Cooper Two and the Ghost Town Blues

“Of all the paths you take in life, make sure a few of them are dirt.”

- John Muir

Peale, Pennsylvania

Corn::rows. Corn::rows. Corn::rows. Corn::rows. Picturesque view. Trees; rocks. Trees; rocks. Trees; rocks. Fields. Woods. Rolling hills. Picturesque view. 

There are a lot of great dirt roads to creep along on in my hometown vicinity. By that I don’t mean being a creeper in the creepy sense but rather a creeper in the Jeepy sense. Priscilla is my Jeep’s name, she’s a Patriot and she named herself. She’s been good to me so far, I try my best to be good to her. She’s white like a queen’s horse and basic like a bitch. She’s a 5-speed, she’s durable and she loves taking it slow. Dirt roads are the best, change my mind. There are quite a few to choose from around here. I usually do a Turkey Street scoot every day after getting the mail, a loop around Drain Lick perhaps. A short journey out to Sylvan Grove at times, there are some great trees out there. That’s all on Drifting side. There are several local haunts of interest for the slow traveler. When the boys fall asleep after I drop Celie off at school I just drive around back roads and let them sleep awhile lest I wake them up taking them inside. Sometimes I cut across Pearce Hollow. It’s cathartic and metaphoric, taking it slow. I get to gather my thoughts between the onslaught of noises and responsibilities that has become my life. I get “alone” time. Plus, I get one on one time. Me and Bob Dylan. Me and Tom Petty. Me and [Insert Artist Here]. Me and Podcasters. Me and the closest I can come to a near silence, filled only with the creaks of Priscilla’s bones and a slow, looped roll of rubber over dirt. Our din mimicking the antiquated sounds of a wobbly suspension on a carriage over dusty road, my white mare pulling me through the trees. There’s something wonderful about Jeep rides; not being covered in kids, listening to their cries or screams, a brief sliver of time without demands when they are restrained and harnessed and I am at the reins. I’m basically Aunt Bethany from National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation: “I love riding in cars!” I like it when I’m driving, anyway. Or when someone I trust is behind the wheel, then it’s a good time. I’ve been on a few hell rides in my life, though. Luckily, I’ve been on some terrific treks as well.  

All of October I drove around taking in the foliage. Daily, I would witness these trees changing before my eyes. It seems to happen so slowly until one day you realize you are looking at the skeletal limbs and trunk of an empty tree you had just watched go through a brilliant display of transition. Full of leaves and color, a moving portrait and then bam—a few wind storms and some rain, a little drop in temperature, and they are gone. Lost forever, fallen to rot at the tree’s base, becoming nutrients for the next season’s show. It’s a cool thing to witness and I am glad to live where we get a good view of the seasonal changes but it can make you sad. It's kind of tragically heartbreaking. Imagine if you didn't know whether or not spring would come. Do you think the trees know their leaves will return? It's hard to keep in mind that the sun will swing back when it starts to move away and leaves us in darkness. The transition of fall into winter can be a hard symbol for that. The cold sets in and you can feel it in your bones.

I used to let my friend Leslie drive me around while I wrote. She’d take the wheel of my Dodge Caliber and we’d go on an adventure through the trees, into the woods, or sometimes elsewhere. She epically drove me all the way to Memphis, Tennessee for my 35th birthday. She also drove me down into Kato, once, and until then I had never been. Kato is a ghost town in her neck of the woods, accessed through Snow Shoe. It also happens to be where my paternal Pap hails from. It’s literally “a town that no longer exists”; it’s just roads through trees and some big rocks and a bridge, I believe. On August 29, 2013 Leslie and I drove to multiple locations as my daughter napped in the back seat, similar to what I do alone now with the boys napping in the back of the Jeep. I, with my trusted red-at-the-time Life Liver's Log spiral notebook in hand (to represent the Muladhara chakra, no less) wrote a song of sorts that day, still a fetus, each verse, a stop on our travels. As simple of a thing as that was, those were some of the best times I’ve had. All I ever really needed was a witness. Leslie came around a lot right at a time when I needed it the most. The years we spent together as friends will always be some of my fondest and even though they were some of my hardest, they were also some of my most "veil-lifting" times. I was writing a lot of odes and sonnets at the time. Manically writing; wound up as my base state, I could unwind and decompress on our car rides. The trees would help ground me. We were just two air signs looking for some earth. We could bullshit somewhat as well while I wrote because I am apt to and adept at dividing focus and Leslie was someone that I felt comfortable with and trusted because she was as equally forthcoming with me as I was with her. For some reason we spoke to each other, mirrored each other...understood each other? Leslie accepted me as me, whoever that was. She also put up with a shit ton of pressured speeches from me. I am grateful for her ability to witness me and for her tolerance of my soliloquies  and lectures which would take place in between the writing. She knew that I often spoke the truth so she took it even when it hurt. She was truly Rock Star about not just simply kicking my ass, though, because she could have, but she loved me and I loved her. Abrasion often rides shotgun with Truth. It polishes by rubbing and it’s often the wrong way. I was just trying to help her out, but the truth is I wasn’t always right. Sometimes I was just mad. She also once told me that I was self-centered. She wasn’t wrong; I was in the midst of an extended episode at the time. I tend to get grandiose. I also am highly distractible and can frustrate people if they need or want my undivided attention. I’ve used her comment for self-reflection ever since, because it hurt, as quipped truths often do. I have since apologized for my abrasive bluntness, or being a bitch, or what have you, and I am grateful that I did have that opportunity. She, in turn, has handed me a few hard, grinding truths as well. Leslie was a real gem, a Dusty Diamond, to be exact. She was a muse. She was a friend. We shared a true kinship. People like that are extremely rare and precious, like jewels in the junkyard of life. This I know to be true, especially when you have trust issues. Diamonds in the rough are a little dusty but shiny and priceless when given a polish. I considered her to be in my innermost circle of trust, which, at the time, only really included my husband. I told her things that I have told no other human or animal. I think it was a divine symbiosis, a mutual decompression. She, likewise, shared a lot of her secrets with me. Our companionship was just what each of us needed at the time. It was also one of the best gifts that she ever gave me and I am grateful for that. She made a real difference in my life. 

