My experience in this Nature and Environmental Writing class has been life-changing, to say the least. It has certainly been one of the best classes I've ever taken. It has not changed much about my relationship to nature, merely the ways in which I go about expressing it, approaching it. But it has certainly been profound.
I have loved this blog. I have loved the excuse to get out of my apartment and really experience-- in-depth-- a part of the city which I might otherwise have cast aside. I have loved the opportunity to create a new home for myself, something I was unable to do in the past two years until now, when this blog helped me give fully to that commitment. I have loved the words and emotions this blog has generated from within me.
I have learned a lot about myself and my relationship with nature. For one, I realized that childlike intensity is still inside my heart and mind. I can bring it forth, delve into that mindset, with the right environment. I have realized that I got burnt-out on nature. I liken it to working in a doughnut shop. The longer you work there, the more likely you are to start hating doughnuts (hard as that may be to process!). I have worked outside for most of my adult life, and I just stopped seeing it, experiencing it, relishing in it, at least completely consciously. While I always enjoyed it, I rarely focused on that. This class has given me a chance to express a lot which has been supressed within me.
I have also learned that, yes, I am a nature writer. I remember receiving word that I had been accepted to Chatham's MFA program. I wondered, for a brief, insecure moment, how ithad happened. How did I get into a program which focuses on place-based, nature and environmental writing? I brushed it aside, but never really answered that for myself until this semester, what with putting together my thesis and taking this class. Now I know. I am a nature writer!
I have also learned how to approach nature, a place, on the terms of a writer. I have had the luxury of getting to know an unfamiliar place, of discovering its quirks as it has allowed me. Now, I remember the quirks of South Carolina. I want to go home, to see it from a fresh perspective. I want to see and know every place in the world in the same way I've been able to see and know Homewood Cemetery here.
I have also learned that my colleagues (including you, Mel!) are incredible. Their writing and discussion comments have been inspiring. They have pushed me to see differently than what I might see myself. They have pushed me to reconsider and rethink my own views, whether to reinforce them or to alter them. They have listened to me and allowed me to open up, supported me and nurtured me, allowed me to grow in all the ways I most needed at this important juncture of academia and Life.
And finally, I have learned that this is indeed what I love. This discussion, this writing, these readings have been some of the best I've had in graduate school. As if I needed it, my passion has been solidified.
I am not sure if I will keep this blog going. I would like to, as it has been invaluable. But I know myself, and I may not be able to keep up. If I do, I might move it to a different platform, and I will certainly open it up to more than just these few perspectives, ideas, and issues. It will encompass all of me.
Frankly, this is the class of the semester which makes me mourn my graduation. I'm going to miss it so much. I have loved it beyond these pitiful words. Thank you all for everything you have done for me and brought forth from me. I will truly never forget!
Sunday, April 15, 2012
Cemetery Cycle - Place Prompt #7
**Author's Note: Pictures will be added to this post at a later date. For now, enjoy the words.**
Let's do away with the formalities, shall we? None of that date here, time there, weather and temp this and that. We are old friends now, and instead of shaking hands, we hug and kiss cheeks.
Life is a series of patterns. The general way of things happens. Things flow forward, seemingly straight and horizontal. One day, the general way ends up back where it once began. Things repeat their flow, even with a bit of a skew, even with a lot of skew. They are still the same things as before. The cycle is circular. Sometimes I wonder why we cannot feel it when we slide down the far side.
Today the cycle is complete. It is not my last time here, but rather it is the beginning of a new relationship outside of this blog required for a grade in one of the last academic classes I'll ever take. I will return, this time without external motivation, because Homewood Cemetery is a new sort of home, a new sort of retreat, a place which envelopes me in its nature and gives to me when I rarely give back anything but my presence, my thoughts, my typed words. Things will move forward and I will continue to visit, without external motivators. There will be a slightly altered state between us, but not for the worst. It shall go on.
So it makes sense to me that today I see Homewood in the glory of what I first saw it in: precipitation. That first visit those short, quick months ago was in snow. The second in rain. Today, we embrace the tears of the sky again. Perhaps this time the sky weeps for the change in our relationship, never easy, but not always bad. And today it is good.
I finally see what this is all for. There is a funeral which disbands soon after I drive through the black wrought-iron gates by the discolored, weathered bricks of a building. In the distance there is a hearse, guests dressed in black with heads bowed, a fresh plot of dirt in the otherwise green curve of the hill's hip. Maybe this is what the sky mourns. It is the first funeral I've seen since coming to visit. And still, the cycle of peeling apart layers continues. One would think this relatively obvious layer would have been one of the first to be discovered, not the last. Or the last for now. I long to take a photo-- I am far away and the scene is movie-esque, beautiful in that intimate way, but I resist. I respect this place as it shows me perhaps the innermost part of itself.
Instead, I drive on, unsure of where to go. I realize that I no longer fear getting lost. These narrow roads, sometimes crumbling, have all become familiar. I know my way around without a map now. I have been here. And here. And here. I remember this. And this. And this. I stop to photograph an amazing green-tarnished relief on a huge stone behind a pillar surrounded by a circle of graves. It is strange, a crop circle, some odd occult set-up, and superb.
As I drive the roads, listening to mind.in.a.box's Lost Alone, singing just below my breath "I feel sad, so left alone. Words are not enough for me to go on" to the trancy EBM beat, I see it. I see what the cemetery wants to show me today.
