Numinous: A Revisit

 

Time to reflect on the purpose of this blog. When I began sharing stories nearly a year and a half ago, I spoke of stories for the last third of life. I promised to share at least one story each month.  I have not shared a story for nearly three months. If I have an excuse for my failure, it is connected to my mother, Ruby, whose death was described in the last offering.

The end of the last blog spoke of the process of saying “goodbye” to someone you deeply love. Over the past three months, I have reflected on my last days with Ruby and focused on my experience of  the numinous on the  night that she died. What do I mean by an “experience of numinous”? I do not have a definitive answer to this question, but I will point the reader in a couple of directions that I think are helpful.

First, I will reflect on the subject of death. There is great energy when we experience the portals that define our time on this earth: birth that ushers us into this life and death that provides our exit from this life. Many cultures have stories of life on either side of these gateways. In fact, the first story shared in this blog, FIRST LIGHT, humorously imagines our life before we are born into this world. When we are granted the gift to share another’s experience at one of these portals, then we may experience the numinous, or the uniqueness of these special times in all of our lives. The numinous is in some way defined by being outside the norm of life. It has been described as an experience of the “holy other” by Rudolf Otto. Otto, in his book, THE IDEA OF THE HOLY, was the first to suggest the idea of the numinous in our lives. However, Otto’s understanding is related primarily to an experience of the divine, of the transpersonal or God.

I suggest that we can explore the numinous in a broader range of experiences. I am not sure. Perhaps I am just expanding my idea of the divine past the boundaries of the traditional Christian religion of my youth. I would include experiences in the natural world, in the world of human relations, and in the world of the arts. As an example of a numinous experience in literature, I offer a story created by Kenneth Grahame. It is one chapter from the classic children’s book, The Wind in the Willows. The chapter is entitled, “The Piper at the Gates of Dawn”. Since this book is no longer under copyright, I will share it here:

THE Willow-Wren was twittering his thin little song, hidden himself in the dark selvedge of the river bank. Though it was past ten o’clock at night, the sky still clung to and retained some lingering skirts of light from the departed day; and the sullen heats of the torrid afternoon broke up and rolled away at the dispersing touch of the cool fingers of the short midsummer night. Mole lay stretched on the bank, still panting from the stress of the fierce day that had been cloudless from dawn to late sunset, and waited for his friend to return. He had been on the river with some companions, leaving the Water Rat free to keep a engagement of long standing with Otter; and he had come back to find the house dark and deserted, and no sign of Rat, who was doubtless keeping it up late with his old comrade. It was still too hot to think of staying indoors, so he lay on some cool dock-leaves, and thought over the past day and its doings, and how very good they all had been.

The Rat’s light footfall was presently heard approaching over the parched grass. `O, the blessed coolness!’ he said, and sat down, gazing thoughtfully into the river, silent and preoccupied.

`You stayed to supper, of course?’ said the Mole presently.

`Simply had to,’ said the Rat. `They wouldn’t hear of my going before. You know how kind they always are. And they made things as jolly for me as ever they could, right up to the moment I left. But I felt a brute all the time, as it was clear to me they were very unhappy, though they tried to hide it. Mole, I’m afraid they’re in trouble. Little Portly is missing again; and you know what a lot his father thinks of him, though he never says much about it.’

`What, that child?’ said the Mole lightly. `Well, suppose he is; why worry about it? He’s always straying off and getting lost, and turning up again; he’s so adventurous. But no harm ever happens to him. Everybody hereabouts knows him and likes him, just as they do old Otter, and you may be sure some animal or other will come across him and bring him back again all right. Why, we’ve found him ourselves, miles from home, and quite self-possessed and cheerful!’

`Yes; but this time it’s more serious,’ said the Rat gravely. `He’s been missing for some days now, and the Otters have hunted everywhere, high and low, without finding the slightest trace. And they’ve asked every animal, too, for miles around, and no one knows anything about him. Otter’s evidently more anxious than he’ll admit. I got out of him that young Portly hasn’t learnt to swim very well yet, and I can see he’s thinking of the weir. There’s a lot of water coming down still, considering the time of the year, and the place always had a fascination for the child. And then there are — well, traps and things — you know. Otter’s not the fellow to be nervous about any son of his before it’s time. And now he is nervous. When I left, he came out with me — said he wanted some air, and talked about stretching his legs. But I could see it wasn’t that, so I drew him out and pumped him, and got it all from him at last. He was going to spend the night watching by the ford. You know the place where the old ford used to be, in by-gone days before they built the bridge?’

`I know it well,’ said the Mole. `But why should Otter choose to watch there?’

`Well, it seems that it was there he gave Portly his first swimming-lesson,’ continued the Rat. `From that shallow, gravelly spit near the bank. And it was there he used to teach him fishing, and there young Portly caught his first fish, of which he was so very proud. The child loved the spot, and Otter thinks that if he came wandering back from wherever he is — if he is anywhere by this time, poor little chap — he might make for the ford he was so fond of; or if he came across it he’d remember it well, and stop there and play, perhaps. So Otter goes there every night and watches — on the chance, you know, just on the chance!’

They were silent for a time, both thinking of the same thing — the lonely, heart-sore animal, crouched by the ford, watching and waiting, the long night through — on the chance. `Well, well,’ said the Rat presently, `I suppose we ought to be thinking about turning in.’ But he never offered to move.

`Rat,’ said the Mole, `I simply can’t go and turn in, and go to sleep, and do nothing, even though there doesn’t seem to be anything to be done. We’ll get the boat out, and paddle up stream. The moon will be up in an hour or so, and then we will search as well as we can — anyhow, it will be better than going to bed and doing nothing.’

`Just what I was thinking myself,’ said the Rat. `It’s not the sort of night for bed anyhow; and daybreak is not so very far off, and then we may pick up some news of him from early risers as we go along.’

They got the boat out, and the Rat took the sculls, paddling with caution. Out in midstream, there was a clear, narrow track that faintly reflected the sky; but wherever shadows fell on the water from bank, bush, or tree, they were as solid to all appearance as the banks themselves, and the Mole had to steer with judgment accordingly. Dark and deserted as it was, the night was full of small noises, song and chatter and rustling, telling of the busy little population who were up and about, plying their trades and vocations through the night till sunshine should fall on them at last and send them off to their well-earned repose. The water’s own noises, too, were more apparent than by day, its gurglings and `cloops’ more unexpected and near at hand; and constantly they started at what seemed a sudden clear call from an actual articulate voice.

