Paris Weeps in November

Paris weeps in November.  The days are cold, wet, and short. Lovers huddle close neath lovers’ covers.  The old pray and remember in churches, synagogues, and cathedrals. And on lonely park benches. Paris weeps for love, loss, and remembrance. 

On Kristallnacht I walked through the Tuileries and up the Seine to the Ile de la Cite, to call on lost friends at Notre Dame and the Deportation Memorial.  In the cathedral, an organist improvised in a minor key accompanied by a light show of popping camera flashes.  I wondered what medieval worshipers would have made of the brilliant play of flashing light.  I prayed that every photon capture a moment of holiness to be released like butterflies in Los Angeles, Kyoto, Nottingham, or Sioux Falls.  The light show added random beauty and mystery, as if Mona Lisa subtly widened her smile at my glance. I offered my poor prayers to those of the countless others who’ve worshipped there in the last 800 years.  Time slipped, we prayed as one for peace and justice; absolution.  Time regained its traction and I was back in November 2011, just across the Seine from Shakespeare & Co. Bookstore, another place of meditation.

The Deportation Memorial, behind Notre Dame, is a place of remembrance for the Jews, Roma, homosexuals, handicapped, resistance fighters, and others deported and murdered by the Nazis and collaborationist French government.  An old man docent searched my bag for explosives on entry. Nobody took flash photos. The place was empty in the rain.  I prayed alone.  Paris wept in shame and sorrow for her murdered children.

Shakespeare & Co. displayed the new biography of Hadley, Hemmingway’s first wife; the “Paris wife” Hemmingway betrayed, degraded, threw away, and never stopped loving. Paris is love, loss, and remembrance.  Already overweight and over budget I considered bringing the 40 Euro book home anyway, but realized that the story is too poignant to read. I’ll stick with Hadley’s own epitaph for their marriage, “I got the best of him.  We got the best of each other!”  She had that one right; but she had the worst of Hemmingway too.

Weary, I boarded the Batobus to pass time on the river watching Paris drift by in warmth and comfort. All the wonder of the city arises from the Seine. The Musee D’Orsay, Eiffel Tower, Grand Palais, and Les Invalides paraded by in antique splendor.  My destination was the Jardin des Plantes, one of Paris’ many vast island sanctuaries for plants and animals.  Parisians understand the importance of supporting the ecosystem within their city.  Birds, dogs, and children roamed the great garden notwithstanding the soft rain.  Diminutive cowboys and Indians darted among the lanes; young parents joined their children on the carousel.  Spirits of deported, lost children drifted in the fog among the living.

Throughout my ramble, I admired many fine street bikes darting like swallows along the avenues.  When Ms. Raleigh and I lived in Paris she was a configured as a bare naked bicycle; no derailleur, no luggage, just bones, brakes, and a saddle:

Two wheels

                                                            One cog
                                                            One speed
                                                            One God

I wished Mr. Raleigh had been able to join me in Paris.  We had some rare old times in the Bois de Boulogne, a city cyclist’s paradise.  It was time to ramble home to the green pastures and rugged coast of West Cork. 

So long, Paris.  Howdy Clonakilty.

Late August in West Cork

Sketching an Adventure:

I dreamt last night that I was in heaven, rolling along celestial byways with Ms. Raleigh.  At first we were among glowing pastel clouds, but as they dissipated I could see that Paradise was West Cork and we were cycling gently along her coastal boreens, going toward Drombeg Circle on our way to Glandore.  St. Murph, Clonakilty’s venerable bike mechanic, remained floating on a nearby cloud surrounded by a clutter of tools, bicycles, and paraphernalia. He was speaking in tongues to an ardent group of followers.  All the roads in Paradise are gently downhill.

Time passes and summer seems to be slipping away.  I have a plan to cycle the new bike path from Westport to Achill, called The Great Western Greenway if you want to give it a Google.  In the meantime, I’m still cycling around West Cork which remains as lovely and mysterious as she did a year ago.  Maybe I am in Paradise and just haven’t yet clicked to it.  If so, it’s an act of grace.  I don’t deserve this beauty and wonder.

Meet Lady Jayne:

I christened my new, sleek Folbot Cooper Kayak a few days ago, naming her Jayne and paddling out into the cove at Dunnycove.  The day was warm, the sea calm and Jayne fairly flew over the water.  We poked around the kelp beds and inspected sea caves accessible only by water.   To my delight Jayne paddles with ease backward and forward, cutting a clean line in either direction.  Then, I saw a plastic beverage bottle bobbing near me and, obsessed as always by tidying, I leaned over to grab it and, doing so, discovered that Jayne can roll.  Jayne christened me as I slipped from her cockpit into the chilly Celtic Sea.  In the drink, I swam along with Jayne’s painter in my hand until a thoughtful father and daughter in a rowboat gave me a hand in the final 100 meters of my cold swim.  I kept the bottle as a souvenir of our first paddle and reminder of my mortality.

