Peace. Pax. Mir. Salam.

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Peace-Typography-Wallpaper-Widescreen-HD

I do not understand why everyone doesn’t celebrate Christmas; I really don’t. I understand the ones who shun Easter; Easter, after all, is what makes Christianity what it is with the resurrection as the foundation of the faith. It is Easter, after all, that set the whole religion in motion. So if you don’t buy into the resurrection part, well then Easter is not for you. Some say Christianity as a faith began with his birth, but I don’t think so. It is the resurrection that turned the prophet into a savior. So if you’re not good with that savior part, okay; but come on–how can you disagree with his ideas, his philosophy? (that’s rhetorical people)

Christmas is when we celebrate the birth of someone—Son of God, Messiah, Prophet, call him what you will based upon your faith, or lack thereof—who is literally the personification of peace. It is not the season to directly recognize his divinity; Christmas is decidedly about his humanity. The man preached absolute peace, encouraged us to love our enemies and forgive them, reminded us to remember our own shortcomings, and insisted on love as the basic tenet of life. Who can possibly have a problem with that?

It seems a lot of people.

I have one friend who hates Christmas. Despises it. Absolute contempt. Though to be fair, he feels that way about everything and everyone. But this time of year he is especially hostile. I don’t know why except he believes not believing in the divine means you shouldn’t believe in the humanity. That makes no sense to me. Shouldn’t we start with humanity? Isn’t that the point to begin with? If you don’t comprehend the mystery of the resurrection, you can at least understand the life of this rebel who stopped history in its tracks. For God’s sake, he cracked history in half so that even those who crucified him must be dated relative to his life. Christmas Day is a chance to remember the one Person who had perhaps the greatest effect on all of humanity.

Some don’t like the shopping, the carols, the crowds, and the commercialization of Christmastime. I never understood that either. If you don’t like the commercialization and crowds and shopping then don’t buy anything. But to put a positive spin on it all: it is the season when retailers do well enough to keep the prices down, when even the most tight-assed co-workers buy a tray of food for the luncheon, and strangers greet you with something other than disgust. It’s like a big, seasonal “time out” where everyone gets to pretend to get along. In July when a six-pack of Corona is reasonably priced, Merry Christmas. Some of those naysayers prefer to point out the hypocrisy of the season, noting the phoniness of pretending to be nice one day, saying “Merry Christmas,” and not giving you the time of day the next.

Okay, but listen: if you have the choice of those around you being nasty only eleven months of the year instead of twelve, wouldn’t you take it? And since when is your peace of mind and happiness dependent upon what someone else says or does? If that is true then there is no better time to pause and contemplate the peace that is the season. That WWJD wristband so popular for a short time some years ago makes perfect sense. Here is The example of how we should act toward other people; here is The Ideal—a Birth that happened only one time in the history of ever—surely it isn’t a bad idea to take one day to recognize his time here on earth and his absolutely radical ideas of, you know, peace on earth and goodwill toward everyone. Have you read his bio? Go ahead, Wiki Him, and then tell me his birth isn’t worth celebrating.

How about this: make dinner and invite friends and family and tell stories of days long ago—like something out of a Norman Rockwell painting. Put some extra spice in the stuffing and make sure someone finishes off the wine. Put the game on, sit near the fire and have a drink and remember those who can’t be with us any longer. They’re missed, especially this time of year. Remember those in homeless shelters and under bridges. Because we, all of us, are the peacemakers, We have to be. There’s no one else.

Peace my friends.

And Merry Christmas.

Obscure Christmas Songs

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I’m crying here. The last three songs in particular will first grab you by the heart, then get you to laughing, then get you thinking. Please watch these. I promise–I really do–they are exactly what Christmas is about.

Honestly, if this season is about anything, it is about humanity; these lesser known scores bend that way.

Everyone plays the standards: Bing, Elvis, Bruce, Perry Como, Andy Williams, The Carpenters, and on and on, adding new classics each year.

But some songs simply get left behind in the wave of music that avalanches onto the airways each winter.

Allow me to present for your listening pleasure Bob’s Seven Obscure Christmas Songs. Feel free to share, forward, follow, sing along:

Do Listen. Warning: Number seven is technically not a Christmas song, but is perhaps more about the very truth of Christmas than any other song ever written. Truly.