The line of the horizon was clear and hard against the sky, and in one particular quarter it showed black against a silvery climbing phosphorescence that grew and grew. At last, over the rim of the waiting earth the moon lifted with slow majesty till it swung clear of the horizon and rode off, free of moorings; and once more they began to see surfaces — meadows wide-spread, and quiet gardens, and the river itself from bank to bank, all softly disclosed, all washed clean of mystery and terror, all radiant again as by day, but with a difference that was tremendous. Their old haunts greeted them again in other raiment, as if they had slipped away and put on this pure new apparel and come quietly back, smiling as they shyly waited to see if they would be recognized again under it.

Fastening their boat to a willow, the friends landed in this silent, silver kingdom, and patiently explored the hedges, the hollow trees, the runnels and their little culverts, the ditches and dry water-ways. Embarking again and crossing over, they worked their way up the stream in this manner, while the moon, serene and detached in a cloudless sky, did what she could, though so far off, to help them in their quest; till her hour came and she sank earthwards reluctantly, and left them, and mystery once more held field and river.

Then a change began slowly to declare itself. The horizon became clearer, field and tree came more into sight, and somehow with a different look; the mystery began to drop away from them. A bird piped suddenly, and was still; and a light breeze sprang up and set the reeds and bulrushes rustling. Rat, who was in the stern of the boat, while Mole sculled, sat up suddenly and listened with a passionate intentness. Mole, who with gentle strokes was just keeping the boat moving while he scanned the banks with care, looked at him with curiosity.

`It’s gone!’ sighed the Rat, sinking back in his seat again. `So beautiful and strange and new. Since it was to end so soon, I almost wish I had never heard it. For it has roused a longing in me that is pain, and nothing seems worth while but just to hear that sound once more and go on listening to it for ever. No! There it is again!’ he cried, alert once more. Entranced, he was silent for a long space, spellbound.

`Now it passes on and I begin to lose it,’ he said presently. `O Mole! the beauty of it! The merry bubble and joy, the thin, clear, happy call of the distant piping! Such music I never dreamed of, and the call in it is stronger even than the music is sweet! Row on, Mole, row! For the music and the call must be for us.’

The Mole, greatly wondering, obeyed. `I hear nothing myself,’ he said, `but the wind playing in the reeds and rushes and osiers.’

The Rat never answered, if indeed he heard. Rapt, transported, trembling, he was possessed in all his senses by this new divine thing that caught up his helpless soul and swung and dandled it, a powerless but happy infant in a strong sustaining grasp.

In silence Mole rowed steadily, and soon they came to a point where the river divided, a long backwater branching off to one side. With a slight movement of his head Rat, who had long dropped the rudder-lines, directed the rower to take the backwater. The creeping tide of light gained and gained, and now they could see the colour of the flowers that gemmed the water’s edge.

`Clearer and nearer still,’ cried the Rat joyously. `Now you must surely hear it! Ah — at last — I see you do!’

Breathless and transfixed the Mole stopped rowing as the liquid run of that glad piping broke on him like a wave, caught him up, and possessed him utterly. He saw the tears on his comrade’s cheeks, and bowed his head and understood. For a space they hung there, brushed by the purple loose-strife that fringed the bank; then the clear imperious summons that marched hand-in-hand with the intoxicating melody imposed its will on Mole, and mechanically he bent to his oars again. And the light grew steadily stronger, but no birds sang as they were wont to do at the approach of dawn; and but for the heavenly music all was marvellously still.

On either side of them, as they glided onwards, the rich meadow-grass seemed that morning of a freshness and a greenness unsurpassable. Never had they noticed the roses so vivid, the willow-herb so riotous, the meadow-sweet so odorous and pervading. Then the murmur of the approaching weir began to hold the air, and they felt a consciousness that they were nearing the end, whatever it might be, that surely awaited their expedition.

A wide half-circle of foam and glinting lights and shining shoulders of green water, the great weir closed the backwater from bank to bank, troubled all the quiet surface with twirling eddies and floating foam-streaks, and deadened all other sounds with its solemn and soothing rumble. In midmost of the stream, embraced in the weir’s shimmering arm-spread, a small island lay anchored, fringed close with willow and silver birch and alder. Reserved, shy, but full of significance, it hid whatever it might hold behind a veil, keeping it till the hour should come, and, with the hour, those who were called and chosen.

Slowly, but with no doubt or hesitation whatever, and in something of a solemn expectancy, the two animals passed through the broken tumultuous water and moored their boat at the flowery margin of the island. In silence they landed, and pushed through the blossom and scented herbage and undergrowth that led up to the level ground, till they stood on a little lawn of a marvellous green, set round with Nature’s own orchard-trees — crab-apple, wild cherry, and sloe.

`This is the place of my song-dream, the place the music played to me,’ whispered the Rat, as if in a trance. `Here, in this holy place, here if anywhere, surely we shall find Him!’

Then suddenly the Mole felt a great Awe fall upon him, an awe that turned his muscles to water, bowed his head, and rooted his feet to the ground. It was no panic terror — indeed he felt wonderfully at peace and happy — but it was an awe that smote and held him and, without seeing, he knew it could only mean that some august Presence was very, very near. With difficulty he turned to look for his friend. and saw him at his side cowed, stricken, and trembling violently. And still there was utter silence in the populous bird-haunted branches around them; and still the light grew and grew.

Perhaps he would never have dared to raise his eyes, but that, though the piping was now hushed, the call and the summons seemed still dominant and imperious. He might not refuse, were Death himself waiting to strike him instantly, once he had looked with mortal eye on things rightly kept hidden. Trembling he obeyed, and raised his humble head; and then, in that utter clearness of the imminent dawn, while Nature, flushed with fulness of incredible colour, seemed to hold her breath for the event, he looked in the very eyes of the Friend and Helper; saw the backward sweep of the curved horns, gleaming in the growing daylight; saw the stern, hooked nose between the kindly eyes that were looking down on them humourously, while the bearded mouth broke into a half-smile at the corners; saw the rippling muscles on the arm that lay across the broad chest, the long supple hand still holding the pan-pipes only just fallen away from the parted lips; saw the splendid curves of the shaggy limbs disposed in majestic ease on the sward; saw, last of all, nestling between his very hooves, sleeping soundly in entire peace and contentment, the little, round, podgy, childish form of the baby otter. All this he saw, for one moment breathless and intense, vivid on the morning sky; and still, as he looked, he lived; and still, as he lived, he wondered.

