Culture

I've been to China twice.  And I was fairly certain I'd consumed my lifetime supply of Chinese opera.  Yet last night, I found myself at the Chinese Garden, wine glass in hand, strategically choosing a seat by the lake in order to occupy my mind with fish-watching, if necessary. 

It was a beautiful spring night. The air was infused with the scent of gardenia. And a great blue heron was perched on the peak of the pagoda in the center of the lake.  Even though his visit had a nefarious purpose -- a dinner of young orange koi -- he was celebrated for bringing an auspiciousness to the occasion.

As the music began, the sound was just as I remembered. The resonance of the voices and instruments was incredibly high pitched with no bass support.  The rhythm had a certain strength, yet was ever-changing and unsettling.  And to my western-trained ears, the undefinable melody simply never resolved, making it difficult to relate to the music.  It was, quite simply, foreign.

So I focused on the view. I watched the fish swish their thin feather-like tails to create rippled reflections of curved slate roofs and green manicured trees.  I noticed how the intricately repetitive patterns in the wood carved window frames stood out against the abstract otherworldly qualities of the Taihu stone edging the water.

And that's when my eyes began to help my ears understand how this music actually suits the Chinese construction of place and space.  I could hear the swishes and the ripples, the repetition and the anarchy. And I could perceive why the music feels so ungrounded.  For the truly important forms and shapes in the garden stand above the ground, and mainly above our heads.

Even though I didn't recognize a thing that was going on, and I didn't enjoy the sound as a pleasurable experience, and it's quite possible I've completely misunderstood it all, it was fascinating to receive an idea about how culture and place might be truly interconnected.

And in the end, it was satisfying to know that this brave artistic effort was applauded and appreciated, when two women who were simply over the moon about the performance leaped to their feet calling out "one more, one more" in Chinese.  Their enthusiasm was obliged with not one, but three more.

Along the path

Even though some of the grass
is already taller than me
the young oaks finally rise above
with just enough form
to anticipate future magnificence.

And the wild pink roses wind upward
in search of sunlight
as they splendidly frame
the irresistible eyes
of the deer.

The water forms the heart
of this intricate dance
where the blue heron hides
in the dark reeds
that flank the damp edges.

Where minute bubbles
create perfect
radiant circles
that delicately reveal
the life underneath.

Where the soaring eagle
with a flick of its wings
abandons the majesty of the sky
to become a fierce and deadly king
crashing down to take its meal. 

Where the beautiful black feather
yet remains
to be found by another
and purple clover
still tastes like honey.

Scrabble stories

I'm losing most of my electronic scrabble games these days. And I dislike that. So I made up a new game.  Five minutes to write a story using all the words from the finished board.  I'm allowed to change the tense of the words and can skip some of the two-letter nonsense words. These are my rules after all.

Here you go.

He was such a patsy.  He actually believed the 20 foot manta ray on the ceiling of the museum was real.  She wondered how many other people of that ilk were running around the city, mired in fantasy and misconception. 

It felt like a broiler in the taxi.  She tugged on her shirt to get some air, suddenly wishing she would have joined him in his car on the way to the expo after all.  But dang.  He just wasn't right for her.

She had so hoped for a cure, an aloe, to soothe her frayed nerves.  After being a nanny, practically serving as mom, dad, and ref for those quints -- including the one with the tic -- she felt as though she may as well live in a sty and share the slop with the pigs and horses.  How had she sunk so low?

She leaned her head forward as a signal for the driver to stop.  She threw the money on the front seat and ran into the bar.  "Jeez lady," the hauler said as he drove away. 

Upon ordering a whiskey, neat and an avocado sandwich, she felt much more refined about the goings on in her life.  And after a few more, she knew she would be perfectly pleased to either doze or dance a jig.

It just didn't matter anymore.

Little things

Last Saturday:

That morning, the first salmonberry of the season appeared in the woods. So early, almost as though it shouldn't have been there yet. The surprise made it that much more joyful to pluck and taste its woodsy flavor.

Later, a quick drive to the nearby nature preserve shook off the frenzy of a trip to the mall. In a place filled with ease and familiarity, I was eager to spot my favorite things, the bald eagles hunting from the angular branches of the bare trees in the lake, the egrets and herons stealthily stalking their lunch in the shallows, and the little owl napping on a favored branch hugged up against the wide cedar trunk.

