From our deck you can see the planes drawing white jet streams across the blue sky. I often wonder where they are speeding off to. Luggage packed tightly below. Seatbelted passengers with their seat back trays balancing undersized drinks. Headphones connected to tiny screens. So much effort and cost to get away. 

Yesterday, I managed to get away, but only on my own two feet for our neighborhood walk. 

After our driveway with the empty street hockey net, there is an enormous rusted anchor impossibly dropped into our neighbor’s front yard. They are collectors of everything. 

At the end of our road where the dirt turns to asphalt there is the new house built by wealthy wash-ashores. We were so ready to dislike them for replacing the tangled woods with their house, their pool, their barn, and their guest house. Turns out they are too nice to dislike.

Next is the weekender house. A cute little place with shutters we almost bought before settling on the one we live in now.  They come down regularly with their two large dogs. He cuts the grass and tends to the seasonal homeowner rituals like hanging holiday lights and planting tiny American Flags along their split rail fence for Independence Day.

The next street is sleepy in the off season. Houses with empty driveways and curtained windows. In summer a parade of out of state license plates spills out of overcrowded driveways and into the road. Beach chairs circle in side yards, strange dogs bark from the ends of ropes tethered to scrub pines, and window unit air conditioners hum against the heat.

In the middle of the block is the house with the white shell driveway where the old woman used to pluck weeds on her hands and knees. She has been gone for nearly a year now, hopefully to a place she wanted to go that is smaller and easier to keep in order.

Around the next corner is the house with the new wooden ramp rising gently alongside the steps to the side door. The couple still climb the stairs clutching the railing hand over hand. I imagine a son or daughter had the ramp built worrying over what might happen.

Down at the next bend you can see the blue water of the cove framed by summer green leaves. In the fall the leaves color, then drop away before winter winds arrive. There is the always empty single story ranch without the usual For Sale sign. They have a side driveway my twins have discovered as the perfect spot to enjoy the full view of the cove from town to ocean.

Further down is the house my family rented the year of my ninth grade. It is empty in the off season, which makes it easier to remember our year there: playing soccer in the front yard with my brother, riding bikes through the open field across the way now dotted with homes, and the bedroom my brother and sister shared with the line of masking tape down the middle to keep the peace.

Three doors down, before you turn back onto our road, there is one of those kit houses puzzled together. A very nice home with a perfect yard, but it doesn’t have the look of a house built by hands. The owner is always cutting the grass, but is never too busy to stop, walk into his garage, and trade a treat for a paw shake from our dog.

Back on our dirt road, the trees lean onto one another, shading and quieting the walk. It’s been nearly seven years since we bought our home – the first two years were just summer living with me commuting on weekends. Now, going on five years of living year round, things have become story-wrapped and familiar. Our neighborhood walks overlap each other across the seasons. Walks with old friends visiting. Solitary walks. Walks holding hands. Walks our twins take together – reminding us they will eventually move away. 

Back on the deck under a night sky, sitting in my crooked wooden chair, I look up and see a single light flying. I think again of the seatbelted travelers. 

The stars shine fixed and unconcerned – just as they were yesterday and will be tomorrow. No where to travel, nothing to chase, and nothing to flee.

So nice to simply stay home.   

It arrived yesterday. We threw the old one away – left too long hanging through too many rains. This one is two-toned green and made of recycled materials – trash repurposed for relaxation. 

I strap it between the two trees in our side yard alongside the fence we share with our neighbors’ bouncing terrier gone hoarse from barking.

Like so many things on the list it remained unchecked because of more pressing tasks: laundry, the orthodontist, sawing and stacking the tree that fell last winter, mowing the lawn, cleaning the bathroom, vacuuming, grocery shopping, returning a too-small swimsuit, walking the dog, going to the dump, dropping the twins off at hockey, picking the twins up at hockey, cleaning the windows, making dinner, doing the dishes . . . you know . . . the list.

Measured and balanced, I sit carefully in the middle, then: lift both legs, tuck knees tight, quarter twist left, back arched high, shoulders big, arms extend over head, then out ninety degrees and hold steady like gliding wings. Done. Checked off the list. 