`Rat!’ he found breath to whisper, shaking. `Are you afraid?’

`Afraid?’ murmured the Rat, his eyes shining with unutterable love. `Afraid! Of Him? O, never, never! And yet — and yet — O, Mole, I am afraid!’

Then the two animals, crouching to the earth, bowed their heads and did worship.

Sudden and magnificent, the sun’s broad golden disc showed itself over the horizon facing them; and the first rays, shooting across the level water-meadows, took the animals full in the eyes and dazzled them. When they were able to look once more, the Vision had vanished, and the air was full of the carol of birds that hailed the dawn.

As they stared blankly. in dumb misery deepening as they slowly realised all they had seen and all they had lost, a capricious little breeze, dancing up from the surface of the water, tossed the aspens, shook the dewy roses and blew lightly and caressingly in their faces; and with its soft touch came instant oblivion. For this is the last best gift that the kindly demi-god is careful to bestow on those to whom he has revealed himself in their helping: the gift of forgetfulness. Lest the awful remembrance should remain and grow, and overshadow mirth and pleasure, and the great haunting memory should spoil all the after-lives of little animals helped out of difficulties, in order that they should be happy and lighthearted as before.

Mole rubbed his eyes and stared at Rat, who was looking about him in a puzzled sort of way. `I beg your pardon; what did you say, Rat?’ he asked.

`I think I was only remarking,’ said Rat slowly, `that this was the right sort of place, and that here, if anywhere, we should find him. And look! Why, there he is, the little fellow!’ And with a cry of delight he ran towards the slumbering Portly.

But Mole stood still a moment, held in thought. As one wakened suddenly from a beautiful dream, who struggles to recall it, and can re-capture nothing but a dim sense of the beauty of it, the beauty! Till that, too, fades away in its turn, and the dreamer bitterly accepts the hard, cold waking and all its penalties; so Mole, after struggling with his memory for a brief space, shook his head sadly and followed the Rat.

Portly woke up with a joyous squeak, and wriggled with pleasure at the sight of his father’s friends, who had played with him so often in past days. In a moment, however, his face grew blank, and he fell to hunting round in a circle with pleading whine. As a child that has fallen happily asleep in its nurse’s arms, and wakes to find itself alone and laid in a strange place, and searches corners and cupboards, and runs from room to room, despair growing silently in its heart, even so Portly searched the island and searched, dogged and unwearying, till at last the black moment came for giving it up, and sitting down and crying bitterly.

The Mole ran quickly to comfort the little animal; but Rat, lingering, looked long and doubtfully at certain hoof-marks deep in the sward.

`Some — great — animal — has been here,’ he murmured slowly and thoughtfully; and stood musing, musing; his mind strangely stirred.

`Come along, Rat!’ called the Mole. `Think of poor Otter, waiting up there by the ford!’

Portly had soon been comforted by the promise of a treat — a jaunt on the river in Mr. Rat’s real boat; and the two animals conducted him to the water’s side, placed him securely between them in the bottom of the boat, and paddled off down the backwater. The sun was fully up by now, and hot on them, birds sang lustily and without restraint, and flowers smiled and nodded from either bank, but somehow — so thought the animals — with less of richness and blaze of colour than they seemed to remember seeing quite recently somewhere — they wondered where.

The main river reached again, they turned the boat’s head upstream, towards the point where they knew their friend was keeping his lonely vigil. As they drew near the familiar ford, the Mole took the boat in to the bank, and they lifted Portly out and set him on his legs on the tow-path, gave him his marching orders and a friendly farewell pat on the back, and shoved out into mid-stream. They watched the little animal as he waddled along the path contentedly and with importance; watched him till they saw his muzzle suddenly lift and his waddle break into a clumsy amble as he quickened his pace with shrill whines and wriggles of recognition. Looking up the river, they could see Otter start up, tense and rigid, from out of the shallows where he crouched in dumb patience, and could hear his amazed and joyous bark as he bounded up through the osiers on to the path. Then the Mole, with a strong pull on one oar, swung the boat round and let the full stream bear them down again whither it would, their quest now happily ended.

`I feel strangely tired, Rat,’ said the Mole, leaning wearily over his oars as the boat drifted. `It’s being up all night, you’ll say, perhaps; but that’s nothing. We do as much half the nights of the week, at this time of the year. No; I feel as if I had been through something very exciting and rather terrible, and it was just over; and yet nothing particular has happened.’

`Or something very surprising and splendid and beautiful,’ murmured the Rat, leaning back and closing his eyes. `I feel just as you do, Mole; simply dead tired, though not body tired. It’s lucky we’ve got the stream with us, to take us home. Isn’t it jolly to feel the sun again, soaking into one’s bones! And hark to the wind playing in the reeds!’

`It’s like music — far away music,’ said the Mole nodding drowsily.

`So I was thinking,’ murmured the Rat, dreamful and languid. `Dance-music — the lilting sort that runs on without a stop — but with words in it, too — it passes into words and out of them again — I catch them at intervals — then it is dance-music once more, and then nothing but the reeds’ soft thin whispering.’

`You hear better than I,’ said the Mole sadly. `I cannot catch the words.’

`Let me try and give you them,’ said the Rat softly, his eyes still closed. `Now it is turning into words again — faint but clear — Lest the awe should dwell — And turn your frolic to fret — You shall look on my power at the helping hour — But then you shall forget! Now the reeds take it up — forget, forget, they sigh, and it dies away in a rustle and a whisper. Then the voice returns —

`Lest limbs be reddened and rent — I spring the trap that is set — As I loose the snare you may glimpse me there — For surely you shall forget! Row nearer, Mole, nearer to the reeds! It is hard to catch, and grows each minute fainter.

`Helper and healer, I cheer — Small waifs in the woodland wet — Strays I find in it, wounds I bind in it — Bidding them all forget! Nearer, Mole, nearer! No, it is no good; the song has died away into reed-talk.’

`But what do the words mean?’ asked the wondering Mole.

