projects are just about impossible in cramped and oppressive living quarters, not to mention the daily and nightly stomping and sound system racket penetrating ceilings and walls. But... during my coffee break in the middle of my 8-hour workdays I can scribble a few notes, and late at night when the stampeding herds cease I can steal a few more moments to write and read more philosophy. I’ve invested in a strange “white-noise” machine that has a setting that imitates the sounds of rainstorms. And this returns me to those windchilled bus stops. Just for now, I persist in my insistence. On better days, the wincing and cringing become pointers to remind me of the progress of time. This is surely transitional. I’m wagering my life on it, and my philosopher saints will ride shotgun with me.

Such pursuits as the arts and philosophical studies may appear as goals, but these are indeed means. Bonaventure’s responses to the Sentences of Peter Lombard include the observation that we will not find our fulfilling achievements in the finite. “Our desire tends beyond each finite goodness toward and beyond another finite goodness.” In his enduring Itinerarium, Bonaventure wrote, “To follow the way of the soul towards God means to strive with all one’s strength to live a human life as close as possible to that of the blessed in Heaven.” Reflecting upon Bonaventure, Etienne Gilson wrote of the itinerary’s road as illuminative, and the pilgrimage is adhered to by love of the destination. A brilliant member of my staff whom I mourned last year liked to say, the saints are always teaching us. And I like quoting how she used to tell me this, Elaine surely being among those saints. Submerged in an undefined and intensely anxious time of instability and discomfort, such means as writing, the study and teaching of philosophy, spiritual devotions, and productivity on the job serve to maintain my sanity. I meant what I’d said to my friend at the bus stop. The itinerary trims the undivided highway margin between humiliation and humility. The latter is necessary for the exploration of philosophical truths, admitting that reason alone cannot achieve its object unaided, submitting to the Light which irradiates and moves the conscience.

accidental and transitory

“At the very moment when everything seems to be collapsing
before our eyes, we realize that quite the opposite is true,
‘because you, Lord are my strength.’
If God is dwelling in your soul, everything else,
no matter how important it may seem,
is accidental and transitory,
whereas we, in God, stand permanent and firm.”

~ Josemaría Escrivá, Friends of God, 92

1

Until at least this past decade- with refinements in wireless communications- those who appeared to talk to themselves were generally regarded with suspicion. Urban streets being arenas of assessment, stereotypic self-talkers tended to be written off as rumpled shufflers conversing with the air. Now, stereotypic bluetoothers tend to obliviously stride around, conversing with the air- except for the occasional crackling voice in response. For an observing pedestrian, I’ve gotten used to seeing individuals sauntering around to their own speaking voices. Negatively, the loud talkers in public spaces are intrusive. Positively, I get a great excuse to keep on talking to myself as I might while driving or working. Journaling gives me space to preserve ideas and experiences, as well as making sense of observations and ideas in writing. Speaking to my thoughts while in transit or at work also helps me distill observations and decisions. Thematically, my self-talk and most of my journaling -and photography- are parallel strands along the same streams of absorption, reflection, and creativity. These are extensions of consciousness. But like expression and the life of thought, self-talk wields enough influence to determine how we operate within as well as outwardly. Working alone as a self-propelled and consistently accountable one-person department for 36 months and counting, I’ve been my own voice of assurance. That’s a formidable discipline for me, unceasingly working through the depths of pandemic, personal loss, desolation, and gentrifying displacement, while rarely able to dispel my longrunning streams of verbal self-condemnation. Indeed, surviving present hardships only becomes more difficult amidst harsh self-criticism.


2

Small devotional booklets I've made which also hold my transit pass.

Gesturing with thumb and pointer finger about an eighth-inch apart, I hear myself exclaim, “I’ve got this much margin for error.” Unreasonable as it may sound, there are deepseated reasons beneath this, with a lengthy catalogue of failures, missed opportunities, and comparisons. And yet the hard-driven efforts and persistent hopes continue. Self-talk clashes against the challenge of faith. The equation of oppressive conditions at all hands has forced a necessary straightening out in the form of “Let’s get through this,” and “We’ll get there.” (Oddly enough, I naturally default to the plural- but only interiorly. It reminds me of King David asking his own soul why it was downcast.) In recent months while standing at city bus stops in subzero cold as part of my daily commute, I’ve been reading the wise homilies of Josemariá Escrivá. His essays join my special category of books that seem to have been written for me. I think every reader has their own equivalent bibliography.