Staring through the branches at the blue summer sky, I feel the gentle sway of the breeze and listen to the leaves whispering among themselves.

But . . . Damn it! I forgot my book, and if only I had an iced drink within arms reach, and a pillow, and my sunglasses, and my phone, and my speakers, and . . . music playing. That would be perfect.

My mind unfolds the list: beds need stripping, dishes are piling, tires need rotating, the grill is low on propane, we are down to our last gallon of milk, I need to finish that article before Tuesday, and our library books are all overdue.

I take a deep breath in. I let a deep breath out. In . .  out. . . in . . . out . . . 

Everything will just have to wait. I close my eyes, stretch my toes, loosen my jaw, and feel gravity’s anchor.
Then a familiar voice calls me from the front yard, aaaaaand . . . back to the list.

Morning light slanting through blinded windows wakes me.

Downstairs, barefoot and swimsuited, I pour coffee into a mug wheeled by hands.

Driving towards the ocean, I round the bend just past the pond and see a stroller-pushing-dad tucking against the paved shoulder. I brake – hands at ten and two. Drifting over the double yellows into the left lane, my nod greets his wave. I remember that chapter of my own life: pushing the twins to the coffee shop and then to the bench overlooking the piered beach.

Cresting the hill, I see the layered horizon: blue sky, on gray clouds, on white fog, on sandy dunes waved with green grass. The striped palette of a summer morning.

I park in our usual spot, stash the keys behind the gas cap door, and walk down to the water. Stepping from dry sand to wet, my toes brace for the first wave. Not ready. I step back to let the undertow retreat one more time.

Wading knee-deep, I count down from ten. Deep breath. Three . . . two . . . one . . .  Dive. Ice. Eyes shut tight. Fingers search. Touching the bottom, I push to the surface. Warm air. I turtle onto my back with toes up and arms winged. Floating. The waves lift and cradle . . . lift and cradle.

Strangers arrive, lugging themselves over the dunes and past the lifeguard stands where they unfold chairs, push open umbrellas, and lay flat their colored towels. 

I float against the tide. Pushed in, I swim out, making sure my feet can touch the bottom. “Be safe,” I remind myself, thinking of my family and wishing for simpler times before the nightmares. A time when the world felt safe – the ocean detaching me from worries atop my finned board, watching for the next wave, feet dangling unconcerned. A time when our dreamed-of future felt inevitable. 

I weigh cold water against warm land and lift my feet one more time. Buoyed by the sea, I turn to gaze towards the horizoned-shore I cannot see. 

Thanks for reading,

Peace

I walked barefoot to our mailbox on Sunday. Thankfully we live on a dirt road and there is no Sunday delivery. I walked free of anticipation, carefully considering each step. The walk felt weightless: Armstrong-like.

Where the dirt turns to asphalt, the shade of the trees edging the road invited me to continue. In my new summer feet – not yet padded – I stepped my way past the row of empty mailboxes toward the cove with its promise: ankle lapping waves of cool salt water.

The pavement burned hot. Between leafy shadows, my feet found the lined shadows of overhead wires strung between ivy climbed telephone poles. Tightroping one foot over the next, I mimicked the high wire act of squirrels.

Around the bend, I passed the old family home of a best friend from high school and thought of him – now – living in another town with a family of his own – his brushes and oiled paints turning blank canvases into art. 

At the bottom of the hill where you turn right at the landing, I remembered the cottage once there that my family had rented for two weeks in August. Empty days filled with croquette, mini golf, ice cream, ocean swims, lake rinses, and sticky screened-in nights with roasted marshmallows on found sticks.

As hoped for, the water was a cold relief. The smell of the tide conjured a memory of playing cowboy with blankets draped over the split rail fence of my grandparents’ house. I could almost smell the studio off the garage where my grandmother’s drawings revealed themselves on her slanted drafting table. Images outlined by sharpened pencils and filled with water colors.

I stood firm against the ankle lapping waves, the wind chasing sailboats around the cove. Behind me, parked alone on the landing sat a friend’s truck. I wondered where his boat might be returning from later. 