It is a large tree, cracked into spiky shards at the very base of its trunk, fallen onto the graves downhill from it. It shrouds these graves, has dislodged some of the stones surrounding it, but is holds them close in its embracing branches. I work my way down the hill. I try not to step on the graves, but I know I do anyway. I rush to this tree. It pulls my heartstrings right to it.
I spend 30 minutes or more photographing this one tree. I get on my knees and peer up through it. I stand at the top of the hill and look down on it. I sit on limbs after I test their stability, photograph gravestones between other limbs. I photograph the little grave stone which sits rightat the base of the trunk, right below the crack. It sinks into the red-brown dirt, muddy from the moisture. I photograph it, the tree bent over it. I photograph the trunk, the bright green moss against the backdrop of grays and browns in the bark. I photograph the age rings of a branch. And then, I look up into the severed trunk of the tree.
This is what the inside of a tree looks like. This is what its organs are made of. This sawdust, this hollow drilled up its spine. It shows me its excruciatingly resplendent bowels, spreads itself wide open before me, a great, organic yaw with a spiked cowl, the most private and personal parts it could ever impress in my mind's eye-- its insides. This is what the cemetery has for me today. We have become this close that I may make love to the very core of its fibers.
And thus the cycle of this cemetery, the tree and funeral offering their death to me after I strove so hard to pick at its life. And this, this is what I came here for. The beauty of the decay. It took a while, but we're finally on that level. I can't wait to continue to discover the nuances of our intimacy from here.
"The world around me starts to spin. Suddenly it starts all over..."
-- "Hold My Ground"
Funker Vogt
Let's do away with the formalities, shall we? None of that date here, time there, weather and temp this and that. We are old friends now, and instead of shaking hands, we hug and kiss cheeks.
Life is a series of patterns. The general way of things happens. Things flow forward, seemingly straight and horizontal. One day, the general way ends up back where it once began. Things repeat their flow, even with a bit of a skew, even with a lot of skew. They are still the same things as before. The cycle is circular. Sometimes I wonder why we cannot feel it when we slide down the far side.
Today the cycle is complete. It is not my last time here, but rather it is the beginning of a new relationship outside of this blog required for a grade in one of the last academic classes I'll ever take. I will return, this time without external motivation, because Homewood Cemetery is a new sort of home, a new sort of retreat, a place which envelopes me in its nature and gives to me when I rarely give back anything but my presence, my thoughts, my typed words. Things will move forward and I will continue to visit, without external motivators. There will be a slightly altered state between us, but not for the worst. It shall go on.
So it makes sense to me that today I see Homewood in the glory of what I first saw it in: precipitation. That first visit those short, quick months ago was in snow. The second in rain. Today, we embrace the tears of the sky again. Perhaps this time the sky weeps for the change in our relationship, never easy, but not always bad. And today it is good.
I finally see what this is all for. There is a funeral which disbands soon after I drive through the black wrought-iron gates by the discolored, weathered bricks of a building. In the distance there is a hearse, guests dressed in black with heads bowed, a fresh plot of dirt in the otherwise green curve of the hill's hip. Maybe this is what the sky mourns. It is the first funeral I've seen since coming to visit. And still, the cycle of peeling apart layers continues. One would think this relatively obvious layer would have been one of the first to be discovered, not the last. Or the last for now. I long to take a photo-- I am far away and the scene is movie-esque, beautiful in that intimate way, but I resist. I respect this place as it shows me perhaps the innermost part of itself.
Instead, I drive on, unsure of where to go. I realize that I no longer fear getting lost. These narrow roads, sometimes crumbling, have all become familiar. I know my way around without a map now. I have been here. And here. And here. I remember this. And this. And this. I stop to photograph an amazing green-tarnished relief on a huge stone behind a pillar surrounded by a circle of graves. It is strange, a crop circle, some odd occult set-up, and superb.
As I drive the roads, listening to mind.in.a.box's Lost Alone, singing just below my breath "I feel sad, so left alone. Words are not enough for me to go on" to the trancy EBM beat, I see it. I see what the cemetery wants to show me today.
It is a large tree, cracked into spiky shards at the very base of its trunk, fallen onto the graves downhill from it. It shrouds these graves, has dislodged some of the stones surrounding it, but is holds them close in its embracing branches. I work my way down the hill. I try not to step on the graves, but I know I do anyway. I rush to this tree. It pulls my heartstrings right to it.
I spend 30 minutes or more photographing this one tree. I get on my knees and peer up through it. I stand at the top of the hill and look down on it. I sit on limbs after I test their stability, photograph gravestones between other limbs. I photograph the little grave stone which sits rightat the base of the trunk, right below the crack. It sinks into the red-brown dirt, muddy from the moisture. I photograph it, the tree bent over it. I photograph the trunk, the bright green moss against the backdrop of grays and browns in the bark. I photograph the age rings of a branch. And then, I look up into the severed trunk of the tree.
This is what the inside of a tree looks like. This is what its organs are made of. This sawdust, this hollow drilled up its spine. It shows me its excruciatingly resplendent bowels, spreads itself wide open before me, a great, organic yaw with a spiked cowl, the most private and personal parts it could ever impress in my mind's eye-- its insides. This is what the cemetery has for me today. We have become this close that I may make love to the very core of its fibers.