Another Day:

Today I cycled over to Rosscarbery and along the way stopped at Red Strand.  It was about 11:30 and the beach was empty except for a single family.  Dad was waist deep in the shore break teaching two of the five children to surf.  He’d push them along as a wave came and both, a boy and girl, were making the right connections.  On the sand, Mom, three other kids, and three dogs were romping around with beach toys.  I said a prayer for the lot of them; a lovely family.

The fuchsias are blooming and I’m happy to report that the honey bee population of Dunnycove prospers.  When I step outside my door I can hear them working. Blackberries again line the lanes.  I must find the time to pick some for freezing.  I will, of course, eat them first.  Why take chances on tomorrow?

Springtime in West Cork

It’s spring in West Cork and an old man’s fancy returns to cycling and other first loves. Daffodils bloom in door yards and early Daisies grace the lanes.  Wildflowers of every color reappear in the forest paths at Castle Freke and will soon find themselves among the tendrils of young girls’ hair.

Have you ever thought about the Christian notion of “grace” ?  What did our old ones mean when they said things like “There but for the grace of God go I”?  I’ve struggled with this from time to time and come up with “undeserved love.” Maybe “grace” is a loving act done without quid pro quo, price tag, or expectation of return; some stranger rescues your drowning dog and walks away unidentified.  Is that act grace?  I’m not sure.  Grace seems more ongoing and durable to me than a single selfless moment.  Grace endures. And somehow this thought leads me on to women.

Every man should contemplate grace because some are loved by a woman. No man deserves this love, this grace. A woman just decides one day that this guy’s the one for her and, against all reason and accountability[1], she takes him to her heart and that’s that!  If you’re one of those fellas, go to church today and light a candle.  That woman brings you the grace of God.

When blackberries lined the lane

You brushed my hand and

Hold it yet as winter’s tide

Tops the reef at Red Strand.

Black stained lips still

Kiss mine with urgency

From time to time

Echoing that first embrace.

Will I love you less for wayward

Gray I sometimes find

Or lines which sun paints

At the corners of your eyes?

I who by your grace

Find beauty in every breath

And yet thrill to your smile.

---

[1]  In the Jack Nicholson movie, “As Good As It Gets,” a nubile receptionist gushes up to the curmudgeonly romance fiction writer played by Nicholson and asks him how he can write so truthfully about women.  To this Nicholson growls, “It’s easy.  I just think of a man and take away all reason and accountability.”  The line is good for a laugh, but the script writer was onto something. 

Goodbye Elfreda

Are you familiar with the Zen concept of a koan, a question which cannot be answered within the confines of ordinary logic? For instance, "Why is Pi?" (My personal favorite) or "What is the difference between a duck?" (A Zen joke, suggested response: “Both legs are the same.”)  I'll open this chapter with the thought that friendship is a koan. Since everything we create, including friendships, is pregnant with its own dissolution, why do we “friend?”

I cycled to Rosscarbery last Saturday morning taking the route along the beaches in a roughly northerly direction. Puddles from Friday night’s rain had become icy patches in spots the sun had not yet reached.   The tide was out and there was a clean reef break at Red Strand; an even 6 foot surf at Long Strand.  I day dreamt of my beach rat boyhood.  That reef break, a couple hundred meters off shore, captured me.  The morning sun illuminated the spume flying off each wave's crest.  They seemed somehow too perfect to be "real," another koan.

As a child I was very open about fantasy, so much so that my parents became concerned at my "lying" about the events of my day.  My mother read me the Dr. Seuss book "To Think That It Happened on Mulberry Street," a story about a boy who makes up fantastic events.  After that reading, mother would ask me "Frankie, did that happen on Mulberry Street?" when she thought I was fabulating.  I had no problem acknowledging Mulberry Street. I knew adults too believed in Mulberry Street. Jesus walking on water and Mary's ascension into heaven, for example, clearly happened on Mulberry Street.  I kept this knowledge to myself, however, already guarded in my interactions with grown-ups and their “real world.”

