Awash in flame...

It's the how I remember things from that time that is odd to me. The dreams I had then tell me more about my struggle than anything else. It is the only time in my life that I have ever dreamt about fire on a consistent basis. Not just fire in it's beauty and strength, or even in it's demand of respect and attention. But fire like the scourge of alcohol poured on to an open wound. These violent, active images that lay in wait in sleep were telling me the damage that occured then, was far beyond what I could understand. What I may ever understand...

Last night I dreamt about the ocean, awash in flame.

Waves were crawling across a beach as black as night, glowing in hues of red, orange and ocher. The light upon the water was eerie and pulsating from the fires and the intense sunset which was reflected there. Fires alight with voracious heat and flickering tongue, in the water and on the beach. Fires... Everything was burning. Everything seemed haunted and alive. Smoke, dense in my nostrils with the smell of charred wood and fabric, burnt earth. The air hazy, acrid and dry made my eyes water and itch. I rubbed them smearing soot across my cheeks, blackening my tear streaked hands. In this landscape it was hard to decipher between what was fire, water, and sky.

The beach was a long stretch of black sandy grade, slow and shallow. It bore each wave like the tender drip of a torture device. Waves taking their time to spread all the way out before receding back just as slowly. This dark beach was peering out from underneath the orange, vitrescent waves as the water returned to itself again and again. It was mesmerizing. It was frightening. It was beautiful. This scene was terrifying to me, but there was such light here. Such beautiful, dancing, fluid light like glass being blown and wielded just before it shatters. I heard someone faintly say, "Shall I light a fire for you?" But saw no one. I felt no one near.

These many beach fires, they had been intentionally lit. Fire on the beach. Fire in the water. Debris everywhere, in flame. This, the left over burning of waste; of that which is not wanted, or discarded, of that which is left, of that which remains, it is burning... Large sections of debris were in flame as far as I could see across the inlet. The ocean having claimed some for herself, was carrying parts of it away, still on fire, out to sea. These parcels appeared to be the remnants of a ship, a cabin, a structure of some kind. So much of it, spread out so far now. Charred, no longer recognisable here and there burning, scattered, strewn. There was something familiar here, like tea leaves in a cup. This particular configuration seemed right, and through my black tears recognizable like the back of my hand.

The fires on the water were astonishingly captivating. I found myself in a trance staring out at sea, the movement, rhythm and color there. Shadows and light, water and fire, bizarre and unreal. Entranced, I stood, walked, sat in the wet sand, sprinted across the angry beach, finally laying crumpled, exhausted, worn. I stayed on the beach for hours. Sat and held my knees to my chest, found myself in deep sobs of remorse and release. Tear streaks on my ashy face. Face marks on my knees. Eyes inflamed and raw. But I could not bear to not watch it all burn. I couldn't close my eyes. I wanted to see it. I wanted to bear witness. I was home.

I watched it slowly smolder through the evening. The sky turned to black. And as the stars blinked their way back in to being the captors of the night, I was gifted. The blue blackness was luxurious. The color shift from reds to deep tones was soothing, calming, quiet. It felt like a cloak had fallen upon me, weighing me down into the earth. This cloak made of dark, vaporous night.

Suddenly I was aware that Lincoln was here. He was sitting not far from me, a little over an arms reach away and behind me to my right. I wasn't startled, but on edge. I didn't want him to know I wasn't aware of him the whole time. I wasn't provoked by him. I wasn't surprised. Oddly I wasn't even aroused by his presence. I didn't care. There was no exchange. No emotion revealed. No connection. He was just there, observing, being. I was annoyed by it. Repulsed by him. And if I did nothing he would move on. I slept some, closed my eyes in prayer more like, and the night passed, and the dark passed. And he was there...but not for me.

And as the morning light erupted on to the beach, and stars disappeared in the sky, there appeared the beach of my childhood. The beach of Kingston Washington, a pale gray and blue palette, pristine but for the dark shapes on the bank in low tide. The beach now seemed the palest blue silk kimono with black herons in flight across it's weave. So lovely, almost fragile, most certainly fleeting. Fleeting because unexpectedly there were birds. So many birds. Bright birds, noisy and aggressive, not herons at all. Birds who picked through the rubbage, scavengers all.

And I was angered now. Reeling at the strange gull like birds, such lack of respect. Disturbing the silence, the peace, the burial grounds that this felt like. How dare they take that away from me too. These birds were disturbing the dead. Disturbing what had just been in flame. Dismantling again the landscape before me. I wanted them gone. I started to pick up rocks and throw them at the strange birds. And I threw rocks at them harder than I thought I could throw, with better aim, and with more power than I knew I had. And he stared at me, confused. I didn't care. I looked away unfazed. He waited awhile watching me, contemplating my strange action. Then he too picked up rocks and began to throw them at the birds saying, "Good idea".

It had been a long troubled night. And the birds were annoying, noisy and bright. They were tearing at things, and fighting with each other, squawking and screaming in a cacophony of sound. I could not stop them, and gave up my fight. They were on task and quite desperate in their need. I was exhausted and in deep grief and shock. I needed to sleep now. I wanted to rest. I needed to shut all of this out. When I heard Lincoln whisper, "Shall I light a fire for you"? And I replied as I walked away, "Do what you wish, but not for me".