A captivating reading, like going out photographing, really gets me out of my own way. Escrivá’s words are notably welcoming. Between the lines of his theological reflections are plenty of his personal anecdotes about his poverty during the Spanish Civil War, and especially his experiences as a university chaplain. As it was for college students in midcentury Spain, present-day individuals struggle with existential angst. It is dangerously easy to believe that what we see is all there is, and that each setback is an unrecoverable blow. But Escrivá asked his listeners and readers to question the perspective that considers denied opportunities to be earth-shattering and perilous. Such things, as he said, should be viewed as “accidental and transitory,” which is to say incidental and temporal. He emphasized keeping in mind an all-essential thirst for the eternal, for the Living God. Escrivá wrote in his essay called Humility, “Why do we become dejected? It is because life on earth does not go the way we had hoped, or because obstacles arise which prevent us from satisfying our personal ambitions.” Of course this speaks to my ill-fitting and uneasy predicament. “Don’t be frightened; don’t fear any harm,” he insisted, “even though the circumstances in which you work are terrible, worse even than those of Daniel in the pit with all those ferocious beasts. God’s hand is as powerful as ever and, if necessary God will work miracles. Be faithful!” Sanctifying the everyday is a theme that manifests throughout his writing.


3

I wonder how many of us, when we graduate from school- brimming with catharsis and ambition- say, “my life’s goal is to be humble and lowly.” Who does this? Not me. Academic and professional work are pointed toward achievement, success, and prominence. As many of us commendably aim high, many of us are frustratingly brought low. The former is in our nature, the latter makes us chafe. And the rub is in the transcendence of setbacks; not once or twice, but persistently countless times. Indeed, it is humbling to consider standing straight in defeat as a measure of success. With my philosophy students, we regularly take up topics in axiology. In one of our Socratic forums my question to the class about the definition of value became a discussion of how we determine value. It was a great discussion, and a parallel thread about the widespread societal concern called success led to how each person defined stability. Engaging in philosophy, we balanced such concepts as implied in material and moral ideas. As we step back to see the fluidity of the present as incidental and temporal, borrowing from Escrivá, an antidote for dramatic devastation is found in the sanctification of understated tasks.

If we regard the present as provisional, rather than as helplessly irreparable, we can freely admit that everything is subject to improvement. That ubiquitous self-talk (for those among us who care to listen to their own thoughts) is also worth improving. Proofreading the inner script is a form of healthful detachment, essentially an untethering from living as though momentary deficiency is some kind of life sentence. Even if momentary amounts to years, and even if the years are saturated with rejections. Resilience has an upturned chin, an affirmative step, and conscientious manners. Things won’t always be like this, I tell myself, even at this late stage of the game. The pearl of great price is the open door in the wilderness labyrinth of barricaded passages. It is imperative to trust enough to hold with insistent certitude that supplications are not spoken into an unattended void. Prayers are surely not self-talk; whether or not they are granted does not mean they are not heard. Grace must be met with courage, and trials must not have the last word. I’m holding to this, as I navigate this throwaway here-today-forgotten-tomorrow culture. It’s easy to believe the immediate is everything. But it really isn’t, and such tempting mirages must be bypassed and resisted at all turns. There is much for me to learn these days about the fine differences between humility and humiliation. Fulfilling the daily obligations, under miserable living conditions, it consoles me to confidently keep its very temporariness in mind and to interpolate dashes of creativity when possible. And continually telling myself to keep faith, look upwards, and never cease searching for better conditions. No doubt, I daily join my praying voice with all who struggle with housing and employment. Fortitudo et spes.

repairs

Meno: What do you mean by saying that we do not learn,
and that what we call learning is only a process of recollection?
Can you teach me how this is?
Socrates: I told you Meno, just now, that you were a rogue;
and now you ask whether I can teach you,
when I am saying that there is no teaching, but only recollection.

~ Plato, Meno.

