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When I was 12 or 13 years old, I had an encounter with my father that had an enormous impact on me. I was working after school as a cleaner in a woman's house and not doing a very good job. I didn't know how. I scrubbed floors on my knees, and she had a mop. I had never seen a vacuum cleaner. The money was small, but it was everything, and at some point I complained to my mother about the woman who had hired me. My mother said I should quit, but obviously I wanted those few coins so I didn't. And yet when I spoke to my father he just looked at me and said, "Listen, you don't live there, you live here."
Now a lot of times people say simple things and it's not so much what they say as what you hear. I heard, "Do your work well, not for who hires you but for yourself." I heard, "You make the job, it doesn't make you." I heard, "You are not the work, you are not the job, you are the person." My father's words affected me all my life, because I was always interested in doing first-rate work, and I was always interested in knowing that I could not be defined by the work I did. I didn't have to say, "I'm a teacher, I'm an editor, I'm a housekeeper, I'm a waitress." Those were occupations, but there was a person back there, and I think it was the person who was enabled, ultimately, to begin to write books much later in life.
Toni Morrison - the perfect seam
"You don't live there, you live here."
There is so much in this that registers profoundly well, that is centering, that awakens and uplifts - you don't live there, you live here - that is regenerative and reverberates, (magnificence), and is reminiscent of children listening, noticing, realizing, redesigning warped spaces; of prescient minds being nurtured. Here is someone holding up a light exactly where it is needed: a decision point; that welcomed clarity: you don't live there, you live here. Listen.
When I was a wee-boy needing a mother's holding hand to cross a street, I was taken to an extraordinary place several times - for sure - unless I was dreaming. I was unaware at each of those occasions that I was being taken to this special place, and at each disappointment thereafter I remained unsure if I would ever be taken there again.
I soon began to day-dream of that place, for it was a world outside of me, a bright and sunny world of glossy greens and dusty browns; a flourishing flare of nature - delightful - (if infatuation of wee-boy memories are allowed here); a world I could hug like a globe and peer through. Its innards fluttered musically and was scattered with playful patterns rich in stories no one elsewhere tells. I had much rather be there with birds of every color than where the world went through me and in its kerfuffle dove in and out of my spacious belly like chased dolphins. But I didn't know where the special place was, or how to get there, or how to ask to be taken there. For sure, the special place I resonated so infectiously with was as real and as magical as necessary. I could breathe there, and each time was revived, easily that is, before the spell was broken.
The going and coming to and from that place before the spell was broken happened (to put it succinctly) in this fashion:
- a grungy odor of oil and gas and grime and steam encircles me
- mom holds my hand firmly, hustling me up through a hurried press of humans and animals crossing a broad wooden bridge
- quickly, that bridge folds up behind us, closing us in with no way back
- there's rattling and shuffling and odd creaks, and finally a seat
- this is where the circus is; for to me it is a circus, since I had never seen one before this first time nor knew how a circus ought to be; perhaps someone muttered, what a circus, imprinting these wild crops of predictable charades as a circus, amiable in all of its wellknown contortions
- after a while, waves of golden light and rocking shadows crisscross me
- soon thereafter mom holds my hand firmly, hustles me up and onto a grungy bridge appearing from nowhere, like magic, and suddenly all around me is magnificence. Like a miracle! A brand new world! Life. Living. Love. Light. Rhapsody.
- there, I am, with no reflective sense of time, only of being, and of being allowed to be, and of relishing whatever being is; boyishly refreshing it is; revitalizing
- soon, too soon, with no warning, this cold shower, this tugged-up pants, this tucked-in shirt, this shuffle up the bridge, these creaks, this circus, despite a bright expectancy, do not lead to golden crisscrossing lights
- a grungy odor of oil and gas and grime and steam encircles me
- the world goes through me, diving in and out, like salmon up a wild stream.
Listen: you don't live there, you live here!
