Perspective

There’s a pink/purple/blue sunset tonight over the Blue Ridge Mountains of Roanoke, Virginia. Appalachia. Wow.

Same sunset, or one just like it, happens on all days except the rainy ones. Yet, here I’ve lived for years of my life and here I’ve been unable to see them all this time. I’ve lived behind trees, in valleys, in basements, behind walls, behind blinders, and sometimes just blind.

Just a matter of perspective.

Same pretty sunsets happen, but those sunsets don’t happen to those who don’t see them. There are hundreds of thousands of people here, and I wonder how many of them admired the sunset today. My guess is 20%.

But it’s not just sunsets, it’s everything, even things that aren’t pretty. I won’t write more here about seeing the beautiful things, as I have written ad nauseum about that idea here and elsewhere. I will, however, suggest you take a look at something (sunset or otherwise) and admire it today.

Quick update on my life:

School has started. The first week is always difficult, and this year our school system has had to make budget cuts and staffing adjustments that simply mean more work for everybody. I have more students than I’ve had in the past, and my days are very, very full.

Writing is slow-going but I’m doing my best to schedule time to be creative. I love making things. Sometimes I’ll remember some of the work I’ve already done and feel very proud. My unpublished novel. My few poems and stories that saw print. Of course, other recent things. They’re the best I have to offer in this world.

Running is increasing. Up to 15 miles now. Only a few more weeks of increasing mileage. I’m running more than I ever have, and it’s a great experience. I’m learning a lot, specifically that (like the the title of this post), running is a matter of perspective. The last mile is always the most difficult because it’s the last mile and NOT because I can’t run it physically. On the last mile, I’m always thinking about being finished. Therefore, it’s most difficult. I think my marathon will be mostly mind over matter. Perspective.

Life is full of new people, too. I’m meeting wonderful people lately, all of whom bring to the table their own unique stories, and all those unique stories thrill me until I sort of hum like a power line. I really have to pull back sometimes, as there are billions of such power line stories.

Oh, and I’m excited about the cool days of autumn upcoming. My sunsets will look even prettier when the leaves turn their sweet, dying colors.

Hmmm … just realized something. Autumn colors, the source of countless poems and various craft-fair watercolors are dying leaves. In our world, death usually isn’t viewed as beautiful. Haha. Depends on how you look at it. Perspective again.

Curses!

Las Vegas 2009

I like to tell people that when I travel to a different city I like to “try the city on” as if each new place is a new shirt or pair of jeans.  I want to see how different places fit me because I’m never sure if I’m satisfied with my current look.  Because I’m a writer, I need to notice the differences and record them if I can.

New York feels like a slick black suit with a silk black tie and highly polished shoes.  It’s the city of big things, serious art, and beautiful strangers from all over the world. 

Chicago is a knee-length overcoat.  The icy blasts of wind keep people bundled and fighting nature … but there is a lot of vibrancy and beauty underneath those overcoats.  Chicago is a place to go for a long, creative think.

Las Vegas is a tacky t-shirt, a tuxedo, and a pair of big furry boots.

I’m in Las Vegas as I type this.  Sitting here on my third day having coffee while looking out from my room on the twenty-fifth floor over The Strip, which is slow paced (it’s bright and early) and the tan color of the surrounding desert.  Early sunlight in Vegas is wasted on tourists checking in and out, senior citizens wandering from casino to casino spending their pensions dollar by dollar before the lunch buffet, and the occasional drunken young man stumbling up the ramp to the hotel, wearing a rumpled suit and a pair of broken sunglasses after being out all night with surgically enhanced female escorts, his buddies, and various concoctions in yard-long plastic cups with giant straws.  The daytime here is for tourists and families.  Still, it’s very nice, and fun, and interesting to behold.

It’s like someone decided to place an amusement park in the middle of a desert valley, spread it over several miles, put a freeway from north to south, and let all the adults come here and do semi-naughty things to remind them of how young they once were.  Palm trees adorn this freeway, as do Elvis impersonators and dumpy dudes flicking the rubber bands around brochures for a good time.  People go in and out of the hotel/casinos snapping photos with statues behind them.  Husbands and wives talk one another into spending twenty more dollars on the nickel slot machines.  They eat at burger joints and sub shops.  They smile, and laugh, and shop, and tease one another about the wild things they may do that night.

