A lesson from a new friend: let things flow through you, no need to collect or hold them.
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personal reflection
Mary Oliver wrote an essay about dogs called "Dog Talk" that I just love. I love it for many reasons, mostly because it appreciates dogs for their complexity and challenges me to overcome my fear of them.
In her essay, she reminds us that dogs are from two worlds — the domestic and the wild — and that they uniquely experience both fully. She writes, "Dog promises and then forgets." And doesn't he? I sense in Rusty an intelligence that communicates with me and makes contractual agreements.
- "I won't pull on the leash if you take me to that thing over there."
- "I won't wake you if you prioritize me and take me out right away."
- "I'll do pretty much anything you want if you give me a treat."
But then there are moments of demanding behavior, or of hunting, or of playfulness and he is overcome. The contracts that bind us are far away.
Reading Oliver's essay, I thought, "Human realizes and then forgets." I have moments of deep insight into who I am, or how it all works, or what I need or want and then I am distracted — just like Rusty when he smells a chicken bone on the sidewalk or spies a neighborhood cat underneath a porch — and I lose it. I get distracted by the details and the drama and I am overcome. The wisdom that I once found is far away.
Humans are entirely domesticated, but we do know a similar duality. We live as both the grasshopper and the ant, both the tortoise and the hare, both the domestic dog that promises and the wild one that goes after whatever it desires, or fears, and forgets.
Last night, after a series of events, the pie safe and kitchen table pictured here were reunited.
The table has been in my family for over a hundred years. It was my great grandmother's, and then my mother's, and it was the table I sat at to do homework and eat supper everyday as a child. Each black water stain that shows through its stone maple grain was my fault.
The pie safe was a gift from my uncle John when we were very poor. I'm not sure why he bought it for her, but it came at a time when we didn't have very much and nothing new. It was a piece of furniture my mom took pride in. It was a bright presence, despite its dark wood, in our similarly brown and dark trailer.
I was given the pie safe when I graduated college. I used it in my first apartment as a toy chest, filled with toy guns and ironing boards and Smurfs and Motown California Raisins. In my next apartment, it was a pantry. Its contents were among some of the first signs of evidence of my choice to live a healthier life. In the Treehaus, it was a fully stocked bar and then later, a wardrobe. In the Perry Building, it spent several years in the basement as storage for home-canned goods and then for the last year as a bookshelf in the living room.
My Mom got remarried on January 8th and moved into a new house. Jen and I went down for the wedding and we rented a truck to bring back the table. It's been in the basement for a couple weeks, but last night we brought it up and also moved the pie safe into the dining room. This morning as I sat drinking coffee and reading over cookbooks, I found it a strange comfort to be back in their company. I treasure these two unexpectedly. The childhood they represent is one from which I distanced myself as soon as I got the chance. But gently, they invite me to reconsider that distance — to reunite the past with the present; to change and also stay myself.
You are the shark. YOU ARE THE SHARK. #youareyourownshark