A Hero's Journey

What ever your fate is...

whatever the hell happens, 

say "This is what I need."

It may look like a wreck

but go at like an opportunity

a challenge.

If you bring love to that moment,

not discouragement, 

you will find the strength there.

Any disaster you can survive

is an improvement in your character, your stature

and your life.

What a privilege!

This is when the spontaneity of your own nature 

will have a chance to flow.

Then, when looking back at your life, 

you will see that the moments that seem like great failure

followed by great wreckage.

They are the incidents that shaped the life you have now. 

You will see this is really true:

Nothing can happen to you that is not positive,

even though it looks and feels at the moment 

like a negative crisis.

It is not.

The crisis throw you back,

and when you are required exhibit strength...

it comes. 

-Joseph Campbell, A Hero's Journey

http://www.jcf.org/

 www.herosartjourney.com

A trick of time

At surfer's beach

truth be told

a rush of splayed bamboo

screens the waves

good sets rolling in

the young like seals

let gravity be the guide

surfers shower and peel wet suits to reveal new skin 

we talk

re-construct

the past

share our sides of it

and wonder what happened in all those years

See?  It's all good

I am who I am

who I was meant to be

after all these years.

Me with my conventional joys, clogged heart, head in the sand

wondering what it I had just let go?

You with your uncut cords and highway stories from beyond the maps,

wondering what a white picket fence might have meant.

We think back to the paths we crossed and wonder how all this time's gone by

(And we both know time's a trick don't we?)

a trick of memory

Neil Young:

Thinking about what a
Friend had said
I was hoping it was a lie.


Or perhaps just a mis-placed atom

in a complex molecule of memory

bent to serve a story

that would make life bearable.

remove the atom

split the element

Can time alone turn a sore spot tender?

i know i didn't do

what you said

i know you have to remember it

the way you do

i forgive you this way

out of the old pain

and remain myself

Ian and Sylvia are singing Early Morning Rain

I set myself up for this

As I work grading student papers in my study

the cat sits on my desk.

His tail carves a question mark in the space before the screen.

I'm in the early morning rain

40 years ago.

waiting to move on

very stuck on the ground.



Like then,  I best be on my way

In the early morning pain.

Sink and swim

I'm surprised when I find a poem in the kitchen sink

the first few lines swim in my mind

I must return to the blank blog page

and spill the ideas into the virtual sink

Ah flow in the gray morning

Time to turn the music on!

At my kitchen sink

I've found a poetry spot

a place that puts the images in my head

and draws the words from me

in the morning,

before the day begins

I stand at the kitchen sink and look out the window toward the sea

and I see

and occasionally record

the songs still springing from my heart

making tea

making tea on a foggy morning

breathe easy

lilacs bent with dew

buffalo grass grey with mist

the kettle sings then shrieks

like old memories that
radiate when held up to the light

no,  just hot tea
in white porcelain mug
on a foggy morning



dan baumbach photography
http://danbaumbach.wordpress.com/

second wedding anniversary

A rain swept hill in Crete

Sheltered in a Shepard's hut

So new in love

every day announced itself

a gift.

We said, Look at us!

We're living life!

So many years since that rainy afternoon

Bounce the grand baby on my knee

Watch our grown children laugh

Remember all of the meadows and hills
we topped.

I love you!

Henri Hillinck: Art

Portrait of his daughter Joanie, 1947

Henri Hillinck: Portrait of his daughter Jocelyn Date unknown

Henri Hillinck: Les Pigeons 1933

Henri Hillinck: Southwind 1939

Henri Self-Portrait

Pepita 1928

Mountain scape, unsigned undated

1941

New Images of Henri Pierre Hillinck's work

I came across these snap shots today.  They are by Henri Hillinck.  Most likely done as a part of a series of prints he produced in 1939.  My guess is these pictures were taken by my Uncle Bill Hillinck  He was also known as Bill Ryan.  If anyone knows where the original prints are let me know?

Logan is growing on me!

water melon

Is anything sweeter
more satisfying
than the recollection of
a special point in time

when taste combines with sound and light
makes a memory?

Sweet cold water melon

served as a break
from heavy work on a hot day

I look out the picture window

and  remember

eating a slice of seedless morning melon.

dog's dream

What do dogs dream?

for surely they do dream

I watch Brindle dozing on the couch.

His eyes rolling behind closed lids
the big paws twitching
the gutteral snore turns to muffled woof and wheeze

is he chasing the road runner of his dreams?
is he connected with all dogs past, present, future,
hunting with the pack?

Or is it simply random neurons firing,
fueled by a reptilian biochemical breakdown
of kibble and the radiance of the sun
on his dun colored tiger striped back?

what do dogs dream when they sleep?