Obscure Christmas Song #1

Jackson Browne: The Rebel Jesus

Obscure Christmas Song #2

Paul Simon: Getting Ready for Christmas Day

Obscure Christmas Song #3

John Denver: Christmas for Cowboys

Obscure Christmas Song #4

Bob Dylan: Christmas Island

Obscure Christmas Song #5

Trans Siberian Orchestra: Christmas Eve/Sarajevo

Obscure Christmas Song #6

The Piano Guys: Angels We Have Heard on High

Obscure Christmas Song #7

Ralph McTell: Streets of London

Hello, It’s me

~ aviewfromthiswilderness ~ 1 Comment

It’s easy to lose touch with friends, with family. People move on, drift apart. Distance, interests, the unanticipated paths that move us in separate directions. It doesn’t mean we don’t think of each other, don’t miss each other; it doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be beautiful to see each other again. It’s just circumstance, and time, and the slow erosion of life.

Geez, life itself can be so tragically depressing, can’t it? But how much of the sadness do we bring upon ourselves? It’s easy enough to call someone, toss out a quick, “Hey, I can’t stay on, but I was thinking of you.” We don’t need to make promises of lunches and catching up; we don’t need to ask questions about employment or children. Just “hey, I hope you’re well” can change the course of a person’s day. For some, it can literally save a life.

I mentioned recently I woke from a deep afternoon sleep and my bearings were out of whack—time, place, reality—and I reached for the phone to call my dad. He’s been gone seven years. I shook it off and went outside, my day picked up where it had left off. It would have taken five minutes to call one of my aunts, the last two remaining of his siblings, and tell them I was thinking of them, “I hope you’re well.” One is ninety-five years old, the other eighty-five. Both are fine—for now. At what point do we say, “I should have called.”

I suppose we tend to believe we might bother someone, or that they’ve forgotten us or are busy, that they will wonder why the hell after all these years we’d call them anyway. But that’s probably not true—the proof is in knowing I’d love to hear from people. My aunts would be thrilled.

It’s been a rocky five years. More than a few times I’ve wanted to pick up the phone and call family, friends—some I obviously do. There are some people who I’ve remained very close to or became close to again. But many more I didn’t. So much can be misunderstood and interpreted wrong, so we grow distant instead of calling and saying, “Hey, you okay? What happened?”

If we called one person a week for just five minutes to say, “Just checking in. Sorry it’s been so long and to be honest I can’t stay on, but you were on my mind,” we might just make someone’s day, pull them out of some med-induced numbness to keep them from depression when both of those just might disappear with a call. Maybe not. But.

It was the end of November and twice the previous week at exactly seven in the morning my office phone rang and I didn’t answer it; I was getting coffee. The message was from a very old friend of mine. This was before cell phones, when an answering machine was the only device available if someone wasn’t there. In the office the voicemail could not be heard live; we had to wait until the message was left, then dial some code and retrieve our voicemail. Both times I tried calling back a few hours later but couldn’t reach him.

Then seven am rolled around a few days later, and this time I was in the office but my bag was on my shoulder, keys in one hand and coffee in the other, a bagel in my mouth, and a student outside the door waiting to ask something or other, so I let it go to voicemail and knew I’d try later that day.

Before I could, another friend of mine called and told me what happened. How they found him. How he left a note steering a co-worker to the garage.

I know had I answered the call any of the previous times to talk, it wouldn’t have made any difference in the outcome. None. But it would have been nice to catch up, spend a minute or two laughing one last time, telling him I’d call in a few weeks. That would have been nice.

My office phone rang another time and I didn’t recognize the “Is this Bob?”

“Yes it is.”

“ROBERT!!”

Okay. Let me stop here and say I actually despise the name Robert. I don’t know why. I like it from my family because that is all they’ve ever called me (long story), and to hear them say Bob is odd. One time a girl I liked in High School called me—actually called me!—and asked my mother, “Is Bob there?” and my mom said, “I’m sorry, there’s no one here named Bob.” (insert a loud Charlie Brown UGH). When we moved to Virginia Beach after ninth grade, I became Bob to everyone. It stayed that way with the exception of a few people who call me “Bobby.” But Robert has to be family.

I sat wondering from the obvious Long Island accent which cousin was calling.

“Ernie? Roy?”

“Ha! It’s Eddie!”

Ed was my best friend for years when I was young. We hiked every aspect of the state park next to our village, wandered the beaches of the Great South Bay, and taught each other everything we could know at that age about music. We were inseparable. Then thirty-five years later he called me.

We talked often before he left this world, and there was no awkward transition, no “what the hell are you calling me now for” implications. Just joy.

I do that now. I randomly call people—usually I know them. It keeps me grounded. It reminds me that everyone I was I still am, every way I have been is still simmering inside. If it is true that my “life has been a tapestry,” the people I have known have been the thread that held me together. And there are times, I’m telling you, times holding it together has not been easy.

