Week 3 of the Wheelchair

I've been using a wheelchair for the past 3 weeks after fracturing 4 metatarsal bones in my left foot. I was trying to collapse a cardboard box but it slipped out from under my foot and I fell, landing with my weight on my left foot. Being in a body requires mindfulness and even then, one may still suffer an accident. One great thing about it is how marvelous the staff at Ashland Community Hospital's emergency room is. I've gone there twice in the past few years and both times it was a friendly, even uplifting experience.

People suggest that it is instructive to navigate in a wheelchair as an educational process in order to understand the experience of the disabled. Yes it is educational. First it is much harder to do anything, from getting something from the cupboard to getting out of the house and into a car.

When your eyes are at the height of everyone else's waist or chest, you remember how big everybody seemed when you were a kid. In a crowded place, I noticed a natural wish to protect myself from the quick movements of others. You feel more vulnerable, in other words. Sometimes people look at you as if you are defective or should be avoided. (Since I am quite aware of these "mostly unconscious" attitudes in regard to being older, this was one more layer to assimilate in terms of prejudice and avoidance.)

In spite of the various difficulties, I have been enjoying this period of time. Maybe day after day of spring rain has helped in this regard. Well it's raining again, I say to myself, settling in for another day in the house.

I finished some rewrites on A New Wrinkle and am pleased with them. I am surveying what I need to do in order to get it produced locally and elsewhere. I am planning several events that involve reading the play or performing excerpts from it. I am reviewing my overall vision for Sage's Play, which includes seminars, lectures, performances, community forums and a book on aging, which I am starting to write.

There are moments when my overall vision seems rather BIG. I now remind myself that I have had little signs posted in my office for months THINK BIG. I want to free myself up in that way since I have often confined myself to small thinking in the past. I want to THINK BIG and be relaxed and easy about having a BIG vision. What's the BIG DEAL? Big or small, you still have to do one thing and another, look for ways to synthesize, expect miracles and enjoy the ride.

I am enjoying the ride which right now involves a wheelchair.

My 69th birthday is about to arrive at the end of the month, so in the Sailing Toward 70 cruise, I am coming closer! Birthdays tend to get me reflecting on my life. I am remembering how my dear astrologer friend Kate Maloney said to me in a reading many years ago, "Doesn't it all seem of a piece?" She was speaking of the pattern of my life. I was ashamed to admit to her that no it did not seem all of a piece. It seemed disparate, fragmented, and the themes were hard for me to see and understand. Now finally it does seem all of a piece, the whole journey thus far with all of its variety, tributaries, cul de sacs, bogs, peaks, enchantments and epiphanies. I notice that my awareness of not only my life but of the culture and era becomes more panoramic with time. Many decades of life can do this it seems.

No guarantees or certainty about anything. Here one minute, gone the next. Learning to relax with that. Meanwhile, beautiful bird songs outside my window and the promise of some sunny interludes today. Hope you are enjoying the ride too.

Photo credit-- www.crinklecrankle.com

Reaching for the Moon

Full moon time again. This marvelous photo is part of a series titled Moon Games that photographer Laurent Laveder created using his children as models. I highly recommend that you take a look at what Laurent has done at Moon Games. The images are quite magical and I imagine it was a lovely experience to play with one's children and the moon at the same time.

We've all dreamed of climbing up to the moon at times, haven't we? I know I have done my share of it. When I was a child, one of my favorite occupations each month was kneeling at the window, resting my arms on the sill and gazing out at the full moon and stars late at night when everyone else was asleep.

We humans have been moon gazing for a very long time. There's something about it that stirs and revives us. Of course, that inspires art, whether it's Laurent Laveder's photos or haiku by the famous Japanese poet Matsuo Basho (1644-1694). Here are three of my favorite Basho poems about the moon.

The pine tree of Shiogoshi
Trickles all night long
Shiny drops of moonlight.

Among moon gazers
at the ancient temple grounds
not one beautiful face

Spring too, very soon!
They are setting the scene for it --
plum tree and moon.