Empty handed, I stood filling my lungs with salt air accented by barbeque-smoking coals – a perfect summer afternoon. The clear sky promised a sunset with the last orange light extinguished by the illusory Western Coast horizon of the sandbar we call home – its crooked arm flexing into the Atlantic on a planet we no longer believe is flat. 

I turned away from it all to walk back home, barefoot and happy I had nothing left to do.

There is an octagonal window at the foot of our stairs. In the morning, it lights the way to breakfast. In the evening, it reflects the climb to bed. 

I’ve been meaning to clean that window since we moved in five years ago. But from the outside you need an extension ladder to reach it, it’s the smallest window in the house, and you really only see it when you take the stairs. Not exactly “top of the To-Do list” material.

Finally, last weekend I did it: extended the ladder, footed it level with a broken brick, and climbed up with my bucket, a spray bottle, and a roll of paper towels. The whole job took maybe ten minutes.

Satisfied, I walked back into the house and stood at the foot of the stairs looking out through the cleaned window. I could see Nothing – just the deep green summer leaves waving back at the house. Perfect job: dirty glass wiped clean.

Next, I called my wife to marvel at my handiwork. She too stood and looked at the “Nothing” I had done: seeing only oak leaves dappling the afternoon light.

I’ve read that while we install doors and windows for insulation and protection, it is the empty spaces – the opened doors and windows that make the rooms liveable. 

The light we let into our homes and the views we enjoy from inside are transformed by the attention we give to those open spaces. A front door introduced by a carefully chosen welcome mat becomes an invitation to friends and family. A back screen door that lets cool summer morning air flood the kitchen becomes a reminder of the carefree season. Bedroom windows draped with color and accented by blinds become guardians of our late Sunday afternoon sanctuary.

Nobody notices a cleaned window. Dirty windows grow on us without drawing much attention. Why is it that “work for good” goes unnoticed and we struggle to see when things begin to darken? Living trips over living and tangles everything when we rush – our heads down. Window cleaning must be scheduled maintenance like annual visits to our doctor to check if we are well. 

No window is ever perfectly clean. Even the most attended pane has streaks and spots revealed by slanting sunlight.  The human touch always leaves a mark – perhaps nature’s way of checking her own wellness.

Setting aside a few minutes to wipe away the dirt from yesterday to enjoy a view of the new day’s morning light is something we all deserve. Like a good night’s sleep that makes space for the hope of a today brighter than yesterday.

Writing begins when you compose the first sentence. Then comes the second sentence. Usually, after the third sentence you begin to have something to say. 

I recently left my job under bewildering circumstances. A few days before my departure, I found a note and a box on my desk. A colleague and friend had gifted me the pen I am writing with now.

Interesting thing about writing – the way pushing words from your brain, down your arm, through your hand, into your pen, and onto paper gets you to the heart of your thinking. This pen is made from a piece of scrap wood gathered from the woodshop classroom of the school where I was the principal until a week ago. 

My colleague and friend is a music teacher who crafts wooden pens as a hobby. The pens are beautiful. This one has a shape that fits perfectly in my hand with just the right balance to make writing effortless. The wood is dark with a rich black swirling grain, capped at either end by Celtic inspired metal finishings. The ballpoint is smooth and leaves just the right amount of ink on the page. The end is capped by green glass that captures and reflects the light.  

Writing reveals the connecting patterns that form the fabric of our histories: helping us to see our circumstances clearly enough to choose roads yet taken, to blaze our own way, to step away from the safety of following. 

I graduated from the high school where I served as a principal for the last four years. The graduation ceremony I presided over one month and four days ago fell on the fortieth anniversary of my own graduation from the school. A few of my friends’ children were among the graduates who walked across the stage and shook my hand. I held my last faculty meeting outside in the school courtyard from the spot where I used to sit as a student. Strange how the pieces of your life find each other when framed by reflection.