Going by the numbers on what is commonly called the Western calendar, here comes a new year to be seized upon. I began journaling in 1994, albeit sporadically, and then consistently beginning in 1999. Even back then, I’d reserve an evening leading up to New Years Eve for a “year in review” journal entry. These are great to read back over, and I highly recommend this for those who write their perspectives. As 2000 approached, I wrote a “decade in review,” and have had occasion to do this twice since. Such practices are not meant to handwring and rehash, but I naturally took to preserving reflective summations of time spans, such as years, or weeks at work, or eras at schools and jobs, or lengthy travels. Having taught writing, I’ve created years of lesson plans built around journaling prompts, and encourage writers to make up their own so they can keep going. My favorite prompt materialized as I’d write in an Exchange Street café now long gone: I heard myself say... Coffeehouses, prior to the pandemic, were great places for lively conversations and for reflective writing. When I’d shift from some animated discourse to assembling written thoughts, something always lingered from what I’d heard and what I heard myself say. It’s a way to visit what is really in one’s thoughts. What have you heard yourself say? Living under covid-era restrictions (and now fewer cafés), configurations have changed, but eventually we can catch our spontaneous thoughts and still make note of them. Resolved to emerge from the last year’s housing misery which led to an inhospitable living situation, recently I heard myself say, “I think the only way to not crumple under all this is to see the dynamism in the open-endedness in front of me.” That’s how to start a new year.

I’ve always admired restorers of objects, structures, and historic artifacts. Gratefully, my speed-dial numbers include my typewriter repairer, fountain pen restorer, camera technician, and auto mechanic. These individuals are also esteemed friends. When any of us talk shop, we’ll often note the parallels between their crafts and mine as a bookbinder and conservator. The purposes of our respective restorative work is to keep things in fine operational order. Often when I stitch a set of signatures and add silk bands at the extremities of a spine, I’ll invoke how the owner of Cambridge Typewriter says, “it doesn’t just have to work well, it has to look good!” Tom says this while polishing the parts and cover of a Royal or an Olympia- just as Greg across town used a special chamois to make my sterling silver Bossert & Erhard fountain pen gleam as crisply as it writes. When I use decorated endpaper material to conserve a book, I’ll usually make matching bookmarks and dustjackets out of the excess. Among my workplace colleagues, the maintenance workers take as much interest in what I’m doing as the librarians. Now 24 years in professional practice, I’ve always considered preservation to be the archivist’s operatio Dei. Conscious of that, I’m sure to use the best alkaline, long-fibred materials I can find, so the books and documents will have lengthened lives of utility and integrity. Too many aspects in societies, workplaces, municipalities, and throughout the world are woefully broken. While wishing all along to practice a tangible compassion, some things I can do are to continue preserving the documental record and the written word, and try to be an encouraging ingredient to all those with whom I interact.

As startling as it is to ponder, the covid pandemic era is now at its 3-year mark. If the present time is a latter stage, its duration remains unknown. Social and mental health impacts have yet to be fully evaluated. An immediate shock for many were the sudden disruptions, quarantining requirements, and isolation during the scrambling for immunization. Surely a topic for a later essay. Sufficient for the moment, as a social being and public employee, I had to fall back upon skills cultivated during my years of solitary work. While we were all learning about “supply chains” and shortages not seen in more than a half-century, many turned their efforts toward “do it yourself” work-arounds to such practical matters as producing household cleansers, clothesmaking, and doing more cooking from scratch. A great many of us that had never “worked from home” found ourselves, by necessity, pressing our apartments and computers into service to be able to stay employed. I created a remote version of my service desk by using a corner of my dining table, also purchasing headphones and a refurbished laptop- even repairing books in my kitchen.

As a longtime bookbinder, as well as a bicycle repairer, I could simply use my various sets of tools to remedy basic mechanical and electrical problems. During the 14 months of rotating my work site, between the library and my apartment, I took to carrying tools from one location to the other. In order to stay organized, I separated the materials and flash-drives by their function, helping to always have on hand what was needed. With just about all my commerce done online, along with most everyone, I had to deal with purchases arriving after long spans of time- and damaged. For example, a small toolbox for archival marking tools, hard enough to find, broke in transit. The vendor did not have any others, and kindly reimbursed me. Really wanting to use the box, and taking a good look at it, I replaced the completely broken hinges by melting small holes in the plastic with a bookbinding awl which I heated in a candle flame, and using 2 pairs of needlenose pliers to create rings out of bent-out thick paperclips. My repair worked like a charm, and has been holding up now for 2 ½ years and counting. Like my stitched bindings, the repaired item has more strength than the original structure. I use the box daily, it’s become one of my reminders of these times.