Then I pick up the phone. “Hey, just wanted to say hi, I won’t keep you. I hope you’re well,” which almost always leads to a thirty-minute conversation, and those waters that have always run through my life still flow, holding me together, help me to know that just over the slight slope of the earth is someone who might not mind hearing from me.

We are all we’ve got. The money and house and cars and computers and trinkets and walls filled with art and attics filled with boxes are all secondary at best, all fade to the periphery of our lives compared to those we love.

We’re all we will remember.

Anyway. Talk to you soon.

A Joyeux Noel

~ aviewfromthiswilderness ~ 2 Comments

rockwell

Well before dawn this morning, I could see some stars and what must have been a planet in the west. Something about a clear sky at Christmastime has always mystified me, captivated my attention and imagination, from the simple, fun thoughts of reindeer and sleighs to the philosophical digressive pondering of First Cause and the imaginative world of proof. I love Christmas morning with its tidings and anticipatory pay-off. But even more I love the days earlier, of anticipation, alone, when the sky is a narrative, and the Author was sharp enough to leave enough room to us to fit in our own passages as we need to.  

In the east a sliver of light.

I remember now:

On Christmas morning before our parents were awake (or so we supposed), my siblings and I would gather, usually in my sister’s room, to exchange gifts we had bought for each other, before we headed down for the beginning of Christmas Day. It would inevitably still be dark out, and I know we’d lay awake waiting to hear each other also awake in the other room. A tap on the door. A “come in.” And we’d sit on the floor and open our presents.

At some point (like clockwork, as much an annual tradition as the Turkey or the pies), our mother would wake our father and he would exclaim, “I thought I said no one up before nine am!” and he couldn’t hide his smile to our laughter at the ludicrous suggestion we’d be up any later than five. It was always cold out during those Long Island years, and often snowy, but we weren’t going outside so it just added to the magic. Dad would be in his robe and slippers and he’d head to the living room as we gathered on the stairs and waited for him to plug in the multi-colored lights on the tree, and those on the rail, bringing to life the otherwise dark room. Mom had, of course, already organized whatever presents we would get into separate piles, and Dad would stand back and she directed us to the right area under the branches, though sometimes it was obvious if an unwrapped toy appeared, clearly already wished for by one of us. Dad would sit on the couch and watch in joy, even through the stream of “Wow, thank you Mom!” wishes continued.

It wouldn’t be long before the aromas of breakfast mixed with the onions and Bell Seasoning already underway for the stuffing, and eventually we’d need to get dressed, if not for church since we might have attended midnight mass, certainly for the droves of family who would soon fill the rooms. It was a beautiful way to grow up. I do not know the possible stresses, fears, and sacrifices that went on behind the scenes—that’s how good they were at it. Then, much later in the day after everyone else had left and we had all settled into the routine of looking at our gifts again, Dad would emerge from some closet with his gifts for each of us—books he had personally picked out, bought, and wrapped. It remains one of my favorite memories of all of my memories of my dear father.

It’s in the forties here today along the Chesapeake, and sunny. This is one of those days each year where I’ve been up so long and have done so much that it feels like it should be six hours later than it is. My sister and brother and nieces and nephew are all off in various parts of the country with their families anticipating their own Christmases, all of us with some common traditions, all of us with our individual touches to the holiday. Certainly all of us fortunate enough to be celebrating Christmas, laughing and telling stories, enjoying the food, the drinks, the sounds of football or Christmas music, and especially the welcome sounds of children, with another on the way. We are, to be sure, at peace this year. Anyone with family is engulfed in traditions which help balance our lives; they bring peace to our soul while providing some shared space not only with each other but with the idea of our ancestry, the hope of our posterity.

My father used to sit to the side for most of the holiday and enjoy being surrounded by his family. He’d carve the turkey, and of course disappear toward evening to get the books to give to us, but I picture him most in his chair, watching a game, laughing with us, waiting for Mom to call him to duty in the kitchen. He has moved on, and whatever there might be to know after this life of ours, well, he now knows, and that too brings me great peace.

Two deer stand nearby in the woods, cautious but not fleeing. It’s so quiet out. Absolute peace stretched out like canvas in all directions. On the water some ducks ease by.

I miss the days before society took “nearby” and “not far away” and tossed them to the strong breezes of technology and One World. The people I love are hundreds and even thousands of miles away, and we are used to that now. But this time of year I’m keenly aware of the distance. But in that small house around that small table when I was a child were so many relatives it is crazy to conceive how we pulled it off. But no one cared—we were together. Everyone was close enough to “drive over,” and by the time the turkey came out of the oven, a small crowd was sitting and standing and outside and in, laughing and sharing serious moments, because it was Christmas.

