Unpredictable, at times abrasive, over enthused, emotionally explosive, with the capability, will and act of accessing myriad outlets of expression- the childlike behavior of the weather this odd august day lends itself well to the events and emotions presented to me. From the itching winds of twilight interrupting my much needed sleep, through the unbearable weight of a humid summer noon resting heavily on my heart, straight to the angry bite of a sporadic storm littered with electricity shooting shards of sharp nothing at my lifted spirit; Much, like an anxious drunk fingering the moist neck of bottle too close to completion, yearning for more yet knowing the intoxication is fleeting, demanding and disrespectful, I have at every corner of the day been blessed by words spoken, heard and imagined. The power of prose is intimidating. Daunting is the gift to think lyrically at times for its consuming presence creates confusion in the working mind! It can become a nearly impossible feat to find the time between witnessed or experienced beauty in which to cleverly organize the arsenal of words aimed at justly describing feeling. I don't know which way to go, which avenue to start explaining the immense happiness that is growing from the cockles of my soul. I have found happy, found love and worth within myself. This is a feeling I have not had or felt to this extreme ever. And I am beautiful for it. I feel it. I feel beautiful- from the inside out. I feel so radiant- so pregnant with gratitude and appreciation that it bursts from every sacred chakra within my body, even ones I did not know existed. Oh to be loving life! To being that ball of energy and light- to share that positivity with praise and generosity-To be loving love so much that whatever form it chooses to take is an instant, unforgiving, eternal, hopeful, wildly exciting feeling. And to further control and harness that love to use its awesome power constructively, responsibly, and with respect is earth shattering. I am filled with perception to the point I feel loose and overwhelmed with the unbearably simple duty to communicate the beauty and divinity that resides within everything.
To best break it down, I must start with our epic conversation.
Your words stole my day. Your conversation coolly charged with both humor and sincerity arrested my concern for the minutia that was to make up this afternoon. Much like the hot hot heat that is impossible to ignore, your stories and laughter were a soft avalanche making it harder to breath through the humidity, harder to ignore its brooding beautiful presence. Hastily I hurried home after my phone lost its charge, cut you off. I had no other concern or want but to continue to speak with you. While speaking or listening or writing or reading, you, and you, and you and you help me to see things new, by seeing them with me, I am able to see in an old light with a new intensity.
I see the clouded fire in the faces of passersby.
I nod, while the corners of my mouth sneak a smile, at a woman aggravated by her canine companions flagrant excitement at the sight of an aloof bird.
I absorb joy from from pigeons that pick at parched grass.
It's the little things that never cease raping my mind. Playful words lick quiet moments. At one instance a rogue hair resting unnoticed on a broken square of cement can run around the cavernous jetty of my hungry mind.
An old woman rich in her wrinkled complexion that mirrors the aging wood of an ancient tree.
A stick, lazily unaware of his importance in the path where he sits.
The madness of thick drops of rain jumping from the clouds under sunny skies in the least expected of moments.
However, it is also the immense tragedies and sickening realities that shape us or color our judgment and ability to comprehend and relate.
The love in my heart, the love that I own, my love, the love that cradles my heart and holds my souls outstretched hands was angrily challenged during the second half of my day.