Heading back from the dust to the dirt, it’s a privilege to have so many dirt roads to take it slow and decompress on. Grassflat and Drifting are almost like sister villages, nestled on the mountaintop. I spent a bit of time there as a kid. My brother and I would ride with my father through Cooper Two to get there; it’s a dirt road that connects them named after the old Cooper Two coal mine. I’ve traveled this road many times in my youth but not as often as of late. These past months I’ve expanded the stretch of my local drives. I found Cooper Two surreally different because I always, for some reason, expect my childhood  ride home. That Cooper Two is long gone. So is that Grassflat and that Drifting for that matter. Last month during my foliage rides I moseyed out to Peale, which is connected to Grassflat but it also, in a haunting way, no longer exists. Oddly enough, Peale is the ghost town from my neck of the woods, like the mountaintop Kato. I hadn’t been down to Peale since April of this year, when I was still pregnant with Otis. People go to Peale for many reasons, mostly recreational now. The Red Mo race launches from there, of course. Four wheelers have access to Gorton through the tunnel and out to the Viaduct bridge through Peale. I used to ride out on 4 wheelers with my brother when we were kids looking for old bottles on the hillsides, pulling them out from underneath the layers of dead leaves and sediment like we were digging back in time. We found some pretty neat ones. People have camped, drove, rode, walked, and boated in Peale. Some people just come for the spirits, or in an attempt to lift or find theirs. Peale is almost a local Mecca, a local haunt for self-seeking and escape: holy ground. 

Peale, Pennsylvania was an old mining town founded in the late 1800s when the Beech Creek Railroad line was the main way into places. It once held near 2,500 people that relied on the coal mines or railroad for their bread and butter. It was owned by the coal company. After the town diminished with the active train line and mines, people slowly dispersed, some moving up into Grassflat. Several houses as well as a church are in Grassflat now that were from Peale. There were only two camps left in Peale when I was young and now there is only one, as well as a garage structure. One camp was burnt down years ago and it still makes me sickeningly sad. Only one real structure remains and the foundations of some things but you can walk out to look for the lone grave of Martha Renfrew, the only marked grave left in the Oakwood Cemetery. She was aged 14 years, 11 months by the inscription on her tombstone. This was all so fascinating as a kid. At some point, somebody put up a sign to mark the Oakwood Cemetery. I can remember this and it doesn’t seem that long ago but now the words on the sign have since been destroyed and nothing remains  aside from the side posts and a few small boards that a dark piece of fabric is tied to. The changes that this land has gone through during my lifetime alone are phenomenal. To think back farther to when it was a bustling hillside community of over 2,000 is about enough to blow your mind. 

Although not from the bustling Peale days, one structure has remained for at least my entire lifetime, and that’s the bridge, however it is really starting to show its age. Anyone local who’s anyone local has some memory of this bridge and probably that big crack in the side that seems so much bigger than I remember it being  every time I see it. But it’s a reminder that bridges will eventually crumble. Rebar protrudes from the cracking concrete, a strong skeleton that will only keep the bridge together so long. Time wears on everything; everything eventually turns to dust. I’d spent the past two months watching the leaves fall and transition, thinking of how many changes I have endured during my short lifetime alone and how many more await me. 

And so there I sat on the Peale bridge at the reins of Priscilla pondering the past with one too many ghosts riding shotgun. We try to reach back with our minds, like I dug with my brother into the dirt, excavating for any unbroken remnant to hold in our hands. Our shined up, dirt-plucked vessel can be a wonderful memento and it will even hold water but it’s place is in the past and therefore it’s a relic. 

Peale looks entirely different today than it did as a kid. The drive across Cooper Two is the same way. Entire hillsides are cleared. Peale Camp has burnt down. So many trees are gone. The landscape is drastically different and it hollows it out, making it seem less of a shelter but more of a marvel, because it opens up the hillsides to the expanse of trees and better shows the distance from here to there. You can get a glimpse of the forest through the trees now. It all seems so far away. Going to a ghost town is akin to visiting a graveyard.  Lost in time, a fog from long ago settles over your  mind. These hills used to be filled with homes, people, families...life. My gram’s sister lived in one of the last houses out here. Some were moved board by board to be reassembled in Grassflat. The church was moved. Peale was a once bustling country town set up with all the trappings of a city and is now a quiet place of refuge and recreation. The Red Moshannon has brought its race crowds, though, time has been unwinding here for decades, the mines still bleed into her beds and mark the creek with their rusted blood. Enjoy her splendor but don’t drink the water. 

The lines from the Day Song seem even more pertinent today, as well as my embryonic Dusty Diamond lines, in a ghostly way: "All alone with those inner demons...where's it hurtin' tonight girl?" In an attempt to understand the present we try to reach back into the past with our minds but the past will never come back to you. We remain haunted like these towns are by the specter of the past. But maybe it can be a friendly ghost? 

Verse 1:

I went to an old house sitting out in a field.

My body was shaking, my spirit was thrilled. 

Empty without the life that we bring.

Silent without the songs that we sing. 

Oh, but it’s still standing. 

And I think it always will. 

Verse 2:

I went to a town that no longer exists.

I give into whatever my spirit insists. 

Once upon a time, maybe we were trees.

Twin oaks, side by side, all in a dream.