Issa on twitter

in high school

found Issa early

I wrote haiku

climbed Mount Fuji

like a snail

many times

many times



















Thank you Denis Huckaby,
 the HS English teacher
who introduced me to Haiku.


Now Issa's  images are on twitter! 

@issa_haiku

loafing

Yesterday,

stretched out on my couch

I looked through the window to see

20 birds

perched like leaves on the bare thin limbs of a tree

hunkered against a cold wind

facing into the breeze and riding the branches.

as one

they  launched

leaving the tree bare.

shortly after, I slipped into a sweet mid-day nap.

An old man blogging simple observational free verse when he should be working

No fool like an old fool?

A survivor spending time to let the optimistic candle of mindfulness generate images on virtual paper?

Still thinking in verse after all these years.

Is it enough to briefly set aside the mundane demands of the day to save some words?

Enough?   Not really, but something at least.

thoughts while waiting for the bagels to toast

I imagined the trajectory of my grandson's life

ranging beyond where I'll ever see.

What richochet of chance, desire and opportunity

will push his orbit to the stars?

Listening to Joni Mitchel recalls my youth.

I imagine the life of my grandson while the bagels toast.

Being in love again, without reserve,

makes an old man,

young!

Mad Rock Climbing

As a young man I overcame a fear of heights by learning to rock climb and mountain climb.  I spent many of my best days out in the wilderness (long before cell phones).

My last big climb was Mt. Ritter in the Sierra Nevada Mountains.

I did some free climbing in Canada that took me right up to the edge where life was one breath at a time.  (Experiences I never shared with my parents!)

This is a shot taken in the Selkirk Ranges of Central British Columbia summer 1974. In the background are the peaks surrounding Glacier Circle.

It took a long trek across a glacier to get to this spot, on the flanks of Mt. Sir Donald.  We climbed until midnight, but ran out of energy.  Spent another tough windy night high up before descending to the little valley of Glacier Circle. There we found a Canadian Mountain Club hut stocked with survival provisions for climbers.  Just 23 visitors had signed the register in the past two decades. We Spent a few days re-cooping in comfort.

My climbing partner Rico and I spent as much time as we had climbing in this area.  Most of the first ascents were made by Norman Clyde back in the 1930s.

We'd lugged 100 pound backs up the trail.  Too much weight in climbing gear and not enough food.

When the time came to leave we ended up making a 20 mile cross country hike on empty bellies.  about half way back to the main trail we came across a glacier swollen river.  The swirling muddy white water boomed with big boulders swept down river.  A fall into the river meant death.  We found a steel cable slung bank to bank and use it to cross.

I got vertigo as I hung upside down pulling hand over hand along the steel cable.  I went over first. On the far side I noticed the carabiner that held me on the line was hot to the touch. The friction of the cable cut half way through it.  Then Rico rigged our backs and I brought them over. Finally Rico made the crossing.  It was good to be alive and on the other side of the creek.

Crossing this river was one of the crazier things I've done with my life.  I remember hiking another 5-6 miles with an empty belly.  We came across an empty Canadian forest service cabin. The crew were on the job, but had left the remnants of breakfast stacked on the sideboard.  We found a pound of prime bacon!  I recall some plums in syrup as well.  It was one of the best scavenged meals of my life! 

Later on the same trip I was solo hiking near Banff.  I'd heard of a great fishing lake 25 miles in.  The rumors were true.   

This was in August of 1974.  While I was in the back country Nixon resigned and Ford took over.  I heard the news from other hikers as I trekked out  (filled with fish and the calm resolve of a week of solitude).  It was a good time to be out of the country and deep in the wilderness. 

The following year I returned to British Columbia to climb in the Bugaboo Range.  I went out alone, hoping to find a climbing partner on the mountain.  As it turned out no one would climb with me so I set about climbing solo.  It was the most challenging climbing of my life.  It meant the world to me to be able to climb up the face of the Hound's Tooth free of ropes and worries about the world at large.

This shot was taken by a member of a Polish climbing team that followed me up the Pigeon Spire. They were training for a climb on  Aconcagua  in Peru and invited me along.  

As it happened, I was in the Bugaboos as a consolation prize.  I'd been hired to cook as part of a climbing team going to Aconcagua that summer, but was replaced at the last minute by a Spanish speaker.   The irony of getting another invite to Peru on a mountain top in British Columbia was not lost on me.  Unhappily the Polish team was useless. They were under-skilled and downright dangerous. No way I'd climb with them. 

Crossing the glacier to get to the approach and climbing route up Pigeon Spire was exciting.  I crossed solo several times that week.   

The Canadian Mountain Club maintained a climbers hut on the edge of the Glacier.  For a few bucks a day you could lay down your sleeping bag in the big Quonset hut at the base of the climbs.  It was an international spot filled with climbers from around the world. I was part of the brotherhood for several weeks of literal high times. 

