elieaxelroth, Author at Elie Axelroth

If I Can’t Go Away I Can Stay Here

August 20, 2021 By elieaxelroth 7 Comments

I recently challenged myself to give up watching TV for a week. I thought it would be hard to do, but I’m finding there are plenty of other, more engaging ways, to while away the evening. Like jigsaw puzzles and reading, listening to music, even cleaning out drawers and cabinets is surprisingly more entertaining than TV. One week has expanded into a month and counting. I’m sorting through old files, travel photos, birthday cards. It occurs to me I’m reliving the past, then happily shredding what no longer applies.

As a psychologist, the past was my bread and butter. Like Socrates, who said, “the unexamined life isn’t worth living,” I encouraged my clients to make friends with the past, to take seriously their lived experience, embrace their own truth. I delighted in the many “aha” moments awakened in the process. Sometimes just that was enough to make peace with the past.

And yet, it occurs to me that at some point, all the exploring and analyzing, dissecting and probing the past outlives its usefulness. It’s one thing to learn from the past, it’s quite another to live in it.

In the midst of COVID, I miss traveling. And going to the movies. The ease of meeting up with friends for dinner. Maybe all this sorting through old files and swearing off TV is my way of finding a path forward, something fitting for the times we’re living in—the desperation, the fear. The uncertainty.

I, too, have spent my share of hours uncovering and delighting in my own insights about the past. I believe those were hours well spent. As George Santayana famously said, “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

I toss another file folder into the recycling bin, aware of how quickly six decades and change have slipped away one tick-tock at a time. As disconcerting and unsettling as the current times are, I don’t want to sleep through it, to wake up with another decade having evaporated. The past won’t help us now, that’s for sure.

During an afternoon meditation, I remind myself—again—to be present with the breath. After all, that is the practice. For a brief flicker of a moment, I sense a billowing curtain, a shadowy partition, a gap between the present moment and everything else. For that brief moment, there is nothing but the breath.

And in that moment, I feel free and light and filled with joy. Awake for what’s now.

I invite you to read related blogs including When The Best I Can Do Is Pray and Hope Arrives Like the Tap, Tap, Tapping of a Woodpecker. And my novel, Thin Places, that is available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle. Also, look for my second novel, Cross Body Lead, to be published by Propertius Press in November, 2021.

When the Best I Can Do Is Pray

January 31, 2021 By elieaxelroth 25 Comments

Montana de Oro, California

The last number of months, I’ve been praying every day. For safety. For courage. For peace. It has become part of my routine, like drinking tea in the morning or brushing my teeth. Most often, I lie quietly on the couch, but sometimes I pause along my daily walk; I sit on a log or a park bench and I close my eyes. I listen to the mallards slurping in the eel grass, the song sparrows, the insistent chirps of the phoebes, the gentle ebb and flow of the bay rippling along the shore, kayakers calling out to each other in their faraway voices.

A mere three minutes every day, I pray for myself and for my wife and my family. My sister-in-law who is recovering from surgery. A friend who just lost her husband. I pray for my children and my yet-to-be born grandson who is barely the size of a grapefruit, but is already swimming and kicking and playing with his toes. I know this because of the miracle of ultrasound. I pray that all those around me stay healthy. I pray for those with COVID. I pray for reason, for facts, for enough ventilators, for the nurses who will vaccinate us. I pray that everyone will wear a mask. I pray that my turn to get the vaccine will come soon.

In the evermore existential climate crisis, I pray for the birds and trees and the earth. When the skies in California were smokey this past fall, I prayed with even greater urgency, that we might be free to breathe again. I pray for those who’ve been harmed. For anyone I have harmed. I even pray for a few of the people I struggle with. Fervently, and with as much attention as possible, I pray for President Biden and Vice-President Harris. I wish I could pray for Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley, but for now, I leave that to others.

