Of Scuds and Sarin

Say what, Mr. President? We're going to do what? Without whose approval? Our decisions are based on how much evidence? Blame it on my pietist background, or my bleeding heart, Peace Corps serving, hippie mentality, or just on a higher sense of order, but I am wondering what in the world our executive leadership is thinking when they threaten to take unilateral action against a Middle-Eastern nation with controvertible evidence of wrongdoing. Even our current president, who has, for many of us, been a symbol of deference and reason, stands in total contradiction to his rhetoric during the early days of the Iraqi conflict. I'm disappointed, and I hope others are, when they hear our leaders say, "We have evidence, some of which we can share with the public, which strongly suggests wrongdoing." Be wary, very wary of this talk, especially when it hearkens back so ominously to the trillion dollar incursion that we are still cleaning up from, a recent conflict that, it can be compellingly argued, created more destruction than it helped to avoid. If we cannot learn from Vietnam, or use the War Powers Act as a tool to avoid the same mistakes, then what is this great civilization able to learn from? If we cannot wait to get confirmation from inspectors, or until other nations join ranks to say that strikes are necessary, what collective self restraint do we have? When other nations choose to wait for evidence of chemical weapons and just where they came from, and the United States' leaders choose to move forward, we are demonstrating collective arrogance and disdain for the judgement of all of our 'allies' throughout the international community. I don't get mad much, because I just don't see the point, but this kind of senselessness from politicians really angers me. Don't tell me about your civil order or how we should appeal to higher angels when you will take life and order so lightly as to jump into another conflict. Chemical weapons and despots should not exist, but neither should African genocide or abject poverty, but somehow the dull ache of hunger and systemic hate isn't as sexy as unilaterally blasting away a possible occurence of chemical warfare.

Poets and Busboys

Last Sunday, I went with a good friend to Poets and Busboys in Northwest D.C. and had a great time listening to incredibly talented, passionate people speak their truths.  One by one, poets and writers rose, walked to a dimly lit stage, and spoke in front of a crowd of black and white and Hispanic and Asian and young and old and men and women, about 75, and spilled unbridled emotion.  There was joy and sadness and love and hate.  A major theme, though, was anger.  Anger at government, at 'white' society, the 'men' that have kept everyone down, all of those people who work within 'the system,' and support the 'status quo.'  Honestly, I found it hard to take.  If the anger had been based upon something other than anti-establishment angst at humankind, it would have hit home, and I could have understood more where it all was coming from, but most of the hard words came out of a general malcontent, irritable, affect.  In the past days, I have seen over and over coverage of the 23-year-old man who was shot because he was white and the aggressors were bored.

High profile hate crimes towards the historical majority take place frequently, and it remains taboo in our society to question whether our emphasis on equality and openness for one segment of the population has tipped the scales so far that we have become blind to true equality, blind to an entitled racism that persists in a historical minority.  As we celebrate the incredible leap forward that the march on Washington afforded our civilization 50 years ago, I hope that all of us can think about peace for all, the end of prejudice and racism for all, and begin to think about the present and future, instead of always feeling angry or apologetic for the past.  Poverty continues, as well as racism, bigotry, and sexism.  I'm sure many people will disagree with my simplification of the situation, but I think it is like any other relationship we have in life.  Until we can forget the past, or forgive for the past, for betrayal, or for harsh words,  the violence or hatred or bigotry that scarred us, we cannot get to a new place.  It's true also for 'macro' race and gender relations in America.  We have to get to a place where we can separate the past from the present.  Many would say that we aren't there yet, but we have to pick a point when we say 'the future starts now, horrible things have happened, but this is now, and that was then.'

