Closed Captioning

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During the witching hour last night, my electric blanket turned itself on and fried me to a crisp. Light from my flaming hair revealed the outline of God burning beside me which provided strange comfort. Over time, I’ve had various vague ideas about the best ways to die. I’d not thought of this one, but it seemed an acceptable alternative. Our charred bodies were soon unrecognizable. It was over.

The enormity of waking has overwhelmed me. I’m the walking dead, moving through my morning chanting please, please, please. I don’t know what I’m asking for, but I’m certain I’m supposed to ask. Being dead absolves the body. Being alive requires fortitude, vision, and help.

One of our chickens lost an eye to a predator, but she’s still laying eggs. The garden is buried in snow, flat and pristine except for the tall dry stalks of late blooming weeds. The exhaustion of autumn always gives these invaders an unfair advantage. Spring will bring renewed energy for the inevitable skirmishes, but there will be no definitive victor. The spoils of war are never what one might imagine.

Since the thousand-year flood two years ago, we monitor the river with new respect. God and I are working steadily on the basement with an eye to evacuation. We’ve moved our vulnerabilities to higher ground, aware of the futility but content to at least be doing something. Doing something. Doing something. I am the walking dead doing something.

God routinely disappears and only explains their whereabouts in languages I do not understand. Multiple translations scroll across the bottom of the screen. I’m forced to suspend my agenda and hold very still as I struggle to grasp the plot of the cosmic drama. I wish God spoke simple English. Then I could do two things at once.

Instead, I must contend with the tongues of angels and demons, the vernacular of eagles and earthworms, the dialects and dialogues of the infinite all rising on waves of unprecedented heat, wrapping the earth in a shroud of utterly brilliant sunsets. Or are they sunrises?

God wears the tattered ozone like a cape and lands gracefully beside me. I am still chanting please, please, please as I accept the bent elbow and march down the aisle toward the edge.

“I hear you,” my Escort whispers, leaning down. “But you might try a thank you now and then.”

The dark and troubled waters below offer no sustaining image, but I don’t need one. I am the walking dead, learning to navigate weightlessness. I am the walking dead, slowly, slowly, slowly letting go. Letting go. Letting it all go.

The Ways We Use the Frontal Lobe

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Even the most obvious instructions for being happy, healthy, and wise are routinely ignored, ridiculed, and explained away. Physicians, therapists, pastors, scientists, Jesus, the Dali Lama, Taylor Swift, and a vast array of poets and philosophers past and present shake their heads, mystified, and discouraged.

For instance, though cheap and easy, fossil fuels are finite and poisonous, but who doesn’t like well-paid extractive industry jobs, entertainment, warm houses, and nice vacations?

In the long run, we’d be happier (and less likely to go extinct) if we fed the hungry, welcomed strangers, exercised, turned down the thermostat, stopped bombing, and reduced our fat and sugar intake. Instead, we use our astounding intellect to invent complex rationalizations for less-than-helpful choices.

Me: Admit it, God. Your frontal lobe design has failed. Abstract reasoning is a bust.

God: Yeah. Science and compassion shot to hell by fear and feigned ignorance.

Me: I know. We strive to be avenged, satisfied, pain-free and immortal.

Meanwhile, there’s fire. I let the morning blaze die down because the sun is taking over, beaming radiant energy into the thermal mass I call home. Earthly fires are a triangle: Oxygen, fuel, and heat. Existence is a triangle enabled by fire: Birth, life, and death.

God: And I’m a triangle: Creator, Recycler, and Evolver. I don’t give up.

Me: Well, if I were you, I’d call it quits on earth. Lots of flops and botches.

God: I know you would, and I know you’re afraid, but I’ll never not be around.

The glow of the sun is not fire. It’s nuclear fusion, which involves protons smashing into each other so hard that they stick together and become something new. This transformation produces a tremendous amount of light and heat.

Me: That’s like us, God. When we smash together, good energy is released, right?

God: Cute. But no. You’re a willy nilly smasher. Mostly, you bounce. I help with repairs.

Me: But sometimes, I smash into something vaguely like you. I’m sure of it.

God is chuckling. As usual.

We are all willy nilly smashers. We take a hard run at something, crash, pick ourselves up, dust off our boots, gulp some coffee, tea, whiskey or kombucha, and take another run. Sometimes, fusion occurs, and we’re changed. But mostly, we bounce and remain unchanged.