Oh, but we’re still standing.

And I feel we always will. 

Verse 3: 

I went to a church that holds no services.

My spirit is pious, despite its perverseness. 

Echoes throughout with the sound of silence.

No evil, no anger, no hate, and no violence. 

Oh, and it’s still standing. 

And I believe it always will. 

Verse 4:

I went to the hilltop and gazed at the mountains. 

The clouds were rollin’ and my spirit was shoutin’. 

Open expanse of trees and sky; 

Will your memory never die? 

Oh, no, it’s still standing,

And I know it always will. 

CHORUS: 

On my way home I came to the crossroads,

I took a wrong turn into one of my episodes.

I got stuck in the mud, shed a little blood.

I’ve been having these visions for years,

Wiping tears through the forest of fears,

And I’m headin’ home the hard way. 

Make Hay While the Sun Shines

“Whan the sunne shinth make hay. Whiche is to say.

Take time whan time cometh, lest time steale away.”

 ~ John Heywood, 1546 AD

I fall down a lot of rabbit holes through my days. I have a highly distractable mind and I follow a lot of thoughts away from the party and into the woods. It can be a problem but I do explore ideas and concepts and learn a lot of new things because of it, so, all in a day. 

Recently, in exploring quotes and sayings about hay because of some photos I had taken, drawn to and interested in local hay bales because visually I think they are like giant fields of Shredded Wheat, I discovered this gem about making hay: Make hay while the sun shines. The saying apparently originally appears in John Haywood’s “A dialogue conteinyng the nomber in effect of all the prouerbes in the Englishe tongue” dated 1546, although it is thought to have originated much earlier from Tudor farmers of Europe. The saying warns farmers to make their hay while the sun is shining. It is about taking advantage of an opportunity while the opportunity still presents itself. 

In Tudor England farmers didn’t have the technology that they have today to determine the weather. The best they had was “red sky at night” to help them decide. So, they had to get it whilst the getting was good, you could say. If they waited another day to make their hay they could risk it raining and ruining their harvest and the growing season would have all been for naught. This was a pretty big deal. That’s where this Proverb came in. While it was sunny and the conditions were good it was best to make the hay lest they lose the opportunity. They said this so often to remind themselves and others that it became a verbal chunk of wisdom you handed out and repeated, passing on the knowledge for posterity and, let’s face it back then, survival. Think of how important hay was back on Tudor farms when animals were relied on even moreso than they are now.  Getting your hay made was akin to getting your business done.

This saying struck me when I found it. I thought it was neat. As far as I could recollect I had never heard it before. I wondered why, after years and years of these hay bales. There are cornfields and fields of grasses galore where I’m from and I’m still here. I’ve been driving these roads since I was a kid, literally. I rode plenty a dirt road atop a cooler or in the back of a pickup. Suffice it to say I’ve seen a bale of hay or two. I remember my dad parking us on the side of the road to go out into a field and climbing up on one when I was young. Being placed on one, perhaps? Hay bales were huge as a kid, they’re fairly big to an adult but as a kid they are giant things. It felt like you were on the top of the world as a kid, sitting on a hay bale. Or at least like you were riding a horse or some other mythical creature made of grasses. It was fun and my dad knew how to have fun because he also followed ideas and thoughts away from the party and literally into the woods. He could be rather impulsive and curious; we never knew what we’d be doing. Sometimes we rode hay bales. 

Fields and fields of hay made by local farmers, we drive by it all the time. Shredded wheat, it resembles, I’ve often thought; if I were to make a diorama of a farm I think I would use Shredded Wheat as hay bales. Frosted Mini Wheats for winter scenes. Sometimes they wrap them in white plastic. This makes them look like fields of puffy marshmallows. Marshmallows would be great in a diorama too. I digress. 

I pondered this advice in my own life, for there are times that I have left my hay to rot in the field and wasted a perfectly fine harvest. Motherhood is teaching me to weed out what isn’t necessary and boil down what I need into a condensed stock of wants and wishes. I reckon that's a fancy way to say prioritize. Adding a third kid has lit yet another fire under my ass. If you want to be a breeder and a creative you need to learn to make your hay when the sun shines, get it while you can and move like you stole it. Conditions are never right for long. If you don’t move on something when the opportunity is there chances are you’re going to miss it. This sounds like a call to impulsiveness but it’s not. Much of life is about timing and yet it’s hard to tell when the time is right for anything. I am never going to have uninterrupted large chunks of time to write or create or do anything that restores me but I desperately need to do those things or I do not function properly, my soul begins to feel imprisoned. I need to take full advantage of opportunity, however elusive it may be, if I don’t want to lose myself in motherhood. This is a call to seize the opportunities that present themselves while the getting is good, whether that’s a job change, or a creative endeavor or simply getting anything done with 3 children in tow. It’s about getting your business done, finishing what you set out to do lest you not be able to finish it at all and sometimes just riding those hay bales.

A field of frosted mini-wheats this morning.

Neo-words

Focus focus discipline.

I can’t I can’t I can’t win.

Lose it, lost it, once again.

Seek it, sought it, find the pin.

Laser, loser, precision.

Dueling needles, under skin.

Dig it, dig it, carve it in.

Kick it, kick it, in the shin.

Focus focus, self-control.

Hocus pocus, rig’marole.

One track mind, my mental goal.

No fault for a lack of soul.

Darling, darling, darling dear.

Keep me, keep me, keep me near.

Show me the darkness you fear.

Take me with, don’t leave me here.

Call me gorgeous, precious sphere.

Shed a crystalline blue tear.

Underground, bones rotting here.

Living hell, my darling dear. 

Darkness, darkness, in the hole.

Hill of beans upon the fool.

Working with the crudest tool.

Found my mind and lost my cool.  