The sun is present now, but it is chilly, so I’m going inside again. I bought Michael a book at a local nautical shop and I need to wrap it to “surprise” him with Christmas evening when the rush of the day has settled down. He will be gracious enough to act surprised, just as we did with our father when he would predictably surprise us with books fifty and more years ago.

Well, except for one time. We had all settled down and we were sitting quietly, even the television off, the games had ended and dinner was done. My sister looked at our father and said, with a smile, “Okay, so where are our books?”

Thank God for memories. They bring us closer, help us to find the simplicity.

Resolves, Part Two (On the Bright Side)

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2022 was a truly tremendous year. For me anyway. Good days, bad days, “going half mad days,” of course. But if I were to drone over the past twelve months, my general consensus would be I’ve been terribly lucky (fortunate, blessed, tapped by Buddha–whatever).

There’s the obvious, of course. Professionally, my book The Iron Scar: A Father and Son in Siberia, launched (it didn’t “drop” folks–stop dropping things) to rave reviews. While that was going on, a dozen or so other pieces appeared and I am in negotiations for two separate books, Front Row Seat for one press and Wait/Loss for another. I’ve got two other projects here on my desk, and this blog is up to over 1500 unique readers each week. Plus, I STILL don’t write poetry–so there’s that.

My son and I hiked dozens of trails in as many state parks from the Potomac to the York. We spent more time outside in the last year than I ever thought we would, and he shot pictures which hang in galleries and private collections.

I sat on a pier on Lake Ontario and talked about life, about the passing of time, about the regatta to the east and the sunset to the west. We laughed about the things friends laugh about and sat in an understanding silence when we thought about our dads, about the inevitable change of seasons and generations.

In May my siblings and I brought our mother to dinner for her birthday and we laughed until we cried. We always do, and we sat remembering our father who lived a long full life, and celebrated our mother who is still very much her self, the matriarch as well as the focus of our jokes. I drove home appreciating her sense of humor and her absolute goodness that seemed to have leaped over me and into my son.

I hiked to the wind caves in Utah and we spent four days finishing each other sentences, each other’s thoughts, and laughed, and we walked in silence. We drove out to the salt flats of the ebbing Great Salt Lake and drank champagne and watched the sunset, and time didn’t stand still so much as we no longer cared about such measurements. We simply watched the sunset much like we had thirty-six years earlier two thousand miles east and toasted friendship, toasted whatever celestial changes brought two random paths together again. Maybe not so random.

I sat on my porch and watched deer, hummingbirds, osprey, and eagles. Michael and I stood on the sand at the river and watched sunsets, changing tides, talked about caminos and trainrides, talked about what’s next.

I had coffee with one of my dearest friends last week and we laughed for an hour about how beautiful life has been. I had a dozen lunches with another one of my closest friends, and we put aside our writing careers and talked about dads, we talked less about words than we did the quiet that comes between them, the grace of a smile, the love of a glance. He told me of the wildlife in South Africa and I told him of the snow in Utah.

The thing about time is we can make it stand still if we want. Go watch a sunset with someone, go sit on a pier and talk for hours, have lunch and laugh, have coffee and cry–the clock stops, the earth stops spinning, and everything that should be right is and everything that went wrong fades into something like a mist.

It was an extraordinary year. It was one of six decades of extraordinary years.

I woke. I got out of bed and watched the sun come up over the bay. I laughed. I spoke to my mother or my brother or my sister or my son, and at night we watched the planets and stars.

It was a year of moments I’ll never forget. I’m still sitting on the salt in Utah watching the sunset. I can still feel the calm waters of Ontario, I can still see Michael crouching down with his camera catching just the right angle of the sun on water.

I still understand perspective and the absolute power of love.

2022 was just fine.

Resolves

~ aviewfromthiswilderness ~ 2 Comments

2022 kind of sucked. For me anyway. Good days, bad days, “going half mad days,” of course. But if I were to drone over the past twelve months, my general consensus would be I need a do-over.

So it is.

I won’t bother with the details, but it was challenging; thankfully, not nearly as much as it was for most other people, including some loved ones, but challenging just the same. And yet, here I am at the end of it both metaphorically and literally as 2023 is sitting right in the path just a few feet ahead of us all.