Slipping Tires

One summer evening, a college friend and I decided to drive his rear-wheel drive Chevy truck out to the Hone Quarry reservoir and try our luck at the trout that were purported to be in the deep waters at its south-west end, the area shaded by still extant Eastern Hemlocks.  The deep waters were crowded with tree trunks and stumps that had fallen off barren, arid slopes at the foot of a steep skid littered with shale of the Alleghany Plateau.  We backed the little truck down close to the water and then waded with rods and tackle as far as we could into the cool water until we were up to our bellys and the gravelly bottom gave way to slushy sandy loam that had collected on the lake bottom in the years since Civilian Conservation Corps men had impounded the area.  A mild evening gave way to a cool night, and as stars started to shine in a darkening sky, we headed back to the little truck.

Key turned, ignition clicked, and the engine hummed but the tires spun.  We pushed and prodded, taking turns pushing for hernias, but we gave up, and decided to walk for help, a bigger truck with a stout rope was sure to be right down the dirt road that led through the campground.

On this evening, though, no one was camped or parked along the road, so we walked the long winding path out of Hone Quarry, some 3 miles to Rt. 257.  As we walked on a school night, apathetic to tests and classes, we talked of all of our hopes for the future, careers, women, sang David Allen Coe, Alabama, and all of the verses of American Pie we could remember.  We were tired and wanted to get back to Milwaukee's Best at the dorm, but, realizing that we had a long road ahead of us, we just laughed and planned and poked at what life might bring.  We would go into business, we decided.  George's Seafood with the motto "If it ain't fried, you 'been denied."  Across the road from the seafood restaurant, filling the tanks of all the fried seafood eaters, I'd erect a service station named Pete's Pitstop.  Our little utopia of all you'd ever need would be down in Southside Virginia, between Buckingham Courthouse and Richmond on Rt. 60, in the land of tobacco fields, loblolly plantations, and the best pulled pork Virginia has to offer.

My friend is a teacher now, with two beautiful little girls and we don't get to talk much, but lots of nights like that one, when we walked 6 miles to find someone to pull the Chevy a couple feet so that we could go back to life, remind me of a bond that we share, much like the bond that we all share through memories and happenstance that make life the great experience it can be.  It's as if all of our plans and work and routines just serve as backdrop to the serendipitous times that come along unexpectedly, forcing us to walk a bit farther, and think a little harder, about what could be.  Whether or not we get to the destination we set out looking for, we've seen growth and change, and, at the end of a full life, that may be all that matters.

I think we're all a little too independent and overconfident to think that life might just be leading us from coincidence to coincidence, and from sorrow to circumstance, from enchantment to epiphany.  The next day, I'm sure I had classes where I sat at a lecture and learned important ideas, but none so important as that moonlit walk with wet clothes, tired legs, and invigorated spirit.

Naturalist's Manifesto

Cars flash by,
Diesel and Gas,
Coolant and Rubber,
On Asphalt and Heat Scorched Sand,
All Pulled from Deep Bowels,
Of this Home,

Lights Flash and Flicker,
Synthetic Lightning Bugs of Defiance,
To the Turning of this Great Blue Green Ball,
Gnats and ants on our secure, seductive flotilla,
In the midst of an ancient plan,
That continues to roll and roil and revolve,

Above the mayhem of confusion,
Cumulus rolls with a fury,
The sleeping fatalistic giant,
With a wall of wet torrent,
Sheeting across a dark sky,

Our tiny egos and racing and raging and ruckus,
Reduced to slippery, invigorating coolness in an instant,
Trees cower and printed bits of our madness blow,
And the gnats turn their heads to avoid the fury,
As fierce winds breathe,
And soiled tears fall,
This power of eons rakes across the landscape as if to say,
"Remember me; time still belongs to me,"

Crevasse

Walking, crawling, scraping,

Through an ancient streambed,

The hum of water is gone,

And the drip, drip, of sustenance has dried,

Riffles have since flowed to the ocean,

And every sign of life is lost, evaporated into eternity,

All except for me. 

 

How far have I walked in this void?

And how far must I continue?

Without answer,

My legs propel me further,

Bone and cartilage with tendon and sinew,

Unrelenting, forgetting their frailty and age,

Looking for something, feeling, groping for something.