She Leads Me Home

I followed my anger out into the woods.

I shrugged off Its stronger offenses. 

I found a trail, I searched for the Good,

Unknowing, let down my defenses. 

Into my garden and over my wall, 

The remnants of shadowy deeds. 

Creeping under the mockingbird's call, 

Frantically pulling at weeds. 

At dusk, I buried her under a tree,

And left a small cross at Her head. 

At dawn, I drank, as I was in grief, 

Remem’bring She never was dead. 

- December 15, 2015 

Discipline & Listening: “The Ben Taylor Experience”

In December of 2013 I attended a house concert, my very first, at the Oak Mountain Hideaway House, which is actually just over the river and through the woods from my home.  This was a delightful and highly meaningful experience for me, one that I will (God willing) always remember that has taught me a valid life lesson, in all actuality, maybe a few of them.  The atmosphere was chill, the hosts were warm and accepting, the house was lovely, and the talent was AMAZING!  My first house concert experience was with Mr. Ben Taylor, son of musical legends James Taylor and Carly Simon.  YES!! Conceived of the sperm of JAMES TAYLOR and birthed out of the vagina of CARLY SIMON!!  I watched him perform in a living room, in front of a grand fireplace complete with Christmas décor.  I also was fortunate enough to meet him afterward and perform a song for the man on the guitar that he played that night, which blew me away and almost brought on a panic attack all at the same time.  It was like meeting the son of gods; it was like having a conversation with Hercules??!  Okay, I am well aware that he is just a man, but aside from his amazing music, he’s my type of people.  As it were, it was a night of music, listening and lessons. 

Upon arriving at that house concert I had never heard any of Ben Taylor’s songs, so I had a completely open mind and blank canvas to accept the strokes of his brushing artistry, or finger picking, beep booping sound box wizardry, what have you.  His music is an interesting mix of impressive finger picking with a touch of pop and some beat box mashing sprinkled on it.  He performed mixes, including his mash up song "Fire and Vain" created using two of his parents' most popular songs.  He did a cover of his father’s, but more importantly he thoroughly introduced you to his style of music in a very intimate way.  Declaring himself an honorary member of the “S.S.S.” club, meaning the sensitive singer/songwriters, he told stories and explained himself in a very personal and down to earth way.  His music is inviting and thought provoking.  This man’s a thinker, that is obvious right away.  His newest album “Listening” had recently been released and we heard tracks from it.  I sat on the stairs in this magnificent living room, with a perfect view of him at work.  It was like being on the set of Storytellers.  After his sets I was left with the feeling that I actually got to know the man, although this was nothing compared to my experience later on in the evening. 

After enjoying snacks and wine while mingling around the place, we ended up approaching Ben once he had settled onto a bright red futon in the basement after giving autographs upstairs for awhile.  At the time, Ben was in the midst of a conversation with a woman I will refer to as E.  E and Ben were talking about a dream that she had at some point in her life about a light house and being somewhere lost in time, one in which she felt held significance and a connection to Ben for some reason. Ben now wore a huge, mesmerizing ring on his right hand that he fiddled with. His report with the woman was open and frank, reflective and not dismissive at all. She was explaining that she sensed a connection between the two of them, something to do with the lighthouse dream. I was sitting right beside him on the futon now, following their conversation, just listening and waiting to continue speaking to him. We had introduced ourselves already but E trailed on and I don’t like to interrupt a good conversation, hell, even a bad one. He described life as a series of “harmonic blips”. So many songs [lives], he said, were similar with the same harmonic blips. And sometimes it recognizes a harmonic blip in another song [life]. Can a blip of oneness create or clone itself or something like that, he mused. Can it?  He said to E to recognize it for what it was---a harmonic blip in time in these bubbles of oneness that we are. Profound. Even more profound hearing the actual conversation, I'm afraid my memory isn’t the best of story tellers. At the end of their conversation I remember him saying “What do you want me to do about it? Should I write a song about it?”  He also referenced an episode of South Park.  “That reminds me of that one episode of South Park...write a poem, mmkay??  Make you feel better, mmkay??” Harmonic blips, bubbles of Oneness and South Park.  Oh, yeah.  My kind of people. When speaking of life and the soul, and how we all hailed from Oneness he said "I don't know what seduced me out of Oneness and into form...[but] I’m not afraid to die because I know that I will go back to that Oneness. My only fear is that I won’t be able to feel or create or write or express [in that state]...” Sitting around musing how linear time is just a created illusion and discussing life after death...my kind of people.

  

At some point while we were all sitting around him my father mentioned that I play the guitar, which mildly embarrassed me but I’m grateful that he did it now.  When asked, I replied that I dabble.  I mean, seriously, this is James fucking Taylor’s son. I dabble, I dabble! I basically am a monkey playing with a coconut and a string compared to this man, his father and his mother. He jumped up eagerly and retrieved his guitar out of the case, the guitar he played that night that appeared to be ancient and well loved, worn in, abused, even.  Like it had grown into Ben somehow at that point, it was THAT well used.  Most of the time I honestly held that thing gawking at it in awe, clutching it to me like the bouquet awarded to the queen of the prom!  It was beautifully scratched and dinged, like an ancient musical artifact.  I remember sitting there wondering in the moment if James Taylor had ever possibly picked up this guitar of Ben’s while jamming at his parent’s house or something?  It was a little overwhelming to think about. The whole thing still remains somewhat surreal to me, while also being one of the realest moments of my life.  But there I was, sitting there holding this artifact guitar in front of Ben Taylor and a handful of strangers. I wasn’t prepared for this, I was trying not to fall into a panic attack right there. Luckily there was wine! I had my sister grab me another drink. Ben pretty much demanded that I play him a song. So I did. 

