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A musing we will go Just the other day during a particularly frustrating point in my workday I stepped outside of the office into the cold winter air. I stood for a moment watching the small clouds from my breath condense and then quickly dissipate. It was the end of November with the winds out of the northwest. The sky was blue with a patchwork of clouds drifting overhead. As the clouds floated by I wondered if it looked to them like they were standing still and it was the Earth that was moving. Do you think it seems that way-that the Earth goes spinning round beneath them? I know that in truth the Earth does spin around beneath them and that is one of the main causes of the convection currents that drive the wind, but I had never really thought about it from the perspective of a cloud. There really is no point to this monologue. I haven't posted for a few days due to the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. We had family in town who were staying with us, and I had three young children (8, 5, 2.5) to entertain the whole time. This weekend served to remind me that life is fleeting and that the most important thing we have are the connections we form with each other. As we sit upon this wet, spinning marble hurtling through the void of space and come to comprehend the impermanence of life, it is good to realize what is dear, and in this case taking time to sit and write an entry for my diary fell second to baking sugar cookies and reading bedtime stories. How I do wish to have children some day. It is time to go in search of my muse. It has not been easy of late. As a matter of fact I'm conducting auditions. You see, before things went so terribly wrong, my wife was my muse, my inspiration and my well of happiness. Now all that is lost-irrevocably torn asunder by sex and lies. Although, it wasn't always my wife. Before her there was a darker more flamboyant muse. A spiteful teasing bitch who would tenderly force me to write. Now I've come calling to all of her old haunts to find them cold and sterile. Like calling the numbers in your little black book to find that each one has been disconnected. I've left a trail of treats from the entrance of her cave and placed a box supported by a stick attached to a string attached to my hand in hopes of luring and capturing her. I'm a fool. She is smarter and more fickle than that. This will be no easy hunt. She must be part feline. It is impossible to own a cat, they own you and choose to allow you to keep them company. They show you affection when they choose, or want something, and if you fail to provide for them then they find another. I'm afraid that my muse has found another, just like my wife. I'm afraid I have no more to say on that subject so now I'll just let my mind wander along with the music in my head and see what comes out of the shadows. Sirius, the Dog Star, shines brightly above the North Pole. Cultures living above the Equator have used this star as a landmark, a beacon, to guide them on land and water. These cultures and people invented many instruments to aid them in this task-the compass, the sextant, star charts, longitude and latitude, even going so far as to cut the world up into little wedges, like the pieces of an orange, to better track and understand their location. Eventually attaining Global Positioning System technologies to embed in cell phones, cars, boats and planes. Now all that we need to do is use the OnStar console on the dashboard of our car to plot our course. So now we always know where we are�at least relatively. They say that the Phoenicians used dead reckoning. That is navigation without the aid of instruments or devices. Not unlike the migrations of birds the Phoenicians used to sail the Mediterranean from one port to the next on their travels unencumbered by maps, charts, stars, satellites, and any other item that could ultimately offer incorrect or imprecise data. Of course, history only tells about the successes of the Phoenician navigators because those who were incorrect in their own internal calculations and reckoning probably never survived to tell the tale. And now it's midnight with the snow falling outside, swirling in angry clouds beneath the streetlights. Only a few houses still have windows shining against the slate of night. Each pinpoint of light is the location of a story. Each car passing in the night harbors secrets. Every person in a crowd has a tale. We are all an anthology of experiences waiting to be tapped, drained, distilled and read. I am not special. I am one of many. I have just tapped myself and try my best to distill what is in my head, and what a bitter drink it is my friends, what a bitter drink it is. I just have to keep reminding myself that I still believe in magic. |
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