Mostly my prayers are humble and unassuming, as if I am standing on the edge of our vast universe. May I be safe. May I be healthy. May I live in peace. My inner voice is quiet and tentative. I pray with reverence and hope and awe.

And then I stumble.

Sandpipers along the bay

I am brusque with a salesperson, impatient with my wife. I am stingy and unforgiving, jealous of what others have, even though I have everything I need—and more. I disappoint myself over and over again because I have forgotten that we are all trying to do our best. And besides, who am I to judge?

Sometimes it feels like the best I can do is to pray, which is not to suggest that prayer is a little thing. On days I’m feeling scared or overwhelmed, my prayers are more like the pleading of a lost child. Please, may we be safe. May we be healthy. May we live in peace. I pray for the renewal of trust, and the safekeeping of our dreams for a just world. For the strength and stamina to face each day. For comfort and contentment.

In desperate times like these, when I fear for our democracy, my prayers, that are even more urgent, are not for me—or for those close to me—but for others. Our elected officials, for the pages and staffers, the reporters who were all forced to take cover under their desks. They may not tell us they feared for their lives, but they did. I pray for calm and clear-thinking. I pray for reason and empathy and strength. I pray that we can all pause, long enough to figure out the right thing to do, and the best way to get there. I pray for forgiveness. I pray for accountability without revenge. I pray for justice.

Today, and in the days ahead: May we be courageous. May we be bold. May we be wise.

I invite you to read related blogs including Hope Arrives Like the Tap, Tap, Tapping of a Woodpecker and Thin Places: The Possibility of Transformation. And my novel, Thin Places, that is available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle.

Hope Arrives Like the Tap, Tap, Tapping of a Woodpecker

November 9, 2020 By elieaxelroth 22 Comments

They come out of nowhere, seemingly all at once. The tap, tap, tapping of a woodpecker in one of the dead sycamores in my yard. Then various chirps and twitters. Swirls of goldfinches; I hear the whisper of their wings. A chickadee. Bushtits and white crowned sparrows. An oak titmouse hidden in the foliage. A pine siskin splashing in the birdbath.

It takes time before my feathered companions become accustomed to my presence, but then they flock to the red berries on the pyracantha bushes and my bird feeders and they perch on the fence. They scratch at the seed that has dropped on the ground.

I am sitting as still as possible, looking skyward. Waiting. Because if I so much as lean over to pick up my binoculars or my camera, they scatter in a blur of unrequited promise. They are not like the coastal birds who pose in full sunlight or sandpipers who skitter in a coordinated swarm along the surf, like the murmuration of swallows at dusk.

It is not easy to resist the temptation to reach for my phone, check my email, refresh the NY Times webpage as I sit impatiently surveying the trees. But I am rewarded when there is rustling in the leaves. I search for subtle movement—enough to help me locate the sound. A bright orange breast and white circle around the eye. An American robin. It looks more spectacular than the robins I remember back east as a child. Later I look it up in my Sibley’s and it is indeed the same ubiquitous bird. How wonderful to see an old friend, seemingly unaware of his beauty.

Then just as suddenly, it is quiet again but for a steady breeze moving through the trees, my neighbor rolling his trash bins to the curb, a lawn mower off in the distance. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a flicker of yellow, like a warbler. Instead, it is a single dried leaf fluttering to the ground in a tumble of disappointment.

In the space of an hour, I have forgotten oh so briefly all about the election. And the pandemic. All the waiting we’ve been doing—for a new president and now waiting for inauguration day. Waiting for a vaccine. For the calendar page that will usher in the end to this crummy, heartsick year.

We are waiting to get back to our lives—our lives that have been on hold.

Except, this is our life. Masks and hand sanitizer. Zoom meetings and social distancing. Four years of a cruel, raging president. Fires and floods and hatred in the streets. A country that needs desperately to heal. And so much more.

If nothing else, 2020 will be remembered as a year of collective and personal grief. And waiting.