And thus the cycle of this cemetery, the tree and funeral offering their death to me after I strove so hard to pick at its life. And this, this is what I came here for. The beauty of the decay. It took a while, but we're finally on that level. I can't wait to continue to discover the nuances of our intimacy from here.
"The world around me starts to spin. Suddenly it starts all over..."
-- "Hold My Ground"
Funker Vogt
Sunday, April 8, 2012
Duality - Blog Prompt #6
It was the best place. Kiawah Island, a barrier island off of South Carolina's Atlantic coast and about an hour away from the artsy, historic city of Charleston, was the best place I've ever visited. Home to the Kiawah Island Golf Resort, the 13.5 square miles of the island is only accessible by bridge and then by special permit provided to residents, vacationers with reservations, and guests on a special guest list, which is checked by security at the gated entrance to the island--the only entrance and exit available.
Residential homeowners, 98% white and 100% filthy rich, drive the one main road of the island, past the resort, to the northern part of the island, where their enormous mansions are protected from vacationers by a second gated security checkpoint, but if said vacationers are riding rented touring bicycles on a bicycle path, they can pass through without stopping to gape at the homes they'll likely never afford except in their quaint American dreams. So why, then, would I, a person so opposed to corporate monopoly and "the 1%" adore this place?
It's not a tourist attraction in the usual sense. It's a nature preserve. Through the Kiawah Island Natural Habitat Conservancy, there are protections on the marshes, the beaches, the flora and fauna. Life takes on a different stride here. It becomes that laid-back, Southern island life one might expect. Most people use bicycles to get around. The beaches are pristine and never overpopulated. Deer abound in the woods and marshes. Hundreds of species of birds are within sight or earshot at all times. Alligators share the bike paths which wind around their marshy ponds. Raccoons, foxes, opossums, bobcats, coyotes, rabbits, squirrels, snakes, toads, frogs, salamanders, loggerhead turtles, egrets, herons, eagles, and hundreds of other types of animal life abound on the island. There are forests, marshes, beaches, dunes, ponds, streams, and of course the ocean. Life slows down when sharing a vacation with nature.
My family has taken vacations to the resort island sparsely, as it is expensive but definitely worthwhile. We kayak, swim, read, laze about in the sun, ride bicycles, cook out, visit the resort restaurant where we ask the chef for his special recipe for sausage gravy. We go crabbing and catch blue crabs in the Kiawah River which we bring home and make into Lowcountry Boil. We sit on the balcony of our condominum at night and listen to the tree frogs while we wonder about the loggerhead turtles laying their eggs in the dunes.
We do not bother with time, cell phones, the internet, or television here. We do not ask if we can come and go. We simply come and go when we please. We spend all day outdoors exploring every inch of the island from the watchtowers we climb to peer over the marshes to the manicured lawns of mansions on the northern part of the island. This is where nature has become the sublime.
How, then, could this also be the place of my nightmares? How could this place have ruined my life? And why would I be so desperate to get back after several years?
I didn't know when we were there. It wasn't until hindsight showed me. He met someone there, someone he stayed in contact with behind my back as I pretended we would get married. And when I found out, I hated Kiawah Island more than I've ever hated any place, any nature, in my entire life. I never wanted to see it ever again.
Though I have no bad memories from that last visit, my emotions skewed the way I thought of the island. I despised the happiness it brought, the out-of-towners who pranced around in skimpy bikinis and stole boyfriends from long-term relationships. I despised the families with young girls, the homewreckers. The nature could not save the face of the island in my mind and heart. I never wanted to return ever again. How could such a paradise lead to the biggest emotional breakdown of my entire emotional-fractured life?
Now, a year and a half out from my discovery, on the brink of the biggest achievement of my life, I long to return. I want to save the island from my personal vendetta. I want to see it in its beauty, in its entirety. I want to separate the plants and animals of my heaven from the anger and hatred of my hell. I must face my fears. I think of the Litany against Fear from the Dune novels: "I must not fear. Fear is the mindkiller. Fear is the little death which brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone, I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone, there will be nothing. Only I will remain."
Only I will remain, with the alligators and hawks, the saltwater sea breezes and the bivalves, the horseshoe crabs and the endangered loggerhead turtles. We will all lay our eggs in the dunes, protected by the lights-out ordinance so our creations can find their way to the sea.
Residential homeowners, 98% white and 100% filthy rich, drive the one main road of the island, past the resort, to the northern part of the island, where their enormous mansions are protected from vacationers by a second gated security checkpoint, but if said vacationers are riding rented touring bicycles on a bicycle path, they can pass through without stopping to gape at the homes they'll likely never afford except in their quaint American dreams. So why, then, would I, a person so opposed to corporate monopoly and "the 1%" adore this place?
It's not a tourist attraction in the usual sense. It's a nature preserve. Through the Kiawah Island Natural Habitat Conservancy, there are protections on the marshes, the beaches, the flora and fauna. Life takes on a different stride here. It becomes that laid-back, Southern island life one might expect. Most people use bicycles to get around. The beaches are pristine and never overpopulated. Deer abound in the woods and marshes. Hundreds of species of birds are within sight or earshot at all times. Alligators share the bike paths which wind around their marshy ponds. Raccoons, foxes, opossums, bobcats, coyotes, rabbits, squirrels, snakes, toads, frogs, salamanders, loggerhead turtles, egrets, herons, eagles, and hundreds of other types of animal life abound on the island. There are forests, marshes, beaches, dunes, ponds, streams, and of course the ocean. Life slows down when sharing a vacation with nature.