As an adult, I accept that dreams, waking and sleeping, are as real as the "real world" which we Westerners think so important. Why do we so prize the world of pollution, robotic weapons, terrorism, and perennial armed conflict; the world where children starve and friends die young? I prefer Mulberry Street where life is gentler, people are kind to one another, dogs speak, and pigs can fly.  Mary, Jesus, Krishna, and Siddhartha are my dearest friends and teachers on Mulberry Street.  Given the choice, who dares say I'm mistaken?

Coming home from my Saturday adventure, I went through Castle Freke and Rathberry, a hamlet a klick or two inland from Long Strand.  A light rain was falling and the setting sun created a rainbow over the castle.  Horses grazed on the castle lawn and I wandered off down Mulberry Street.  Cycling takes me there.  While I was out I stopped for a chat with my Airedale pal, May.  She gave me a kiss and I gave her a biscuit. 

   

My dear friend Elfreda, who called me “Dad,” died unexpectedly last night.  That rainbow over Castle Freke was her angel path.  Elfreda’s lottery dream was to open a home for Down’s Syndrome children.   She didn’t want a Lamborghini or a yacht, just a loving place for discarded children. I shall miss gentle child Elfreda and wonder if I can sing “The Parting Glass" ever again without a tear for her.

The sun is shining on the Celtic Sea; life and friendship are insolvable koans. Today I embrace them in all their beauty,  mystery, and wonder.

Shanti

So I moved to Dunny Cove, a place so obscure that most people in the nearby big city of Clonakilty (pop. 2000) scratch their heads and ask for coordinates.  Then, if they’re driving here, they get lost anyway and call on their mobile phones for directions.  I like this.  Dunny Cove is a tiny sandy beach surrounded by high cliffs and menacing rocks.  There are three houses in the cul de sac; I live in half of the first one, a duplex high on the verge overlooking the cove and icy winter Atlantic.  Pods of whales and dolphins glide pass my doorsteps, silent as shadows in a churchyard.  Basking Sharks loll just off shore. There is magic in Dunny Cove.

My neighbor, in the other half of the duplex is Shanti, a medium sized black and white dog of indeterminate, but undoubtedly splendid, ancestry.  Shanti is sui generis, his own pup in every way from his big soulful eyes to his unique “Queen Anne” shaped forelegs.  Of course, Shanti has a human caregiver, Cathy, my winsome neighbor, but the thing is that Shanti is a guy dog and “mature” like me.  He seems genuinely happy to have the friendship of another old dog. (Of course, it may just be he enjoys the treats I slip him.)  And, Shanti is an ancient soul, peaceful as his name and exemplary in his love of all creation.  So we walk together, greeting neighbors, canine, bovine, equine, and human with friendly smiles, sniffs, and kisses.  Shanti refreshes himself from rain puddles and a little roadside seep spring he’s shown me.  Shanti says the spring is holy and has its own resident naiad, a water deity named Trixi.  Trixi is a doggie deity.

Shanti makes a paradise of each moment, looking up from time to time to share the joy with me.  “Isn’t puddle splashing lovely?  Did you notice the earthy fragrance of that horse; the bright yellow of the Gorse?” So Shanti coaxes me into his magical world of spirits, scents, and sensations; a place otherwise lost to my numb human observation.

Shanti and I like to walk to Beala Cusheen a neighboring cove where he searches out Pepper Dulse (Osmunia pinnatifida), a kelp, which he eats with gusto.   Pepper Dulse, is very high in minerals and has culinary uses as a spice, but in moderation.  Fresh from the shore it tastes salty and spicy.  Shanti has a jones for Pepper Dulse, but eats it only after first vigorously shaking the sand and little sea creatures from it. Shanti is a nearly a Jain so assiduously does he avoid killing. This too endears Shanti.

Speaking of seaweed, I’ve just purchased Prannie Rhatigan’s Irish Seaweed Kitchen, a wonderfully illustrated cookbook singing the praises of Ireland’s abundant shoreline.  All Irish seaweeds are quite edible and may be used in salads and soups, as spices and more.  An Irish seaweed you might find in your neighborhood health food store is Carrageen from which one may easily make Carrageen Jelly, a wonderful dessert served with lemon and honey.  My friend Cally introduced me to Carrageen Jelly just a few weeks ago.  It’s like ice cream from the sea and is good for you!  How often in a lifetime does that happen? Once I purchase my Vita Mix blender I’ll have seaweed in my daily smoothie and soups. 

So it goes.  Life is abundant in West Cork on the edge of the Irish speaking sea.  May every earthly blessing find its way to your doorstep in this the season of moon and stars.