I look up again, searching for fluttering, a bobbing branch, a streak of color. I believe that gazing up at the sky is an act of faith, a respite. It is freedom. And courage. It is the possibility of something previously unimagined. It is hope. A prayer. The chance for redemption. It is the brief, nearly imperceptible, pause between the in-breath and the out-breath—conscious only when we make it so. It is a space between all the waiting.

And in the meaning we make of our lives, it is not the waiting that matters, but what we do with the space in between.

I invite you to read related blogs including Nesting in Place: How A Few Backyard Birds Are Teaching Me to Listen and Thin Places: The Possibility of Transformation. And my novel, Thin Places, that is available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle.

Nesting in Place: How A Few Backyard Birds are Teaching Me to Listen

July 12, 2020 By elieaxelroth 19 Comments

California towhee

It started with a pandemic. And a bird fluttering by my office window. Back and forth in my line of sight, distracting me from whatever seemed more important at the time. Paying bills or googling how to fix a running toilet. Or maybe I was making a to-do list—trying to figure out how to fill my days while sheltering in place.

It was serendipitous, that bird, hopping along the top of the fence. With so much time on my hands and nowhere to go, I took to leaving the binoculars and my camera out on the desk.

As it turns out, it was a lively California towhee. A curious, social bird, brown with a tinge of cinnamon on its tail and a single, insistent chirp, chirp, chirp. They’re quite common and I started seeing them all over. I’m not sure how I’d missed noticing them before.

Coopers hawk

Lately, I’ve been hearing a cacophony of sounds from my patio. But for the squawking crows and the sweet, melodious song of the white-crowned sparrows, I haven’t learned to identify their calls—at least not yet.

But this morning I heard what were unmistakably distress calls. There in the tree above my patio was a Coopers hawk quietly posing for me while neighboring birds sounded the alarm. There’s a whole lot of drama out there—if only we’re prepared to notice.

great blue heron

In the trees adjacent to my house, I’ve identified flycatchers and chickadees, a white-tailed hawk, a Nuttall’s woodpecker, cedar waxwings feasting on red toyon berries, black-eyed juncos scratching at the ground. Yesterday I came upon a flock of bushtits—fluffy balls of brown and gray twittering in the bushes.

Snowy Plovers: A COVID Silver Lining?

Given that it’s summertime, I’ve taken to walking a section of beach normally overrun with off-roaders. Due to COVID-19, the area’s been closed to vehicles, and the beach is suddenly, stunningly peaceful. It seems to me that the birds are at least as happy as I am with the misty mornings, the tranquil undulation of the waves, the unfettered expanse of quiet.

The area is home to western snowy plovers and California least terns, endangered birds that nest in shallow indentations in the sand. Recently, California State Parks and Recreation was found to be scuffing out their nests and putting up mylar streamers to scare away the birds—all in an effort to make it possible for the dune buggies and ATVs to return once the coronavirus restrictions are lifted.

The Coastal Commission caught wind of what they were doing and called a halt to it—at least until the end of September when snowy plover breeding season is over. What they were doing is, after all, a violation of the Endangered Species Act.

I’m afraid that whatever happens next will have less to do with the wildlife. And more to do with the vociferous lobbying of off-road enthusiasts. The off-roaders will tell you that the Coastal Commission has already significantly restricted their range for recreating. But I feel greedy for the plovers—sweet little birds, who shouldn’t have to depend on the kindness of an indecisive bureaucracy for their survival.

western snowy plover

In the meantime, I’m taking advantage of the quiet on that section of beach. I’ve seen great blue herons and egrets, black-crowned night herons, whimbrels and willets, godwits, gulls and pelicans. And yes, I was lucky enough to spot a few plovers scurrying across the sand.

So while the health of our country is all-too-scary to contemplate, I’m in the enviable position of being able to nest in place. I miss traveling, of course. And who knows when that’ll be safe again? In the meantime, I’ve discovered a whole other world out there. Right in my own backyard.

