LEAF PONDERINGS

One wild night a few weeks ago, our computer crashed and died. I was off line for 9 days. Strange as it was, I actually enjoyed not having access to the internet. Perhaps I needed a rest...because I was delighted to get it back just after I began teaching my Wild Writing class at the Western Maine Senior College. Teaching this class was a leap of faith for me as I have never worked with adult writers before. As a children's librarian in Marblehead, I enjoyed creating and teaching a writing class to aspiring authors whose average age was 10. It was called Voice Ventures...and I absolutely loved it. Of course the kids probably taught me more than I ever taught them, but that is always the way with children. And always OK with me. I had no idea what to expect working with seniors...or shall I say, my own age group. I can't express in words how wonderful it has been to facilitate a group of senior writers. I feel so honored and blessed to be able to do it, and though we have met only twice, I am already looking forward to more. I feel like I have been digging underground for ages, in the dark and breathing the damp air of raw earth. Suddenly, I have hit a vein of gemstones and they shimmer and shine in vibrant colors...showing me the nuance and texture of my surroundings. The students in my class are truly gems. I've struck gold...a treasure trove of beautiful souls. I am lucky to be able to share writing time with them...to learn from them by hearing their stories, learning slowly what really matters down deep. I've slipped through a door in perception and I have begun the joyful journey of seeing my home environment through the words, images, eyes and ears of my elders and collegues. The process seems to be waking me up. 13 years after arriving here in Bethel, I feel I have found a way to get beneath the surface. This wild writhing class makes my heartstrings sing. Today I will share my write from this past week's class because it is a piece written truly from my heart...and what I want more than anything lately, if for the universe to feel my heart. It is good medicine.

       Crumpled leaves move, touch one another as they make their very best effort to hold on tight until the next cool breeze. Crumpled leaves smell dank and yet the crunch, the whispers and the decay are all reassuring, evoking memories of morning walks to school, of piling leaves to play in-to throw leaves sky high, laughing, shrieking in the exuberant play of children at recess. Leaves ask me to let go. It sounds so easy, that simple request. Easy. But I ask you leaf, how is it you can hold on so long? What is it that makes your moment right? What forms the perfect set of circumstances for your stem to suddenly "let go"? It's not just the strength of the wind or the dry days giving way to the shine and slant of autumnal light. It's not the recent rains providing more moisture. Something mysterious...something only you know acts like a clock and tells you it is time and suddenly a fresh playful breeze catches you up and carries you away from your tree-away from the bark you have known and loved all summer-away from the texture of the nearby lichen. Leaves spiraling in the wind. It is fall. My birth time...and I feel the lift of wind as it whooshes in and plays with my mother's hair. She can no longer get up on her feet alone. We sit together looking out the window-watching the the wind and rain playing in the tree limbs. Who's out there she asks? I hear a man's voice. Yes, Mom. I hear it too. I hope they don't expect me to foot the bill...and we better make sure everyone can make their own sandwiches because I'm not waiting on them. No Mom...there's no need for you to foot the bill and you don't need to wait on anyone if you don't want to.

     Her hands are like tissue...or dry leaves. Her face is crinkled with texture and tears of a long busy life. She has a nagging cough. I call it her bark and we enjoy the play on words. Mom has always enjoyed playing with language. She has phrases she uses and we girls have been writing them on a list as we remember them. Sometimes they come out of our mouths unbidden and someone will say there's one...there's a Phylisism. "O my sacred aunt!" or "never hoid of the boid!" When I try to think of them, I can't seem to bring them forward. But when we sit around, sharing, they spring uncoiled from our deepest childhood memories, linking us all...we sisters.

Mom sees things in the trees. She is careful. She seems to realize some of her perceptions may be hallucinations and so she looks sideways to me...asks me to verify if what she sees is real. I am endlessly interested in what will happen next as I allow silence to participate in our conversation. Why, she asks, do the Goodhues build green buildings? And I remind her of the job I had ironing shirts for Mr. Goodhue. I hated domestic work. But now...I enjoy puttering around the house watching the play of light and shadow, cleaning this, sorting that, fixing a meal. At sixty I actually choose these jobs over others. Her eyes go from impish to vacant. She is lost in a memory and it has become hard for her to take me with her. She has such trouble with word retrieval and putting thoughts together. I can see that soon, it may become impossible for her to finish her thoughts. Soon, the filmy color of her eyes will find it harder to see whatever it is that she sees in the trees. And soon, some mysterious readiness will become known only to her and like a leaf in the wind, she will let go.

In the meantime, the colors change and the cool air wrestles with the last of summer's warmth. Birds fly south and the chick-a-dees sing a persistent and cheerful song while the chipmunks pick up every last acorn...and I turn 61.