This was a morning that came with a big surf on Topsail Island. Still, this lone bird and I showed up--he for breakfast, and me for the time of day. Those waves were big and loud. It's a wonderful thing to hear nothing but the surf and to be pulled into it because it will have you. A lovely surrender.
The USS North Carolina in Wilmington, North Carolina, is a marvel of modern warfare. Walking the several levels of this floating city designed for the single purpose of pounding the enemy into submission, I am in awe. "Who thought all this up?" is all I can think. (I know; I'm brilliant.) There are wires and cables and gauges everywhere, and who knows for what purpose and how this purpose is connected to that one and how it all comes together to make a single machine of sheer force. Somehow all this stuff comes together to support the men on the battleship that they might do their part to win a war as it's fought in the Pacific. There's nothing easy about this boat. And then to think there are so many just like it for the same purpose. Then, to think of all the men who piled on to make it go and to fight and to win and maybe come home. Maybe not. Walking this thing from top to bottom with my nephew Alex, we see veterans who served on the North Carolina talking to Navy officers who are on board for some special event. There is a lot of tenderness in all this strength. Somehow. (My other photos are here.)
After Clyde's running-away drama, he was under house arrest, and I kept him tethered to me whenever we ventured out. Getting used to life down where he lives it, I discovered some pretty nice things grow close to the ground. These yellow flowers towered over him, and they were lovely. He and I came across them when we revisited the scene of the crime (possibly) at the top of Topsail Island.
After a busy school year, a busy summer school, and a busy few weeks vacationing with my family on Topsail Island, it was good to have a week to myself. They were quiet days during which I sat back and watched the world.
One of the most delightful things I watched was the entering into the ocean of a newly hatched loggerhead turtle. He made his journey across the sand to the water with the help of some turtle hospital volunteers and 50 onlookers who cheered him on his way. Night had come early; the sky was black with storm clouds before 7:30. In the dull light, the water swirled round the little guy, rendering him invisible and then taking him on his way in very little time.
Just watching that little guy do what he was destined to do--to step into whatever life had to offer under cover of darkness and despite the rough weather coming (or maybe with the help of it) and just go, all alone in a vast world--humbled me.
You do what you do because you're you. You go.
Looking into the sky a little later that night, I saw the light of military helicopters whose pilots and crew were doing what they do because they are who they are. They were practicing for what lay ahead in Pakistan and other parts East. Looking into the sky day and night any day of that week, I saw these fighters at work. Alone or in groups of two or three, they flew in and out of view, close to the water, up and down the beach. It seemed no matter where I turned, they were there. Their presence wouldn't let me forget there is a world beyond the strip of beach called Topsail Island, that not everything in this world is calm and easy.
That you do what you do because you're you. You go.
Watching all this, I wondered if character is a choice or a matter of destiny or maybe a bit of both.
Watching the natural world at work with the love and admiration of ordinary people and watching the military world at work through the sheer force of will of the individuals who make it, I got to thinking those things that don't display these kinds of excellence just aren't important.
Make it count, or let it go, but stay with what is important. Be yourself; be excellent.
That last week was a good one. It returned me to my own little world feeling sure and calm. If the turtle can do it, if the dudes in the sky can do it, then I who live somewhere between their worlds can do it. I will be myself.
Slowly, I am going through my Topsail Island photos and enjoying looks back at three beautiful weeks in the most wonderful place in my world. I have enough pictures to get me to Christmas, when I will return. Three weeks there was enough time to see time change, to become aware at the end of the day of how much lower the sun was than when we arrived. The light seemed to skitter across the wet sand like sea foam, temporary, evanescent, dreamy, lovely.
This rose bloomed between two of its predecessors outside the Poplar Grove Plantation in Wilmington, North Carolina, a few weeks ago. Beyond the roses was this garden and a tree (What kind of?) draped in Spanish moss. I like the moss very much. It seems to insist on coolness no matter how muggy the day.
I saw dolphins on the horizon following a shrimp boat while I was swimming this morning, and I thought of a sixth-grade boy in Waterbury who was one of my students in the summer program. He is a sweet, slight child--the kind whose bones break if you raise your voice even slightly. He is an angel.
This child's big summer trip was to go to the Mystic Aquarium in Mystic, Connecticut, and see dolphins. He told me this right after he told me he wished the summer program would never end. This was at the end of our third week, when my eyes were on the calendar and I was counting down to North Topsail Beach for three weeks of bliss on the beach.
His words out of the blue--"I wish the summer program would go on forever, Miss"--stopped me in my tracks. Obviously, being in a poorly air-conditioned, dirty school building with hallways loaded with janitorial junk; eating government-issue breakfast and lunch (too scary to think about); and being with a mix of kids who seemed so much larger and more wordly than he to do school work, real and serious school work, meant a lot to this kid.