God: Essentially unchanged, but not unfazed. Shed the defeatist attitude. Keep smashing.

Me: Ah ha! You’re still working on the frontal lobe, aren’t you?

God: Well, I may be deluded, but I believe even total failures have redemptive value.

The sky has clouded up and blocked the sun. I smile at the Eternal Delusion and get my matches. It’s time to start another fire.

Membership

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Once in a while, book clubs invite an author to visit. God prefers anonymity, so she always declines. Not me. Often, it’s a nice experience, but on rare occasions, things get awkward. Members who’ve read only the title and back cover take the opportunity to share views tangential or even hostile to the essence of the book. Others fawn over the author, more focused on affiliation than analysis.

And speaking of awkward, I know of a romance writer who finagled an invitation to join her neighborhood book club. Because she published under a pen name, no one realized who she was. When it was her turn to choose a book, she held up her latest bodice-ripper, the slick cover burbling with cleavage and low-slung jeans. Everyone burst into laughter, thinking this was a joke. The author stomped out, never to return. They did not read the book.

“Well, they should have,” God says. “Romance is a billion-dollar industry.”

I roll my eyes. “I prefer murder mysteries. They do less damage.”

God leers at me. “Ah, come on. What’s wrong with a little erotic fantasy? Steamy scenes, orgasmic encounters, soulmates finally licking or sucking just the right spots…”

“Stop!” I interrupt. I don’t enjoy talking about sex with God. “Could we change the subject?”

“Sure,” God says. “But what is the subject?”

I pause and then admit, “I don’t know. And you know I don’t know.”

“Maybe we should talk about who gets invited,” God says.

“To what? Book clubs?”

“No. To anything. You all want to belong, don’t you?”

“Not necessarily. We want to belong to our tribe. People who look and think like we do, believe what we believe, read the same books, and share similar realities.”

“Then don’t invite me!” God snorts. She pulls on her turtleneck sweater. “You’re strangling yourselves. Loosen up, you judgmental little speck.”

“Don’t worry,” I snap. “You are definitely not invited. And don’t call me speck.”

Evening is approaching. The daylight remaining is not straightforward.

“Speck. Dot. Flicker. Flash. You realize that like rain, fire and light do not discriminate, right? So, instead of speck, how about I call you light of the world?”

This is a seductive but perilous proposal. God is the Ultimate Refractive Substance. As light passes through God, it splays and changes directions. That’s why stars twinkle. If I agree, I will be bent and fractured. My membership anywhere will be in question.

“Let me think on that,” I say, hedging.

We curl up on the couch and continue reading our book club’s latest selection, Sun House, by David James Duncan. As usual, I’m a little behind.

Honing Toward Perfection

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Today, The Gods are the consistency of sunset, vulnerable as snow. A northern gale stirs my worst instincts, exposing the road to hell and back—a familiar excursion for many of us. The Gods are hopeful hitchhikers, rebellious dancers who lead and follow at the same time, repeatedly exhausting themselves.

“Truth.” The Gods sigh through the haze of impending February. I hold the palm of my hand steady, hoping they’ll land. They weigh nothing. They mean everything.

“Rest here,” I whisper. “You’ll be safe with me.”

My bravado is laughable. Nowhere is safe for God. Not evolution. Not war. Not atmosphere. Not black holes, good intentions, bad karma. Perhaps The God’s most accurate description is They-Who-Are-Not-Safe, and they are especially unsafe in the grasping hands of human imagination.

The Gods remove their glasses, breathe, and rub the lenses with their pure cotton robes. They assume a professorial pose.

“My dear, we’ve known you a very long time. You’re the shape of a certain universe where treachery is expected. Suffering is real. You’re a stone rolling downhill. We can’t catch you because we’re rolling, too.”

This apparent abdication angers me. If it were possible to give God a swift kick in the butt without hurting my own toes, I’d do it many times a day. But with God, I never wear steel-toed boots. Instead, I wear thick, cozy socks so I can slip quietly from room to room, age to age, life to life, barely disturbing the old soul.

“We hear you anyway,” The Gods laugh. “Our senses have been honed by the human condition. Our legs are blown off, our children starved. We bear the brunt of genocidal hatred.” They pause and add, “These embodiments are excruciating, but being misperceived has its rewards. There’s nothing we don’t see. Nothing we don’t hear. Nothing we can’t bear.”