`That I do not know,’ said the Rat simply. `I passed them on to you as they reached me. Ah! now they return again, and this time full and clear! This time, at last, it is the real, the unmistakable thing, simple — passionate — perfect — – ‘

`Well, let’s have it, then,’ said the Mole, after he had waited patiently for a few minutes, half-dozing in the hot sun.

But no answer came. He looked, and understood the silence. With a smile of much happiness on his face, and something of a listening look still lingering there, the weary Rat was fast asleep.

 

The mythologist, Joseph Campbell, speaks about our experience of the numinous in terms of an encounter with a living myth: “it may be talked about and taught, but talk and teaching cannot produce it. Nor can authority enforce it. Only the accident of experience and the symbols of a living myth can elicit and support it; but such symbols cannot be invented. They are found. Whereupon they function of themselves. And those who find them are the sensitized, creative, living minds that once were know as seers, but now as poets and creative artists.”

My own awareness of the idea of a numinous experience first happened when I read Carl Jung’s autobiography, MEMORIES, DREAMS, REFLECTIONS. From Jung I learned that we need to allow for a subjective view of events in our lives. Sometimes we need to experience life with our eyes and ears half-closed!

This brings me back to the experience that started this exploration of the idea of the numinous in our lives: my gift to be present when my mother died. Had I approached the experience rationally, I probably would have called for medical support when I sensed that she was dying. Instead, I sang and encourage her to pass through the portal of death to whatever lay in her future.

One last thought on how we discover numinosity: it happens when we live our lives to the fullest human purpose, not when we set out on an adventure to discover it. Kenneth Grahame’s story illustrates this so well. Mole and Rat do not set out to experience the numinous, they are simply trying to do the right thing, to help another creature in need.

In the world of storytelling we talk about the idea of the “cracker barrel” story; that is, one person tells a story and others take up some thread of the story and expand it into another story. I am hoping that you will join with me in a cracker barrel exploration of numinosity. Please share an experience of the numinous in your life, or a story where you found numinosity. It is my ambition to have this blog become a place where we share our experiences and stories of the numinous in this world.

The End of a Long Goodbye

Halloween 2011

Ruby died this evening. The day started with a visit to the funeral home that tonight holds her remains. I went to make the arrangements for her death, but I had no idea that she would die on this day. After the funeral home, I went to the bank to look for an insurance policy that I thought might be in our safe deposit box. While I was rummaging through saving bonds, jewelry, wills and old coins, I had a call from Neshaminy Manor (the nursing home where my mother lived). It was the afternoon shift nurse. He wanted to know if I had been updated on Ruby’s condition. I said, yes, I had talked with the hospice nurse in the morning. I would come tomorrow to visit with her. He suggested that I might want to consider coming today.

It was then about four in the afternoon. I decided to go home and eat before I went to the nursing home. It might be my only chance to get a meal. I went home, ate some leftover wonton soup and a scrap of good sourdough bread…with butter. On the drive to the nursing home I put on a CD, a Bach cello suite, sensing I needed to collect myself for my work ahead.

When I arrived on the floor where Ruby lived, I looked up the nurse, Ralph, who had called me. He said he was concerned because Ruby was under hospice care, but there were no orders to keep Ruby at Neshaminy Manor. A nurse could decide that she needed more care than they could provide and call for an ambulance. I said that I did not want her taken to the hospital. He said that was fine, but if I went home and another nurse came on duty, that nurse might decide to send her. I said I would call hospice to make sure that my wishes were followed.

I put in a call to Donna, the hospice nurse. Meanwhile, a supervisor nurse came to the room and checked Ruby. She said she was going to order morphine to slow Ruby’s breathing. By this time Ruby was breathing like a runner exhausted from a ten-mile run. I wondered at her ninety-seven year old heart. How long could it work so hard? The morphine was given and I seemed to notice a slight relaxing of her breathing. Sitting beside her I started to get sleepy myself. I looked at the family pictures on the wall. I looked at a young and beautiful Ruby at her brother Raymond’s wedding (I think). It is the picture of  her whole family.

By this time it was nearly five-thirty. I started to think about my brother, Cecil, who was scheduled to leave the next day for a family vacation in Hawaii. Should I call and warn him that Mother might be dying? I decided yes, I will call him; I will let him decide if he wants to change his plans before he gets on the plane to the islands. I talked with Cecil. He said he would think about changing his plans over night and call me in the morning. We left it there and I went back to Ruby.

She seemed a little more settled. The hospice nurse returned my call. We talked briefly. She confirmed Ralph’s observation. There was no order to keep Ruby at Neshaminy Manor. The family was expected to make the decision. This was the very thing I hoped hospice would help me to do, to allow Ruby to die without medical intervention. I decided I would stay at the nursing home as long as I could, maybe sleep over. I asked Ralph if it was all right for me to sleep in the chair. He said it was no problem.

It was now close to seven in the evening. One of the aides came in to check Ruby, to see if she needed her diaper changed. We talked about turning Ruby on her side to help her breath easier. While the aide worked to make Ruby more comfortable, I went out to call my sister, Gloria. We talked briefly. I suggested that, if she wanted to see her mother alive, she might want to come to Philadelphia. We agreed to talk again in the morning. I still did not suspect that Ruby’s end was so near.

I went back to the room. The aide was gone. Ruby was propped up higher in the bed. Her eyes were open. Her breathing was more quiet. I thought she was looking at me. I started to talk, saying that I was her son, Ray, come to visit with her. There was no expression on her face. I started to watch her chest to see if she  was breathing. For the first time, I thought she might be dying. No, she was still breathing; each breath was shallow and taken after a long interval, but she was still breathing. I started to sing to her. I do not know what I sang, but most likely  they were old hymns. After singing for a while, I started to talk to her. I was direct. I encouraged her to go, to leave this life- almost like a chant- I said: go, go, it is all right to go, go, it is all right to leave this world.

Now I knew she was going. She was dying. At one point I thought she was dead, then there came another breath, then another. I do not know how long this went on. I stroked her head. I sang to her. I encouraged her to go, to find her way. Finally, I was fairly certain she was gone. I put my hand on her chest to see if I could feel a heart beat. I thought about a story I was working on. In the story a man, in his human vanity, tries to bring another man back to life by breathing into his mouth. I thought about breathing into Ruby’s mouth to bring her back to life.  I did once try to resuscitate  a young man who was injured and dying. I did not try it with Ruby. It was her time to leave this world. I went back to encouraging her to find her way to the next world. I sang more hymns. I said several prayers for her release; then I witnessed the last function of her body. As she expired a tear was formed in her right eye. We both shed a tear as we said our silent goodbye.