I ended up chicken shit, and all I could muster up was the most nervous rendition of a cover that I could do. Honestly, it was more a severe case of Swiss cheese brain. I couldn't even remember my own songs in that moment, at least not enough to make it through an entire song. So I went with an automatic cover, which turned out fine. Everyone sang along, including Ben, so that was fabulous, but it was rather embarrassing that I just couldn’t recall one of my original songs to play for him, especially when he specifically asked me to play something that I wrote after I played the song that I did. (KNOW THYSELF!!) "Discipline!" Ben Taylor said. This is when I realized I needed a much more intimate relationship with my own work...and also to grow a big dangly set of balls. It was pretty pathetic in a way, but in the end, I’m glad I didn’t play anymore, because the true theme of the evening was his last album’s title...”Listening.” There were many magical words of wisdom spoken that night, and to think I would have missed out on them had I broke into a song, had I been cocky about myself, or overly eager to impress the man.  Instead, I mostly listened.  At this point, I held his guitar like it was a newborn.  I fondled it and fiddled around on the strings, but didn’t start into song.  I was listening to everyone else. We had a good conversation going, why interrupt it with Ego? My Spirit was drawn to listen. 

It was while holding that guitar that Ben Taylor bestowed some of the best advice onto me. He critiqued my playing, which was awesome. He told me that my pocket was good and was apparently impressed because for being a man that seemed rather in touch with his feminine side (in the sense of spiritual balance) he explained that was ONE thing he was sexist about; he thinks that men are better with their strumming hands, better at holding the rhythm. But he wasn’t mentioning this in a derogatory way, he was complimenting me. He said my left hand was good also, but my right was notably better. So that was pretty sweet, having Ben Taylor basically tell me I have good rhythm, even for a girl. We then listened as another girl that was there cradled the guitar as she crooned out an a Capella song that she had wrote herself. We all tried to convince her to just learn to play. "A little DISCIPLINE!" Ben said this a couple of times that night. Indeed.

This experience has taught me about the value of listening, to others as well as to myself. It has given me the drive to listen to my own story, my own music. It helped me to see that I should take myself more seriously as a singer/songwriter, even if it is just for fun because it is expression. Simply because I am a bubble of oneness expressing itself with my own harmonic blips. I have so many songs because I am simply compelled to compose them. So then I write these things out as I am compelled and I won't revisit them enough to actually hear what I am even saying. I have since this experience started to have my songs recorded, the songs that I couldn't remember in that anxious moment with Ben. In recording my own music, I have been able to revisit each song and get to know it in an intimate way again. I get the chance to actually LISTEN to myself. I learned a wonderful lesson from Ben about the value of being an artist, the discipline it takes, and the art of listening. So, thank you, Ben Taylor, for the wonderful experience, thank you for your impromptu critique, and more importantly...thank you for listening.

Me playing for Ben Taylor at the Oak Mountain Hideaway

A Metaphorical Look at the Hoagie of Life

I bought fundraiser hoagies off of my sister-in-law for my nieces recently and they were delivered today. You know the kind, baggies of fillings, packets of dressing, all of that wonderful don't-have-to-cook-the-night-they-come goodness? So I made one up and cut it into pieces for my daughter and I to eat tonight for dinner. She took one bite of her piece and deemed it weird, but then proceeded to come at my sandwich demanding bite after bite. Now, she does this with many foods at many meals but the sandwich thing got me thinking, maybe because I love hoagies and was irritated that she refused hers and wanted to devour all of mine. Om nom nom! But as she was doing this, I couldn't help but think about how it was the same damn sandwich? Why do kids do this? But, then of course my mind took off with the thought metaphorically and applied it to all of humanity like I tend to do with the mundane.

What makes your kid assume or think the sandwich on your plate is any better than the identical one on their own plate? For that matter, what makes people think or assume that your sandwich is any better than the one they are eating? We are always so busy looking around at what everyone else is eating that we devalue what is on our own plate. What's funny is that we all construct our own hoagies. Maybe the bread or the meat is the same but each of us decides which of the baggies we open to use and which we leave, what condiments we add or don't add, how big or small we cut it, which way we eat it. But it's all constructed from the same base...it's really the same damn sandwich!

Life is like a good sandwich. It's a hoagie, it's a submarine. It is filled with a bountiful combination of ingredients of your own choosing, a delicate construction of layers. If you look at life as a sandwich then we are all just eating off of the same endless party sub. So don't try to take bites off of other people or think that others have a better piece than you have, because, after all, we are just eating off of the same sandwich anyway! And how you take it is really up to you. It's your choice; you make your own damn sandwich!

Life is full of variety and differences, but if you take off all of the toppings there are mostly similarities. We all have that common roll, if you will. Life is your own piece of the eternal party sub and if you pay attention to what is on your own plate and are truly grateful for what you have instead of what you don't, there's a good chance you'll find happiness there in its delicate layers, somewhere between the pickle and the cheese. 

A Yen for Sweet Solitude

The blueberries balance the tea bean buzz,
I'm driven by chances, I'm driven by was.
Compelled to sit silently just before midnight,
Searching for something not found in the daylight.

Coffee and pancakes, a simplified yen,
I sip at my mud and forget about when,
I found strength in failure and knew no success,
I came out with more when I needed less.

I go out walkin' searching for truth,
In the late night hours, after I've fallen through,
The hole in my heart when I've hit the floor,
I hunger for solitude and the sweetness of yore.

That time when my breasts ruined a wedding ceremony...