Essential to the repair of an item is understanding how it works. Having to do much more of my living and working as a reluctant shut-in, it invariably became necessary to organize my household. (This proved helpful when the building very sadly had to be emptied of its residents last summer and all of us had to move out.) My usual studies and writing had to be done in and close to home (but at least I had a spacious place to live, at the time). Very thankfully, a supply line was opened to me via the Boston Athenaeum’s mailing and database services. I also continued teaching via Zoom, joining the many who became fluent in the medium.

Amidst these times, I reacquainted with old writing tools, and put them into working order. Pens present their own forms of mechanical puzzles. While rinsing a much-loved Reynolds fountain pen from one of my many sojourns in France, I watched the ring from the nib section roll across the kitchen sink and irretrievably down the drain. As with the toolbox mentioned earlier, a study of the pen showed me how the ring was more than decorative trim- it actually provided the needed margin of space to allow the pen to be tightly capped by pushing the nib section into the mechanism that snaps it closed. I set the disabled pen on my desk, not sure what to do with it. One night, while writing and listening to the radio (a supply-line of culture itself), I stopped to look at the poor old Reynolds and an empty yoghurt cup I used for calligraphy. That curved rim got me thinking, and it occurred to me that perhaps if I could slice the plastic just right, I’d have a replacement part. Using my narrowest bookbinding mat knife, and masking tape to hold the container in place, I sliced thin strips of the plastic. It took a few tries, as I saw how exact the fit had to be, to get the pen to snap closed with the same click as it did before with its former metal ring. After getting the precise breadth and length, I sliced an extremely thin slice of archival plastic tape for the inside of the replacement ring. It worked perfectly, and I was able to use the pen as before- albeit sporting a white yoghurt container ring.

I later found other uses for the strong, yet thin, plastic material to create spacers for altering new refills to fit older pens. Either due to cost savings, or forced obsolescence, inserts for even the higher-end ballpoints are manufacturered shorter now than before. Unlike a fountain pen, a ballpoint is essentially a “handle” that houses an inserted refill combined with its writing-point. The two components, like a textblock and book-cover, need to perfectly fit to be functional- and look right. Using very tiny pieces of the yoghurt cup plastic, I created spacers to customize and “push out” the points as needed for both the writing and the retracting. Getting the right fit was followed by adhering my homemade parts to the backs of the refills, and using a heated sewing pin to create a “breather” for the ink. Again, the repairs have held up to use, and the tools have been in the fine operational order of my preference!

Having field experts as friends makes for great conversations. As well, I can turn to their professional expertise, supporting their enterprises, too. As it became possible to visit with neighbor and longtime friend Pat Daunis at her shop, I brought her my Reynolds pen, and asked about creating a permanent part to replace what I had made. She liked what I’d created, and used it as a reference point. We had a great visit, talking about the crafts of lettering and calligraphy- and I hired her shop to fashion a new pen ring. Daunis jewelry is among the very best and most highly-regarded that is made in Maine. Pat made the new and precise pen ring out of brass. This will surely last for the life of the pen- and I’ll make certain to rinse it over a tray, with the sink drain-stopper in place!

Last week, I visited with another old friend whom I respect very much, and that’s Andy the owner of Classic Camera & Repair of Maine. I’m continuing to work full-time through these extremely difficult times. The slivers of personal time I’m able to find are for reflective writing and photography. I made sure to keep my faithful Rolleiflex unpacked, and have been making new images during snowstorms again. Andy helped me by testing the camera’s shutter, and that occasioned a heartening visit.

Repairs and restoration are expressions of healing. I think of this when I bring books back to life, as well as when I see how fellow craftspeople and mechanics perform their own renditions of this. Of course, the treasures made for written and photo arts are meant to be used en route to new creative ventures. The damage done by the displacement last year, like collateral social ramifications of this pandemic, have yet to be assessed or remedied. I won’t know the extent of this current nightmare, until landing in a peaceful and comfortable living space- away from stomping, blaring, odors, and congested confinement.

Finally and for the moment, I recently stepped away from the fray for the first occasion in a year, with a week in Boston. Soul repair takes much more time than it does to calibrate an instrument or to fabricate components. And iron-willed patience. Between the always-welcoming environment at Beacon Hill Friends House, and inspirational studies at the Boston Athenaeum, I especially savoured the sweet familiarity of beloved communities. Not only could I hear myself thinking, but I sensed myself breathing, being in the presence of many kindred spirits, and in the absence of overhead bombast. Indeed, the idea is to bask amidst the moment, though admittedly it became a distraction to want to load up on peaceful civility for the road ahead. To say the least, I took many notes, aperch in some beautiful places.

unseen visible

“Blessed is that nothingness,
and blessed the secret depths of the heart
that possess everything. It desires to have nothing for itself,
casting away all cares so that it may burn more brightly
with compassion.
Live in faith and hope even though you are in darkness,
for in this darkness God enfolds the soul.”