My family has taken vacations to the resort island sparsely, as it is expensive but definitely worthwhile. We kayak, swim, read, laze about in the sun, ride bicycles, cook out, visit the resort restaurant where we ask the chef for his special recipe for sausage gravy. We go crabbing and catch blue crabs in the Kiawah River which we bring home and make into Lowcountry Boil. We sit on the balcony of our condominum at night and listen to the tree frogs while we wonder about the loggerhead turtles laying their eggs in the dunes.
We do not bother with time, cell phones, the internet, or television here. We do not ask if we can come and go. We simply come and go when we please. We spend all day outdoors exploring every inch of the island from the watchtowers we climb to peer over the marshes to the manicured lawns of mansions on the northern part of the island. This is where nature has become the sublime.
How, then, could this also be the place of my nightmares? How could this place have ruined my life? And why would I be so desperate to get back after several years?
I didn't know when we were there. It wasn't until hindsight showed me. He met someone there, someone he stayed in contact with behind my back as I pretended we would get married. And when I found out, I hated Kiawah Island more than I've ever hated any place, any nature, in my entire life. I never wanted to see it ever again.
Though I have no bad memories from that last visit, my emotions skewed the way I thought of the island. I despised the happiness it brought, the out-of-towners who pranced around in skimpy bikinis and stole boyfriends from long-term relationships. I despised the families with young girls, the homewreckers. The nature could not save the face of the island in my mind and heart. I never wanted to return ever again. How could such a paradise lead to the biggest emotional breakdown of my entire emotional-fractured life?
Now, a year and a half out from my discovery, on the brink of the biggest achievement of my life, I long to return. I want to save the island from my personal vendetta. I want to see it in its beauty, in its entirety. I want to separate the plants and animals of my heaven from the anger and hatred of my hell. I must face my fears. I think of the Litany against Fear from the Dune novels: "I must not fear. Fear is the mindkiller. Fear is the little death which brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone, I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone, there will be nothing. Only I will remain."
Only I will remain, with the alligators and hawks, the saltwater sea breezes and the bivalves, the horseshoe crabs and the endangered loggerhead turtles. We will all lay our eggs in the dunes, protected by the lights-out ordinance so our creations can find their way to the sea.
Sunday, April 1, 2012
Cemetery Surprise - Place Prompt #6
Sunday, April 1, 2012 - 1:28 PM - 58 degrees - partly cloudy and warm with a soft wind
I dig my fingernails into the ground, cake the dirt beneath them. I pull up the plant, cut into the rind with those same nails, and peel to see what's beneath, peel again to see what's beneath that, keep peeling until the pulp of it, juicy and wet with a slight floral fragrance, makes mud of the soil at the tips of my fingers. This is how I discover the nature of Homewood Cemetery, like fruit in my hands.
Today, I want to revisit the first pond I found during my initial visit to the cemetery. Mainly I want to see the weeping willow again, thanks to a post by a fellow student which mentions their mythology. But it happens to be right beside the pond, and I know much will have changed between the cold, cloudy winter day on which I first saw it and today.
Movement to the left. There are bodies, two of them, with arched black necks and faces striped with white cheeks. Canadian geese-- I know them well from the flocks that hunker through the winter at the YMCA pond back home in South Carolina. I grin at the connection, feel as if I am an old friend to this place which now gives me little gems to spark my memories, good emotions. Homewood and I are more than acquaintances now, and we can have these private moments together. Homewood might have peeled some layers on me, too.
A splash. Something has glopped into the pond near my feet. I don't see it, but I notice the abundance of lily pads lazing on the water, sunning themselves beside the reflections of cottonball clouds and fresh trees. Were they here before? I don't remember them, though I'm sure they were. I wonder why I didn't make the connection between them and my horse pond in SC before. We have those, too.
As I stare at the wavy trees and shift the focus of my eyes from their reflection on the surface to the muddy browness beneath the pond, I see an orange fish flutter by. It looks like some sort of koi, and I wish I could jump in and take a picture. I imagine how the fish flies through the water, much like the grackles and robins which sprint from tree to tree above me. I hear their calls, bright, alert, confident.
A ratta-tat-tat-tat-tat. A ratta-tat-tat-tat-tat. There is a woodpecker somewhere in a section of trees farther down the lane from where I am by the pond. I think of tracking it down, wonder if it is a red-headed woodpecker like the ones back home. Everything reminds me of home today, and I realize it might be because this is my new home now. I know I will be here beyond graduation now, and perhaps these happy little connections whisper to me, "It's okay."
Before I can make the decision to go, though, something else catches my eye. Another kerplunk into the pond, and I see frog legs dart swiftly, stretched behind the thick body, beneath the lily pads.
I am making my way around the pond. There are two boys coming around the pond in the other direction, and once we are on the same side, they stop, staring into the thick of reeds at the back of the pond. I hear a rustle between the dry stalks and look as two turtles rush into the water. The boys laugh, and I wonder if they had anything to do with the hustle of the turtles. It annoys me, but I can't make assumptions. I walk closer to them and they take the hint, see my raised camera as if I'm waiting to take a picture but they are in the shot, and begin walking past me. They don't know I actually took a picture of them.