So, in 2011 I was asked by friends to play the music for their wedding ceremony.  Me.  Acoustic guitar.  Alone?! Finger picky whatever I want.  I was also requested to do a piece of a specific song while the bride walked down the aisle.  This was serious stuff to me, and I was incredibly anxious about it!  I was also a little baffled as to why they thought I was capable of playing a wedding ceremony in a church where I am usually far too consumed with the fear of spontaneous combustion to think about the guitar, but their trust in me was encouraging.  Either way, I was horridly nervous and incredibly flattered and excited all at the same time. It was an endeavor and one of the coolest musical experiences I have had. 

I had heard about the Bridezilla show enough to have a little bit of worry. The bride was awesome, though, about everything and it went well. It wasn't like that show at all! The song for her walk down the aisle was a secret to the groom, though, which was sweet. It also wasn't exactly an acoustic number, so I had to do my best to figure a light finger picky deal for it, girl it up a bit? It worked. She dug it. I practiced those barre chords so much to avoid screeches and other bad sounds; it's ironic what ended up happening.

On the wedding day, everything was cool, my volume was set, I was in position. I was doing a couple random picking progressions while the parents and families were seated. During the procession and recession I chose to play a piece I wrote myself. This song, while still untitled, is now fondly referred to as "The Wedding Song". It had lyrics, I just omitted them for the ceremony. They aren't exactly wedding lyrics, I reckon? The music, however, seemed to fit just fine.

Everything went well while I sat and played for the wedding party's entrance, but then...I stood up for the bride's stroll down the aisle as was the plan. Well, I broke into the song, or 'piece' of music, rather, barely long enough to be considered anything else, and I realized something was wrong immediately, but didn't realize what until it was too late. The piece was so short and precisely timed I didn't really have time to correct it without possibly ruining it worse, so I just went for it. Apparently the groom was incredibly thrilled with their special selection, although, I never saw because I was focused on my field of error.

My volume was supposed to be set roughly at 50%, and it was for the sitting part. I realized that once I stood up, my boobs slid my volume all the way up!!! I mostly could tell because you could hear every slide and squeak of my fingers over my voice. Also, to my dismay, the bride, who came to a stop at the end of the aisle positioned directly in front of a PA system speaker, flinched and jumped with every fingering sound. I was able to look up and see that, unfortunately. All of that practice!! Those fucking barre chords!!! Gah!

I was told afterwards by a friend that it sounded to him as though the PA system was just kind of bad, which made me feel a little better, I guess...about my breasts ruining a wedding ceremony...and only the most crucial part, at that. My final playing for the recession, though, was pretty flawless. I tried to redeem myself and end it on a good note...literally.

Overall, it was a huge honor and privilege to be able to play my friends down the aisle and I am incredibly grateful and thankful that they presented me with this opportunity. I was, however, a little disappointed that my female bits had to interfere with my playing as they did. It's challenging to play the guitar with a decent set of breasts! Not only can they make it awkward to hold, they apparently sometimes have a mind of their own!

Up To Date: 11 Days of Marchin'

What's 'Been Doing?
(Marchin' a Nutshell)

I've been roaming here and there;
my mind's been mostly everywhere.

I've been stuffed up and home remedy battling,
my tonsils and sinus cavities are rattling.

My throat is dry, my lips are cracked.
Not even an opposite I'd attract. 

I play, I read, I sing, I write.
I stay up and down through the night. 

I sigh, I sit, I think, I guess.
The days are mostly more or less.

I merge the forms, try to compose.
A song is born from line of prose.

Keys to strings to pen and back,
The days go on, I can't keep track. 

Daily Dialogue #6

Blessed be the day for me and mine.  All things shall heal in time.  The sun shall forever shine on the world like a giant mother, watching and spreading her warmth.  I feel I have fallen from the top of a great tree,  through dark skies, and gnarled limbs beat against my face as I make my way down, down, down...into the fog at the base of this gnarled tree of life. Its roots are exposed.  It's drying up and drying out.  It's screaming into the wind at a pitch only other trees can hear.  The Hollow echoes its pain through itself, deadening and strengthening the other trees simultaneously.  Great oaks bark into the night.  Maples howl onto the moon and vibrate their wooden words into the cold ether. 
Which dimension does the voice get lost in?  What cloud does the sound hide in?

2/6/14

"What is hidden in that shadow?"

What is hidden in that shadow,
Behind the overcoat of darkness?
What is shadowed by the hidden,
In its mystery and starkness?

Who is shirking in the shadow,
drawing back from golden light?
Who is lurking at the window
watching the sun shine at night?

Death is waiting for my brothers
to play the long forgotten tune.
Life is waiting for the Others
to face the dark side of the moon.

What is hidden in that shadow
that I can't see with my eyes?
What is unseen in ugliness
and lost in beautiful lies?

What is hidden in that shadow
under the thoughts and forms of pain?
What is wrong with letting go
of your umbrella in the rain?

What is hidden in that shadow
beyond the glow of your city lights?
Who is waiting on the horizon
to take you where you set your sights?

1/24/14

"What your mirror thinks of you..."

Sometimes I see you smile when you look into my eyes.
Sometimes I see you shaken when they're drowning from your cries. 

Sometimes I see you stare at nothing---and nothing stares you back.
Sometimes I see the emptiness and shame from what you lack.

I can not give to you what you do not give to me,
And what you are is only what you look at me and see. 

When we're alone, I see you thinking, dazed and solemnly,
I command attention, but you hate to look at me.

We are the same, you and I; your only freedom is to break me.
To you I'm bound and tied; I'm your reflection, you'll never shake me.

12-30-13

Floating in the Stream of Consciousness

In the air behind us our spirits intermingle as we are near.  They high-five, and groom each other and passionately kiss, each penetrating the other, swirling in the shape of infinity.  On the earth beside us our shadows throw sticks and stones and so we tread on shards of glass, carrying the weight until our feet leave a trail of blood that we'll follow back to where we began.