This morning marks a week from the day I walked out of my corner Principal Office for the last time – my favorite surfboard under my arm. As a student at the high school, I surfed before first period. Displaying the deep green board on the wall of my office was my way of encouraging everyone to think of our school as our home away from home. Now I sit in the quiet of this blue-green summer morning, unrushed, enjoying a second cup of coffee on my deck instead of balancing it on the drive to school. I am trying to  imagine the next chapter of my journey. A chapter so far without routine, without duties, and without the haunting weight of looming dilemmas. 

Like this pen made from scrap wood and transformed by the hands of my artist friend, I will need to refashion myself. An exciting and frightening prospect. Making pens is my friend’s hobby – work he loves to do. Can I fashion a new life out of something I love to do? 

What I have now that I have not enjoyed since the summer I was twelve is empty time. I am blessed. I married the love of my life. My twins are my favorite people. I live in a place where the light and the water are like no other. I have close friends I trust without reservation. My parents are healthy and live in the next town over. My brother and sister enjoy loving families of their own. Strong roots for branching out.

Maybe the answer to my new looming question (Now What?) is simple: Write. No sense in worrying about the unknowable future. Replaying the past is exhausting. Maybe the thing to do is right in front of me: the pen, the open time, my hobby: essay writing. 

I have always dreamed of being a writer. I think I will lean into that, pick up my gifted pen each morning, trust in the art, and see where my words take me.

From the boardwalk I see the cresting whitewater. The waves are big today. Beach chair in one hand, coffee cup in another, and my notebook tucked under my arm; I scan the beach and pick a spot for my chair close to the water and safe from the rushing waves. I see myself at the center of this blue-green day.

A visitor sits twenty yards to my right. He is not in a good spot.  I see the next set. The fourth wave is the biggest. I count down from ten. The wave rolls toward the beach, buoyed by the sandbar until gravity collapses the whitewater lip. The ocean rushes over the tide mark, flooding the visitor and scattering his belongings. Soaked, he retreats. 

Then it is my turn. A rogue wave rushes beneath my chair, soaking me to insignificance. Waves break under forces far greater than me: shifting sandbars, changing winds, rising and falling tides, waxing and waning moons, gravity that saves everything from floating into space.

Things fall apart when we put ourselves at the center. Anger springs from selfish needs unmet. Frustration overwhelms when things don’t work our way. Sadness wells when we reduce the world to our personal troubles – when we live alone as the center of our lives. Hubris explodes everything.

We lighten our load when we carry the weight held by others, when we listen intently, and step out of our own way. Our eyes open to see the road yet taken when we risk being known – honestly, openly, and without reservation.

Knowing people, waiting patiently, listening to the stories behind their choices, we can understand and be understood. We grow by opening ourselves while leaning in to others until our lives unfold in ways that feel right, make sense, and dissolve false expectations. 

We find our way forward when we hear while being heard, see while being seen, and feel while being touched. The back and forth spiraling energy of relationships wriggles us from the clutches of distracting narratives about who we should be. 

When we step out of our center to listen beyond our voice, see beyond our eyes, and think past our assumptions, then we leave the center empty: a hollow hub pulling things together. Rooted, we branch out, reaching for the light only we can see and responding to the call only we can hear. It is the dialogue between the self and loved ones that magnetizes our compass and shows us the way forward.

Like the storied weight of a hand-made quilt patched with scraps of worn clothes, a gray winter sky cocoons us in warm dreams of spring nestled by winter. Unleaved branches scratch the sunless sky – back and forth in the winds – searching for blue.

A thick blanket of winter sky invites us to stay close to home. To not wander out – should the rain return or the wind come again from the north. Only the near-empty milk carton is reason to drive into town. Jacketted and hatted against the cold, I open the truck door and feel the sun for the first time in months. Magnified by the arching windshield, the cab is sun-drenched. Not the dry empty, directed blow of the heater. No – this heat is thick, heavy, and enveloping. A sun-warmed cab on a late winter drive into town – spring is coming.

The quiet of boredom, the morning gray, the emptiness of days without plans – all are signs the carnival of summer is being pulled closer by spring. Late winter carves out empty hallows – spaces where time skips a beat for us.