Interesting, I don’t find myself beaten down or discouraged; no, just the opposite. I feel a sense of resolve. We usually don’t notice during the trials of life that they can also be wake-up calls, preparation in a way for what’s next. I am faced with new beginnings and I really don’t mind. It’s as if I was given the materials to build new wings then pushed off a cliff and told to figure out how they work on the way down. We either land on our feet or we learn how to fly.

Well it usually does take a shove off the cliff. We are so resistant to change, aren’t we? I mean, theoretically we welcome change, we enjoy the variety and new experiences; but realistically it is scary, especially when rocketing toward sixty-three years old. Still, with a little contemplation and retreat, plus just the right amount of caffeine, I’m able to see how I could only arrive at this place I find myself by suffering through the scratching and peeling that occurs when shedding an old skin. And now that I’ve had a moment to regroup, process, rationalize, and meditate—I believe I’ve come up with some basic resolves.

I’ve made promises before. I’ve guaranteed people I’d get things right, and more so, I’ve promised myself I’d complete certain tasks or put certain things behind me, and I’ve fallen short of those intentions.

Here’s why that won’t happen again: I’m growing old, and that comes with it a certain self-awareness that “it’s now or never.” And I’m not good with never.

First though, in making these resolutions, I had to reach back into some former motivational training. There was a time I was paid very good money to assist people with their resolve to change. Thanks to lessons learned from my old boss Richard, I’m acutely aware that we don’t lose fifty pounds by losing fifty pounds. We lose fifty pounds by losing one pound, then another, then we gain a few back and then lose a few more than that, and eventually we realize we’ve made progress. So my list must be patient; it must not contain bravado or climatic moments at every turn. A friend reminded me last night that if there is a tree in our path, we don’t pick it up and move it–we can’t. We cut it into doable doses, and slowly rid ourselves of the blockade.

Second, my list must be tempered by experience. One of my favorite character traits revealed in The Great Gatsby is when his father, after Jay’s death, is reading the list of resolves his son wrote when just a boy. In one of them the young Jay had written, “Save $5.00 (crossed out) $3.00 per week.” We learn Jay has ambition but understands his limitations. My list must show hope without setting myself up for discouragement.

Third my list must not bring me down the old paths I’ve walked aimlessly hoping to bump into something good. Nothing falls in our lap; we will not win the lottery, talent without effort is as common as corn, and the famous truism is as true as ever—the definition of insanity is doing the same thing hoping to reach different results. No, my list must be specific, take advantage of this clean slate before me, appreciate the challenges I still carry, blend my talents with a determined work ethic, and be unabashedly honest.

It is how my resolutions should have always been of course no matter my circumstance, whether one of comfort or not. I would tell the health club members that a list of resolutions can be created any time of the year, from any point of momentum or despair. And while obviously I know that, my past resolutions were often lofty and quickly abandoned, and I almost always waited until either the New Year or my birthday to implement change.

And finally, I must appreciate those aspects of my past which worked, which I rely upon to know who I am, and which I refuse to abandon. It is brilliantly acceptable for a list to include, “I will continue to…” several times. Many things in my life, after all, worked out fine and I have no intention of resolving them away. So any successful list must include not only new approaches to the old failures but reliance upon tried and proven traits which keep me sane.

In the end, this year is no different but for one minor aspect—my future is completely unpredictable for the first time in three decades, and the attention I pay to these resolves will be the difference between making the same mistakes or making it all worthwhile.

So here I am at the break of this New Year, and I came up with a short but solid list with which I can move forward with confidence and hope. I do like the New Year best for these sorts of things. Before that, though, two items to rule out of resolution lists: First, no more weight loss plans. Come on, I’m not an idiot. How hard is it to know what is good for me and bad for me? A primary way to not have to worry about changes in health care laws is to attempt to avoid the need for health care at all, and one of the two ways to do that is to eat right. No sugar, no salt, no late night eating, etc. We all know the list so there is no need for it to be on our “resolution list.” Just freaking eat right, Bob. Second, exercise. This is yet another way of avoiding doctor’s visits, and we know this. Oh my God we all know that if we move around we stay healthier. This isn’t rocket science. To include it on the list is to imply I’ve got the attention span and discipline of a five-year-old. Exercise and healthy eating have no place on the resolution list of anyone who can think clearly. The exception to this would be legitimate addicts (which also would apply to the group dedicated to quit smoking and drinking). If you are not an addict then just be disciplined and stop making excuses. If you are, then the resolution should be to seek professional help immediately so the New Year begins with a program to move away from old habits. Besides, many rehabilitation programs already have the greatest resolution list ever created: To accept the things I cannot change and to change the things I can. I don’t attempt so much for the wisdom part.