And that night, most of them don’t do terribly wild things.  Most of them gather stories to tell and get genuinely embarrassed and nervously laugh out loud when the dancers (ahem) do their thing.  Most of the visitors go to a show, look at the dazzling lights (absolute neon fireworks), and lose some more money at the blackjack table.

Some, though, do terribly wild things and pass embarrassment on their way to guilt at about 4 a.m.  Still, the guilt doesn’t last long because of the gilt.  The sparkling lights and smiling people make you feel better, at least until you get on the plane to go home.

I’m in love with Las Vegas, as I am in love with everyplace I visit.  It’s not the fun, the debauchery, the entertainment, the action, the decadence, or the attractions. 

It’s the people, of course.  Here, they are complicated and beautiful.  That dancer is going to school.  That blackjack dealer has been here twenty years making a career out of a card game.  That hotel concierge is worried about losing her job in a down economy.   

It’s always the people.

There are world-class performers, entertainers, hucksters, real-estate developers, clergy … all walks of life in this crazy gem in the middle of the desert.     

Las Vegas sprang up in the middle of nowhere when the government decided to build the Hoover Dam post-Depression.  The workers (government employees) and their families stuck around, and then a few years later, gangsters started building casinos. 

And then real-estate moguls got involved and built mega-resorts. 

And this amalgam of laborers and criminals and showgirls and moguls produced the city that attracts the tourists from all over the world.

Vegas is sweat and vice and kitsch and fun.  I’m glad to have visited it, this grown-up version of Disney World.

A New Place

I find myself still bouncing about from place to place, trying to find a life to which I may adhere, and I’ve landed (who knows for how long?) in a new apartment on top of a hill. 

Ah, my new place is wonderful when I compare it to my old place!  I have so much more than I have had in so long.  A few hundred square feet more space.  Big, gorgeous windows that let in so much light that I’m forced to curl up on the carpet like a cat and nap in sunbeam during the day.  Vaulted ceilings that make me feel like I’m in a chapel.  A view of the Blue Ridge Mountains facing due west (I know this because I’ve watched two sunsets already).  A shared pool, sauna, gym … and I could gush about the pleasantness of it for many more paragraphs.

Still, is it “home?”

For the past couple of days, as I’ve unpacked and rearranged all of my belongings, I’ve been asking myself whether or not this feels like home.

Home is so strange a concept to me.  I think I feel most alive when I’m not “home.”  Big cities, foreign countries, and (most conveniently) fantastic stories … someplace else.

It is when I am far away from “home” that I feel closest to where I need to be.

Maybe it has something to do with the way my spirit wants to be free from the bonds of gravity and the physical world and return to wherever it has already been.

Maybe it’s just a longing for the passion I felt it in my youth.  That bee-sting of love.  That hardcore beauty that causes a boy to focus all his actions and efforts to see that beauty again.  I am not a boy, and love and beauty are both different for me now.  Maybe I’m getting too old to feel at home.

Is it possible that I’m just made to be a searcher, a wanderer, a wonderer, a man who will never find that “normal life” so many people grab and hold onto; living and dying with their familiar worlds all around them.  Familiar worlds and people cheering them on, comforting them, loyal to them.  Familiar worlds, all blanket-like and snuggly, all goodness or trying to find goodness with a family.  And is it possible I will live and die without knowing these things?

Come now, Mr. Lucas.  You have a chance for “home” as much as the next person.  After all, home is where the heart is.  There’s no place like home.  Home is a refuge against the storms of life.  Home is where a person finds solace in a hectic world.  A man’s home is his manor, his castle, his kingdom.

Maybe.

Or maybe I don’t want a manor, a castle, or a kingdom.  Maybe my particular heart doesn’t want that kind of home.

—

I find myself in a new place.  A fine, new place.  Lots of space, lots of light.  It’s really pretty, or at least I think so.

But is it “home?”

Oh, we’ll see, won’t we!  There’s a good possibility it will soon feel like home.

Whatever it is, home or just another new place, it’s good for now.  It will be a good place to write.  It will be more inviting than my old space.  I will enjoy it.

I am happy here, and grateful.  More space and more light … very good to have.  Things are as they should be. 

For now, at least.

—

Why don’t you come for a visit?  I’m without a couch and the art has yet to be hung on the walls, but you can always curl up on the carpet in a sunbeam and snooze.  I’ll just be tapping on this keyboard in the corner.  You’ll hardly know I’m there.