At this moment the phone rang. It was Nancy. I told her that Ruby had died. She said she was coming down to be with me. I said fine and hung up. I sang and prayed for a while longer, then I went to find a nurse to declare Ruby officially dead. When I approached the nurse, and said that I thought that my mother was dead, she looked shocked. She called for Ralph and they both came into the room with me. The female nurse used her stethoscope to listen for Ruby’s heartbeat. She shook her head to say there was no heartbeat. Ruby was dead. Both nurses left the room.

I continued to sing to Ruby for some time. The supervisor nurse came back into the room. She said that I was so fortunate to be here when Ruby died. Most people deal with death without experiencing it. She told me that her cat had died today and she was so happy to be there when the animal died. I agreed that I was happy to be part of Ruby’s end. I said, she helped me to come into this world and I was here to help her to leave this world. We both cried together.

The nurse asked about Ruby’s clothes. I said, give them to whoever needs them. She suggested that I call the funeral home to come for the body. I did this. I talked to a woman who said the funeral director would call me back.

I stayed alone with Ruby for a while longer until Nancy came into the room. We hugged and talked. The funeral director called and said that he would be there within half an hour. It was time to say goodbye. I kissed Ruby one last time. Nancy kissed her and said goodbye.

We drove home silently. I ate a big piece of apple cake with vanilla ice cream, followed by two glasses of Irish Mist. I tried to go to bed at about ten-thirty, but I could not sleep. I  have been writing for an hour and a half. Maybe I can sleep now that I have started the process of saying goodbye.

Raising the Dead

Last thing she said as I lifted the backpack on my shoulder, “you’re a goddamn romantic!” Webster defines a romantic as, “one whose life has no basis in fact: imaginary, impractical in conception or plan. Marked by the imaginative or emotional
appeal to the heroic, adventurous, remote, mysterious, idealized, and passionate love”

She was right; well, in a way she was right: I imagine that it was more my friend and fellow traveler who was the romantic. When my friend and I had a conversation, ideas took on an electricity; we were like two poles, positive and negative. When our ideas became heated, an arc of blue-white energy bounced back and forth. His energy
was positive: there was about  him a certain grandiloquence, patrician manners, a look in his eyes of one who leads others. He was sure of his own salvation and sure that he could lead you to the promised land. I, on the other hand, tended to the negative pole. I doubted everything. I had a tough skepticism born from my working-class roots. I did
not believe in saviors of  any sort or kind; and I was not about to follow a leader. So you see we were a perfect match; supplying the underdeveloped side of each other; together we made a whole. I must admit I had come to love my friend, and what we shared was a
common passion for ideas and their applications in life. This mutual feeling led us to the decision to leave the women in our lives and take a sojourn together in the land of warm sun and turquoise blue water.

We found our tropical paradise in a white sand, fishing village on the coast of the small, Central American country of Belize. The place had two major attractions for us. First, it was cheap to live there. We rented a two story house: faded pink stucco exterior with a white tile roof, and wood louvered windows painted Christmas green. The second attraction was that the local population spoke English. This was important for my friend who needed an audience for his performances. I was happy to have him perform just for me, but my friend’s charisma could not be hoarded. Within two weeks of our arrival in the village, he had struck up a relationship with the mayor of the village, the captain of
the local military garrison, and a fisherman who mended his nets on the dock. The children in the streets loved his stories. He flirted shamelessly with all the old women who spent their days sweeping the dirt street on front of their houses. And as you might guess he did not forget the pretty, young women he encountered as they passed on the street.

Some of the local citizens did not take kindly to the flamboyant foreigner in their midst. I heard one say, “he is full of big talk, he struts about town like a peacock
with his feathers permanently displayed.” I will admit that my friend was full
of big talk. He was full of self assurance: he believed he was unique and
gifted. Sometimes he claimed miraculous powers that bordered on the ridiculous,
but he was not a  hypocrite, he did not simply parade about to make a show of importance. He truly believed in his powers, and this was proven by an incident during our stay in the village.

One night in the village café, where we often went to eat and have a few drinks, my
friend got involved in a heated discussion about the subject of death. The discussion centered on the reality of raising someone from the dead. One man insisted that he knew of a holy man who lived in the jungle who had this power. Another mentioned the story of Jesus raising Lazarus after four days in the grave. Others doubted the powers of the holy man and Jesus.

My friend listened to the discourse until he could not restrain himself, “don’t you know the story of Elisha from the Old Testament of the Bible. Elisha was called to
the home of Shunammite woman. Her son had died. The prophet locked himself  in the room with the body of the boy. First he prayed, then he laid upon the body of the child and blew air into his body. When the body became warm, the prophet got up and walked around the room; then he returned and lay on the body again, hand to hand, mouth to mouth. He breathed a second time into the mouth of boy until he sneezed seven time and
opened his eyes.”

Obviously my friend knew the story and he had thought about this subject. I looked over to him, and half in jest I asked, “do you think it is possible, today, to bring
the dead back to life?”

His smile filled the café with its radiance. He said, “I feel so much God in me, if you touch my hand this moment, it will emit a spark of life. My breath holds the
sweetness of the nativity.”

I smiled and shook my head, but said nothing.

“Why, you don’t believe me?”, he challenged.

“I believe you”, I said. I did not want to humiliate him. The others laughed, but no one stepped forward to touch the hand of this modern prophet of God.

Walking back to our house that night we did not talk more about raising the dead. The subject dissipated on a cool, sea breeze as do most conversations of friends
who drink together.

It was nearly a week later that we were again eating and drinking in the same café
when a group of men approached us. They were carrying a plain, pine box. They stopped next to our table.

“What’s this?”, I inquired.

“The tailor”, said one.

With a sinking feeling, I asked, “dead?”

“The Yankee said he can bring the dead back to life” said one of the men as he turned to my friend.

I turned to my friend. There was a disturbed expression on his face as he got up and started to the door. “Bring him to the house”, he called loud and clear as he left the café.

For a moment I hesitated, looking at the box, then I called after him, “are you sure
you want to do this?” He did not answer back, so I motioned to the men to pick up the box and follow along.