Centerfuge

There is the time that passes and changes you, and the time that leaves you bare. Moments in a life that seem to capture some essence of who you are, or who you will become. There are many episodes in time that are pivotal to one's character. For me, the mid spring/summer months around my 23rd birthday would be that centerfuge by which my psyche revolves even today.

I found her here on MySpace. That small buddah like cherub that I held in my arms, is now 18 years old. I stared blankly at her picture for a long time thinking I would recognise her, know her somehow. A pixie in her own right. Different than her mother. For that I am glad. Lovely, dark haired and somehow brooding. I imagine she would be. But so much time has passed. She wouldent remember me. Not that I would expect her to. Or even want that.

But I remember her... She used to love to put the small round crystal I wore on my neck into her tiny baby mouth. That pendant was a touchstone for me during that time. She used to seek it out sparkling in the hot Mexico sun. Gobbling up the clarity that was so missing for all of us then. That clarity that is still missing, even now.

I still have that pendant. I cant bear to wear it. I wonder why I hold on to it then? I so rarely look at it there in my jewlery box. Except that it holds a place for me. Marks that time which is so fragmented. It is one of only a few objects that I desperatley hold on to prove to myself that that period of time existed. It's existance tells me something. It makes me laugh a little to think of it's circular shape. The axis by which it was made, and worn. The place that it rested there on my body, between my heart and my voice. That place so much a turning point, a point of rotation, that marked center...

Breathe, just breathe...

There are moments when to breathe in large amounts of oxygen (like you have never taken in breath into your lungs before), becomes a huge revelation of beauty and wonder. In the last few months I have had a kind of love affair with breathing. I know that sounds ridiculous. We all breathe. All the time. But that is the point... When are we aware of our breath?

Maybe we are momentarily aware of our breath: if we are meditating, or exercising, or singing our lungs off in the shower, or having sex, or when we hic up, or yawn, or when we are perhaps underwater for some reason? But really the fact that this automatic response - breathing air in and out - can also be consciously controlled, is quite something dont you think? Breathing is a part of the autonomic nervous system. Respiratory function happens with out our needing to think about it. Even if we were to hold our breath long enough to pass out, once unconscious we would automatically do what? ...Breathe... Our brain, and our bodies want air. Maybe more than any other thing on the planet: not money, not oil, not sex, drugs, or security, not love, not joy, not power, just air. Give me air...

In the last few months there are instances where I have felt shock, or been surprised at something, frightened even, where I have taken in air quickly, "to catch one's breath". I have felt instances of huge relief, like when an immense burden has been lifted off, and you slow your exhalation purposefully to feel the relaxation flow over you, settling in, deepening. Ive had instances of needing air so desperately, Im gasping for it. Where the breath has become to slow or shallow, and the build up of carbon dioxide is too great in the bloodstream that you find yourself taking in air in large gulps. We all probably have had these experiences in the last few months, but did you think about them when they happened? Were you really aware of your breath?

Take a big breath now. Do it. Doesnt it feel good? Did you know that your left lung is smaller than your right? Do you know why? Your heart lives on the left side of your body where your lungs live. There's only so much space. And I have just quit smoking, again... But I have done so partly because of this recent love affair with breathing. With this new awareness of the wonder of such a simple, involuntary act. We breathe hundreds of times a day... To breathe is to be alive. Because we know that without it, we would expire, and not breathe in again... Maybe that one breath you just took consciously, will change your life too? Maybe it was just another breath that went by...unnoticed.

Not a dream at all...

Last night before bed I saw a large raccoon trundle out into the light of the street lamp not 50 yards from me. It was a big animal, unaware for long moments that I was looking on, taking in the sight of him. I was somewhat surprised at the casualness that he took out in the open; thinking maybe he was unafraid or uncaring of my gaze.

I was sitting silently watching the fog roll in off of the tree tops. How it danced and wavered in the light and breeze between the branches of the huge maple in my front yard, eerily falling in waves towards the ground. When out of a hedge he came silently into view. He walked 5 feet out of the shadows in to the driveway of my neighbors house, sniffing at the ground, looking onward. He was round and healthy, quite beautiful. Fixated on the pavement, looking, looking at something I could not see. He seemed to saunter though, cocky and amused.

I haven't seen such a large raccoon maybe ever. I was giving him no reason to change his direction or his intent on finding whatever it was he was looking for. I was just there noticing him. And in his looking he was unphased by my presence or simply remiss. Regardless, I know they are intelligent animals with a viscous streak. Something to be wary of. Yet I was not.

I found myself wondering what he would do when he finally did understand I was near. I found myself waiting for the moment to let him know. As the moments passed, I thought for sure he would see me there, hear or smell me. But he did not. I finally moved my arm slightly, just enough not to make a noise but create a movement he would certainly feel. With his masked face now pointed directly at me, he stared for what seemed like a long time. He gazed right into my eyes - weighing his options. He was in plain sight and knew it. He knew as well that I had been there longer than he had, observing him. It was unnerving to him I knew. But I was no threat to him, just reminding him about what is hidden, about secrecy and disguise. Who was the one wearing the mask? Who was transformed?

I knew it was me, as he very carefully sized me up once more and turned to slip into the night.