On a breezy May afternoon, driving down a street I once traversed regularly to and from the college, where I taught so many
kinds of people—the very young, the not-so-young, the middles, the later middles, the young old, the middle old and, lucky for me, the later old, lifelong learners—
two ladies in the latter category make their way down the sidewalk with walkers like a couple of ships chugging alongside each other—old friends, compatriots, I imagine, even if
they move more slowly than they once did. Clearly, the forces of gravity, infirmity and age do not stop them. Now on your way to me for a walk—me well into the young old category, you in
late middle—I whisper a wish into the tousle of trees overhead that we might one day be like them, deeper into our already aging futures—each upright, outside together, stepping carefully over cracks and bumps,
if necessary, hands guiding aluminum frames with little wheels, on our way to matcha or hot chocolate, under branches ripe with new leaves, or bare and waiting, two longtime friends still learning each other, sharing tiny,
grateful moments—lucky us.
Walking buddy Timi Ross Poeppelman / Photo by Jan Haag
They had me at London. And Writers. They write online at 8 a.m. London time, 12 a.m. for me. I’m up till midnight anyway when I post the day’s poem, so when the message pops up,
Writers’ hour starts in 15 minutes,
with a handy link, I decide to jump in, wondering how many people are up at 8 a.m. London time ready to write. 284 people today—that’s how many— popping in like kernels coming to life in a hot pan.
284 people writing, together, in silence for 50 minutes at the beginning of a new day (the very beginning for me).
And because so many leave their cameras on as they write, I do, too, admiring the morning light coming in Katrine’s slanted ceiling window behind her, not to mention the skylight over Jim’s head. I relate to Patricia, chin cradled in her hand, admire Carolyn’s profile at her computer, am intrigued by Leigh writing in Dubai, a faraway place I can only imagine.
We are all ages, shapes, sizes and colors. Cathleen’s resplendent in turquoise, lovely against her mahogany skin, and Silvano’s giant glasses slide down his nose, light gleaming off his smooth head. I don’t know how to pronounce Wibke’s name, but I love her thick black bangs, and Oli has her eyes closed, perhaps meditatively typing?
I’m deeply grateful to Matt and Tracy, our hosts, headphoned and on camera, Matt looking off into the distance, pen in hand, stretching, taking a drink, fingers to forehead, thinking, which counts as writing. Tracy gazing into the screen, making me wonder what words are coming to them this morning.
I want to crawl through my screen into Alison’s bookshelf behind her, give Sheila a big high-five for appearing onscreen in her pink robe, and props to Hilary for writing outside in what appears to be a vigorous wind, her hair blowing skyward.
I don’t know any of them, yet I feel like one of them, some of them signing off because they have to go to work (“Thank you for the space, peace and companionship,” Net says). Me with a poem draft that didn’t exist an hour ago, thinking about bed almost an hour into this new day, my bookshelves night shadowed behind me onscreen,
marveling at the writers around the world writing at the same time—four times a day in different time zones, oodles of us—as I pick up and sip from my typewriter mug that says in bright red, “You’re my type.”
All of you so are.
***
You can learn more about free writing dates with the London Writers’ Salon here.
You’ve traveled this far on the back of every mistake. — Dorianne Laux, from “Antilamentation”
So list ’em. Write ’em down. C’mon, you’ve kept some of them—too many of them—wrapped around your heart like rusty barbed wire,
and if you make a list (too many rainstorms without an umbrella) you’ll feel better, truly (I thought I could hack chemistry?) the badder, the better (charred my lungs on one cigarette)
(sneaked a look at my notes on the final) (who said red hair would look good on me?) (the accident/relationship I drove away from)
Keep going, honey: (shouldna kissed/slept with/married that one) (took the wrong class/wrong turn/wrong job)
And? (forgot to water the plants/feed the cat/pay those bills) (ran the stop sign/ran up the credit cards/ran when it got tough)
Worst of all? (didn’t trust you/love you/let you love me) (didn’t say goodbye/should’ve stayed till the end/fell for someone else)
And now look at your list, fingers on the page, lift it to your lips and kiss it, then let it go— send your regrets floating off a bridge,
rocking to the river below, then floating away, or folding it into an airplane, throwing it as hard and far as you can,
or setting it aflame, or burying it in a deep hole. Unwind that barbed wire from your heart and repeat three times:
The itch that demands a scratch right in the middle of the back, the spot no amount of arm twisting can reach, sends bears backing up into trees to shimmy into rough bark just right for scraping away annoyance.
The irritation that sends dogs into frenzy, cats into paroxysms of agitation, and me looking for someone, anyone, with even the smallest fingernails to go after the point that my brownie-baking grandmother would happily attack with gusto for as long as I liked, saying,
Is that better, honey? More?
