Writing Processes

Okay, this looks like another letter. Let me try to spell out a few things. I like to write out some of my thoughts and if I imagine that someone will read what I write – whether a poem or a letter –that’s part of my process. If nothing else, writing with someone else in mind helps sharpen my thinking. It is not so important that people actually read what I write – though I hope for that result on occasion.

But here’s another thing. I am quite serious that my working process also includes the hurley-burley of Aimee’s. It’s not as calculating as it sounds. I’m just relaxing, messing around, having something to drink. But the noise and commotion jangle my mind in ways that sometimes lead to ideas. Sometimes people - especially young people whom I would almost never get to know in the outside world - do or say things that refresh my mind. Hell, I like to watch. And I like being where people like me.

Aimee’s is also a different place to make some notes from out of my primary working environment: my regular walk to the river. And I also work in front of a computer and other places.

For me, this is part of what work is. I have now chosen to be what I call a poet/philosopher. The title is unimportant except that it defines rather simply what I want to work at. That is, I intend to spend considerable time observing the natural and the built world around me and also the people I encounter. I try to understand something of what it all means. And of course, I am trying to write about it - especially poems and word sketches that express some insight and wonder.

That I like my work is no surprise, but taken seriously, it is something of my mission to produce writing so that others will taste a little of my joy in living. There is some effort involved. And, I expect a creative product. And if my processes don’t produce writing that other people want to read, I think that I will still have done good work and have satisfied myself. I will have done my best. And there has already been some appreciation.

And so, why am I telling you this? As I said earlier, this is part of my process. If you’re actually reading this, it’s because I thought you’d be interested in reading it.

In a way, these are my notes from yesterday. You were there.

So for me, the last two afternoons at Aimee’s clarified something. Of course I have realized that Aimee’s will rarely be a place where nuanced or complex thoughts will be discussed. That’s not news. And I often can’t help interjecting questions that interest me into the room, and specifically, at times, to you and to others. Sometimes there are responses that move my thinking along. But I also can’t seem to help talking nonsense. And other people, too, have things to say or blurt out. Aimee’s is a word-in-edgewise kind of environment after all. Most often, the conversation I think I’m looking for has been pulled along into just more bantering and jokes. And that’s fun, too, it its way. But sometimes it’s just loud, mostly empty, talk.

But all of it is also often a just a good time. But here’s one of my dangling questions again: Could you be happier?

Dawn has been feeding me thoughts from ‘The happiness project,’ a book she’s reading. I’ve done a lot of reading lately on how the mind words. The object here for me is not really to become happier in general but to understand my own experience better.

And I don’t wish to spend too much time on this discussion. I am more properly trying to prepare myself to try to create something. Writing, for me is mostly a practice, a discipline, something like meditation, perhaps – call it Zen, if I am giving nicknames to things now.

You see, being honest is a bigger challenge for me that it might appear. That sentence really sets up the paradox. I am more willing than many to try to be honest – with myself, and, I hope, with others. But I have also become aware of how little I know of myself. Honesty is elusive. I think that any human being is like an iceberg – to use a favorite metaphor. Most of who we are is beneath our conscious awareness.

You told me that Dante shows you something like that in ‘The Inferno.’ He was exploring our evil side, our capacity, which you say that we all possess, for doing things that we would not do. I could read more for myself – for I am not really lazy, as I said. A more honest response to you would have been to say that I have other things I want to do more. I am more fixated on the good side of things.

But I am not ready to make this digression, either. I am not dishonest by intent, but I’m sure I often fool myself. I don’t know the whole truth. Not even why I like some sips of egg crème better than others. Or why it often doesn’t matter. Instead, you should understand that so many things are for me are part of a goal, or perhaps it’s a game that I play with myself, a way of preparing myself to do something more that I want to do.

Let me try to be clear. I took piano lessons, starting more than fifty years ago, now. I practiced. I played. I performed. Let’s say that I was good. Well, really I was good enough for what I had put into it. Which wasn’t that much. But let’s say that I got some satisfaction out of it and I managed to make some notes and passages sound pleasing to some ears. But I gave up the piano after not very many years. It hadn’t become my passion.