I rest at the edge of the pond where they had stood, see one of the turtles floating in the middle. The red and yellow stripes on the sides of its head are familiar. It's a red-eared slider, and again, I've seen plenty back home.
As I continue my slow meander around the pond, I pass the reeds, which still look sound, still sound decayed, hollow with the wind. They look like giant matchsticks with the fuzzy heads on their stalks, and I know they'd go up in flame quite readily, too.
On the other side of the pond, another red-eared slider. I sit on the edge of the pond in front of the weeping willow, which I've saved for last. Honeybees buzz around me, play tag with delicate white butterflies which land in the mud, seem to eat from it. I consider how this goopy brown substance as a background only makes their whiteness sparkle more.
And then the weeping willow. I duck beneath and between the strands of its branches, peer out to see what this tree sees everyday.
I peer at its gnarled trunk which only gives it more of an elderly, wise appearance.
Under the falling strands of the tree, it is quiet, shady. They seem to block out some of the harshness of reality-- the bright, the loud, the very realness of everything. Flies and gnats buzz, and it smells like a bouquet of flowers though none are near.
I decide to head back to the car after spending some time peeking at gravestones behind the flexible limbs. I walk up the hill, my visit complete. Out of the corner of my eye, I see an old drainpipe, red and crumbled. I can look up the pipe, and were I to walk up the hill a few steps, I could look down into the other half of it. I only notice it in passing, as it's one of those examples of decay I love-- these things stand out to me.
But then movement makes me stop. I saw something gray withdraw into it. I am sure it's some kind of bird; I see what must be fluffy gray down from a puffed, fat young bird. I see it again, but it looks more like a rabbit.
I wait, and then it pops out again. It's not a bird at all. It's a groundhog! I am excited because I've never seen one in real life and I am so close to this one (within a yard or two). We play hide-and-seek for several minutes. He pops his head out and stares at me, retreats back into the pipe. He pops his head out and stares at me, retreats back into the pipe. I take his picture each time, demanding that at least one turn out well.
I then leave him to his privacy and mosey up the hill, head home. I love this getting to know, this becoming acquainted, this dating of the cemetery. And now that I will stay here in Pittsburgh a while longer, I think I'm ready to call this a second home.
I dig my fingernails into the ground, cake the dirt beneath them. I pull up the plant, cut into the rind with those same nails, and peel to see what's beneath, peel again to see what's beneath that, keep peeling until the pulp of it, juicy and wet with a slight floral fragrance, makes mud of the soil at the tips of my fingers. This is how I discover the nature of Homewood Cemetery, like fruit in my hands.
Movement to the left. There are bodies, two of them, with arched black necks and faces striped with white cheeks. Canadian geese-- I know them well from the flocks that hunker through the winter at the YMCA pond back home in South Carolina. I grin at the connection, feel as if I am an old friend to this place which now gives me little gems to spark my memories, good emotions. Homewood and I are more than acquaintances now, and we can have these private moments together. Homewood might have peeled some layers on me, too.
A splash. Something has glopped into the pond near my feet. I don't see it, but I notice the abundance of lily pads lazing on the water, sunning themselves beside the reflections of cottonball clouds and fresh trees. Were they here before? I don't remember them, though I'm sure they were. I wonder why I didn't make the connection between them and my horse pond in SC before. We have those, too.
As I stare at the wavy trees and shift the focus of my eyes from their reflection on the surface to the muddy browness beneath the pond, I see an orange fish flutter by. It looks like some sort of koi, and I wish I could jump in and take a picture. I imagine how the fish flies through the water, much like the grackles and robins which sprint from tree to tree above me. I hear their calls, bright, alert, confident.
A ratta-tat-tat-tat-tat. A ratta-tat-tat-tat-tat. There is a woodpecker somewhere in a section of trees farther down the lane from where I am by the pond. I think of tracking it down, wonder if it is a red-headed woodpecker like the ones back home. Everything reminds me of home today, and I realize it might be because this is my new home now. I know I will be here beyond graduation now, and perhaps these happy little connections whisper to me, "It's okay."
Before I can make the decision to go, though, something else catches my eye. Another kerplunk into the pond, and I see frog legs dart swiftly, stretched behind the thick body, beneath the lily pads.
I am making my way around the pond. There are two boys coming around the pond in the other direction, and once we are on the same side, they stop, staring into the thick of reeds at the back of the pond. I hear a rustle between the dry stalks and look as two turtles rush into the water. The boys laugh, and I wonder if they had anything to do with the hustle of the turtles. It annoys me, but I can't make assumptions. I walk closer to them and they take the hint, see my raised camera as if I'm waiting to take a picture but they are in the shot, and begin walking past me. They don't know I actually took a picture of them.
I rest at the edge of the pond where they had stood, see one of the turtles floating in the middle. The red and yellow stripes on the sides of its head are familiar. It's a red-eared slider, and again, I've seen plenty back home.
As I continue my slow meander around the pond, I pass the reeds, which still look sound, still sound decayed, hollow with the wind. They look like giant matchsticks with the fuzzy heads on their stalks, and I know they'd go up in flame quite readily, too.