I invite you to read related blogs including Iceland: How Adversity Might Save the Planet and Thin Places: The Possibility of Transformation. And my novel, Thin Places, that is available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle.

Wanderlust Publishes My Blog Post About Morocco

May 4, 2020 By elieaxelroth 3 Comments

Majorelle Garden, Marrakesh, Morocco

I’m excited to announce that my blog post, A Call to Prayer: Morocco, was recently published online in Wanderlust: A Travel Journal.

During my trip to Morocco, I was struck by the religious imperative to pray five times a day. Of course, I had no idea that two years after this trip, many of us would be sheltering-in-place with multiple opportunities to pause and consider how our lives are inextricably connected. On the other side of the coronavirus pandemic–whatever that looks like–one thing is clear: we will never be the same.

If we pause to prayer, to dream, to imagine, perhaps we can repair the broken and create a world that is compassionate and just. A world of peace and plenty for all.

I also invite you to read my most recent blog post, Introverts Have the Edge: A Virus Teaches Us How to Spend Time Alone and my National Indie Excellence award-winning novel, Thin Places.

Wishing you all safe travels at home.

Introverts Have the Edge: A Virus Teaches Us How to Spend Time Alone

March 19, 2020 By elieaxelroth 5 Comments

Gertrude is freaking out. I don’t blame her. She’s an extrovert and now we’ve been ordered to shelter in place for a month. But she’s not making it any easier on herself. The news is on full tilt and she’s watching the stock market plunge. There are track marks on the carpet where she’s been pacing. The fact is that as the days go by, I’m feeling increasingly anxious too. I remind her we have plenty of toilet paper and there’s soup in the cupboard. At least for now.

I’m an introvert, so this crisis we find ourselves in is a bit easier. We introverts crave solitude and quiet. We’re most comfortable at small gatherings and we spend a lot of time in our heads.

Meditation

Gertrude gives me the evil eye when I suggest meditating. But then she mutes the TV and plops herself down on the couch. Just focus on your breath, I tell her. She lasts five minutes which is a pretty good start. I send her an interview with meditation teacher Tara Brach.

Focus on What You Can Do

I’m trying to acknowledge the reality of the crisis without giving in to panic. With disinfectant in hand, I wipe down the kitchen counters. I put my gym membership on hold. I make a list of all those hunkering down activities I never get to—clearing off my desk, rotating the mattresses, organizing the garage. Writing a blog piece on how introverts rule. There’s some house painting I’ve been avoiding. Yard work. I call my son who helps me figure out how to order food online. My last public outing was to buy a new refrigerator—mine is chirping and heaving and the repairman gave it two months at best, which seems eerily similar to how long I could be cooped up at home. I hope the new refrigerator arrives before there’s a puddle of ice cream on the kitchen floor.

Practice Gratitude

I’m aware that families with children and healthcare workers and emergency personnel and workers in the service industry are experiencing significant stress for who knows how long. Either they risk being exposed to the virus or they’re not getting a paycheck. I’m reminded of how lucky I am. Even my adult children, however inconvenienced, are coping well.

Live in the Moment

I notice that without all the daily errands and distractions, my sense of time is changing. Like an extended vacation, it takes at least a few days to unwind and then time feels expansive, even precious. Gertrude and I take a walk in the rain. We’ve been cooped up inside with drought-defying March rains. We stop along the path to watch how the muddy water swirls and gurgles down the creek. There are two mallards paddling around in a seasonal drainage swale. Both the rain and being outside feel like a miracle. I’m trying not to count the days—either how long it’s been or what the future will bring. Today is today is today.

Penguins and Sheep

Later that afternoon, I come across an app that identifies duplicate photos. I’m elated there’s something else I can add to my list of hunkering down activities. I scroll through travel photos and I’m reminded that Iceland is a whole country of introverts—and sheep, both of whom thrive on the solitude. Penguins in Antarctica, on the other hand, are very social. Despite the cold and isolation, they seem to manage with good humor and curiosity and each other.