Now, in my fifties, writing has become my passion. And the practice of it is very much like what I did with piano – and also other things I have worked at in my life. There’s a tangling of work and play with me – two words that generally mean what most people think they mean, but which have considerable nuances associated with them in my mind. I’ll leave it with a mention.

Putting thoughts into words is one way to explore my own mind. Doing it – attempting to write  with some discipline – is different than just messing around. Call it work. That is not to say that every word is clear and expressive, but by creating a goal – that is, an idea in my mind that, however unformed – that goal becomes a force which guides and even impels me forward. There is something for which I strive.

So this letter is me doing my scales. Mrs. Harms used to listen in to me on the piano every week. Analogies sometimes break down.  But I’m mostly thinking on paper, as the older metaphor goes. It is part of the process which I hope will get me to the point where I create some of the goodness and wonder I sometimes feel at being alive in other people’s minds - with words. I’ve managed it on occasion. I know what it tastes like. It is a paradoxically selfishness and selflessness that I think maybe the Buddhists might talk more about. What I want is to give. What I want is to give. Words will make you even crazier than you started if you think about them too much.

And so I’ve said enough for now. Increasingly, I see that my explanations of things (as in this letter) are just ‘doing scales.’ But expressing my thoughts and feelings is not so much ‘telling’ as ‘revealing’ what is in me after my years of living. What is worth sharing? There’s an old saw: show, don’t tell. But these are all just words.

Tolstoy said something like this: What is Art? Art is sharing your experiences well enough so that they are as vivid and meaningful for others as they were for you.

And so, finally, back to today’s notes.

Aimee’s is good for some things and not others. I prefer the younger minds to the older ones I meet there. I often talk without thinking much too much. I think too much. Ah, now there, Mr. Shakespeare, there’s the rub. It’s another paradox to live with. I heard you say it and I’ll say it in my words. Thinking – about happiness or anything else – begins to diminish your experience. So I should just be, says Mr. Buddha. But examine yourself, says Mr. Socrates. Ah, the rub.

I believe you when you say you like my questions. And believe me when I say I like the questions you pose for me – although I am often looking behind your words to find them. Certainly with you, but also with others, the conversations I want to have are often not the ones we do have. So many other things distract. And sometimes the distraction is what we want. And so I try to find time, to make time, to make opportunities so that part of those conversations can happen.

And so, this letter. I am not asking for a written response. I have already imagined you reading this and have gotten the benefit. Do tell me what seemed important from your perspective if you want to.

But mostly I hope we have more conversations. Maybe I should just tell you about the time I kissed the richest girl in town. I’ll make something up if I have to.

In the end, the lives I touch and the lives that touch me are what I live for. Oh, what drivel! What everloving heartfelt drivel! Maybe I should give music another more serious try! But this is nearly as close as I can come to telling you what I mean. I’d advise you not to focus too much on what I say. Look for what I mean. And sometimes the only way I hear my own dishonesty is by saying things out loud. Maybe one day I’ll manage to tuck some truth and beauty into my words. Maybe I won’t. Here’s what I wrote after leaving Aimee’s yesterday. It’s good enough for today.

Talk - Don’t talk

Sometimes the universe seems to be speaking to you.

Sometimes it’s just the wind.

The leaves on the trees are only green,

catching air and slipping back and forth

against the sky blue sky.

My shoes are too short.

My toes are too long.

My eyes, heavy from lack of sleep.

Kyra made me an omelet

with bacon and tomatoes and raw onion.

There was cheese, of course.

Words and questions and banter

filled the air at Aimee’s.

My butt grew tired.

I could hardly recall

if anything meaningful had been spoken.

But with a smile from Kyra,

I pulled the door.

The sun was hot.

The breeze was fresh.

Sometimes the universe has nothing to say,

but a look will carry you home.