12-30-13

Cunnilingus Sonnet

Between my legs he finds himself at home,
I run my fingers through his golden locks.
For, in these thoughts I know I'm not alone.
He knocks me out of my white cotton socks.

His velvet tongue against my open door;
No need to knock so I just show him in.
His mouth is hot and I'm aching for more. 
The space between our lips is paper thin.

A roller coaster ride, I'm at the top;
Rhythmic Kashmir waves urge me ahead.
It's harvest time and I'm the only crop.
I reap what he has sewn inside my bed. 

As energies increase, I hold my breath,
For this is what they call "the little death".

12-15-13

Heroic Couplets in Iambic Pentameter

I feel you in the night when I'm alone.
To me, your heart will always be my home.

Into the skies of your mind I will soar.
The fire of your thoughts I will restore. 

The graves of our twin souls remain upturned;
There's no forgetting the truth that we learned.

There is no drying tears that we must cry;
There is no "hello" without a "goodbye".

I'll choke on your name until I can't breathe.
And after I'm dead I'll still never leave.

There is a place inside me where you live,
And you will take from me all I will give.

Laundromat Sonnet

Today I went to town to wash my clothes;
Covered in piss, those sheets still needed cleaned.
Industrial strength washers in a row,
The silver shining drums inside them gleamed.

With quarters in a bag, clothes sorted out,
My underwear and bra fall to the floor.
For me it's all for All, no Tide or Shout, 
I launder my stains as I watch the door.

The rain outside reminds me of your heart;
The steady beat upon the pavement speaks.
The dryers drone on like they've come apart.
I haven't washed my soiled sheets in weeks.

Blood stains fade after a wash and rinse.
You cut me and I haven't seen you since. 

12-6,7-13

First Kiss in Present Tense

In a Christmas kitchen he beckons me into the dark, and pulls me to him with a sense of entitlement, a sense of juvenile urgency, a seriousness you possess only before your heart has felt the lashings of the world, when exploration is still the only destination, as if it was his sole duty to seduce me.

With red and white confections still crushed between his teeth, he seeks out my lips and parts them smoothly with his cool peppermint tongue.

He feels like menthol velvet as we meet like high tide to the sand.  Slowly I melt into his mouth, matching the movements of these lapping waves of youth, tasting the ecstatic new found sweetness of his candy cane kisses.

Writer's Block and Compelling Tells

I have been meaning to finish up so many writing 'projects' for the longest time but I just haven't been feeling it.  Scrawled words emerge from time to time on random substrates, but I have been distanced from my writer's mind for some time.  Well, not the mind, just the motion.  Lines pop into my head as usual, but I don't grab a pen.  I let them fall to the bottom of my mind, and figure if the words were that good...they would come back to me.  Some do, some don't. That's the funny thing about words.

I like to have my trusty Moleskine with me, and it is usually in my purse, but I've been using it only for concert noting on the go, as of late.  I've been lost in thought instead of words.  The truth is I have dozens of journals and notebooks...aching for words.  Blank pages scream at me from every corner of my space, but I have not felt compelled to touch them.  I've been lost in instruments more so, but have been lax with that as well, until last week when I was compelled to pick up my Alvarez for three days straight.  Being compelled is another funny thing.  It's almost like a program in your brain you have to follow; you are driven to carry out the mission.  I just didn't seem to want to do anything else, so I just went with it...and let the housework back up.  My bathroom paid, but I was rewarded.  It lasted three straight days and then waned.  It felt good.  Sometimes, I am just compelled to do things and it feels best to just go with it.

So, today while I was in the store for a few things, I was compelled to buy a notebook and pens.  Stationery.  It should be known that I have a thing for stationery; I'm drawn to it like a moth to a flame.  I wander away from my husband at the site of the paper aisle in a store.  I am ridiculous in Staples.  It's borderline fetish.  Okay, I don't feverishly rub composition books on my genitals, or anything, (although if it was a leather bound journal, now...) there is just nothing like a fresh tablet and brand new pens! So, even though I know I have plenty of notebooks of every size and color, I for some reason felt I needed to purchase a small 3 subject Mead notebook and a pack of pens that claimed they were 'The smoothest in the world!'  The Bic Velocity. Good pen.  Smooth.

I felt compelled and went with it and got the tablet and pens.  If my Self says she wants a tablet on a whim, then what does that say?  What deeper tells does my spirit show?  Perhaps that she is ready to write again.  Perhaps that she wants new paper...for her new words.  Or...perhaps she is just a fetishist after all.  Let's see what she is compelled to do with it.

Growing Pains

Engaging is hard work.  It takes time, it takes patience.  It's an art.  Sometimes, what you need to do is disengage. 
Everyone has their own issues.
It's hard to focus on others while trying to maintain and heal yourself.
It can really seem selfish.  Accept it. Everyone needs to be okay with being a healthy amount of selfish.  Everyone needs to take time for the Self.  It's nobody's job to make you happy; it is your own responsibility.  Nobody can do it for you.  The dirty work is yours.  Do it for yourself, in your own way, however it is you heal.
Nobody will stop to hear you talk about your story because they're too caught up in writing their own? Write it.  Write it out long hand, page by page, word by word.  Bleed it out like from an opened vein and put the pain to rest.