 

I sing to myself,

Reminded of my own thoughts,

And all I hear are my footsteps,

And the ringing of rivets on an old carabiner,

Plod…..plod….crink…crink.

 

The sounds of biner on cave pack persist,

To remind me of another trip,

And another streambed,

And other riffles that have since disappeared,

To the ocean,

 

Everything is gone in this dark old channel.

Everything except for me. 

Tyler Derden

I always think back to the fight club line, where Tyler Derden and the Edward Norton guy (can't remember the character's name) are on a bus, speaking of all of the misconceptions in life, and Tyler Derden says, as a beautiful model on a billboard passes, "Self improvement is masturbation."  Now, we'll forego the irony that this was said by none other than Brad Pitt, who probably had to 'improve' himself at the gym for months before the filming of the movie, and we'll skip to the existential question of whether or not there's any truth in it.  I figure, the lines that ring in my head over and over are few, and the ones that stick may have some importance.

Well, I was born in the Shenandoah Valley, where the verdant hills put forth a swell of life in the spring time, karsts bubble all around with clear spring water, and where piety, simplicity, and the conception of humility are thick as molasses on a January morning.  I think all of us who came from the culture of piety and humble acts would agree that self improvement, for lack of better words, is masturbation.  All of the chestbeating and body toning and self aggrandizement are for the birds, and the real truth of life comes from acts of charity and our protestant hard work, the same hard work that brought early church members across an ocean just to find freedom to choose their personal spirituality and work hard, believing, the rest of their days.  These weren't Carnegies or Vanderbilts or Rockefellers ruling the world and monopolizing wealth, but instead were Showalters, Stauffers, Knicely's, and Hesses, all looking for a piece of land to build on and live out their faith simply, for the rest of the time they were alotted.  Recently, while doing some work in the library of congress, I came across the census and tax records from Rockingham County in 1789.  My great grandfather 7 times over was listed there.  Daniel Stover, Dayton, 17 cows, 0 negros, 1 dwelling, 3 mares.  That was all he had, and probably all he ever expected to have.  While other founders of the nation were banking oil wells and steel, Daniel Stover was tending 17 cows.  I would gamble to say that the wealth of these two classes was inversely proportional to their eventual satisfaction in life.

I'm in the process now of retraining myself, though, to find a balance between the oil barrons and the pietists.  The maximum simplicity, although nobel, will not ever have appreciable effect upon the actions of those who will rule this tiny world, and I don't think that it is responsible to have such a vibrant hue of enlightenment, and choose not to share it with the world outside.  I choose self improvement, in health, and education, and in the joy that I try to bring to others.  The key is finding the balance.  You can't see very far if you're on one side of the fence or the other, but only when you are sitting on top, teetering between extremes and risking collapse, only then is the horizon truly clear.

Breathing

Saturday afternoon, I crammed rope, ascenders and a couple trustworthy carabiners into my old canvas bag and threw it into the back of the truck.  My caving suit was stained from the mud from the last trip, the red faded slightly to pink, and the blue darkened with fine clay.   I stuffed my old backpack with the necessary clothes and food, and set it on the backseat.  Shortly thereafter, Andy and Matt, (two good friends from work) rolled up and loaded their gear along with mine and climbed in.  Andy, with two half sleeves of colorful mystic tattoos and a snarling beard, Matt, with his intellectual circular-rimmed glasses and manicured beard, and I, with chaw and sunglasses and unshaven scruff started on our way, and the three of us unlikely comrades lit into the mountains of the Alleghany Plateau to find cave known as Breathing.  We found a quiet campsite beside the headwaters of the Calfpasture River Saturday evening and set up, with chairs, fire ring, and tent to enjoy the evening.  As the sun set on riffles and leaves gave way to evening breeze that swept through the hollow, we cast fly rods in hopes of luring fish to our plates.  Andy was fortunate, and caught two chubs and a native trout, all of which we ate around our little fire.  When that was gone and the evening gave way to night, and the dew set on litter, we sat and smoked, listening to the remnants of this year’s cicadas, eating sausage and trail mix, before retiring to the tent.