“I don’t understand,” I lament, holding my head in my hands. “I just do not understand.”

The Gods laugh a second time, a wistful, ironic laugh. “You’ve got a bad case of existential fatigue,” they explain as they offer their scarred and ancient palms. “Rest here. You’ll be safe with us.”

With trepidation, I lay myself down in the fleshy folds, and the holy fingers curl inward.

“So, this is where I disappear,” I mumble, drowsy.

“Not yet,” The Gods say. “You still have senses to be honed.”

I snap awake and begin burrowing back out of the corporeal warmth. I don’t want to be honed. For a third and final time, The Gods burst into laughter, so hearty and inclusive that I can’t help myself. I laugh, too.

“See?” The Gods say. “Honing isn’t that bad.”

God (and Dr. Bossypants) Speak

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Some astute readers may suspect that God is well-acquainted with Dr. Bossypants, and this is true. God and Dr. Bossypants had little tête-à-tête this week because they like making up rules that they believe will enhance people’s lives, and they generally like people. At least a little bit. Their combined hubris is something to behold. At times like this, I just sit back and take dictation. We all hope these suggestions will help more than hinder. I know a lot of us are a bit oppositional. Try to resist getting indignant about being bossed around. But if you must, that’s okay. God and Dr. Bossypants are both fairly forgiving.

That Lonesome Valley

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One of the harder things about human consciousness is the realization that we are mortal. No one knows exactly how to handle this, but as the generations ahead of us decline and pass, we bear witness, one way or another. Some claim that the last task entrusted to sentient beings is to die well.

My own mom was a fighter. Even though beset by serious medical limitations, she renewed her realtor license in her eightieth year. My dad died when Mom was thirty-nine. She was utterly shattered. She arranged for immediate family to be seated in the back pew at the funeral, and afterwards, she never set foot in the church again. She was done with that version of God, and who can blame her?

“Not me!!” God interjects. “No blame here.”

Even though she unchurched herself, Mom held a steadfast belief that when she died, she would meet my dad in heaven and give him a full account of how she held on to the ranch and finished raising the kids.

I glance at God, sad, proud, and a little embarrassed at the childlike simplicity of her assumptions.

“No worries,” God says gently. “Even if that’s not exactly how things work, I appreciate the ways humans create myths and rituals to find strength and resolve. Your mom’s resilience was epic.”

“Yeah. But remember how she felt about mirrors and getting old? She hated the reflection of her aging face. Really hated it. And it was tough for me, too. I could see what was coming, not only for her, but eventually for me.”

“Oh, I remember,” God nods. “But I’ve noticed you don’t hide from mirrors. In fact, you seem drawn to them.”

“Maybe,” I laugh. “Morbid curiosity.” I lean into my antique trifold mirror, pull my skin back toward my ears, make a goofy face, and add, “Mirrors prove that I’m still here.”

My grin fades as I continue to stare. “But God, I see the etching of the years, I see what my children see, and it breaks my heart. I wish I could protect them.”

“I know. But you can’t. Love isn’t always about protection or denial. Love tells the truth and then offers to help,” God says, as the room floods with mirrors. Every wall is now reflective.

“Like what you’re doing right now?” I ask. “Is this love?”  

I fight the urge to close my eyes and cover my face. Instead, I square my shoulders and press my palm against the cold glass. From deep within, the ancient eyes of God twinkle, and God’s palm meets mine. The glass warms.

Sticky Notes

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What would life be without sticky notes and lists? I jot reminders and post them helter-skelter around the house, hoping to remember who I am and what I need to accomplish in any given block of time. I float from dream to dream, idea to idea, task to task. Few are completed at one go and sadly, some won’t ever be. Completion does not come easy for me.

“Me neither,” God says. “But that’s not all bad. There’s something to be said for process. Say, could I borrow some toenail clippers?”

I lean back and imagine managing the overgrown toenails of the living God. I see rippled volcanic lava, gradually and graciously colonized by umbilicate lichens drifting in and attaching for the great breaking down. Lichens are neither plant nor animal. They’re a union between fungi and algae, like gay cowpokes enduring unbelievable conditions just to dance. Their symbiotic version of the two-step may be our last, best hope for shaping the wild eruptions of creation, for taming the deadly individualisms and cult-like allegiances poisoning the downstream waters.