The coffin was carried to the pink, stucco house with Christmas green louver windows and a white tile roof. I remember thinking of this detailed description as they
struggled to get the box up to the second floor where my friend had his room. In retrospect I think I was preparing for my role as the witness to the holy man’s first miracle.

The truth of the matter is that I did not venture upstairs all of that long night. I was terrified of being in the same room with the dead body- and my heart trembled
to think that my friend’s soul should be backed to the wall and forced to face such a hard reality. There was no hiding place between the ridiculous and the sublime.

For a good part of the night I heard the sounds repeated over and over. First there was the creaking of the bed, then loud breathing, and finally footsteps back and forth
on the bare wood floor. This pattern of sounds was punctuated by deep sighs from time to time. How long the struggle lasted I cannot say because I finally succumbed to exhaustion. I fell asleep on a chair while the godly work continued over my head.

When I awoke, it was daylight. Across the table from me sat my friend with a bottle of coke in front of him. You cannot imagine my amazement, and the admiration I
felt for him. Here was a man who had entered the realm of the ridiculous, passed beyond to reach the boundaries of lunacy, and now he had returned and was sitting exhausted before my eyes. I got up from my chair and went to him. I put my arms around his shoulders to show a gesture love and consolation.

He looked up to me, a plea for support in his eyes, “what should I do now?”

I did not hesitate, “I’ll call for the priest to come and bury the tailor, then you and I will go for a swim in the ocean”.

My friend and I stayed in that little fishing village for another three months. We
continued to visit the café and engage in philosophical discussions. As you might guess, in the eyes of the locals, a bit of shine had disappeared from friend’s armor. But for me, there was no dimming of his light; indeed the light shines brighter every time I tell the events of that night. I think I was witness to a special kind of miracle that night, the kind that happens every time the human soul risks lunacy to reach out, or in, to experience the divine.

Oh yes, to finish my story, when we returned from our sojourn in the tropics, I ended my relationship with the woman who branded me a romantic. I did not hold it
against her that she thought of me as a romantic, I just decided she would never be capable of the passionate love I needed from my partner in my life.

Lessons Learned as a Young Hitchhiker

Before the “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Universe”, even before Jack Kerouac published his novel about life on the road with Neal Cassidy, I was introduced to the world of the hitchhiker. Well, it was not hitchhiking across America, it was hitchhiking a stretch of country road between where I lived in Brighton Township, and  Beaver, Pennsylvania where I went to school from seventh to twelfth grades.

Today you do not see many hitchhikers. My guess is that this reflects the proliferation of the automobile as much as the dangers of life on the road. For myself, growing up in the 1950’s, I enjoyed my father’s adventure stories of crossing America. As a young man Cecil Warren Gray traveled on the cheap from Pennsylvania to California during the Great Depression. He rode in a bus until he ran out of money near Chicago, then he hopped freight trains and hitchhiked the rest of
the way. I particularly remember his story of being picked up hitchhiking just west of Chicago. The man was driving a shiny, black Cadillac.  My father swore the man had a tommy-gun in the back seat. He was sure it was Al Capone or one of his men. Later on the trip he was sleeping under bridge one night in Colorado. A thunderstorm came up, the stream over-flowed its banks, and Cecil’s shoes were washed away. How he replaced his shoes was never part of the story as I chose to remember it. I was not interested in the negative.

I grew up with a romantic view of life on the road. And by the age of twelve, I was ready for an adventure of my own; even if it was only hitchhiking a four mile stretch of road between my home and the town where I went to school. My mother was not in favor of her son hitchhiking into town. She thought it was dangerous. My father disagreed with her. The truth was that, at that time, we had only one car in the family. There was no public transportation: and father worked at Crucible Steel Company in Midland, six miles in the opposite directions from Beaver. He often worked different shifts. I could hitchhike or stay at home.

My first nighttime, hitchhiking adventure to Beaver came when I was in seventh grade. A girl, who lived in Beaver, invited me to a party at her church. I do not remember who picked me up that night going and coming from town, but I remember my anxiety about walking alone into the party. The church was set on a park in the center of town. I circled the park at least ten times before I screwed up my courage to go into the party. I do not remember anything about the party or the girl who invited me, I only remember the experience of walking around the park. Circling a task that is difficult has become a metaphor for my way of dealing with life. I have often thought of that night when I have something difficult to do in my life. I say to myself: all right, you have walked around the park long enough, it is time to act.

My hitchhiking stories to and from Beaver are not all so full of moral rectitude. Sometime about the age of fourteen I was hitchhiking into town on a summer evening. It was still daylight. A car full of teenagers passed by me as I  stood with my thumb extended. Suddenly the car stopped and backed up to me. One of them, a boy who was probably four or five years older than me, got out of the car and approached me. I knew I was in trouble. I turned and started to walk away from him. The driveway to my house was not far away. He followed after me cursing and calling me names. Finally, at the entrance to the driveway, I stopped and turned toward him. As I did he slammed his fist into my jaw and I fell to the ground. I curled up on the ground and protected my face. He laughed, spit on me, and went back to the car. For a long time after that incident, I did not hitchhike to town. When I finally had the courage to hitchhike again, I did it with a new awareness that every ride had the potential to bring good or bad into my life.

It was about that same age that I landed a most fortuitous ride. There were school buses that transported township kids to and from school in Beaver. These buses ran  before and after school. If you stayed after school for activities, then you had to find your own ride home. One spring afternoon I was hitchhiking home from track practice. The best place to thumb a ride home was on the corner of Fourth and Buffalo Streets on the edge of Beaver. It was there, by the Beaver Cemetery, that both streets fed traffic on to Tuscarawas Road, the road I lived on four miles out in the countryside. It was a warm, spring day. I was hot and sweaty from practice, and carrying my shorts and t-shirt wrapped in a wet towel.

I looked up Fourth Street and saw a new Ford Fairlane 500 coming toward me. This car was what we called a, “hardtop convertible”. It was two-toned in color, fire engine red and white. The car passed through the light and pulled over. I recognized the driver, he was a senior at the high school. In the passenger’s seat was a girl I did not recognize. She slide closer to the driver to make room for me in the front seat.

As we started down the road, the driver leaned forward and asked:  how far are you going?