But they were not to be found.

Settling for a ramble around the wide gravel farm road that circles the perimeter, I relished how the green growth of spring so rapidly cancels out the muted shades of winter. And I got lost in thought as the sounds of gravel underfoot and redwing blackbirds overhead were reminiscent of my grandparent's farm where we used to tumble around in the haystacks and the barn and the cow pasture letting our imaginations run wild.

The first fuzzy caterpillar of the year wandered across the path.  Oddly jolly and stoic at the same time, they're always a thrill to spot. I can never resist carrying them along for just a few moments, although I occasionally wonder if I've taken them away from their progress towards some seriously planned destination. This one had long white fairy-like whiskers standing out above its black fuzz.

As I leaned down to set the caterpillar free, I spotted a pile of hawk feathers scattered on the edge of the path.  The hunter, snared and eaten by something even more powerful. It was fascinating to see the results of the struggle up close, and marvelous to have the chance to see how each feather is utterly unique in some small way, be it color or markings or size. Despite the destruction, it was all quite beautiful.

With a few stolen feathers tucked into my journal, I continued on to see a flock of tiny swallows dancing wildly over the pond as they skimmed tiny bugs from the surface. 

And just before I headed back up the hill to the parking lot, one smooth frog peeked out at the water's edge. Good thing I spied him first because he quickly slid to the bottom as soon as he spied me.

It was a good outing.

The big moon

The backstory to this story is that one night many years ago, Ali asked me to tell her a story. I told a tale about a little star named Twinkle who lived with his family and friends up in the sky.  Every day, with stardust sandwiches in his lunchbox, he rode the school bus down the tail of a comet to Galaxy Grade School where he had many sparkly adventures.

For a long time, until the stories dried up, she was regaled with what became her regular nighttime request, "tell me a Twinkle story."

Now she's twelve. She proudly pronounces that she's a lot older than she looks.  And for the last several years, she's made it her quest to debunk all the childhood magic, and prove that it is indeed her parents behind it all.

Last Saturday night, as the clouds parted just in time for the biggest moon of the year to rise out from behind the tall fir trees opposite our house, we wandered out to the driveway to stand and stare at the pure white brightness as it illuminated the contrails of nighttime airplanes on journeys to faraway places.

As we looked up at the sky, this is how the conversation went.

Ali: What are those dark spots on the moon?

Me: They're craters formed by asteroids and meteors that smashed into the moon long ago.  It's what gives the moon it's face... you know... the man on the moon?

Ali: What face? What man on the moon? No one ever told me this. How did you never tell me this?

Me: I'm pretty sure we covered that at some point in your lengthy childhood.

Long silence.

Ali: Well,  I guess it makes sense after all.  If Twinkle's mom is the moon, then she has to have a face. OK. Let's go inside, it's cold.

At least a little bit of the magic stuck.

The official office tour

So this is where we all work, at Lewis Kennedy, in a cute house in the Sellwood neighborhood in Portland. It was built more than 100 years ago. We have an actual kitchen and I just boiled some water on the stove so I could have some tea in my brand new girly pink teacup. The refrigerator is far cleaner than the ones at OPB. And I find it amusing that there is a giant claw foot bathtub in the bathroom, which I don't think gets much use.

 

These are the stairs up to our offices. They are very steep and narrow. Word has it that a ghost lives at the top, and that said ghost in fact, lives in my office.  However, we have yet to be introduced.

And here is my office. This is the view from the doorway.  It used to belong to Jim Lewis, although I'm not sure he'd recognize it now that it's been all Becky'd up. My favorite thing is the little thinking table with the cool red chairs I found at City Liquidators.  I'm hopeful that lots of great ideas will be inspired while sitting there. Even though the window is tiny, it actually opens for fresh air! And soon I'll have a view of nice green leaves on the big trees outside.

And here's the view back towards the door from the thinking table.  The shelves are filled with lots of books and other quirky stuff that makes me laugh and reminds me of my favorite people. And I've been assured that my now empty file cabinet will soon overflow with papers. So I guess I'd better get to work!