On the other side of the pond, another red-eared slider. I sit on the edge of the pond in front of the weeping willow, which I've saved for last. Honeybees buzz around me, play tag with delicate white butterflies which land in the mud, seem to eat from it. I consider how this goopy brown substance as a background only makes their whiteness sparkle more.
And then the weeping willow. I duck beneath and between the strands of its branches, peer out to see what this tree sees everyday.
I peer at its gnarled trunk which only gives it more of an elderly, wise appearance.
Under the falling strands of the tree, it is quiet, shady. They seem to block out some of the harshness of reality-- the bright, the loud, the very realness of everything. Flies and gnats buzz, and it smells like a bouquet of flowers though none are near.
I decide to head back to the car after spending some time peeking at gravestones behind the flexible limbs. I walk up the hill, my visit complete. Out of the corner of my eye, I see an old drainpipe, red and crumbled. I can look up the pipe, and were I to walk up the hill a few steps, I could look down into the other half of it. I only notice it in passing, as it's one of those examples of decay I love-- these things stand out to me.
But then movement makes me stop. I saw something gray withdraw into it. I am sure it's some kind of bird; I see what must be fluffy gray down from a puffed, fat young bird. I see it again, but it looks more like a rabbit.
I wait, and then it pops out again. It's not a bird at all. It's a groundhog! I am excited because I've never seen one in real life and I am so close to this one (within a yard or two). We play hide-and-seek for several minutes. He pops his head out and stares at me, retreats back into the pipe. He pops his head out and stares at me, retreats back into the pipe. I take his picture each time, demanding that at least one turn out well.
I then leave him to his privacy and mosey up the hill, head home. I love this getting to know, this becoming acquainted, this dating of the cemetery. And now that I will stay here in Pittsburgh a while longer, I think I'm ready to call this a second home.
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Emotive Powers - Blog Prompt #5
When I cry, it rains. Every major distressing life event I've experienced has been capped with grayness, oppressive clouds bearing down on the ground in an effort to become one with the earth, to suffocate me, to give in to my wishes.
With my tears, I control the atmosphere, give hardier physicality to the tiny, personal, and ultimately worthless drops of salty water that trail my cheeks, stain my lips brighter with their moisture, a crude lip gloss. They do not satisfy me. They are not enough.
I must escape the binds of my own body, bring my emotion to the masses of air and cloud, move them with my hefty shudders, the puffs of sigh escaping from my mouth. I must become something bigger than myself, than what plagues me. I must give it to my land, drive the cycle, give growth to what surrounds me even as I shrivel myself, drain all my waters into the ground, let it soak the life from within me, give it up to the sky until the stuffing bursts open, falls to the ground again.
Is it an heaving cry? Let there be thunder, mimic the groans of grief from my belly! Let there be lightning, imitate my flashes of memory in their destruction! Is it an angry cry? Let there be hail, mime the pounding of pain through my head! Let there be wind, tornado or hurricane, enact the rampant flutter of my heart as it explodes in my chest! Is it a soft, silent cry? Let there be sprinkles or glitters of snow, blanket and cleanse my soul.
Or is it a joyful cry? Let there be life from whence these tears stream. I'll find a field, crank up my music, dance for hours in trance on my own. For I am the Goddess of Rain. It is I who bring the waters or drought.
Saturday, March 17, 2012
Cemetery Awakening - Place Prompt #5
Saturday, March 17, 2012 - 12:36 PM - 67 degrees - sunny,
warm, and breezy
Today I decide to be stationary. Each time I’ve come to the cemetery, I have moved, walked around or mulled about, sometimes for hours. Today, it is warm, the sun shining from a crispy blue sky, and it’s a lot like spring, almost summer even. I want to sit in the sun, feel the warmth of it, laze about, take in just one particular view of the cemetery as its life is more alive than in winter.
There are birds sounding everywhere. It’s unlike anything I’ve experienced here before, that flat, motionless, lifeless terrain I described in my first visit. I’ve come to an aviary, but I cannot see the birds. They want me to listen, to enjoy their music. I wish now that I had been schooled in picking out the calls of various birds so as to know which are with me today. I know some, but they are in South Carolina. I can tell you what a mockingbird sounds like as it dips and dives onto Ticky Tac to protect its territory; I can describe the buzz of hummingbird wings, so close in memory that I can almost hear it right beside me.
I look down, to the left, from the weathered concrete bench on which I sit, overlooking the steep drop and rise of the cemetery before me.
The grass is short and green, except for patches where it has grown taller, somewhat ragged, but still bright. A fat bee buzzes in one of these right beside my leg. I don’t draw back like many people might. Years of working at the barn have made me accustomed to certain insects, like these bees, and other“creepy crawlies”-- giant writing spiders, snakes and skinks. I feel anaffinity towards this bee, wish there were flowers near for him.
I turn to survey the land beside and behind me. Most of the trees are still skeletal, save for the evergreens. But I notice a tree in bright pink bloom hanging over the edge of the drive to my left.
To my right, in the distance, there is a bush that is blossoming white flowers that remind me of daisies upon closer inspection, though I know they're not.
I notice the weeping willow which I had seen on my first visit, remember how its strands were brown. They are green now.
I would like to see all of the trees full and bushy. They don’t look like they’ll ever grow green again, even in this awakening of life.