And when I’d nod or moan my assent, practically bicycling my leg like a happy dog, I relished the pleasure of having another lavish kind attention on my person, this garage for my soul, still carting me through six-and-a-half golden decades.
May it always continue with hugs and back scratches, as much agreeable touch as one can decently get in public, and perhaps, with luck, the private brush of caress, of cuddle, of embrace, affirmation of endearment, testament to true affection.
Grizzly bear back scratch, Denali National Park / Photo: Patrick J. Endres
I retrieve the thick blue foam pad and toss it in the empty bucket along with a sturdy trowel, my favorite pair of clippers and the digger— a three-pronged fork perfect for raking small patches of stubborn dirt.
If I remember, I grab the gardening gloves I’d rather not use but know I should in thorny situations. Dirty hands, soil embedded in nails, drying the skin, is such a satisfying feeling, as it is to sink onto the foam kneeler before a plant, a bed, a bush that needs attention.
Is there a more humbling act than this? I never considered myself a prayerful person; it took years to see that this pose that strains muscles I use only to do this work counts as communion, as divine interaction,
that every whispered, OK, grow now, is a heartfelt blessing, a devotion. This being human is blessedly low, of the earth—me, here, with busy hands, happy in quietude, tranquil mind.
And when I rise, brush off dirt and plant bits—stray roots dangling from my knees like lace—I grin at my creaking parts as, unbidden, the prayer sweeps through:
On an overcast Wednesday I walk the front yard, casting like a fly fisherman looking for the best spot. I eyeball possibilities after yesterday’s wander through a nursery, guessing how many plants I need based on what survived the drenching winter—as always, driving home with too many. But that, I figure, gives me options.
Which I need when, sinking to my knees in supplication, despite my best efforts at digging, I can’t deepen a hole thanks to old roots or decomposing clay pipe. The big fellow in the gallon pot will need a different place to land, so instead I choose the small red-flowered kalanchoe, a new-to-me succulent that prompts a prayer of hope for this little one.
As I dig, I unearth more than a few earthworms, depositing their wiry pink bodies in the dirt I set aside, position the plant just so in its cradle, then tuck the original occupants back in with their new roommate.
I cringe when I accidentally trowel one in half. But the two ends continue to wriggle and, I understand, thrive, reborn within eight days into fully functioning worms—mouth, brain and all.
So I pray to the garden gods that these blind and deaf creatures may safely burrow their tubular selves into dark soil, eating and pooing and creating healthy space for new roots—silent environmental helpers busily improving their home place, which they so gracefully share with us, too.
Moist, dark soil, ready for new life to begin. —Tina Davidson
We live for this all winter, the first trip to the nursery to see the babies, to coochie-coo under their tiny leaves, to fondle their too-heavy heads, so hard to hold up.
We can’t wait to bring them home and tuck them into their beds, freshly turned dirt waiting for them, our hands busy with implements, a little food, a hose—whatever we think they need to grow.
We often come home with too many, then search for places to put them. But we find them places where we will check on them probably far too often. We will enthuse over each centimeter of height, over new leaves.
We will pluck the shedding bits, and yes, some of them we will mourn, gone before their time. Already in their resting places, we may just tuck them under a bit more, thank them for what they brought to us in their brief lives, remember their
perkiness when we brought them home, full of promise, as we promised them everything, refusing to think of the moment they would leave us, kneeling in supplication, dirt under our nails,
before we turn again to the ones still growing—the taller, bushier, thriving ones we hope, with luck, will outlive us.
Hey. That vine that climbed the trellis in your Aunt Betty’s backyard, the one with miniature pink buds that popped out like teeny nipples each spring,
the one you said smelled like a French whorehouse—what was that again? Because it’s climbing over my fence. Haven’t seen it for several years
but boom! It’s back. I’d know that smell anywhere, but I can’t for the life of me remember what it’s called. Some kind of jasmine? Not the showy white star
jasmine—these are tighter, smaller blooms—and it’s driving me crazy that I can’t remember. More crazy that you’re not here to remind me. Here. I’ll take
a photo, hold the phone to the sky; maybe you can see it from where you are. Or better yet, I’ll just go stand by those blossoms that are like catnip to bees
(yeah, I’m mixing a metaphor—you loved doing that),
and I’ll inhale deeply and think of you saying, “Yep, French whorehouse,” as if you knew firsthand, anticipating my reliable guffaw, which is perhaps why its name escapes me,
delighting as I do in your perfumed simile. Tell you what: I’ll park myself by the fence for as long as it takes for you to drop the name into my ear, just to hear your voice through
spring sunbeams, basking in the lush, overpowering sweetness that brings you to me—pink jasmine, BFF!—so heady I have to sit down, breathless,