All of the above was recalled spontaneously after viewing a rock climbing movie.  Friday, March 2, 2012.  (37 years after all this wildness.) ~ Dennis

grandson number one

after so many years

rocking a baby to sleep again

grandson number one

this is why I breathe

see it now

don't miss it

grandson

Stories from Heaven

This morning, while preparing breakfast, the name Paul Portuges came to mind.

Paul and I knew each other at UC Berkeley.

He was a mentor and inspiration to me.

His words and determination to write a place for himself in the world impressed me.

I thought of a time in Bolinas.  Driving fast, a passenger wedged into a seat next to Paul as he raced down the dark road.  I braced my feet against the firewall to keep from banging around in the seat. In doing so I somehow distorted the metal and caused the car to accelerate.  We skidded to a terrifying breathless stop just short of a phone pole.

Same weekend.  A foggy beach.  On the hill above the sand a young woman, dressed gypsy, came up through the mist trailing a billy goat.  Subtle smile and not a word as she passed.

Later walking alone on the beach I saw a tall figure in the distance.  Two huge dogs zig-zagged in front of her.  Bernese Mountain Hounds.  We passed and nodded.  Julia Child?  Indeed.

Bolinas makes for good memories.

Addicted to search, I found Paul on the net.

This work of his is memorable.  I enjoyed the video and the evoked images of another time.
 
Stones from Heaven from Paul Portuges on Vimeo.

One student, One classroom, One day at a time

This question has been on my mind for a few days. "Share  one or two stories about stuff  YOU’VE done to “disturb the force.”

I could use this as an icebreaker discussion prompt.  I'd change it to "Share  one or two stories about what YOU’VE done to change the world."

Snap shots:

A young woman calling my name in the Las Vegas airport years ago.  She ran up to me, "Mr. O'Connor do you remember me?"  

I did. Her name was Crystal.  If you look at a person's eyes the name sometimes pops up. 

"I'm the only one in my freshman class at UNLV who knows how to write!  Thank you for teaching me."


A knock on my classroom door after school.  I open the door and see a huge man standing there.  I had to look up to see his face (and I'm 6'4").  

In a deep voice, "Hello Mr. O'Connor remember me?"  I looked at his eyes and remembered the little 5th grader.

"Merlin, is that you in there?  I treated you good in the 5th grade right?"  

He smiled and we talked.  He was just back from Pakistan where he was on embassy guard duty with the Marines. 

Teaching a young kindergarten teacher how to start and use an Apple //. Watching her learn more in a two day workshop than anyone I've ever meant since.  Two years later she hired me as the Training Director for a computer company where she was the Sales Manager.  She went on to be a silicon valley multi-millionaire.  I turned down her offer of a fast track job in San Jose and returned to classroom teaching a few months later. 

Over the years this random validation has happened often enough to assure me the 25 years I spent teaching kids was time well spent.   Public school in Northern Nevada  left me burned out and broke, but I wouldn't change it.  It was the good work. No regrets.

Snap shots of the dark side:

Sitting in a little room with the personnel superintendent being grilled and threatened with termination. (This particular guy was a typical bully. He enjoyed making kindergarten teachers cry. We locked horns many times and I usually won. This was the same guy who later asked me to become a principal.)

Having a school board member yell at me in an open meeting "If you don't like it around here why don't you just leave?"  (My nickname at the time was "The Tom Hayden of Douglas County". 8-)

(This one's a personal favorite.) An outraged parent sitting opposite from me in the principal's office saying, "How dare you teach my child to question authority!" (How dare you teach her to write, to think!)

Carrying a picket sign at a school board meeting and being reminded by a fellow picket. " I don't know how this is going to go for us.  There's plenty of holes in the desert. " I taught in rural Nevada for most of my career.  Within three years all who carried a picket sign, were gone from the district.

Online

Online early 80's:  Getting a poem from a boy in Idaho that I published on my BBS kids writing site.

Online early 80's: Saving my school district 30k on a computer purchase because I could use e-mail.

Online turn of the century:  teaching someone deep in Alaska how to create a capital letter using a keyboard.

I could go on, and probably will, since this is a sweet writing prompt.  But I notice the pattern here. I'm talking about one to one interactions that had a ripple effect in my life and the lives of others.   This ripple effect is something I believe in.  For most of my teaching life my focus has been one student, one classroom, one day at a time.

Mantra: Repeat daily for 20 years:

Show up and give the best you've got on any given day.  

Accept that some days will be much better than others.

Over the years I've taught at least a 1000 teachers from around the world in my online classes.  

I know that for most, I opened doors for them. 

I know by helping teachers I've influence hundreds of thousands of kids by helping their teachers.

Ripples, Ripples, Ripples