“Sure,” I say. “I have a lot of clippers, but none of them work very well. Are you still limber enough to get at your toes? It’s easy to lose your balance at your age.”

“Ha!” Creation smiles lime green and orange through all the particular lichens rejoicing in rain-induced frenetic growth, doing their magical photosynthetic work. Reindeer and slugs, ibex and snails, feasting. Lava, giving way. Breaking down. I’m jealous of all that power.

“Let it go,” God says. “Envy does not become you.”

“But what should I do?” I ask. “I want to be helpful. Your nails are atrocious.”

“You flatter me,” God laughs. “But seriously, give up on the sticky notes. Expose your upper cortex to light. And when things dry up, let the wind take you where it will.”

I comb my fingers through my bedhead hair. “I’ve tried,” I say. “I just can’t.”

Doubt and fear cloud my mind. I don’t know what to say to myself. God slides in, calms the turbulence, and builds us a nest in an old growth forest. Sage gray lichen grows thick and innocent on the bark of the chosen tree.

The slow shape of Compassion crawls toward the primordial soup, a sea turtle of advancing years and infinite patience.

 “Wait!” I shout, running toward the Turtle. “Are there words for this?”

The Turtle just blinks and dives, leaving the shore littered with outdated phrases, false depictions, sharp chunks of lava, and long, irrelevant lists. I settle among this brokenness and wait for the tide to come in.

The tide always comes in.

If There’s A God

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If, in our little fraction of Vastness, there’s a god who demands we worship him above all other gods, I think, well, how about those other gods? What do they have to say for themselves?

And if we continue to destroy our fragile home spinning in the Vastness and end up extinct, I think, well, that’s not very nice, is it? And not at all wise.

And if there are universal laws or holy suggestions about how best to live, I think, well, such guidance should be readily apparent, right? Who would design the creatures of Vastness and hide the best ways?

Then I think, well, the best ways aren’t hidden. We just don’t want to love our neighbors, let alone our enemies. We convolute and complicate to disguise our greed and justify our cruelty. This has been going on for a long, long time. We borrow other people’s sacrifices to quell our fears.

Apparently on crack, the Apostle Paul wrote Oh death, where is thy sting? Well, Paul, I’ll tell you where it is. It’s wrapped in a shroud at the border between the haves and the have-nots. It’s screaming in civilians blown to smithereens by war machines. It’s plastic in the bellies of hungry, hungry children. In fact, Paul, death stings like hell down here most of the time.

And then I think, well, who’s fault is that?

The Silences parade by. Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil. The Excuses slither by. Phony, ignorant, gluttonous. The Hierarchies hail themselves. The Meek stand at attention. The Humble avert their eyes and bow their heads.

“Hey, Happy New Year!” Big God bounds into my consciousness like an exuberant dog.

“Hello, God,” I nod.

“What’s shakin’ baby?” God jiggles her large bottom. “Got some money? I have a few charities in mind.”

“It’s not that easy,” I protest.

“Ain’t that the truth!” God exclaims, rubbing my head with affection. “Who’s a good monkey, huh? Who’s a good monkey?”

 “Stop it!” I laugh. “No one’s a good monkey.”

“You got that right!” God proclaims. “But get out there and do something nice anyway. Eat some greens. Time’s a-wastin’.”

I shake my head. “I’m tired of greens. And besides, money and time are just abstractions. They’re not real.”

Big God raises an enormous eyebrow. “Hmmm. Let’s see how that works out after you’ve ordered your ice cream. It’s warm today.”

Coins jingle in my pocket as the blazing sun drags my remaining hours across the southern sky.

“Okay,” I admit. “I see your point.”

“I’d like a scoop of salted caramel,” she grins. “And two of coconut crunch.”

Laundry

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I sit with my beer and orange juice while a faithful washer groans its way through a modest load of towels and underwear. The cacophony of morning includes two-stroke leaf blowers across the street, Harley riders roaring by, and cheerful but vociferous wild things that do not apologize for their dominance of the airwaves.

Just outside the open window, the Pacific looms large. Sinewy vines have flung themselves over the shoulders of trees and wound themselves around neon blossoms and beautiful fruit.