Upon waking in the morning, we tore down the campsite and left nothing but our fire ring, in hopes that someone else might enjoy this place where we dined on fresh fish and gossip.  The truck loaded again, and we set off for Breathing Cave.  After searching for a marker for a while, we came upon a small 4x4 post planted in the earth with a metal box and arrow, and knew that we had found our trail.  We parked, crunching chicory and thistle under tires, and dismounted, throwing on our rugged jeans and shoes, ready to peer inside the skull of mother nature, where the axons are trickling waterfalls and the synapses are ancient streambeds of clear water.  A two-mile hike among sinkholes and forest brought us to the mouth of the cave, and we ventured inside.  I had been before, but, as always, I reveled in the firm grasp that the cave had on me.  We squirmed through a belly passage to the first room where we took in complete darkness.  It was incredible.  For the next few hours, we looked around, navigating passages and holes and fissures and climbs the best we could.  Everyone would navigate obstacles differently, just as we all do life.  Eventually, we exited the mouth of the cave and walked back to the truck, a bit more weary than before, but more invigorated for the excitement that rushed in our veins, and the experience of a new place.  At the end of the day, we wound up a bit dirtier and with a few more pictures to show for the trip.  But we had seen and shared a great campsite, a beautiful clear night, and we all now know the cave called Breathing.

To Live

Yesterday, aimless on a breezy August day, wondering what to do, I went outside.  I was at my home place, the house where I spent countless hours growing up, looking at my reflection, learning my roots, and sprouting new fruit, and it has become the house where I go for solace on weekends.  It is a place where my mom sits and reads alone, without the comfort of my father, who is losing all of his memories in a nursing home.  As I walked outside though, I strode past my truck, the chainsaw, the kayak, and the bike, through some orchard grass and weeds to the garden.  

Messy with the spoils of unfettered loam and rain, the garden was overwhelming in its disorganization, but I grabbed a splintered handle of a shovel and began to dig potatoes, finding the dead stalks, and heaving at earth.  As I turned the first clod of soil, the smell of soil hit me, and took me back to childhood, before uncertainty of school, the toil of work, lost love and disappointment had arrived, and reminded me of what it felt like just to live, just to feel the earth under foot, smells of life asphyxiating every pore.  For a moment, my worries faded behind a wall of joy, separating me from the unnecessary worry that plagues me as I navigate my nomadic life between the city and this green valley, the place I want to call my home. 

For the past 18 months I have been working in Arlington Virginia, and living in Northern Virginia.  It is a far cry from the place where I lived just 2 years ago, and much different from the life I knew as a child while I dug potatoes in that same soil.  Although just 2 hours from the house I first knew, this place teems with a life that is foreign to me.  I don’t belong here in the middle of the city hype and discord, I know that, but what well-adjusted soul would?  Who am I to have any more disdain for this sprawling life than the Venezuelan immigrant who hangs sheetrock for minimum wage?  How much worse is my discontent than his, and what makes my ultimate happiness any more urgent?  These are the questions that I ask myself, and I am left knowing my own personal truth from yesterday, that the soil will always smell better than money, the rat race, or this ill-conceived civilization that we have created for ourselves. 

The past two years, since writing on this space last, I have grown in monumental ways, but, as with any incredible growth, that growth has given way to discouraging atrophy in others.  Now, as I begin to write again, finding happiness in all of the silly unknowns of life, I have seen that this is not my home, nor is the small town where I grew up, nor is Babatngon, or any of the other small places where I have laid my head.  My home is wherever my soul rests when it is weary, and wherever my mind finds peace.  The peace from within, as we all come to find out, is what makes our lives bearable, not the vestiges of our wealth.  That truth, though easily spoken and written, is much harder to live out. 

Life, I have found, will devour the soul if we are unable to accept it unconditionally.  Take the good with the bad, they say, and live, live, live.