He left me tongue-tied. In my clumsiness, I asked what else he had planned for the summer. That's when he told me about the Mystic dolpins.
On the last day of the summer program, as he was heading for the door, he made a hard right and survived a trip through a fast-moving river of kids focused on leaving so he could give me a big hug. The child said thank you and then, "I'll see you in a few weeks."
My nephew Alex remarked to me last week, "I don't understand why people go somewhere hotter than home for vacation." He had done just that--left Connecticut for North Carolina. And I thought, "Because you don't get closer to heaven than North Topsail Beach, baby." I love the heat. I love the intensity of summer here. I love the beach and the relief and the slowing down and the slow waking and all that goes on. I say go passion for passion. God sends you a hot morning, then live it hot. Just go there and be the day you want to remember. And sweat without shame. Because it's all good.
Amid all the activity on the beach this evening--Marines in their various helicopters playing tag in the sky, pelicans outflying them, seagulls eating dead stingrays, sandpipers being themselves, children eating sand--a baby loggerhead made its way to the top of its nest and into the hands of a volunteer from the Karen Beasley Sea Turtle Rescue and Rehab. Center, to be swept into the wide-open arms of the Atlantic amid the cheering of about 50 people. The turtle walked about 20 feet to the water's edge--enough to imprint Topsail as home (I can relate.). After a little boost from another volunteer, the turtle disappeared into the night sea. Magic. Life.
Adella and I visited Airlie Gardens in Wilmington, North Carolina, last week. There we came across this sculpture garden dedicated to the memory of Minnie Evans. Says the Smithsonian of American folk artist Minnie Evans: "Evans traced her background to a maternal ancestor who was brought to the United States from Trinidad as a slave. There are elements in Evans' art that invite comparison to Caribbean folk art forms, though the artist only once traveled outside her native North Carolina. The bright colors and floral motifs that appear in her paintings were most likely inspired by trees and flowers, especially azaleas, at Airlie Gardens in Wilmington, where Evans worked as the gatekeeper for many years."
Here's a flower blooming in a wonderful but neglected part of Airlie Gardens outside Wilmington, North Carolina. A beautiful place. My daughter and I visited the gardens last week. There we saw a 450-year-old oak tree, a butterfly house, a sculpture garden, and countless other beautifully landscaped areas. The site was once the playground of a rich couple who liked to entertain their guests in style!
Because of my own carelessness, my daughter's Dachshund Clyde ran away yesterday and didn't return until five this morning. From the time he bolted through the (duh) open door until I went to sleep last night, I walked the beaches of Topsail, questioned vacationers, drove through neighborhoods, and prayed he would return. I notified the police, the beach patrol, the elderly gentleman picking cans and bottles from the trash at the park--everyone--that Clyde was missing. Up went a video on YouTube and some local sites asking for Clyde's safe return. We did all we could think of doing to bring that dog home.
In my heart I knew there was nothing to do but wait. He would have to come home on his own. Still, there was no way I could stop looking for my daughter's dog. No way I could shoot the philosophical angle of wait-and-see over this dog she loves so much.
Della was three hours into the trip home when she received my call that Clyde had run away. The car turned around and she joined the search party.
We stood on the beach after supper yesterday and I apologized again for losing the dog. "It's all my fault, Dell," I said to her. "I know, mom, but I don't blame you." She hugged me. I cried. The search went on.
The elderly gentleman in the park had told me, "You'll be blessed," when he took my number and said he'd let me know if he found Clyde. "I'm waiting for it," I thought bitterly as I got ready for bed but there was no dog.
Yet I knew. I had been blessed. By my daughter's gracious love. By the man who cycled all over Surf City for me looking for the pup. By the vacationers who told me what they knew and sincerely promised they'd do what they could. By the lady at the police station who took down all my information and told me she hoped I'd find the dog--and to be sure to tell her if I did. By the man at the park who promised a blessing; he didn't let me forget that life is a blessing even in situations like this one. There were so many.
Last night we left some of Adella's clothes on the front porch. I hoped Clyde would get a whiff of his best buddy and come home. Did that do it? I don't know. But he was here in the morning and in Adella's arms. And he was remarkably clean. Today he has been remarkably grateful for the soft cushions on the furniture outside and for my steadfast attention. He knows where life is good. We have been tethered to each other all day. I'm a slow learner, but when I get it, I get it.
I have learned that you do all you can and then you go to sleep, peacefully, knowing that life takes care of itself. It really does. My last prayer last night? "Clyde, come home." Life does take care of itself. The trick is to be the place with the soft cushions for the ones you love.