God is not bothered by the intrusive clamor and overbearing pigmentation. I am. Yesterday, alone on a windy shore, I circled things into simple black and white.

“I don’t like being one of 7 billion,” I tell God. “The entanglement and commotion make me claustrophobic.”

“Sorry to hear that, Chip,” God teases. (She calls me Chip, as in “chip off the old block” just to bug me.) “Would you like your own planet?”        

“Yes, please.” I nod, dipping my toes in salty water.

The Fluidity smiles and flexes, the tide rolls in, and I see that I am already a planet unto myself. Each nucleus spinning my direction is its own planet. The electrons dance, the stars align. I see that I am a singularity made of singularities held together by unspeakable complexities. I am one of One.

I breathe with grudging acceptance and the Fecundity loosens its grip. I relax. The grass withers. The flower fades. But the Gorilla Glue, the Relatable Pacer of the Universe doesn’t let go, doesn’t stop talking, transforming, or replaneting.

A science teacher of mine once declared, “Cell division is a goddamned miracle.” His asides were not often helpful or accurate, but from the perspective of my own DNA, he may have had a point. Cell division can be a very good thing.

God taps me on the shoulder. “Um, I hate to interrupt, but it’s time to hang the clothes.”

“I know,” I say. “Otherwise, they’ll mildew.”

The neighbor’s laughter sounds like a bird. I can’t tell anything apart anymore, and maybe I don’t want to. It’s all a bodacious blur, a heart-wrenching opera, a country-western shindig, a tsunami of sound, a smorgasbord of color.

The God of All that Ripens saunters seductively to the washer, and we begin the ritual of hanging our laundry up to dry, temporarily halting the march of mildew and mayhem. We air our grievances along with our love, holding our shape against the coming formlessness.

A haze of fruit flies rises from the feast of fallen star fruit, and I realize that even in the tumult and dissolution, all is well. All is very well.

The Circle, The Fall, and The Fat-Faced Child

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From the perspective of a maggot, a cadaver is not an ending. It’s a feast. But then maggots are a banquet for geckos who are later gobbled up by mice. Laying hens peck mice into bite-sized pieces, and I enjoy chunks of chicken in my stir-fry.

Yeah, yeah. Circle of life and all that.

But are we more than maggot fodder? This has been debated since we invented the language necessary to express the longing and horror the question evokes.

“Of course, you’re more than maggot fodder,” The Ether speaks.

I sigh with relief, but I don’t let my guard down.

“And…?” I ask.

The Ether laughs. “You’ll be gecko excrement as well!”

“And there it is.” I roll my eyes.

“Seriously, honey, you’re not one thing now, and you never will be. The Holy Procession always breaks things down.”

I fight to stay coherent and unbroken in the moment.

The Ether materializes as a fat-faced child. Blond and defiant. I stare at the face. I wonder if it will wrinkle and hollow with age or stay pink and ebullient forever. I wonder if I will get my youthful body back someday.

“You wonder some crazy shit,” God says.

“You would too if you lived here. If you watched the news. If you had an inkling of what it means to deal with a real body.”

“Oh, but I do.”

“No, I live here. I am. And I do. You only pretend.”

The Fat-Faced Child frowns and begins to build a doll house out of Lincoln logs and Legos. “I’m gonna paint this pink and live here,” she says. “You’ll see.”

Her energy could easily swallow me alive. I go to the basement to get paint. Hot pink first. Then lemon yellow, lime green, royal purple, and turquoise. With this pungent, tangible turquoise, we could paint ourselves into the Upper World of the Zuni, and I am filled with joy. I am ready.

“How is this possible?” I ask.

“You have to fall,” she says. “Sometimes hard. Sometimes soft. But you have to let go and fall.”

In front of the doll house, a circle of my dearest friends are singing. Ring around the rosy. Pockets full of posies. Ashes, ashes. We all fall down, and they begin to fall. But The Fat-Faced Child falls first. Even in diminishment and grief, this is something I’ve always known.

  The Fat-Faced Child Falls First

Accusatory cataracts

drop from my eyes

And I realize

The Fat-Faced Child

has always fallen first.

Always suffered most.

Always broken the fall

for the rest of us.

And in the endless ruination,

The Fat-Faced Child

uses all the jagged bones

and tender tissue

to build again.