~ San Juan de la Cruz, Letters XV, XX


1

It has now been four months since my displacement from the sold apartment building within which I had my home of many years. Though each day slogs across quagmires of unease, the work weeks capably string together larger parcels of time. Responsibilities along with demands connected to semblances of normal life force an equilibrium to meet each day. Adaptation, in this case, does not mean enjoyment. If anything, the whiplash effect of diminished conditions has sharpened my senses in pursuit of better living space- of a real home. Perceptions have also sharpened in the direction of transcendence. With merely my thoughts to shelter, while freezing beneath the elements at bus stops, I often gaze skyward. The expanse of distance strikes a contrast against the oppressive apartment which is transitional at best. I also read during my waiting, choosing anthologies portable enough for the transitory. So as not to endanger my rations of inspirational words, I’ve cultivated a knack for page-turning with winter gloves. Routines, in their varied forms, are necessary for many of us to accomplish things in sequential order, such as being prepared for the day’s demands. But memory devices must last only as long as they’re needed, until improvements change relevance. Recently while gazing up at the night sky, from the pavement at the corner of Congress Street and Exchange Street, I considered how we all adapt to survive. After some time and trial, the temporal status quo begins masquerading as a foundation; it’s a temptation for which I refuse to fall. All that I found constricting and objectionable four months ago is no less now. The most solid foundation during a provisional situation is that of the spirit, standing unadorned on frozen streetcorners. The Author and Perfecter of my faith will lead me to better and healthful conditions. When housing and daily life humiliate, the fires of ambition can only burn hotter.


2

Beneath the temptation of acquiescence to an objectionable status quo is the notion that efforts at improvement are worthless and in vain. They are not, no matter how high the defeats stack up. Good and intelligent efforts must amount to positive results. What does keep me guessing is whether intensity and thoroughness meet their reciprocal forms of fruition. I’ve had to painfully learn that hard work is far from the recipe for success I’d been led to believe. Following that was being told that “working smart” needed to go with “working hard.” Granted, efficiency is a cultivated craft, and true to self I’ve mastered every methodology I’ve taken on. Though my results have amounted to numerous completed projects, what might be tangibly considered success remains elusive. Also dauntingly elusive is assurance. By this, I refer to a strongly assuring sense of validation that I’m on the right track. Where is the open door? Where is the welcoming place? Where and when may I unpack boxes that have been sealed since last spring? Liberation from the oppressive little hovel and the overhead circus cannot happen soon enough. Things are not looking good, although faith insists there will be open doors and a good future. I’m putting in my honest eight hours every weekday and I’m paying all my bills. The Advent season is about preparing the way, awaiting with expectant hope for the road to finally crest. Exhaustion, frequently made into a badge of accomplishment and survival, is more than anything a manifestation of overwork. Perhaps my efforts needn’t be overdone, and maybe success can happen on less-severe levels of outpouring. It is my nature to strive to make the best impression in all situations, but contemplative wisdom asserts how the most communicative language is silent affection.


3

With Saint Bonaventure, I’ll cultivate reason upon the foundation of belief. At the same time, I’ll echo the unabashed Psalmist whose very depths called to the deeps of everlasting. A withdrawal of the Consoler’s presence challenges that aforementioned stabilizing foundation. As any of the best of us, the anguished Psalmist incredulously cries, “why am I forgotten?” He needs an assuring spring of water for the desert of his life. Nicknamed the weeping prophet, Jeremiah persevered and cultivated through deprivation and even exile. But he held against desolation, clutching the message, “if you seek Me wholeheartedly, I will be found by you.” The imperative in this testing is to believe without seeing. In this case, there are no reciprocal proportions: in order to see, there must be complete belief.

