Essay #2- Water

"Elemental Pool"- San Diego, CA

When I feed my son a cup of water, I usually find myself saying something to the effect of, "Did you know you're made up of mostly water, baby?"  Then I think to myself, "Wow, that doesn't even scratch the surface."  Sometimes I continue on a baby-sized rant about the very water that's in his cup coming from the faucet, from the pipes, from the reservoir, from the rain, from the clouds, and so on, and so forth.  When I think about it, it occurs to me that I am trying to explain one of the most elemental and monumental concepts ever to my 9-month old son, and then it occurs to me that with some of my simplifications, I am actually telling him a few untruths.  This is reminiscent of the age when my teachers thought I was too young to understand that there were numbers lower in value than zero, therefore didn't bother going into negatives.  Years later I remember resenting this.  But now that I have a mommy-sized brain, I am much less offended that I was spared the negatives at that age.  I was allowed the gift of blissful ignorance.  That is no longer my gift to have, but it is one I have passed on down the line to my little Sachem, for him to decide what he'd like to do with it.  In the depth of my existence, I hope he decides to ride the wave as long as possible, and decide what reality is for him.  When it comes down to it, there is only so much that I know about the very technical intricacies that are involved with condensation and evaporation and all of those other annoyingly boring terms that simply add up to the much more interesting...TRANSFORMation.  Water gives life, changes life, and takes life.  Sometimes I feel the water in a stream and almost expect it to reach out to my hand and pull me into another world.  Often times when I'm on the beach, I feel the ebb and flow of a monstrous wave, lurking far out of view, waiting for an unexpected moment to rush the shore and reunite me with creation.  Even in the bathtub, the thought remains, underneath the surface exists a world wholly unknown to me, always whispering and cajoling me to sink below and experience the yang to my yin.  To transform would be to truly live, to feel the splitting of every part of my body into the rushing rivers and surging seas all over the world.  Then words like vaporization and absorption would no longer be how I would try to teach my son of water, but I could instead help him feel what it is to truly be connected to everything, by being water.  

"Running Steps"- Staten Island, NY

52 Essays- An Assisted Weekly Mental Exercise

After enough complaining about being lazy/scattered/unmotivated about the millions of fragments of projects I have forming in my brain (and cannot seem to get started), my husband and I came up with this plan:

Once a week, after the baby has fallen asleep and I have a bit of time to focus, I will sit down and prepare to write.  To avoid the issue of not knowing where to start, my husband will give me a random topic to expound upon, and I will have 45 minutes to let it flow.  This will hopefully help to clear all the cobwebs out, for better or worse!  That's it (plus some OG Angel Mackinnon photographs).  GO!

"Spider's Web"- Lake Caloosahatchee, FL

Essay #1- Trees

"Up the Tree"- Staten Island, NY

In many ways, it seems "the tree" is the anti-human, which is interesting, considering how many things we actually have in common.  On the surface, we are both living organisms that grow from a fertilized seed.  We both stand, breathe, and live to make more little baby trees.  We both transform sunlight, water, and oxygen into food and nourishment for a life that can be as long as a day or as short as a lifetime.  We both live in the gentle balance of the Earth and all of her children, serving as the elders for plant and animal life the world over.  However, for many humans, these enormous and truly elemental similarities amount to little in the way of shared experience or comradery between species, and instead many cannot see beyond the paramount differences that set us apart from one another.  Perhaps our relationship with one another has been forever plagued by sheer human envy, as "the tree", in it's enormous intricacies, seems to embody many of human's simplest desires.  "The tree," you see, is the king of the forest.  It stands taller than all others, and bears witness to every event, serving as sentinel and watchman.  "The tree" can be a most trusted friend, who listens to the secrets of all plants and animals, never betraying a confidence, and always staying until the end of the story.  "The tree" may even be the best friend any man or woman has ever had, never asking for anything in return.  It provides shade for a summer picnic between lovers, and is willing to forever bare the mark carved in a heart on it's bark, proclaiming that "Jonie loves Chotchy," or "Jimmy Wuz Here."  "The tree" embodies all of the most humane and steadfast qualities that any good human should want to live up to.  It shows us what stability really looks like, and how to plant our roots where we stand.  Strange enough, "the tree" knows more about being human than most of us could ever dream of.  Perhaps it's more accurate to say that the human is the anti-tree.  

"Wandering Roots"- Long Beach, CA