Have you ever written haiku or other forms of poetry about the moon? Do you reach for the moon from somewhere deep within yourself? What does the full moon mean to you?

Meanwhile the sun is rising outside the windows with an orange glow. Yes, spring is certainly arriving here in Oregon. Violets, daffodils and even some early tulips ornament the landscape. The hills are green again, even though we still could get more snow in the mountains. Each spring, completely fresh.

Full moon gazing and springlike appreciation-- and on a practical level, the next two weeks will be busy ones in my casita. Composer Laura Rich and I just had our second run-through of the songs in A New Wrinkle. It's great to hear them, but there is still more work to do to get the singers comfortable enough with the material to warrant recording the songs. I'm also rewriting the script of the play some. We're still revising some of the songs, too. So there's all that regarding the play.

This week, I am beginning work on what will be a series of video clips for You Tube that will document the process of creating A New Wrinkle (and other creative ventures from Sage's Play.) I am working on putting the first three of these clips up soon. It's playing around with a Flip Cam and so far has been lots of fun.

In addition, I'm moving in mid-March. The move is not a big one geographically. I will still be in Ashland. But it entails all the usual packing, so my place is now filled with empty boxes and packing material and the piles of filled boxes increase each day. I will be sharing a home with my friend Louise Pare. I'm looking forward to it.

And check out the trailer for this documentary on women artists, "Who Does She Think She Is?" Although women comprise more than half the population, it is more difficult for them to succeed as artists. If they are raising children, that demands a great deal of creative attention and rightly so. Even those without children encounter the prevalent assumption that all the great artists are men, and the cultural bias toward art created by men. I am looking forward to seeing the whole film.



That's the full moon news from my neck of the woods.

When Galaxies Meet

Nature is the most breathtaking ongoing example of creative collaboration. Each element-- air, earth, fire, water, space-- is incredibly distinct and powerful. And those elements weave, dance, merge, collide, explode, dissipate, and appear continuously in an astounding display giving us weather, seasons, environments, ecologies, landscapes--moods and expressions that are subtle, unfathomable in their complex harmony, dramatic and without constraint.

And universes. Galaxies. Way out there in the slow turning of the timeless. Sometimes I wonder whether the galaxies are also deep within my body. And there are times when I know that they are. When I am taken out of the tiny beauty and imbroglios of my personal life to merge with the immensity of the universal. To me, this is an essential element in art and in life.

We often think of the work of great artists as the expression of their individual genius. Of course it is. Only Monet could paint those particular paintings. Only Martha Graham could dance or choreograph those certain dances. Only Emily Dickinson could write that particular poetry.

But so much of art and human endeavor depends upon collaboration. We are linked to, supported and influenced by our family, community, region, country, era, gender, philosophy, age. I've been thinking of collaboration a great deal lately. I was reviewing my various collaborative efforts over the years from the basketball and softball teams of my youth, working on magazines as a writer and editor, playing in improvisational music groups, developing new nonprofit organizations, participating in a dynamic Buddhist community for over 30 years and writing a best-selling book with my former husband.

"Every collaboration helps you grow." musician Brian Eno says of his collaboration with David Bowie. That's certain. Sometimes you just have to thank your lucky stars that your prayers for a great collaborative partnership were answered. What is a great collaborative partnership? For me, it means working with others who have talents I don't have, sharing and creating in ways that are supportive, warm, respectful, honest and lively.

It's a great experience to write in a solitary way, to spend hours imagining and developing creative work alone. And it's also marvelous and very stimulating to collaborate, to be refreshed and aired out by playing with other people.

I know that's what's in the stars for me. Galaxies will meet, that's for sure. My collaboration with composer Laura Rich on the music in my play has been and is a wonderful partnership. And I know it is just the beginning. Now I will meet new galaxies aplenty--and they will be disguised as actors, singers, musicians, directors, producers, backers, supporters and audiences. And in the meeting of those galaxies all stars, planets, black holes and mysteries of outer and inner space will be charged and changed in ways that are yet to be known.