But divine mercy is invisible and cannot be grasped. And the more persistently out-of-view, the more critical it is to press forward. This is neither passive, nor for the weak-hearted, because visualizing the unseen requires reveling in the lacking. Grace and mercy may yet be present to us, without our knowing. Mysteriously, these things are absent right up until the moment of discovery, yet we are called before we can know to reach. I’m reminded of instances during which I’m looking for an object I had set down moments before, such as on my workbench while binding books. A frequent culprit is a transparent measuring triangle. In its pursuit, I’ll say, “it’s in front of me, but I can’t see it.” My eyes scan the work surface and my hands palm the tabletop, while trying to recall when I last saw it. Eventually, I find these kinds of objects, at times in exasperation. Too often, the certain is not apparent.


4

Reveling while lacking is followed by yet another notch for the raised bar, and that’s an honest gratitude amidst hardships. Thankfulness while wishing for leisure, favor, and fortune. The present moment requires my meditation upon divine mercy. These alienating trials of unknown duration demand the confidence Saint Augustine had when he said:

“All my hope lies solely in Your great mercy. Solely in that, Lord. On Your mercy rests all my hope. Not my merits, but on Your mercy.”

My ancient namesake not only embraced an unseen promise, Abraham had only perceptive faith to sustain and light his way to the end of his complex life: “By faith he dwelt in the land of promise as in a foreign country, dwelling in tents...” His very, very distant descendant in Sephardic Spain, San Juan de la Cruz, taught and wrote about embracing the nothingness that holds everything. Sounding like our common ancestor, Fray Juan’s The Ascent of Mount Carmel includes the enjoinder, “hope in detachment and emptiness. The good that you desire will find you before too long.” He went so far as to discipline his temperament to renounce seeking consolations. Such depletion becomes a clear slate- a lens cleaner for the heavenward gaze. Frozen and overcast night skies conceal brightness yet to be revealed. Grace is at hand, without seeing or otherwise sensing its imminence.

This year has been an extremely difficult year which followed one of loss and sadness. I can merely manage as possible, within very tight limitations. While flailing to rectify a regrettable relocation by scouring for something better, admittedly the biggest mistakes are the ones not learned from. The recent move was surely under duress with few choices, but it stands out as a terrible mistake. Needless to say, the painful learning experience continues, and I know much more about what to really avoid. Yet another temptation is that of setting up shop in the wheelrutted inventories of my failings. An old reflex of mine is to turn away from distasteful things- things that are gaudy, unappealing, cruel, dissonant, and unwelcoming. I’ve always turned my camera toward eloquent simplicity and compelling motifs that inspire. That newer reflex I’ve noticed, looking to skies and horizons, counteracting my confinements, is the pull of contemplating the transcendent. This has been my closest way of looking toward home and being enfolded by hope.

radio silence

“And after the earthquake a fire; but the Lord was not in the fire:
and after the fire, a still small voice.
And it was so, when Elijah heard it,
that he wrapped his face in his mantle,
and went out, and stood in the entrance of the cave.
And, behold, there came a voice unto him, and said,
What doest thou here, Elijah?”

~ 1st Kings 19:11-13

Refuge, these days, has become entirely a state of mind. The most critical aspect resulting from the loss of my housing is the absence of physical sanctuary. Chased from our respective homes in the recently-sold apartment building, my neighbors and I suddenly had to find places to live. Some moved far away, most to various parts of this region, but all reluctantly. With employment in mind, precarious as that is, I’ve managed to stay in the city, yet at a heavy price and in an inhospitable place. Along with many of my fellow Maine workers, I’m an offer or a loss away from leaving the state. The grim reaper’s name is Gentrification, nipping at the heels of most of us, regardless of how industrious and loyal we’ve been. For the unwealthy, things are closing in. Looking around my tiny, temporary quarters, filled with boxed belongings, the closing-in is blatant and suffocating. There remains a great need for refuge, above the din of discomfort and anxiety- all the more when assurance continues to be out of range.

Silence, like music, is received and internalized uniquely by each individual. There is a silence beneath surfaces of desolation, of deprivation. There are also qualitative, nourishing silences which soothe the soul. The latter is obviously the sort of quiet that is welcomed and desired. I cherished this long before it became elusive- as it is now in the temporary space. Healthful quiet is a treasure; if you have this in your life, count it as a major blessing. Throughout the recent months, my search for a sense of peace has meant going outdoors to breathe and stretch- often closing my eyes and awaiting those measures of grace. I’ve noticed myself doing this at bus stops, as well as during the late hours after the stomping, thrashing, and television racket overhead finally gives out for the night. It’s a daily staggering for peace, as though on a frenetic and exitless highway. When my friends tell me how “this too shall pass,” my response is “when?” The search continues, to be sure, notwithstanding how consolation, peaceful living space, good job ops, and spare money are all equally scarce.