I have had the privilege over the last several weeks of reading the work of a talented writer who has just started a blog entitled Music, Scars, and Love: A Man Undefined.
Chris is a very talented writer. He is honest and real and clear--and therefore well worth reading. He writes with an unselfconscious confidence and strength that are excellent. Please pay him a visit here. What I can offer today pales in comparison.
The other day my sister and I brought the Yankee fan, Alex, and Adella to see the Bellamy Mansion in Wilmington, North Carolina. The building's architect hailed from New Jersey; and the draftsman was a Connecticut Yankee who got a little cranky over the Civil War, returned to the North, and then came back to fight the war. Slaves and ex-slaves built the house, which was Union headquarters during the occupation of Wilmington.
I took my nephews and my daughter to the Poplar Grove Plantation in Wilmington, North Carolina, last week. The magnolia trees on the grounds of this very interesting place were gorgeous. Here was the sole blossom open on a sultry summer day. More pictures of the plantation are here.
There are so many rules
My daughter says:
When to jump
When to tread
When to flutter kick
When to swim in
When to swim out
When I should let go of her
Do this, do that,
I say
As I watch the water
And know
If I were alone
This is what I would do
So that the numbered hairs
On my head
Would stay dry.
I have taught her this:
If you stay light by giving in to the water,
The push of the wave toward the shore
Is stronger than the pull of the current
That would take her so far away
If you lift yourself up,
If you choose to be brought in.
It's all up to you.
I have taught her this:
Do you want to be here
Or elsewhere?
Swim or don't swim.
Today is the anniversary of Craig Lundwall's birth. He would be 44 if he were here today. But he is not. He took his life in April, 2001.
I met Craig in confirmation class at the Danbury United Methodist Church when we were in the eighth grade in 1981. I had a crush on him then. He was funny, charming, sweet. What not to love? I looked forward to those classes for the opportunity to sit beside him and to laugh. Once, our pastor, The Rev. Terry W. Pfeiffer, assigned us the responsibility of accolyting together. On that particular Sunday, Craig said something about farting, and I loved him all the more. He was real. He farted.
We met again in high school, remembered the church connection, and evolved into the closest of friends. That friendship endured until he took his life in April, 2001. It's not that we knew each other and liked each other; it's that we loved each other for who we were, no questions or qualifications or complications. We loved each other as friends.
I used to think the world suffered a terrible loss because Craig was gone. I used to think the world could be so much more if he were here.
I was angry and sad. And the sadness and anger got the best of me.
Though I miss Craig, I am neither sad nor angry now. I think now, "Thank you for being here, Craig, and thank you for sharing the road with me for so long." Thank you for making my life beautiful.
I think, "Thank you, Craig."
I think, "I love you."
I think, "Dammit."
The cruelty of this world and all those people who "loved him even though he was gay" got the best of him. Always the qualifier, always the "even though you're not worth it, I love you." Always the "I am better than you, so be grateful" in the I love you.
Craig, I loved you for you. You loved me for me. We set the bar high. That was our gift to each other. You are gone. Now, may I live without compromise. May I love without compromise. May I honor your gift.
Love well. Give everything. Because, dammit, love is beautiful.
If Craig Lundwall were here today, he would be marking his 44th birthday. It would be a celebration. All who knew and loved him would be sharing the joy. Craig was remarkable, first and last, for his kindness and his sense of humor. These gifts manifested themselves in so many ways that no single person who knew him--even very well--can name completely.
Craig took his life nine years ago for reasons I don't--can't--fully understand. Obviously, sorrow overwhelmed him, and he saw no other way out. What pain, what anger, what frustration filled his heart I can well imagine, but I don't know. The bottom line is that those things that were not good won out over those things that were marvelous in every way. So his pain was big.
I used to say the world is so much less now that he is gone. That was my own sorrow talking. I see it differently now. These days I say, "Thank you Craig, for being here, and for sharing the road with me for so many years." His gifts were many and beautiful; to stay in sorrow is to miss that. No more.
Every time I say thank you, Craig is here, and the way is beautiful yet.
These guys were ignoring the mobs of kids and kid-like people who were shouting at them at the Bronx Zoo, telling them to wake up and--do what on a hot summer day? Languor was the only logical response to the heat of their day; no need to do or perform. Room service would come, after all. No need to rush about. Though a patch of real estate in a major metropolitan area isn't the right place for these animals, it was working for them. Faced with the choice of hunting down your dinner or waiting for it to arrive, what would you do?
I noticed these guys were in bloom when Della and I were walking Clyde along the Pomperaug at Three Rivers last week. They were the sunshine on that soft, grey summer day. There are many different wildflowers along the river. The stops and starts that go with walking a dog made them more obvious to me than usual. Thanks, Clyde!