I guess when I got into the car I slid further on the white leather, bench seat than I meant to; when I turned to answer his question, I was closer to the girl than I expected to be. Her blond hair was touching my shoulder. I could smell her perfume. I could have leaned another three inches and kissed her on the cheek. Instead, I turned my head to look out the windshield and mumbled: four miles.

The driver responded: we’re not going that far, but we will make an exception for the track team. I figured he was happy to extend his drive in the country. I know I was
happy to be riding next to his girlfriend.

Hitchhiking was part of my coming of age. The four miles of Tuscarawas Road between my family home and Beaver provided a reasonably safe environment for my first taste of independence. I never did hitchhike across America like Jack Kerouac and my father, but I did develop a taste for adventure and telling a good story. And I have pursued these tastes with a modest amount of success. I still spend a lot of my life circling around the park before I can muster the courage for the adventure; but that is fine, it makes for a better story in the end.

Who Sez Life Has to Make Sense?

I have never liked personal stories. They have always seemed to me to be, well, too
personal. They belong more in the world of popular culture, to the world of
stand-up comics and country and western singers. As I have grown older my
attitude to personal stories has begun to change. As some of you know I have
been influenced by the ideas of Carl Jung. Jung suggests that we are healthier
in the first half of life if we can focus our energy outward, on doing things
in the world. In the world of story we think of these as the stories of the hero
and the heroine: but as we pass the apex of life, and begin the descent to the
end of our time on this earth,  there comes a time  to look inward. We call
these wisdom stories. Jung calls this the process of individuation, a discovery
of wholeness in our lives. I think of it as making sense of my life. So with an apology for any excesses of wisdom, I offer this personal story which I wrote twenty years ago in third person andI share now in first person.

The 1960’s was a time of  turmoil and social change in our country. In 1962 I was a college sophomore who responded to President Kennedy’s challenge: “ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country”. I dropped out of college, joined the Peace Corps, and went to Latin America where the US was in competition with the Cuban Revolution to influence the  political and social
process. When I returned from the Peace Corps, I came to Philadelphia to attend an inner-city university, Temple, where I could continue my work in a Spanish speaking community and complete my undergraduate degree. While attending Temple, I started a community center for youth at Temple Presbyterian Church. My tie to the Presbyterian Church grew stronger and I decided the Church was an institution that would better support my ideas about social change. The United States government at that time was deeply committed to a war in Vietnam.

After graduating from Temple, I moved on to Princeton Theological Seminary to pursue a Master’s of Divinity degree. While at Princeton I rekindled my international
involvement in Latin America by participating in a human rights project in the
Dominican Republic and by studying social justice in Mexico during the summer.
At home I was one of a group of students who closed down Princeton Seminary for
several  days to hold workshops and discussions about the war in Vietnam. We also organized a march on Washington to protest our involvement in the war.

The social revolution in our own country and in Latin America was not the only revolution in my life at this time. Along the way I married and a baby boy was born. While I was a student, my wife worked to support our new family. Most days I attended classes in the morning; in the afternoon she went to work and I became a
stay-at-home dad. As I look back on that time, now more than forty years ago, I
was a serious young man who saw himself as part of the social revolution of the
60’s; still every afternoon I shifted gears and entered the world of my three
year old son, Matthew, who conducted his own workshop to instruct me about
life. This was the beginning of  my own personal revolution.

When you have a three year old in your life, you are continually looking for ways
to  spend his or her energy until it is time to go to bed. One of my favorite diversions was a visit to the graveyard. In a town as old and wealthy as Princeton, you can imagine there is a great variety of monuments in the graveyard, from simple stone markers to mausoleums the size of a small house. I enjoyed walking through the place and reading the  historic dates and descriptions about the people buried there. I remember one day I was busy reading when I realized Matthew was not anywhere in sight.

I called out, “Matthew, where are you?”

His blond head popped up from behind a tombstone, “here I am”.

“What are you doing over there?” , I asked.

“Watching ants climb on this thing”, he responded.

Nonchalantly I called back to him, “well don’t get lost,” and I turned back to my own
interest.

For a few minutes I continued to read inscriptions and then I remembered again the child in my life. He was no where to be seen. Again I called out: “Matthew, where are you?” This time there was no answer. I walked over to the tombstone where I had seen his head pop up, but no Matthew. Then I heard a giggle and I caught a glint of blond hair as he ran to hide behind one of  the big mausoleums. That day we started playing a game in the Princeton graveyard that we enjoyed many times afterwards. We called it, “lost and found”. This was the beginning of my course in learning to be a kid again.

They say all revolutions begin with a simple demonstration of truth. I was not an easy
convert to the wisdom of being a kid again. Matthew and I had many activities
for a warm afternoon. One of my favorites was a walk along the canal that ran
past the apartment where we lived. These walks gave him a chance to explore things along the canal path and me a chance to think about social theory and philosophy like: Che Guevara’s , “La Revolucion Agraria” or Immanuel Kant’s “Critique of Pure Reason”, all books I was reading in my course of study at the Seminary. I was a hard nut to crack, but my teacher was persistent.

One day we were taking our walk. It was a sunny, autumn day just as the leaves were starting to turn. I was walking along thinking about something when I realized Matthew was again out of sight. I called out, “Matthew, where are you?” No answer. I
looked into the woods, down the canal, finally I turned frantically around and looked
back up the canal. I saw him kneeling down beside the water’s edge. I called out, “what are you doing Matthew, you could fall into the water and drown!” He did not look up or answer me.

I ran back to where he was and called again in anger, “what are you doing?”

He said in his calm, matter of fact way, “I’m sending Tubby the Tugboat on his way down the canal to the ocean.”

Now I could see what he was doing. He had a piece of bark from a Shagbark hickory tree that stood on the canal bank. He had constructed a crude model of the tugboat from his favorite children’s story. My annoyance with his play was not satiated. I said,
“you could kill that tree by taking bark from it.” He did not respond. He just
came back up the bank, went to the tree, broke off another piece of bark and
went back to the water to send another Tubby on it’s way.

It took me a little time observing a child playing in water to remember the fun of getting wet and muddy, but finally I joined Matthew in making more boats and sending them off to explore the great, wide world. I learned later that Shagbark hickories naturally shed their bark and it does not harm them if you do not take too much of  their bark.

That year when Matthew turned four, we had many adventures. When we were reading “Charlotte’s Web”, we visited a pig farm to learn how pigs really live.
Interest in farm animals led to the creation of our own stories. We started to
tell stories about a donkey who was always getting into trouble. These stories
congealed into one of  my most popular stories for young children called, “Ice Cream Mud”.