Something else I like to do with the list is tell someone I trust to be honest with me, someone who isn’t afraid of me becoming irritated by the reminders and nagging. But most importantly, the list cannot be thought of as “goals for the year.” It has to be a list of resolutions for today, just for today. That’s it. So taking exercise and healthy eating as examples since neither should be on the list anyway, we must not think in terms of “this year I am going to…” but instead, ‘Today, I will…” and do that every morning. And if need be, make it, “For the next hour I will (or will not)….” This is how people achieve success in all fields; they certainly have an ultimate goal in mind, but they almost unanimously work in terms of the “now.” As time goes swiftly by—and it does go by swiftly—the hours and days add up to new ways of life—and before you know it you build your wings and you learn to fly.

Even a leap of faith begins with one determined step.

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Encounter

~ aviewfromthiswilderness ~ 1 Comment

I sat on a bench on the boardwalk in Virginia Beach early Wednesday morning and talked to a man at the next bench who had a sign tucked into his backpack. I could see the words “food” and “work” and “less,” this last one I assumed was the second half of “home.” I asked if he was a vet and he was, and I asked if he was from the Beach, and he wasn’t—he’s from Pennsylvania originally, but he stayed in the area after leaving the military since he had received care here at the clinic off of Shore Drive along the Bay. Until he didn’t. He managed a HVAC company for a while, but his bills outpaced his contracts, his medical conditions outpaced his insurance and money, and his constant stumbling got the best of him. He borrowed from family, from friends, he took jobs until he couldn’t concentrate and had to leave, he sold whatever he could to try and keep it going. No one wanted to help him anymore. But I get that, he said. Just look at me. At some point they said they’ve helped me all they can. I’d have stopped too, he said. He hadn’t shaved in a while, but he had clean clothes and had showered. He told me the church at 19th Street helped him out. He said he’s really running out of options. He added that several friends of his he served with in Afghanistan had killed themselves and they weren’t even homeless, as if they missed a step—they should have had to go through homelessness to get to death was his implication.

I asked what keeps him going. Something good might happen to me, he said. Not today, though, he added and laughed. But something good gonna happen. I got a friend with an apartment gets my mail for me. I keep hoping someone will send me some money, get me back on my feet. I asked what happened all the other times they sent him money; why didn’t that get him back on his feet, thinking about the times I’ve stumbled, thinking about the times I felt lost.

He shrugged. People don’t know what it costs to get out of a foxhole, man. I don’t know what it costs. I wish I did; then I could have said I need this amount and I’ll be fine. But I don’t know. More than what I got. More than what I had. Maybe this week I’ll have enough to get my ass straight again. Probably not. Anyway, that’s why I’m not dead. Something good will happen. Not today though.

I told him I was on my way to meet a friend of mine who received some bad news recently. We were quiet for a few minutes, I said something about how calm the water was. He nodded but stayed in his head.

Friend of mine…I said, and I told him what was going on. See, he said, this is what I’m talking about. Things ain’t so bad for me. You and me sitting here watching how calm the water is. Things ain’t so bad really. I could use a little more help, but not really. You know?

I knew exactly what he meant. I only had five dollars with me but I gave it to him, which he refused at first but then took. He didn’t do it hesitantly. He took it the second time and said, Yeah, thanks, I really could use it. I hate begging.

I asked if he ever hears from family. They stopped answering him. And this year he’ll be thirty, he said. He looked mid-forties at least. Thirty. I asked what he thought it would take to get things right again.

I just gotta decide to do it, he said. You know? I knew.

I told him I’d see him again, but I won’t, and I left wondering exactly who helped who.

Really incredible how calm the water was. Like glass. Like a mirror.  

Books for Christmas–Number Three Desired Gift

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$20 includes immediate shipping. Buy a copy of The Iron Scar, I’ll include Blessed Twilight: The Story of Vincent van Gogh

More Praise for The Iron Scar:

“What a joy the prose is. Rhythmic, driving– the sentences like a train through the wild expanse of the page.”

–Gerry LaFemina, author of The Pursuit: A Meditation on Happiness

“What a wonderful ride The Iron Scar is; I loved every mile of it!”

–George Drew, author of Just Like Oz and Drumming Armageddon

“The Iron Scar shot to the top of my list of favorite books. Not only because I felt like I was onboard with the author and his photographer son as they rode this “oasis” across the wilds of Siberia, but because my father was onboard with me as well, and my sons, and all of my hesitant plans and second-guessed ambitions. Take this ride!”