There are birds that have flown to the grasses before me, allowing them to see me now. They hop around, fly into one another, chirp. I think they are robins, but the sun is in front of me and they are more like shadows from this angle. One lone bird has flown to a patch of shadow beneath the bare, angular limbs of a tree, sits alone, seems to do what I am doing—contemplating the land. This one is definitely a robin. I know from the way it moves in the grass before I see its red breast. They were all around in my suburban yard while I was growing up. My attention is drawn to the shadow in which it sits, a dark reflection of the skeleton growing above it. I realize I love the shadows of these trees as much as the trees themselves.
As much as I like this cemetery, the way it is more alive, and how I can see differences from all of the past times I have visited, part of me misses the cold, seemingly lifeless place with which I first became familiar, the way I had to patiently wait for it to divulge its layers. Change is difficult, they say, and even such a change, which many would assume to be a good one, is somewhat sad to me, makes me nostalgic. Still, I do like seeing the evolution of this cemetery. It's amazing that this is the same place in the photos I took before.
Today, human life in the cemetery is much more apparent as well. There is a group of people walking in exercise gear and sunglasses. Several cars have passed near me in the cemetery proper, not just on South Dallas Avenue to my right. And yet more people walk by. It’s strange to see a place of death come to life, sustain it. It’s also strange for this cemetery to be so open to public use. No one is afraid of the dead here.
The sun starts to burn my arms. I can feel the heat from my skin as I’ve sat on this bench for a while now. The breeze sends ripples through the taller patches of grasses and seems to blow on me to cool the burn, much like my mother would do when she poured hydrogen peroxide on my cuts. I wonder what it is about the sun that makes people feel lazy, the breeze that makes people calm, want to let their hair down to feel it runs its fingers through their hair. I wonder now about this place, how much it reminds me of South Carolina, how it’s that same sun and a similar breeze, the same sky which nurtures me there, 600 miles away. I’d love to be at the barn today. I can almost feel the muscular sway of my horse beneath me as we laze through the woods. But I've got a thesis due on Tuesday!
Today I decide to be stationary. Each time I’ve come to the cemetery, I have moved, walked around or mulled about, sometimes for hours. Today, it is warm, the sun shining from a crispy blue sky, and it’s a lot like spring, almost summer even. I want to sit in the sun, feel the warmth of it, laze about, take in just one particular view of the cemetery as its life is more alive than in winter.
There are birds sounding everywhere. It’s unlike anything I’ve experienced here before, that flat, motionless, lifeless terrain I described in my first visit. I’ve come to an aviary, but I cannot see the birds. They want me to listen, to enjoy their music. I wish now that I had been schooled in picking out the calls of various birds so as to know which are with me today. I know some, but they are in South Carolina. I can tell you what a mockingbird sounds like as it dips and dives onto Ticky Tac to protect its territory; I can describe the buzz of hummingbird wings, so close in memory that I can almost hear it right beside me.
I look down, to the left, from the weathered concrete bench on which I sit, overlooking the steep drop and rise of the cemetery before me.
The grass is short and green, except for patches where it has grown taller, somewhat ragged, but still bright. A fat bee buzzes in one of these right beside my leg. I don’t draw back like many people might. Years of working at the barn have made me accustomed to certain insects, like these bees, and other“creepy crawlies”-- giant writing spiders, snakes and skinks. I feel anaffinity towards this bee, wish there were flowers near for him.
I turn to survey the land beside and behind me. Most of the trees are still skeletal, save for the evergreens. But I notice a tree in bright pink bloom hanging over the edge of the drive to my left.
To my right, in the distance, there is a bush that is blossoming white flowers that remind me of daisies upon closer inspection, though I know they're not.
I notice the weeping willow which I had seen on my first visit, remember how its strands were brown. They are green now.
I would like to see all of the trees full and bushy. They don’t look like they’ll ever grow green again, even in this awakening of life.
There are birds that have flown to the grasses before me, allowing them to see me now. They hop around, fly into one another, chirp. I think they are robins, but the sun is in front of me and they are more like shadows from this angle. One lone bird has flown to a patch of shadow beneath the bare, angular limbs of a tree, sits alone, seems to do what I am doing—contemplating the land. This one is definitely a robin. I know from the way it moves in the grass before I see its red breast. They were all around in my suburban yard while I was growing up. My attention is drawn to the shadow in which it sits, a dark reflection of the skeleton growing above it. I realize I love the shadows of these trees as much as the trees themselves.
As much as I like this cemetery, the way it is more alive, and how I can see differences from all of the past times I have visited, part of me misses the cold, seemingly lifeless place with which I first became familiar, the way I had to patiently wait for it to divulge its layers. Change is difficult, they say, and even such a change, which many would assume to be a good one, is somewhat sad to me, makes me nostalgic. Still, I do like seeing the evolution of this cemetery. It's amazing that this is the same place in the photos I took before.
Today, human life in the cemetery is much more apparent as well. There is a group of people walking in exercise gear and sunglasses. Several cars have passed near me in the cemetery proper, not just on South Dallas Avenue to my right. And yet more people walk by. It’s strange to see a place of death come to life, sustain it. It’s also strange for this cemetery to be so open to public use. No one is afraid of the dead here.
