Vine Woman

I went out for a long walk yesterday afternoon. The sun was out, and while it was cold it, well – sun. It was windy, but I have never really minded the wind. I grew up in a place where wind was a near daily event; a desert valley where the wind seemed to gear up at one end to make a mad dash to the other. Not a fan of blowing dust or sand as a result, but wind in and of itself has always been rather comforting to me. There is something peaceful in the sound of the branches creaking, in the rustle of leaves, even in the howling of a storm.

Walking in the wind in the early afternoon, I began to really hear all of the sounds around me. The rhythmic flapping of a flag creating a percussion line to the quiet whoosh of the air. The gentle rattle of a loose street sign gave a bit of reverb to it all. A lazy crow, floating on the currents was both discordant and striking in contrast to it all. And then, of course, the wind itself like a muted version of the ocean upon the shore. It was a really amazing symphony to me, a peaceful chorus of man and nature.

Granted, we try to tart up such things with our own additions. A neighbor a few doors down appears to have an inordinate fondness for wind chimes. They hang from her porch eaves, drip from hooks in a post, from hooks in the planter boxes; she adds to these all manner of spinners and wind socks so that in a decent breeze the whole place looks rather like a demented miniature fair. Walking past on a day like today is somewhat akin to wandering into a really bad warmup of a less than stellar brass band. I can’t imagine what it must be like to live with that, to have that outside the door.

It made me wonder what it was about the wind this person was trying to harness or deflect. A single wind chime is fine, almost zen if the tone is right. But that many? I wonder if the howl of the wind is frightening and this an attempt to make it less so. Maybe it is a way to push away silence. A chance to feel less lonely. A lot of us are uncomfortable in the silence.

For me silence works just fine. It gives me time to slow down, to think, to ponder. But mostly I find that silence is rarely silent. There is always something, from the wind to the general hum that seems to always be in the background, sounds are around us pretty much constantly. Perhaps we can learn something about ourselves by looking at what sounds we seek out, even in the silence.

I used to commute from Bellevue, WA into downtown Seattle. The route I took went across Lake Washington on a floating bridge. There is a moment when you kind of emerge from the trees and are looking out over the lake. It is a spectacular view, really; especially on a somewhat misty morning. It just seems other-worldly. One morning I wondered what it must have been like for the early settlers of this region, coming through the desert of what is now Eastern Washington or Oregon, after grueling months of slow travel, and then breaching the mountain ranges and see all of this verdant glory. I wondered what in heaven’s name would cause them to leave home and safety; to put everything into, at best, a hard journey to get here.

The answer, of course, is that we are explorers. We question and seek, over and over again. Sometimes failing spectacularly, sometimes succeeding beyond anyone’s wildest dreams. Sometimes we just stumble into it. There is something primal, I think, in questioning the status quo or looking to the horizon. It has taken us from caves to Mars. Literally. And yet for all that primal drive, look at how hard we resist change, how hard we avoid questions.

This is all on my mind today because of Google. I opened it up this morning and there were the heavens in all their glory, just as Copernicus saw them; it is the anniversary of his birthday today. The first man to question the deeply held belief that everything revolved around earth. It was a minor scandal at the time, one that would gain steam mostly after his death (and by the actions of that rabble-rouser Galileo), but that fundamentally changed our knowledge of the world.

Exploration. Questioning. They are two sides of the same coin, or perhaps a natural progression; we question and then we set out to find the answer. Exploration used to have a romanticism to it. The Victorians took it up as a hobby, at least the gentry did, and folks like Darwin made incredible discoveries. The quest for knowledge was considered noble, the Royal Geographic Society was formed to encourage it. Tales of discovery made for ripping yarns, the kind we all tried to re-enact in the backyard or the schoolyard when we were kids. I wonder how many slides, tree houses, trees, large rocks, refrigerator boxes have been transformed – however briefly – into pirate ships, space ships, wagon trains over the years.

And yet once we become adults, most of us leave that sense of discovery behind. We stop questioning. Probably because the questions become a bit more real. And because we are told we need to buckle down, be productive, add to the gross national product. We start to dismiss that desire as a mid-life crisis, as too fanciful. That guy has his head in the clouds. She’s ‘just’ a dreamer. But the world sat transfixed as the Curiosity Rover dropped from the heavens onto the Red Planet, a project that was wildly creative from the sky crane that delivered it to all the technology on board.

I have to wonder on this day, this anniversary of the man dared to challenge the status quo and literally changed the very foundations of our thinking, what things we could do – as individuals, as communities, as societies – if we took even a small page from that book. If we dared not just to dream, but to act. Blazed trails. Took risks. Questioned authority.

Dad and Mom on the steps at Chico State University.

Yesterday was my Dad’s birthday. He’s a pretty great guy, and thinking about birthday gifts got me to thinking about the gifts he has given to me. Both of my parents were teachers, in fact teaching is pretty much the family business when you get down to it. Uncles, Aunts, grandparents, siblings, there are a ton of teachers in the group. But Mom and Dad, they were my first teachers.

Dad taught English, history and government; and I can honestly say that my love of history and a goodly amount of my love of language came from him. I have wonderful memories of his history lessons. He rarely just gave us an answer to a question, there was usually far more to it than that. A book would come down off the bookcase, a passage would be pointed out, discussion would follow. I still recall a 7th grade Civil War history test, a take home test at that, which resulted in a number of my classmates at my house. Dad wouldn’t give us the answers as I think some assumed. Instead he put his rather extensive library on the subject at our disposal. We all got A’s.

I fell in love with history because of him. He has given me an appreciation for how modern day events are affected by past ones, how you can often predict what will happen by looking at similar situations in the past. He made history come alive for me. Never did he resort to dry lists of facts and dates, instead he wove a story around that framework which usually compelled me to go off and learn more about it. It is a direct result of those stories that I found myself spending four hours in the Imperial War Museum in London. In fact, I can honestly say that part of my love for travel is rooted in my love of history. Few things match the feeling of standing on a spot, knowing what went on there. The battlefield at Hastings, standing in a Roman amphitheater in France, wandering the streets of Bruges and having this sense of history wash over me; that is also because of him.

One of his favorite gifts to give has always been books. My love for intrigue novels is his fault. It started with a trio of Robert Ludlum books; books that I devoured in a manner of days. Next was John Le Carre, and then I was off and running. He gives me a book, I find a new area of interest and new books are added to my shelves. Looking over at those shelves right now I see a collection largely inspired by him. This includes both fiction and non-fiction books about espionage, intrigue, intelligence services. On my nightstand are two new books on the subject (one about the Mossad, another about a triple spy!).

Another book that I love, one of the best gifts I ever received, is my dictionary of Modern American Usage. Yes, I am just that much of a geek about language. Mom introduced me to Shakespeare, Dad encouraged the addiction to language. I get from him an unholy love of puns, of playing with words and a deep interest in their origins.

For his birthday, brother Erik and I sent him a collection of gourmet foods. Looking around me here in the office I can only marvel at where his gifts have taken me.