— Shorefront News, Brooklyn

“The Iron Scar: A Father and Son in Siberia is a vivid and often poetic exploration of the personal and the historical, from poignant to hilarious.”

–YAHOO! News, Literary Notes

–A beautiful book by one of the most gifted non-fiction writers working today

–Amazon Reviews

“I wish every book I’ve read over the past two months had been as moving, gripping, and loaded with fascinating information. The journey becomes an emotional and thematic whole that transcends the standard “look what I saw” travel book. So many things stick with me: the royal blue station shacks, the birches with no tops, the meat and potato pastries, the smell of onions, the vodka, the wheel tapping, the once-in-hundred-year flooding, the vast vacancies of human presence, the moving village of the train, the Leningrad hero, the Leningrad ghosts . . . Just so much. Well done!”

-Tim O’Brien, author of The Things They Carried and Going After Cacciato

“The Iron Scar brought me on a journey that unexpectedly and artfully had me thinking about my own father and my sons throughout the book, as well as introducing me to the wild, warm, and colorful world of Siberia. Thank you for bringing me onboard with you and your son.”

-Martin Sheen, actor and author of Along the Way: The Journey of a Father and Son

$20 includes immediate shipping.

Buy a copy of The Iron Scar for $20, and I’ll include Blessed Twilight: The Story of Vincent van Gogh for free.

Venmo: @robert-kunzinger

Zelle: bobkunzinger@yahoo.com

Order today.

Spying on Hope

~ aviewfromthiswilderness ~ Leave a comment

I walked through the library at the college before heading home, and I talked to a few present and former students studying for finals, writing papers, eating bagels. I did not frequent the library when I was in college; I knew where it was though.

This time I sat at a table to read notes sent by an editor for a book project—ironically, about teaching college—and looked up from time to time this last week of classes. A few were on cell phones, but not many. Many were on laptops, but more were reading textbooks, writing, or talking quietly to other students with open textbooks and laptops.

My collegiate muscle memory kicked in and I thought, but it isn’t raining out, or snowing, why are all of these people in here?!

After about ten minutes, a young man, John, who had been a student for a few classes of mine some years ago and for whom I wrote a letter of recommendation for a Study Abroad in Australia, came to my table. We talked about his trip and about how he can’t wait to graduate in May. He sat down and before me was a young man only a few years older than last time I saw him but a world away from who he had been back then. It was his maturity, yes—eighteen to twenty-two is a leap unlike most others in life. But it was more. Experience, of course, travel, and the fact he was always an excellent student.

But it was also anticipation. He is just months from moving away from the bubble of dormitories and fraternity fellowship, and it shows in his eyes, the way when I asked his plans, he sat up, how he talked faster. I rarely get to see this part. I teach predominantly freshman and sophomores here, and they’re still ripe, high school residue still on their shoulders they do not yet wish to brush off, in front of them the camp that can be college when you’re away from home but not really. That’s what I stare at. I’ve been looking at twenty-year-old’s for thirty-three years, and the eyes of someone just a couple of years down the line are different. I never get to look into those eyes.

John’s eyes have that hope, they have appreciation, they have understanding. He said the polite, “I could not have done this without you, Professor,” but I know better. He could have, of course. Some students have an internal motivation that no one could defy if they even wanted to.

I returned to my manuscript written on and off through the years of teaching mostly unmotivated, unenthusiastic, unhopeful twenty-year-old’s, and I knew what I needed to do to sharpen the narrative. Throughout the work I dip into the idea of “possibility,” but sitting in the library looking at the students studying, sharing ideas, working, I noted the one aspect of collegiate life I missed out on in my thirty years of teaching first and second year students—hope. The ones at my previous place of employment as well as many of my freshman and sophomore students here move through the day like they were lucky to drag their asses out of summer break. But later, when what’s next is the next forty years of their lives, these same students will come to life, will discover what they are capable of and if they have the metal to make it beyond the confines of the classroom for the first time in their lives, which already are about a quarter of the way over.

Sitting at that table, pushing aside my own work to watch others, talking to John, talking to a few others I knew as I moved my way from the study area to the Einstein Bagels area, filled me with a sense that whatever might be wrong in the world, these people have what it takes to make it right, and for the first time since I walked by Friedsam Memorial Library at St Bonaventure in 1983 on my way to my life, things felt like they were going to be just fine.

Peace of Mind

~ aviewfromthiswilderness ~ Leave a comment

I never truly fit in.