The end of winter is filled with promises. We wake to the slant of early morning rays that heat the panes of our bedroom windows. Afternoon sun melts snowy ground, revealing islands of green. Sunlight stretches into the evening – offering sunset invitations for long walks ended by standing and watching as the sky colors itself. Random spring-like days send us digging into our bureau for a pair of shorts. Our attention shifts from memories of summer last to plans for summer next.

The end of winter has a heaviness that pulls us to the ground, sinks us deeper into our chairs, settles us more comfortably in our beds. Nothing calls us to action. We stop looking to busy ourselves. We feel the quiet everywhere. For a moment we join in the great hibernation – absorbing the still gift of a melting winter.

Peace,
Chris

It is impossible to know another person completely, to understand the way they are impacted by life, to experience the day as they experience it. In the deepest ways we are strangers to each other. Isolated universes drifting, colliding, and orbiting around each other. Our fears, our worries, the pain we carry, can never be fully communicated. For these reasons and more that I do not fully understand: we should always be kind.

There is so much more we do not know about each other than we could ever understand. The ocean horizon reminds me of my maternal grandmother. What does it say to you? A properly cinched neck tie makes me miss the paternal grandfather I wish I had more time to know. What does a well dressed man trigger in your mind? The smell of the low tide makes me feel warm and at home. Where does the smell take you? The sound of crashing waves reminds me of the time my wife almost drowned. What memory does the sound bring to you? I barely know myself. How could I possibly understand the lived experiences of another.

We are all struggling. Sometimes to remember where we left our keys. Sometimes to pick the right outfit for an interview. Sometimes to do the parts of our job we wish were tasked to others. Sometimes to change the things over which we have no power. The severity varies from day to day – the constant is that we each in our own way fail again and again.

At the same time we each experience life as miracles piled one onto the other. The sunset we see from our deck after a night when sleep would not settle in deep enough – leaving us to rise hours before the alarm was set. The unexpected burst of laughter from a loved one in response to something we say. The smile from a passing stranger. A call from a distant friend and the conversation as though no time has passed between our last meeting. The taste of a fresh strawberry in season. The smell of a wood fire on a late autumn night. Waking to a new day empty of plans or appointments. The sound of rain falling outside our bedroom window on a Sunday morning.  

The one constant in all of it is the strangeness between us. I cannot know what it is like to be you. You cannot know what it is like to be me. Today is the birthday of your son. For me it is the day my best friend was killed by a driver asleep at the wheel. For others it is just another Thursday in another week, part of another month, in one more year. 

It is because we are strangers to each other that we must be kind – always. You never know – anything, really, about anybody. Though maybe that is not completely true. These things I have come to know for certain: a smile is contagious, laughter is uplifting, listening fills the heart, extending grace calms the soul, and being kind – somehow – makes even the deepest pain begin to heal.

Peace,

Chris 

Last night I could hear it. Lying in bed, warm beneath the dark and snuggled under the weight of our quilted comforter, I listened with my eyes gently closed.

It whistled through the trees and clattered across our shutters – gusting and ebbing. At times I could even feel our house shake – framed wood secured by steely nails shuddering off the chill of January winds. Then it would be gone, and I could hear the softer sound of my wife sleeping, and feel the warm body of our dog nestled between us.

This morning I sit here: hot coffee steaming on the side table, morning book in my lap, looking out the living room window, waiting for the light of morning. In the waning darkness I can hear the wind working across our hill – invisible and unmistakably present at the same time.

Then the light comes and with it I see the snow. Big flaked – dancing with the wind – now visible – a ghost revealed by blanketing white flakes of snow. The invisible, now visible – mesmerizing.

Witnessing the invisible – having sound and form combined – I am prompted to wonder what other invisible forces are at work – swirling around our living – hidden and manifest simultaneously.

Intersectionality – the collision of opposites is where we see nature at work. A light flickered on to reveal – if only for a moment – work made possible by the privacy of darkness. Always the light extinguishes, swallowed by the darkness again. But we know the work continues – we feel the force and the remembered flash from the light encourages our leap to faith in what we cannot see or touch, but know is hard at work – moving back and forth, rising by falling, leading by following, stretching by returning – a complimentary dance of opposites colliding us forward.