The constant and compulsive clatter reminds me that many people are afraid of silence. And just as many are unaware of the existence of others in their midst. Aspiring to be compassionate, it is essential to be forgiving of the inconsiderate. After all, somebody needs to be aware of the unaware. As this life is in preparation for eternity, here is the time and place to refine the ability to forbear. But as a flawed mortal who finds forbearance unbearable, I try distracting with noise-canceling headphones (which I can hear through), listening to music, running a household fan, and turning to a lifelong friend: radio. As with any means or instrument, it is for each listener to discern and discover that which suits. Due to all the noise in the building, I’m applying a dulcet layer of classical music to try masking the din of disturbance. My less passive form of listening happens when I seek out noteworthy programs and lectures. If the bulls-in-their-china-closet are too disruptive, especially when they rattle the walls, I’ll use earphones. Amidst the chaos, I’ve taken many inspiring notes from timely broadcasts. With all of this mentioned, when I sense a late night hour when the building falls silent, I’ve noticed how I turn the radio off- just to savour the silence. My shoulders and brow noticeably settle back. It’s the good silence.

The expression, radio silence, has migrated from its technical origin to popular parlance. A command to “go radio silent,” generally meant stopping any transmission due to security concerns about signal interception. This was also employed so that a weak distress signal might be detected. Whatever the case, radio silence is when no broadcast signal is transmitting. In our common discourse, one can remove themselves from interactions, or withhold specific information. If there is a receiving end awaiting a message, there is no signal- just air- and the listener is at a loss for knowledge. Radio silence then becomes a not-knowing. Turning up the sound only reveals static. One might as well switch off the radio, although doing so eliminates the possibility of picking up a signal later. Waiting and potential are intertwined concepts. Non-broadcast air space and static often follow housing and employment applications, often known as ghosting. Inquirers disclose personal information and credentials, and anticipate responses that never arrive. The passage of time accompanies the radio silence. Companies and landlords never worry about offending anyone; they seem to have all they need.

The luxury of enacting a broadcast silence of my own is an tempting idea, especially as I embark upon my 33rd straight month of being a one-man department at the pared-down workplace. It’s been an even longer time since it’s been possible to make the kind of monastic sojourn that I’d take twice a year. The pandemic era has comprised a marathon of work and workarounds for lots of us, but I’m very thankful to be working and managing my expenses. I’m always aware of those who are much worse off. Yet even with a sense of broader context in mind, the prospect of a healthful pause would be an oasis somewhere along the unknown way. This is among the topics of pondering while awaiting late buses in frigid, pelting weather. If only all the inflictions ceased, perhaps just long enough to not have to try being a perfect applicant, or with providential buffer space that is free from brutish situations. Or if things cannot stop, maybe they can noiselessly coast along like those fancy electric cars I’m seeing in the East End. The present experience emphasizes how contemplation needs the respite of quiet, or at least the ability to think above the din. Without the resources to create a large landscape, I can make small snapshots. Until substantial traveling becomes possible, there can be modest spans of reflection. Writing outdoors these days happens in colder weather, but I still make sure to intermittently set the pencil down and look skyward. If anything, doing this helps my perspective. Being attentively aperch is a shorthand regathering. Assiduousness is among my favorite words: rooted in the Latin assidere, it is to sit down by one’s attentive initiatives. Hardly the vacuum of radio silence.

The purgative passage of the soul into darkest night comes to mind in radio silence. There is a receiver that is scanning, attempting to tune for an elusive transmission. Indexing across all available bands, adjusting antennae and power supplies, no signal can be pulled in. The crepuscular radio silence of the spirit lends itself into questioning whether there is a signal at all. Temptation in the desert. Faith says there is a frequency, despite my flailing attempts. Atmospheric conditions can change to something more favorable, so it is critical to keep tuning and hold course. But the when is exasperatingly unknown. Too much time has been wasted. Waiting is anguishing; it is neither passive nor tranquil. A thread running through these times is surely the learning and testing of confident poise. Struggle is a necessary given. We are conditioned to reserve gratitude exclusively for times of success and goodness. The challenge is to maintain that vital resonant circuit in desolation, when there are no soothing broadcasts or music. Gratitude in the radio silence. As well, being a discerning listener means not adding any obstructions of my own.