When I was young I certainly had friends, but I was never completely comfortable around anyone—it probably explains my ease in front of a crowd instead of in a crowd. Honestly, I’m much better and more myself in front of two-hundred-fifty people or more than I am with three or less. The art of small talk has always eluded me; in fact, I wrote a relatively successful piece entitled just that, “Small Talk.” It’s not my thing.

I could never involve myself in the minutia of life. I was always better at big picture jobs—a hotel, a health club—where the objectives were clear and the conversation was kept to a minimum. So you can see the irony coming, right? Yes, thirty plus years teaching and discussing and reworking writing by college students, very often one-on-one. I always fell back on my health club training. That is, I became not so much a professor of grammatical skills or syntax as much as I was a motivator.

Big picture themes. That’s my wheelhouse.

So I never fit in at departmental meetings or brown bag discussions. In those places my mind shut down when endless conversation ensued about how to word one sentence of a document or the need or not the need for the Oxford comma, and on and on and blah blah blah and whomp whomp whomp…

They didn’t want me there. I didn’t take it personally; I just, once again, didn’t fit in. When I was growing up, Eddie and I would wander the state park and sing, and even with him, my best friend, conversation came with a melody and lyrics. Things don’t change.

I went to a high school reunion a few years ago. I knew just four people there. Kathy, her sister Patti, our friend Michele, and…okay three people. In retrospect that makes sense—I didn’t really do much in high school. My friend Mike and I did announcements, and that left the appearance I was involved, but I wasn’t. There was a mic, a room, and hallways between me and everyone else. Perfect.

In college it was the same. I was very involved, but scrutiny of that involvement is illuminating for me. Radio station (alone in a studio talking to the campus); coffeehouses (alone on stage in front of a crowd of people I couldn’t see anyway because of the lights); weekends with keg parties and drunken floormates found me borrowing a car and heading for Niagara Falls. I was more comfortable around the resident directors who were often alone in their apartments, or driving to Canada.

Even when I did participate, what I participated in is defined by the singular concept of “one.”

Tennis is an isolated sport.

Guitar can be played without accompaniment.  

Writing.

Walking. Hiking. In college it was the Allegheny River, in Tucson I’d drive down and wander the empty streets of a Mexican village, and in New England I’d hike to the top of Mt. Wachusett where kettles of hawks kept my attention for hours.

Nature.

I find myself more comfortable in nature because it doesn’t mind failure, it pays no attention to shortcomings and disappointments. It simply allows us to exist as we are without judgement or ridicule.

This afternoon after the storm I sat on some stones at the river and watched the choppy waters, the heron gliding across the duck pond toward the marsh, a kingfisher perched on a wire, and the distant, dark clouds building again, bringing more rain again.

It was a few moments of absolute peace of mind.

A thought about this: The peace of mind thing is not easy to obtain. It is not an absence of sounds and conversations, it is an internal escape from one’s own internal disturbances; the constant interior monologue about everything from the practical (money, transportation, deadlines) to the emotional (sick friends, relatives), to the fleeting irrelevance in life that get their claws in your thoughts and won’t release. So finding peace of mind is not easy to do just because my surroundings are quiet and natural; it just makes it easier.

So I sat on the rocks in a rare moment of internal quiet, the still waters of my mind undisturbed by some psychological pebble, and I looked calmly across the river and realized something profound: this river doesn’t want me here either. It was not created for humans, it is not set up for people. It’s why the heron flew off because of me but not because of the egret or the eagle or the osprey. It is why the tide will ebb and flow based upon the natural phenomena of the moon and the sun, gravity and storms—not because of anything or anyone anywhere.

I once stood waist deep in the Congo completely aware that no human should be there. It is the same in any natural place. In Tucson we stood on the shores of the San Rillito River during the horrific floods of 1983 and watched this once calm, low waterway—a place where kids would play baseball at low tide—snap bridges in half, grab houses off of their foundation, flip them over, and carry them on its back to some other place.

Nature has a whole other level of confidence.

Still, it’s as close as I have come in life to being myself, being out there. Hiking in the mountains, canoeing, simply walking down the coast toward some other where.

Some people never find their reason for being here; they let the world saturate their thoughts like a swollen river and swallow them, giving up, giving in, letting that minutia like money and disappointing others get the better of them. It’s easy to do; it happens. I suppose most people don’t ever feel completely comfortable around others, a bit of self-consciousness slips through. But it isn’t that, exactly. It’s that feeling of always thinking I should probably be somewhere else.

Counselors have said since counselors have been saying things that it is essential to find your place in the world. I agree. I’m not sure I ever will, but I certainly agree, and at least I know where to look.

I’ll be outside. Don’t come.