My young teacher’s magic was working slowly, and I was becoming aware of the changes in myself. My last semester at the Seminary I took a course called, “Anatomy of Revolution”.  For the course paper the professor asked us to write about how we intended to be personally involved in the revolution. I thought about my time in the Peace Corps, my work for human rights groups in the Dominican Republic, my work in mission churches of the Presbyterian Church. I could have written about my engagement in the greater area of social revolution that dominated the political world of the United States. That would have made sense from the way I had lived my life: but deep, down inside of me I recognized that my revolution had more to do with my young son and what he had opened up to me about life. I did not write a paper for my
course in the anatomy of revolution; instead, I spent the semester creating a photographic essay about the relationship between Matthew and myself. As I remember the course result, the professor did not disagree with me. When I
went to his house to retrieve my project, his daughter answered the door. When
I told her my name, she responded: “so you’re the one!”

In the year of 1970 I did a lot of things that many people did not think were very sensible. I graduated from Princeton Theological Seminary with a masters of
divinity degree, then I refused an opportunity to be ordained as a Presbyterian
minister. Instead, I took a job working in a steel mill to help support my family while I started to write  and tell children’s stories. Forty-one years later, I am still writing and telling stories. From my vantage point today, I agree with the title for this story “who sez life has to make sense”, but for me, my life has made sense in the way it worked out. And, by the way, Matthew and I still play in the water, only now we paddle sea kayaks together  instead of building imaginary tugboats!

The Little Tiger’s Roar

Based on a fable told
by the 19^th Century Hindu saint, Sri Ramakrishna

One day a hungry, mother tiger came down from the snowy mountain to a green valley to search for food. She hid behind a large boulder, a tiger cub at her side, and waited for a family of goats to come near.

The unsuspected goats with their bearded heads were nibbling grass as they came close to the boulder. Suddenly the mother tiger let out a roar and chased after them. The terrified goats cried out, “baaah,baaah, baaah” , as they ran away.

The mother tiger pursued the goats only a short distance before she stumbled and fell to the ground. Weakened by hunger, she had used her last strength and now was dead.

The little tiger called out when his mother did not return to the boulder. The goats heard his helpless crying  and had compassion. They approached the little tiger and one of the mother goats fed her milk to the little tiger. And so the little tiger came to live among the goats of the green valley. And as you might expect the goats taught the little tiger their own ways. They taught  him to nibble grass like a goat, and bleat like a goat instead of roar like a tiger, and eat juicy red meat.

One day another tiger came down from the snowy mountain to the green valley. This was a father tiger and he did not hide behind the boulder. He let out a great roar and the goats ran away; all ran away except the little tiger. He had some bit of tiger courage in his heart and he stood tall before the ferocious tiger.

“What is this”, said the big tiger, “a tiger living among goats?”

“Baah, baah, baah”, said the little tiger to the big tiger.

“What is this”, said the big, father tiger, “a tiger that speaks like a goat? This cannot be. I will show you that you are not a goat.” The father tiger picked up the tiger cub by the scruff of the neck and carried him to a pool of water.

“Now look into the water”, said the father tiger, “do you not see two faces, both with black and yellow stripes, long whiskers and sharp, pointed teeth?”

The little tiger looked into the water. He looked at the big tiger, but again he said, “baah, baah, baah”.

The big tiger was not discouraged by the little tiger’s response. “I will yet teach you to speak like a tiger”. Again he picked up the little tiger by the scruff of the neck and now he carried him up the snow mountain to a dark cave where he had stored juicy, red meat that he liked best to eat. He offered a bit of the red meat to the little tiger, but the little tiger was used to eating grass like the goats. He did not want to taste the meat.

“No, no, no”, said the great, father tiger patiently, “you must taste it”.   Now the father tiger put a piece of the juicy, red meat into the little tiger’s mouth.

The little tiger tasted the meat and he liked it. He ate one, two, three, four, five pieces of meat! Then for the first time, the little tiger felt a new feeling come into his belly. This feeling rose up through his chest, and suddenly there came from him a great, loud, tiger roar!

So the story tells us, the young tiger cub discovered his true voice. From that day he lived happily on the snowy mountain and never went back down to the green valley.

That Elusive, Path of Life

     It is three full weeks since I had my knee replacement surgery. This was an elective
surgery. I chose the hospital, the surgeon, and the date for the procedure. For the most part, the event came off as planned. As I imagined this event in my life, I figured it was a good time to reflect on the path of life that lies ahead of me. I figured that I would be confined to the house and unable to move about easily; it would be time to contemplate instead of being active.

      The reality, as you might expect, has been different from the imagined experience. First, I was in the hospital for only three days. The day of the operation they had me
out of bed and starting to walk. The second day I began physical therapy for the repaired knee. Since the operation, I have spent two to three hours in therapy each day.  Because I am lucky to have many people in my life, friends and family, I have spent one to two hours each day either entertaining visitors, talking on the phone or communicating by email. Because I thought I was going to be bored during my recuperation, I prepared a special project for the down time; I purchased a digital scanner to convert old slides to a digital format for sharing family history.

     There has not been much time for contemplation and reflection on the path of life. I
guess in one way this is good, I have not felt a tinge of boredom. My knee now has good extension, nearly one hundred and eighty degrees; when I bend the knee I can go twenty degrees past the ninety degrees in a sitting position. I know that friends and family care about me, that is certainly uplifting. And now more than five hundred slides have either been scanned or pitched into the trash.  I have been busy as a beaver, but my path of life is as confusing as ever!

This brings me to my one reflection that I have contemplated over the past four weeks: the path of  life cannot be charted on a map like a trip from New York to Los Angeles. The best we can hope for is that we periodically look down at our feet and sense the path is still there. The direction into the future is always fraught with poorly conceived plans and misdirected hopes and wishes. Looking backward is sometimes helpful, we can appreciate our successes in life despite the false starts and bad decisions made along the way. If we are blessed then we have learned the benefit of grace that picks us up when we fall down and allows us to start over no matter how many times we fail in living the life we have planned.

Speaking of failures, I see that the month of June passed without my completing the promised monthly entry. This month of July I will avail myself of a little grace to try again to produce two entries, one will be a good story for reading.