Life is layered and Toxic. Moreover it is fragile and at times presents impossible situations, unsolvable riddles of relation and emotion. As my parents and I looked at our lives lived in albums filled with frozen moments-In the early moments of late evening an unannounced hail and electrical storm violently labored through the quiet summer streets of the town in which I now live. The storm was fast but angry- acting as quickly as possible to exert its rage in the most welcoming of environments. I was the catalyst for reverie, the reason we danced together through past generations of changed existence. And we started with our nuclear story, and went back to the lives they led before they met and lingered on the lives they led when they were where I am now. It was beautiful to see the things that made my parents who they were as individuals. And it was beautiful to see them before they met and who made them, and who made them that way, and moreover, who they helped each other to become. But it was most interesting to me to see the life they shared before children entered their lives, before we stole the attention. I was filled with awe to see them as socially flamboyant- to see the crowd they drew and surrounded themselves by. I wanted to feel that minute of their life together, I wanted to know the people they knew- I wanted to know them than- i wanted to be there when they were at their most hopeful, when they believed they harbored the most potential. More specifically, my ulterior motives were to obtain pictures of people from that time who's souls I am told lovingly lurk at my side. I have not met two of these people for they died before I was born. I am told, time and time again, that I harbor the best of them both and this makes my heart feel light and safe for I know they were both amazing people who's lives were cut short due to mental and physical disease. Mostly I am blessed to be the namesake for two individuals that touched the hearts of so many, and I feel proud to invoke their goodness and I feel safe in the watchful gaze of their respective lingering energies. I made mention of one these men, Lawrence, for whom I am named Lauren. He was my fathers best friend and they saw each other through the depths of existence. Larry left behind a widow- a woman I call aunt sometimes, mother at other instances, savior when I'm in a real bind and embarrassed to ask my parents for help. And on this night, before the reverie and restoration of balance to the love in my heart, Norma and I went to dine, discuss and enjoy each others company over cool glasses of white wine. Norma was irreparably hurt by the loss of Larry, particularly because she cannot come to terms with the circumstances of his death. This most amazing man who loved so deeply ended his own life. He was unparalleled in looks and compassion but was brought up surrounded by pain in an extremely unhealthy environment. He was molested by several people and ultimately could not reconcile these invasive instances of his early childhood- mainly because when he did choose to deal with it, he remained connected to the same therapist for something like 10 years. Clearly this time spent together created a bond between the two and both grew involved in an increasingly inappropriate way. After Thirty-Six years of trying to deal, understand and come to terms with the workings of his own brain- Larry turned in his hope and will for knowledge of how to make his mind a safe place one that could maintain the fleeting moments of intense euphoria he no doubt had experienced. Many times, my father told me, when Larry was living with my parents he begged them both to help him end his life. Clearly, at the end of a road, Larry could not look back. He could no longer attempt to tackle the complex sadness his brain and heart could not expel. I can imagine the story as it has been told to me. Larry, purposefully poised and ever intent, entering a vapid lot, sturdily, with purpose, holding a gun loaded with defeated relief. He stopped, cold and shaking, I imagine, to pin the note to his chest that in words, runny from salty tears, written by a nervous hand said 'Call Rex Shaw, he will know what to do.' And with a bustling breath, the trigger was pulled and the bullet released into his head.
I do not understand how my father dealt with this- and to this day it is the only thing that is sure to pull emotion from behind his rough guard. However, he recognizes the lost love and learned something from it. Norma, his estranged wife at the time, unable to help him, unable to deal with his depression, madly in love and in lust- well her life ended the minute his did. Her livelihood took a shattering blow that she has never fully recovered from. Their souls connected, hers must have felt the warmth and pain in tandem with his body. His material being gone, soul released from this chapter of his existence, but hers kept captive- bruised and battered from the self-serving loss of the man she existed for. I shared with her tonight that I was told, and I believe that Larry's soul is watching mine or an integral part of it. My new found knowledge of my fleet of guardian souls was meant to caress a tender corner of her heart, however, I may have missed the right spot. There were things Norma shared with me, information I was not privy to that informs her upset at this news. She shared with me that her and Larry had gotten pregnant some years before he died and the name they had chosen for the child was Lauren. During her pregnancy, Norma miscarried and the child was lost. They lost their child, she lost her love and hope at a biological legacy of their love. Being that Larry dies a year before I was born, and him being so close to my parents, it was a natural choice for me to be named Lauren. Of course they asked for Norma's blessing and she gave it enthusiastically. Oddly, or not so strange at all, Norma and I have been unusually close my whole life. But when I told her he was present in my life to make sure I wouldn't make the same mistakes he did, that he is present in my life to make sure I will be able to work through the complexity in my tendency to lapse into maddening depressions- her eyes lost a bit of light. Perhaps I explained with too much enthusiasm my excitement and gratitude for the strength, love, and resolve he is soulfully monitoring and providing for me in my times of need- things he could not give himself- I missed what really killed her. What he did ended their time together. Yes she is always Aunt Norma and a mainstay of my emotional harness but what he took from her when he took his own life was the possibility of them having a child like me, or a life together like my parents have made. It is true she could have moved on in some way, to some capacity forged a life different from the one she thought she had or deserved- but she did not. That that tender spot in her heart for him was caressed to the point of aggravation or perhaps her heart has not healed and any love that tried to enter has been expelled, leaving her to internalize a growing sadness that has consumed most of her adult life. It was my love for Norma, this important figure in my life, that was strained when we disagreed. It was pushed when I saw that her heart was closed, and angry and unforgiving, and moreover, that she made that choice to keep it closed. Well the sadness that brought me almost erupted as anger, much like the lightening that tore apart this evenings sky, or, like the tiny cannon balls of hail, of furry that shot from the dark clouds- tickled with confusion.
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