Of course, they don’t need toilet paper. And they have an endless supply of frozen food.

I invite you to read related blogs including Thin Places: The Possibility of Transformation and Play it as it Lies. And my novel, Thin Places, that is available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle.

Iceland: How Adversity Might Save the Planet

January 20, 2020 By elieaxelroth 7 Comments

You can’t visit Iceland without thinking—now here’s a people who’ve truly made the best of a bad situation.

The landscape is stark and unforgiving: Scalding hot geysers. Craggy lava rock. Steam spewing to the surface heaving gray and yellowish swirls of mud into the air. Glaciers and ice caves. Punishing hurricane-force wind. Inescapable—and unpredictable—bone-chilling cold. At the height of winter, there’s only four hours of opaque sunlight that hovers above the horizon.

Remember Eyjafjallajökull? That’s the unpronounceable volcano that erupted in 2010, shutting down European airspace and creating travel chaos. Yup, quintessential Iceland.

**The shark meat is cured for four to five months**

If that weren’t enough by way of adversity, I dare you to try hákarl or fermented shark meat. The meat is poisonous when fresh, so it must be cured and then hung to dry for four to five months. Because of the strong ammonia-rich smell, it’s eaten in small chunks with toothpicks and a vodka chaser. Reportedly, the chef Anthony Bourdain said it was “the single worst, most disgusting and terrible tasting thing” he’d ever eaten. I wouldn’t disagree.

How we deal with adversity says a lot about who we are. For the Icelanders, it’s þetta reddast, a favorite expression loosely translated as “everything will turn out all right.” It’s an anthem of both optimism and certainty—that whatever happens, they’ll figure it out.

The Icelanders I met were lovely but reserved—not effusive like the Finns or flowery like the Colombianos. They are a people of few words. Perhaps this is an accommodation to their isolation. Imagine a country the size of New York, but with a population of 339,000 and only 9 people per square mile. It’s a nation of introverts. The closest neighbor, Greenland, is 180 miles away.

As an introvert myself, I find this enticing.

I don’t have the impression that Icelanders feel deprived. They make it a priority to use their limited resources wisely—making them consummate environmentalists. Iceland is a volcanic island and about 85% of their total energy is derived from renewable sources—geothermal energy and hydroelectric power. Many communities in Iceland are clustered around these steamy hot springs. I spent a lovely evening relaxing at the community swimming pool across the street from my hotel in Akureyri where it seems the entire town gathers to swim laps in the Olympic-size pool, splash down the water slides, soak in one of three hotpots—the hottest of which is 43°C or about 109°F.

It’s not surprising they eat lots of fish—cod, haddock, salmon, and monkfish. With what’s left from their dinner plates, they make into beautiful handbags and belts and wallets fashioned out of fish leather; collagen powder for skin products; pet food; calcium and other vitamins; shark cartilage; omega oils. The list goes on.

That same stark, unforgiving landscape that shapes an environment of adversity is also stunningly beautiful. Iceland is a country of thundering waterfalls and double rainbows, mossy emerald green lava fields, geysers and mud pools, glaciers and ice caves. And of course, the Aurora Borealis. No wonder tourists have fallen in love.

It makes me consider my own relationship to adversity. By and large, I live a privileged life, but I can easily get lost in trivial grievances. Robocalls and spam email. The scarcity of avocados. The ever-increasing cost of cable TV. Traffic and the lack of adequate parking in the downtown. These are common complaints, so I know I’m not alone, but they are complaints that mask the true nature of our existential climate crisis. What would it mean if we were able to take in the full reality: that future generations will be faced with unprecedented fires and floods, famine, drought, loss of habitat and more?

Of course, many of us are committed to doing our part to heal the planet. Who among us doesn’t recycle? We’re doing our best to limit consumerism and we send money to our favorite environmental charities. Electric cars are no longer a rarity. Even the presidential candidates are voicing their own concerns about climate change.