Here, too often, I overhear nosey visitors enquiring of my mom whether I speak, or know how to speak, or is tongue-tied - so quiet, that boy!
"He speaks," she'd say. "He speaks when there is a need," her warm glance like a signal, and I smille, naturally, and everyone around me smile, their shadows now bouncing gleefully around our room, while the world takes leave of its senses.
Here, where my only un-invadable privacy are my undisclosed thoughts, stealthily my mom's hand would often brush or caress my head and I'd hear her saying the likes of "Don't throw the baby out with the bath water!" And my reflexive mind would wrinkle. "What baby! All I see is dirty water." Though, my wee-wee-hood was way too wee-wee to have known to coin my clarity in that manner. {Ah, but, miracle of miracles: it was another seed planted, another candle lit, a necessary innoculation.}
Here, where quiet is not silence; here, barely a mother's arms length from engraved human patterns which to an observant wee-boy are as squirly as cats and dogs ravaging fields where squirrels hide their nuts; here, stealthily, my mom's hand would brush or caress my head as she whispers the likes of, "Don't go chasing ghosts down rabbit holes!" whispering at such times when I did not have the reflexive muscle to clap back, "I am not chasing them; they are chasing me up and down unvanishable winds." {Ah, but, miracle of miracles: it was another seed planted, another candle lit, a necessary innoculation.}
Here where I live, with these and in many other marvelous ways, as I dream of the special place and am too wee-wee to comprehend time's ability to tick lives into oblivion, mom is gently, graciously, weaving into minds and spirits a lasting desire for learning, and the joy of learning, and the awesome value of being life-long-learners - ooh, what a Lady - weaving seeds into my stitched pouches, planting seeds in patches of our nourished plots, innoculating us against manipulating diseases, leaving legacies, not in brick or mortar, rather in hearts and healthy minds, doing these so seamlessly I am unaware of the particular effort required of such work, that is, of course, before the spell was broken.
Then one day, while not wee-wee but still a boy, she dispatched me across vast waters - alone - on a grave emergency. When I arrived I was taken aback by a bright unmistakable familiarity. I wondered if I was dreaming or had slipped into a weird trance.
This is the place! This is the place. This is the place. I kept telling myself, this is the place, but the grave emergency had me in its grip, so I began to doubt. Then, having attended to the emergency I came to realize by way of that attention what I have now ascertained to be
a) the invaluable confidence of knowing someone dependable has your back, unconditionally
b) there is a place called home; it is essential knowing exactly where that is
c) someone is holding up the light
I could no longer deny the unmisakable patterns: this is that special place; this is the place mom used to bring me to, the place where I breathed so easily and was always revived. This is the home of my mother's childhood. This is that special place!
And the spell was broken for its realness.
Listen, you don't live there, you live here.
So today, when a six year old boy with his parents permission asked me for a hug, and upon hugging him, a seven year old boy ran up and hugged me, and all around us smilles bloomed - oh, what synchronocity - I can tell you most assuredly it was not us alone hugging. I perceive these boys perceived - miracle of miracles - seeds were planted, candles were lit. These were innoculations against manipulating diseases. Hope! Renewal. Time reclaimed. For it is never not just what is said, it is what is heard. It is not only what is done, it is always what is felt.
Today, I maintain a space where I live - a special place - celebrating and honoring the legends who shape our lives - my life - who keep my candles lit, who whisper when a whisper is warranted, and shout across distracting noises so I hear and understand, who lift me onto their shoulders so I see, and let me stand upon their strong foundations so I am confident, who water the seeds my mother planted so that I am nourished and grow, and am able. They are mighty. They are many. They hold up a light. They are timeless. And you?
Isn't life truly amazing? Isn't it awesome?
Welcome to SEASON SEVEN, 're-CLAIMED,' episode two - time re-designed - curated by Neville DeAngelou.
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ILICET - A Time To Begin Again (True Story) 
