Bittersweet Valentine
Good morning Tuesday;Yesterday I mused about my observation, at the McCartney show, how nostalgia, while in the actual moment to be lived, tends to impair life’s forward movement. I thought about how people were busy capturing a moment about a moment being related to the present by someone who had lived it in the past. I noticed how some persons danced and sang while a great many more persons held their mobile phones high capturing some poor quality video. And I wondered, who captured this moment better? This quickly brought Escher’s paintings to my mind: the one (below) or the two hands drawing each other.
And I wasn’t really inside the stadium at that moment. I was neither dancing nor recording. I was observing, and my mind was quiet despite the commotion around me. I was the fish in that fishbowl realizing he was in water, trying to imagine what was outside. I was looking for answers within to see myself from without. I was inside myself rather than outside with the crowd in the stadium.
Paperback Writer was the next song. This is the coda of my retirement, which a younger man would call career transition. I do not want to think about career transitions let alone admit to having one at 46 years of age. I should be driving around in a new red sports car, picking up 20-year-olds and abusing my established power at the office: enjoying a scripted mid-life crisis not walking into a wilderness. What I did for 22 years was a passion before I retired at 43. But my passion before that was writing creative stories, and I have to redevelop it, which is why I decided to keep this blog.
I used to watch people from my kitchen window on the third floor of my building as a kid. Then I would write about other people inside my stories. This was all about the time I kept a diary. I read some of that diary many years ago. I was impressed with what I had managed to convey despite a lack of polish and spelling so bad I had to sound it out. I was reading about a young boy’s adventures that were every measure as good as any story published. But I always liked to watch people and wonder what they were thinking; where they were going; whom did they know.
It is a snap to know then what I am thinking as I read some of your profiles.
But the next song, I recall it as a solo on piano, stopped my reflections. Its simple, lush soul filled with emotional depth brought tears to my eyes. I recall saying aloud: this is the best song at the concert in spite of the fact the concert was just 6 songs into the evening. And I was right. The song is new McCartney: My Valentine.
It reminded me of what I have sought from a valentine of my own ever since I, as a young man, sat at my kitchen table making the effort to articulate my own giving and receiving relationship needs list. And, as I listened to what this boy-faced old-man sang – about his confidante, his consoler, his optimistic reassurance of relief – I was moved to tears realizing I had not yet found my own incentive in the face of all the disincentives and counterfactual arguments so thoroughly distilled into a culture like a potent, 95% vodka. The tears mourned my passing of hope, and certainly the death of a marriage lasting 60, 50 or even 40 years with such a person – whether or not that marriage contributes to household tax deductions or merely a household of peace.
My next thoughts briefly concerned having children who, as I steadily age, become more likely to be my grandchildren or someone else’s children than my own. I had just finished high school when my mother turned 65. So while it is possible to be pregnant at 46, I am certain the idea of being middle-aged parents is not well thought out. It is something I push back into my mind so as not to be overwhelmed.
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In the meantime while I puzzled out this important song prioritization, I remembered to put down my cell phone, write some more and look out my window sometimes to see what others were in the process of doing.
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It is very easy to get caught up in the sweeping path of other peoples perceptions and directions, and that's ok, so long as you remember that getting back on your own track is always an option.
Escher what an original thinker he was,
and I can relate to your work ethic
I have been ruminating on dedicating a week some time to write the prologue of my novel in progress here. The story is about betrayal. So, it is just a notion of mine. Hard to have work when no one thinks you’re working. Ah, sing it to me Croce!
Its best left to the expertise of Edmond Dante !
But that's just me
The story is not about resolving the betrayal but in living with it, and it is an exploration of betrayal on a variety of levels – not all of them from moustache-twirling design or with detrimental results. It is in three acts at the moment but they run long, particularly the set up. Might ultimately be three books.
You write poetry I see on your profile.
Not to often mind. A study in the depths of deceit by betrayal, or self consent is a good topic.
As for the lineage,
You cant stop or pause the body clock, and any one who tries,
Are they not deceiving or betraying themselves in some way.
And that's a general question not an accusation
"Wish You Were Here"
So, so you think you can tell Heaven from Hell,
blue skies from pain.
Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail?
A smile from a veil?
Do you think you can tell?
And did they get you to trade your heroes for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees?
Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change?
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?
How I wish, how I wish you were here.
We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl, year after year,
Running over the same old ground.
What have we found? The same old fears.
Wish you were here.
It's interesting that we collect memories differently. I always thought that I would have the clarity I did in my youth; but as more and more is crammed into my synapses, I struggle to remember moments with clarity. Photographs have become a saving grace for me... and realising that, perhaps, my life is not about what I have already experienced... but what's to come.
Yours is a very profound statement. It resonates with me.
Memory is re-constructed every time it is pulled out. It gets added to and embellished with every use because the user has had more experiences and (one would hope) a better understanding of events that occurred in the past. There is that distance, like seeing ourselves in a dream; that is counter-intuitive. After all, these are our memories of real events! But it is also why witnesses to the same event cannot attest to seeing the same thing; and why an accused has the right to s swift trial. Memory is a tricky thing easily tinged with nostalgia looking back.
And looking forward, it is about time I get writing another blog post for tomorrow. And I will read your posts about your European holiday to get me into the mood. .