With our planet melting day by day, it’s impossible to know how much is enough. We feel hopeless and overwhelmed. And then we lose our way, pushing aside what we know to be true: that our planet won’t survive any more abuse. The reality is that we can’t afford to forget.

**Mýrdalsjökull Glacier at Katla Volcano**

What can one person do? Perhaps a diet that includes fermented shark and a long, icy cold, dark winter would help to keep us on the right path. Remind us how blessed—and endangered—we are.

Like the Icelanders, we can make friends with adversity. Because one way or another, that’s what we’re facing.

I invite you to read related travel blogs including Colombian Courtesy: The Declining Cost of a Tinto and Morocco: A Call to Prayer. And my novel, Thin Places, that is available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle.

The Rescue: A Short Story

August 26, 2019 By elieaxelroth Leave a Comment

The stranger who rescued him was a dark-skinned woman. She’d been wearing a green dress with flowers and a matching sweater, delicate pearl buttons running down the front. She smelled exotic like rose petals. All he wanted to do was to thank her.

Click here to read my short story, The Rescue, published in Adelaide Literary Review, Issue No. 27, August 2019.

I also invite you to read a recent blog post on The Possibility of Transformation. And my National Indie Excellence award-winning novel, Thin Places.

Colombian Courtesy: The Declining Cost of a Tinto

February 18, 2019 By elieaxelroth 12 Comments

A sign at a café in Medellín illustrates the Colombiano passion for courtesy. Un tinto—a small cup of black coffee—costs $2000 Colombian pesos. Or about 65 cents.

Ask for your tinto with a simple “por favor” and the price immediately drops.

Gush with courtesy: “Buenos días, un tinto por favor,” and your coffee is cheaper still.

The country’s sordid history of violence and drug cartels aside, this is a culture that values simple courtesy. In fact, it’s regarded as rude to launch into a conversation without the requisite smile and good morning. How are you? How’s your family? And your second cousin? Did she move back to Bogotá from the States? They want to know where you’re from and what you think of their safer, more tranquil, vibrant Colombia.

It’s an ease of conversation that leaves me tongue-tied.

Lucky for me, my traveling buddy Cynthia smoothed the way with her warm smile and congenial manner—making our trip that much more extraordinary. Etched in my memory bank is the bittersweet sadness of a diminutive shopkeeper from Ecuador forced to support his family from afar. The hotel manager who figured out how to get us a hot shower when the system broke down. The kind face of the weaver who sold me a handwoven tablecloth.

Having grown up in New York, I’m more at ease with the kind of streamlined, albeit impersonal transactions that take place every day in grocery stores and newsstands, at the bank, on the street corner when asking for directions. A perfunctory hello is followed by your request.

Having to pause and breathe and spend those few extra minutes getting to know someone can feel like an imposition.

Even in California, we’re in a hurry. When eating out at a restaurant, I’ve lately developed an uncontrollable impulse to hold onto my plate. Otherwise it’s likely to be snatched away before I’ve had a chance to sop up that last savory drizzle of avocado balsamic dressing. And woe to the slow eater who’s shamelessly ignored while everyone orders dessert. All over the world—Italy, Ecuador, Mexico, Spain, and Argentina—you can linger for hours without so much as a side glance from the waiter.

Years ago, traveling on a crowded bus through bush country in Africa—maybe Kenya or Tanzania—the bus would stop with no one in sight. No houses or bicycles, no cows or donkeys, or even people. Then seemingly out of nowhere, a young woman would appear; she’d climb on the bus with her packages and young children in tow. Invariably, another passenger would move aside to create a seat and perch the child on his lap. Then they’d chatter away like old friends.

They must know each other, we thought. But that wasn’t it at all. They were immensely open-hearted and friendly, and thought nothing of showing a common courtesy by picking up another woman’s child.