Moving On

Packing boxes, cleaning out cabinets … I find myself moving my life again.  Just a few minutes away, but a bigger place.  One with a few more comforts of … home. 

Home?  Not sure I understand that word.

I’m older than I was the last time I moved.  I feel much older.  Hair graying, skin wrinkling, fatiguing more quickly.  But my spirit has aged more than my body.  Body is plus five years.  Spirit is plus … how does one measure the aging of spirit?  I think maybe by lessons learned, life experienced, innocence lost.  Spirit is plus a hundred.

These five years have been my healing years.  My development years.  My creative years.  My thoughtful years.  My lonely years.

This little apartment from which I am moving has been a bandage, a prison cell, a library, a studio, a laboratory, a place to hide.

There are so many places I will never return, but this one, this little silly one, is one of the biggest places to which I will never return.  One of my homes … as much as any place has ever been my home.

I am (possibly) a homeless man who just happens to have a residence.  That’s one way of looking at it, anyway.

—

So, I have packed up almost all of my belongings in boxes and bins.  I have thrown out old furniture.  I have inventoried and uncovered things I’d forgotten I owned.  I have transfered my utilities to the new address.  I have prepped my life for a change as best as I can.

I ask myself how I’m feeling.  “Self, how are you feeling?”

Not nostalgic, because I have few fond memories of this place.  Not excited, because my future is uncertain at best.

I feel … finished with my youth.  Youth is behind me, and I don’t have time for silliness anymore. 

I feel … passionate about entering the prime of my life.  I am a human man, thoroughly.  I have no stars in my eyes, and so I see very clearly.  I know who I am and what I love.  I know I’m improving and will, daily, become a better man, regardless of what happens.

I feel … hopeful and calm.

I am waking up from what has been a five year slumber.  I don’t need bandages anymore.  I don’t need to hide anymore.  Each day is a blessing.  Each new person I meet, a miracle.  Each new experience, enlightening. 

This Terrible Life hasn’t beaten me.

Dawn.

Work

My work (and by this I mean the collection of things I make up and write down) is getting to be more and more a part of who I am.  I’m not sure if this is a natural progression in the life of a writer or if it’s not.

See, lately, I only feel really, really good when I have made something up and written it down.  I only feel really, really good when I’ve made a new poem, a new melody, a new play, a new story, a new journal entry, a new bit of dialogue, a new rhyme, a new idea about something or someone.

Or, it happens, too, sometimes when I simply digest inspiring art.  Lately, it’s been musical theatre I did not know existed.  Jason Robert Brown, Adam Guettel.  And musical theatre I knew existed.  More Sondheim. 

And quickly, today, a brief bit of J.M. Barrie when I sat down and read a bit of an introduction from Peter Pan.  After reading today that Mr. Barrie claims he doesn’t remember writing the play, I giggled.  Mr. Barrie, in what was possibly an attempt at being ironic or clever claimed that he remembered everything else he had written, all his plays and stories, but not that one. 

I giggled because I think it is probably true!  Peter is such an icon that Mr. Barrie probably had nothing to do with making him.

I think that maybe creativity has nothing to do with how much we can bring to our work, but how much we allow our work to come through us. 

In that case, genius is the act of truly letting go.  Genius is the act of giving up control.

Maybe then the great writers of the world did nothing but learn how to allow their characters and stories to appear.  J.M. Barrie wrote several works, but has only Peter (who is quite enough) by which to be remembered.  Maybe he didn’t make Peter up, he just let him enter our world.

I think Mr. Barrie would agree with that.

I, for one, am glad Peter is here, and I am thrilled to see where my own act of letting go gets me in the next little while.  It’s so wonderful to give up trying and let the work do itself. 

I wonder who I’ll find as I allow my work to happen.  I wonder how happy it can make me to, daily, let go more and more.

I Love New York

I visited NYC a few days ago. Been there a couple times now and been enthralled with the lights, the people, the buildings, the streets. New York feels like home to me. Up and down the streets, walking miles and miles, all the latest and greatest trends, everybody is interesting.

That’s really why I love New York. Seems like everybody there is interesting. I’m sure I’m just seeing it through tourist-colored glasses, but the people of that city seem grand. Some of the greatest talent in the world is found right there, sipping lattes and lying in the sun at Central Park. There are geniuses in NYC by the truckloads.