The sun starts to burn my arms. I can feel the heat from my skin as I’ve sat on this bench for a while now. The breeze sends ripples through the taller patches of grasses and seems to blow on me to cool the burn, much like my mother would do when she poured hydrogen peroxide on my cuts. I wonder what it is about the sun that makes people feel lazy, the breeze that makes people calm, want to let their hair down to feel it runs its fingers through their hair. I wonder now about this place, how much it reminds me of South Carolina, how it’s that same sun and a similar breeze, the same sky which nurtures me there, 600 miles away. I’d love to be at the barn today. I can almost feel the muscular sway of my horse beneath me as we laze through the woods. But I've got a thesis due on Tuesday!
Sunday, March 4, 2012
For Better or For Worse? - Blog Prompt #4
Ahh, Pittsburgh. You were one of the most booming industrial cities at the height of the Industrial Revolution and for decades thereafter. According to Pittsburgh Green Story, from 1850 to 1980, your waters and heavens were polluted as you rose to power because of your love affair with coal. A short natural gas flirtation occurred in the late 1800s, at which point you seemed to clean up, but it wasn't meant to last. You returned to your roots, deep under your ground in fact, where the black gold pulled you back under, sunk its claws into you.
Look at you now! Your skies are blue and clear, your parks green and flourishing, even your cemeteries inundated with plant and animal life. Chatham University is not only an arboretum in itself but is also a leading force in sustainable living within your limits. And one of your daughters, Rachel Carson, is a legend in the environmental movement.
But not all is well in your belly. There's more than just black gold down there, and it's as invisible as air. The natural gas, clean and cheap, within your Marcellus Shale is said to be environmentally better than the coal which coats your stomach, your breath. But is progress always so easy? Of course not.
Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking as it's called in the press, is the process by which companies extract the gas from inside you. How can anyone come to possess something which is intangible? Marcellus Shale Protest explains: "Once a well is drilled, millions of gallons of water, sand and proprietary chemicals are injected, under high pressure, into a well. The pressure fractures the shale and props open fissures that enable natural gas to flow more freely out of the well." Wait. Millions of gallons of water? "Proprietary" chemicals?! Of course sand is dirty; it looks like the natural gas industry is, too.
Just how much better and cleaner can something be if the effort that goes into it is polluted? Contaminated "wastewater" is treated, but up to 50% of the initial amount used is lost forever. Still, in Butler, PA, C. says that she can light the air surrounding the water coming out of her faucet on fire with the flick of a lighter. Apparently the treatments to clean the used water are working, which is phenomenal news since the industry is exempt from the Safe Drinking Water Act.
As the VOCs, or valatile organic compounds, are evaporated off of the water recovered, it combines with diesel exhaust to create ozone plumes that stretch for miles. So much for the cleaner air, it seems, but who cares, since the industry is exempt from the Clean Air Act.
And those ill people and dead animals which show up around fracking-developed areas? It's got to be unrelated. After all, those signs posted in the Allegheny and Moshannon State Forests touting toxic water were put up by hoodlums.
Pittsburgh, your people have done something amazing, though. They've stood up for their rights and yours and banned fracking within your body. But it's all around you; it won't stay away. There's no way to cut off your length of Monongahela, Allegheny, and Ohio Rivers to exempt them. There's no way for you to stop the wind blowing the ozone into your heart, to exempt your air.
Is it really worth it? As it's been said, how much cleaner can an industry be if it's already polluted?
Look at you now! Your skies are blue and clear, your parks green and flourishing, even your cemeteries inundated with plant and animal life. Chatham University is not only an arboretum in itself but is also a leading force in sustainable living within your limits. And one of your daughters, Rachel Carson, is a legend in the environmental movement.
But not all is well in your belly. There's more than just black gold down there, and it's as invisible as air. The natural gas, clean and cheap, within your Marcellus Shale is said to be environmentally better than the coal which coats your stomach, your breath. But is progress always so easy? Of course not.
Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking as it's called in the press, is the process by which companies extract the gas from inside you. How can anyone come to possess something which is intangible? Marcellus Shale Protest explains: "Once a well is drilled, millions of gallons of water, sand and proprietary chemicals are injected, under high pressure, into a well. The pressure fractures the shale and props open fissures that enable natural gas to flow more freely out of the well." Wait. Millions of gallons of water? "Proprietary" chemicals?! Of course sand is dirty; it looks like the natural gas industry is, too.
Just how much better and cleaner can something be if the effort that goes into it is polluted? Contaminated "wastewater" is treated, but up to 50% of the initial amount used is lost forever. Still, in Butler, PA, C. says that she can light the air surrounding the water coming out of her faucet on fire with the flick of a lighter. Apparently the treatments to clean the used water are working, which is phenomenal news since the industry is exempt from the Safe Drinking Water Act.
As the VOCs, or valatile organic compounds, are evaporated off of the water recovered, it combines with diesel exhaust to create ozone plumes that stretch for miles. So much for the cleaner air, it seems, but who cares, since the industry is exempt from the Clean Air Act.
And those ill people and dead animals which show up around fracking-developed areas? It's got to be unrelated. After all, those signs posted in the Allegheny and Moshannon State Forests touting toxic water were put up by hoodlums.
Pittsburgh, your people have done something amazing, though. They've stood up for their rights and yours and banned fracking within your body. But it's all around you; it won't stay away. There's no way to cut off your length of Monongahela, Allegheny, and Ohio Rivers to exempt them. There's no way for you to stop the wind blowing the ozone into your heart, to exempt your air.
Is it really worth it? As it's been said, how much cleaner can an industry be if it's already polluted?
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