In the US, we’re suspicious of strangers who tell us too much about themselves. Or who make eye contact on the subway. Or who offer to hold our child’s hand when we’re overloaded with too many packages. I’m savvy enough to know that danger lurks, but I’ve also witnessed the callousness of strangers standing by while a young mother struggles with her stroller and baby and toddler and diaper bag trying to get onto a plane.

We rarely stop to consider the cost of our paucity of words and fear of generosity.

Since coming back from our two short weeks in Colombia, I’ve been practicing generosity in my words. I have to admit that as an introvert, it’s scary stuff. I want to be friendly—but not too friendly—for fear of creating the wrong impression. And then what?

So now I smile and say hello to the barista. I ask how she’s doing. And what else she has planned for the day. Because I’m quite sure there’s nothing to be lost, except a few moments of my time. And so much to be gained.

I invite you to read related travel posts about Morocco and Cuba. And my novel, Thin Places.

Thin Places: The Possibility of Transformation

December 31, 2018 By elieaxelroth 12 Comments

At the time of the winter solstice, the veil between heaven and earth narrows, opening us to the possibility of transformation. In some spiritual traditions, it’s called a thin place, an idea that captured my attention enough to use it as the title for my debut novel. Thin Places is the story of two people struggling with enormous loss —a young girl who’s been abandoned by her mother and a therapist who’s grieving the tragic death of her husband. Therapy is the thin place that transforms brokenness into healing.

I’ve been witness to many thin places in my life—moments of opportunity, of joy, of a vision beyond myself. Sacred temples perched on a mountain top in Bhutan. Michelangelo’s David. Listening to Mary Oliver recite her poem, The Summer Day. The belly laugh of my children. The sweet and pungent taste of a slice of cherry pie.

The last six months, while recovering from a back injury, has surely not felt like an opportunity for transformation. In fact, I’ve experienced myself as standing outside of my life. As if I were experiencing not so much the pause of a sacred moment but the sharp-edged spidery crack of broken porcelain.

Along the way, I’ve deluded myself into believing that at some point, I would simply step back into my life. Everything from the past six months would be forgotten—and forgiven. Like those moving walkways in an airport—you can get on and off at any time. Luggage and all. No worries, because they always lead to the same gate at the end of the terminal.

In this spidery crack that is my life, I’ve had plenty of opportunity to contemplate what’s next—if what’s next is to be something different from the past.

Lately I’ve been trying my hand at sketching. I pack up my pad and pencils and take them with me on my neighborhood walk. I look for opportunities along the way to stop and draw. A bridge. Crows pecking at the grass. A jungle gym. A park bench. Sitting in a café with my coffee, I look around until I see what draws me in. I’m learning about perspective and angles and shading and plumb lines, simple concepts for now. I try to draw every line, every angle, but I’m intrigued by the idea that some lines are necessary while others are extraneous.

I’ve discovered that it takes focused attention and concentration to see what’s really there. It is our brain that constructs—or reconstructs—what we perceive. But it is our eyes that really see. For instance, we divine a doorway from a line that disappears into the shadows. Shading suggests the depth of a planter box. Parallel lines of a sidewalk narrow into the distance. Our brains fill in the frame and the details.

It is an act of bravery and resistance to be willing to sit and stare long enough to take in what’s actually there. To draw and erase and redraw and stare some more. To see what’s real.

In these hours of concentrated focus, I feel a sense of contentment. My coffee is cold long before I’m ready to pack up my pencils. I’ve come to see that there’s no crack in my life. Unlike the airport walkway, we can’t get on and off when things get tough.

The best we can do is pray and rage and weep. And then gather up our senses and pay homage to what’s real. Because life continues, and along with the grief and loss and pain, there will also be moments of unexpected joy.

I invite you to read related posts Play it as it Lies and On Lost Sunglasses and the Meaning of Life. And my novel, Thin Places.

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Hope Arrives Like the Tap, Tap, Tapping of a Woodpecker