I know. High crime there. I know. High numbers of homeless people. I know. Danger lurking, ugliness abounds, etc.

But there are so many good things there. How can a city of such magnitude be anything but the direct reflection of infinite creativity? I mean, there are Vangoghs and Picassos inside the museums that call to me even when I just walk down the street beside them. There are gigantic buildings that represent entire lifetimes of planning and construction. The streets themselves have legends and lore … Broadway, 5thAvenue, Wall Street, Madison Avenue. And on and under the streets pumping like the city’s lifeblood are streams of subways and cabs filled  with people and people and people and people …

Oh grand metropolis, I can’t wait until I see you again!

A Type of Life Reflected

Nine mile long run … So far, so good! :)

The Best Week of My Life

I have to write a brief note about this past week. I’m working extensively in my personal journals to note the absolute LIFE I discovered while I was gone. I have a feeling it will get transformed into something pretty down the road.

But, I’ll note a few things here to share to those who stumble across this page.

—

I wrote this little show called “Bull: A Puppet Musical” and it ended up being performed at a resort in Greece, and if you don’t know that story then you don’t know me very well and perhaps you should ask me personally to discuss it with you. Buy me a cup of coffee and we’ll have a grand time with it. :  )

Anyway, I ended up going this week with Phil (the designer and genius behind the puppets) all the way over there to see it performed and work with the cast. I met the most amazing people, all of whom ended up being the most interesting set of characters I’ve ever come across. I had late nights out with them, traded personal drama with them, told them stories and bits of personal philosophy, and I really fell in love with the whole situation. They were stellar, beautiful, wonderful people. They understood me, and I understood them, and what I didn’t understand I accepted.

I felt as if I had suddenly fallen into hope.

I need to be around people like this.  Intelligent, witty, fun, artful people who understand and appreciate beauty and who work to make the world a prettier place.  I need to be in that world somehow, and if my writing gets me there then I need to do more and more of it.  Somehow, I’m going to make that happen.

I’m still on fire with it.  I’m still lit up with the performances, the personal dramas, the world of the stage performer.  The voices, the accents, the stories, the jokes, the smiles, the singing, the life.  I’m still reeling with emotion.  I’m still awake with it. 

How wonderful!

It’s so wonderful, that I can’t stop thinking about it. 

I know, I know, they’re just people.  I know, I know, personal dramas like that happen all the time.  I know, I know, that theatre is as old as humanity is.  I know, I know that theatre at a UK holiday resort isn’t often considered “high art.”  I know, I know that life is as beautiful and as rich even in my small town in America.

However, I just can’t help the love.  This is pure love I’m feeling.  Warm, bright love for an experience.  Warm, bright love for life.

I am filled with gratitude.  I am inspired.

Inspired.

Did you know that the etymology of the word “inspiration” suggests the state of being filled with breath?  I feel like that.  Filled with breath, and the voice will follow in writing.

And write I will!  I am already writing it all!

What a great week.  The best of my life.  Not because of the resort, but because of the people who happen to work there.

Thank you.

And it’s only the beginning, I think!  I’m going to MAKE it only the beginning.

—

Some beautiful things I saw and felt moved by and loved:

- The sea.

- The sand.

- A puppy on the beach.

- A woman swimming by me.

- A bar open all night.

- Stray cats meandering by moonlight.

- An old Greek woman working in her garden.

- Cucumbers and tomatoes and feta and olive oil.

- A girl singing a song with me, sort of.

- Young people in theatre school experiencing the time of their lives.

- A wine, a steak, and a bit of chocolate.

- A couple bites from several crepes.

- A flourist enjoying his holiday with his family.

- A large, cool, smart cab driver in a pink shirt and tie.

- A fruit-salesman chanting broken English in a pattern like poetry.

- A story of forbidden love.

- A hotel with three names.

- Ttruly beautiful people.

- Pool with different rules.

- English lessons from English people.

- Greek lessons from Greek people.

- Two new languages for one of my favorite phrases.

- A run on the north shore.

- Olives and olive trees.

- An ex circus performer.

- A squeaking door that sounded like it was wolf-whisltling at me.

- A few sets of eyes that struck me … and hard.

—

That’s enough for now!  There was so much more than that!

I’m now off to make some art about it.  I end this note in gratefulness.  I will hold this week in my heart as a reminder that life is good, that people are generally good, and that the creative things we do can sometimes bring us hope and place us near beautiful people.

Run in crete