Dead Dreams and the Dirty Truth

I have been thinking about what my therapist said at our last session lately.  We were discussing my anxiety over all of my projects and ideas, work and play, my "Renaissance woman" nature, as she put it, and as I was going off about my inability to do everything she reminded me that I was forgetting the fact that I am a single mother during the week.  Not only am I a mother, which comes with all of its responsibilities and sacrifices, but I do it on my own the majority of the time, which comes with even more.  I feel bad even comparing myself to single mothers, who have to be the hardest working, most chronically stressed and strongest creatures on the face of the earth.  Props to that group of women, which includes my therapist.  (You are all amazing!)  Having her make the comparison herself allowed me to see the truth in it.  I am not a single mother for real, but it certainly can feel like it sometimes!  And like other real single mothers, and all mothers alike, time is of the essence.  It is valuable, and we have to manage it or it will manage us.  Sometimes there isn't enough time to do everything, and in order to prioritize for parenthood, we need to make sacrifices.  That's part of the deal.  Sometimes some parts of us have to experience a temporary death in order to rear new life, all in the hope that they will be resurrected one glorious, long-awaited day in the future.

I have given up a lot to be a mother, as does every woman.  We sacrifice our freedom, our time, our sleep, our nourishment, our hygiene and most cases our mental well being...all so our progeny is properly taken care of.  This is an amazing gift, both to give and to receive, but it also can be one of the most soul crippling acts of selflessness.  All of our personal pleasures in life, the places and things that we find and express ourselves in, can get put on hold.  We are at the beck and call of another creature.  Hobbies fall by the wayside, dreams fluttering after them.  My therapist used to be a trainer, she used to be a size 4, she used to be a sculptor, she used to be an artist...until 3 years ago when her son was born.  It was heart breaking hearing her tell how she cried as she covered her potter's wheel in her basement studio.  She had to put those parts of herself away in order to be the best mother she could be. At least temporarily.  In synchronistic fashion my dad mentioned the same thing to me the same day in the same words.  Parts die, not forever.  I am realizing how many directions I am pulling myself in creatively and I know that there are some things I need to put away, things that need to die, although, there are some parts of me that I refuse to give up.  I was forced to break myself down to my basic components and determine what is absolutely necessary for my spiritual survival.  What was the bread and butter of my soul?

When I was little, the first thing that I can remember ever wanting to be was an artist.  I can still remember the first time I was placed in front of an easel.  I can still feel that chalky paint being stirred by my over-sized brush in the bottom of that little Styrofoam cup.  I can still smell the powdery paint.  Part of me is still standing in front of that easel, looking at the blank paper, and making those first brush strokes.  I am still standing there, in so many ways in my life.  Still standing at the easel, at the very beginning.

Painting is an amazing feeling and release.  There is really nothing like it, if you are someone that understands its worth.  It isn't even my "thing" per say, just one of many sides of me, but I have been drawn to it since my early childhood.  It is an excellent means for expression.  It can also be pretty messy, time consuming, and not exactly kid friendly.  I was by some miracle able to squeeze in some painting time early last year, and that was the first time it happened in quite awhile.  I'm not even exactly sure how it happened, I think I just desperately needed it to happen at the time.  It was wonderful, but it gave me a false sense of hope about my life as a mother. It was exciting while I could swing it, but soon I had a stack of canvas and brushes and paints and rags wedged into our already cluttered bedroom.  And there it sat.

There it sat...mocking me.  Every morning I woke up and it was beside me, every night I curled up next to it...next to a dead dream.  All snug as a bug, next to decaying hopes.  "You'll never paint me, EVER!"  The half painted ones taunted me.  It wasn't healthy.  I decided all of it was better out of sight, out of mind instead of in a limbo life, waiting for me to pull them out and pick up where I'd left off.  Not gonna happen.  Don't wait for me.  Shut the car off, I'm gonna be awhile. I decided that even though I feel so emotionally connected to painting and have always returned to it again, no matter how long I had previously given it up for, it represented something I just can't accomplish at this point in my life.  That representation was hard to see every single time I went into my bedroom, my supposed sanctuary.  It needed to be removed.  It was sand in my eye, it just made my eyes water and burn and itch!  It is hard to remember that this is only temporary.  It doesn't have to be forever, it just isn't my main priority right now in life. 

I have a lot of ideas and plans on my plate, I enjoy creating and expressing myself.  There are things that I do that have a purpose beyond expression.  My screen printing and piercing are both possibly lucrative activities, they obviously can not be put on the back burner.  Those projects and all activities they include will continue.  They are my work, not so much hobby, even though it feels like it at times. 

As far as pastimes go, when it comes down to it, writing and music are things I can not go without, and they are kind of tied around each other.  My spirit would be crushed if I had to give these forms of self expression up, especially writing.  It's the only thing that has always been there for me, that has always been a trusted pain reliever.  Sorry, Painting, but Writing stays. 

So, I decided that if my therapist can cover up her potter's wheel, if she can let her creative muscles atrophy until time and life permit her exercising them once again, surely I can give up some things that aren't so much a priority, mainly oil painting, which meant packing my things away in a plastic tote and saying goodbye...for now.  It wasn't as hard as I THOUGHT it would be, but it was still sad in a way.  I just have to remember that it isn't forever.  And I can focus those ideas, that energy, into other aspects of my life.  My screens can become my canvas as I work on my own shirt designs more.  I have been wanting to get a new set of water color pencils.  Perhaps they would be a little more child compliant?  I used to love using my set in college, I think it would be a good compromise.  Removing my small canvas collection helped to remove the negative feelings of failure they stir up in me and also forced me to define my inalienable creative outlets.  I can only be so many parts of me at a time.  It's like the Rock Hall, you have to rotate the exhibits, some pieces need to stay in the vault for a bit, but they will be displayed again.

The dirty truth about being a mother is that you can't be or do it all.  Parts of you die, huge parts, parts that have shaped and defined who you are as person.  Beautiful, colorful pieces of yourself need to be laid to rest for a time, but not forever.  I remember a few years ago my dad telling me that when you are young you tend to think that there won't be time for all of these things that you want to do, but then when you get there you realize, there is time.  Time is of the essence.  The time will come.

Are there any pieces of yourself that could use a temporary death?

In Time,
Missie Sue