Thanksgiving Remembered

The origins of Thanksgiving are various and disputed by people who enjoy disputation.  It is probably older than its traditional inception date of 1621 by the Pilgrims in Massachusetts Bay Colony.  Scholars think the Pilgrims brought this festival from the Netherlands where, by the way, Thanksgiving is also still celebrated.  Canadians celebrate Thanksgiving a month earlier than other North Americans, but that’s because winter comes earlier among the ice farmers; you’ve got to cook the turkey before it freezes to death in the yard.   But, no mind, Thanksgiving is a harvest festival which is now completely secular and ecumenical.  The Pilgrims invited the indigenous Native Americans to feast with them in a gesture which, had it been followed, might have changed the face of American history for the better.

The tradition is one of open commensality. Much like the early Christians, Americans celebrate by breaking bread with newcomers, strangers, and people of diverse heritage.  In my own family, my Aunt Isabel’s Jewish hairdresser and bookie, “Aunt Agnes,” was always present on Thanksgiving.  My grandmother’s lesbian cousin, Dr. Esther, was also with us on many Thanksgivings.   I recall her as a tall kindly lady in trousers who was said to be the first woman physician licensed in the State of Nebraska.  Dr. Esther cured my warts without pain or surgery, prescribing mineral oil and mysterious pills which I now believe to have been a placebo.  Thanksgiving was always a time of open doors, open hearts, and full stomachs.

In my memory, my tiny Grandmother Moran presided over the kitchen with her daughters busily fussing over food preparation and presentation.  Everyone drank eggnog which, when spiked with rum and/or brandy becomes a “Tom & Jerry.” Grandma Moran didn’t tolerate liquor in her house so my uncles all brought flasks to spike their drinks on the back porch.  Granddad Moran did not use alcohol, but seemed to turn a blind eye on the back porch.  Boys will be boys.

Thanksgiving, like Passover among Reform Jews, is a time when you may seek out single people, lonely people, and invite them into your family.  Some, like my Aunt Agnes, become family thereafter.  It is also a time when family feuds are set aside, sometimes settled; peace is made.  We celebrated Thanksgiving with my mother’s whitebread Protestant family and were the only Catholics in the crowd.  Catholics weren’t quite proper in America of the 1950s, before John F. Kennedy was elected President.  My grandfather said grace before we began eating and my Uncle Joe winked at me across the table while others bowed their heads in prayer. 

For the meal itself, Grandfather Moran carved the turkey and we passed the food around the table family style. The turkey’s derriere was always called “The Pope’s Nose,” but not spitefully.  Even my Catholic father chuckled at the old jibe.  Granddad always proclaimed that “south end” of the turkey the best part and kept it for himself.   I hated canned cranberries which looked like they’d taste wonderful, but didn’t.  Everyone poured oceans of gravy over their turkey, stuffing, and mashed potatoes.  Good manners required that you comment favorably on the “flaky” crust of my grandmother’s pies over which one layered vanilla ice cream and whipped cream.  High cholesterol hadn’t been invented yet, so folks could yet eat sinfully without apology or self-recrimination.  Obesity was called “fat” and that’s what any number of my family members were.  Heart attack was considered a natural cause of death, the express train to the bosom of Abraham.

After the meal was finished, I always slid down in my chair and crawled under the table to freedom through a forest of legs.  Uncles adjourned to the living room where they dozed and watched tiny footballers gambol on the black and white television.  Mom and the aunts cleared up, did the dishes, laughed, and gossiped.  In later years, Uncle Joe and I escaped to the Elks Club for snooker or, if apprehended, to the front lawn for a game of catch with baseball and glove.  Aunt Isabel’s Pekinese, “Tippy,” surfeited with outlaw tidbits I’d slipped her under the table, was quietly sick and snored teats up on her innocent back in a corner.

Mindful Cycling:

Riding a one-speed bike is skinny dipping a starlit cove in West Cork.  Visualize surfing an endless point break alone under the golden moon of summer.

I am again in the throes of One-Speed Fever, a passion which affects thousands of bikies daily.  Every cyclist is at heart a minimalist and burning deep in that heart is the joy of mindful riding, a meditation.  In that zone respiration is the Creator’s breath filling your lungs with life, stoking the fire of metabolism deep in your belly.  Your legs move, your muscles stretch and contract rhythmically, but you are utterly still; the world rolls beneath you. The Cosmic OM resonates throughout your body, vitalizing both bike and rider.  Visualize a cyclist within a swarming galaxy whose axis is her fontanel. If you’ve got that, you “get” one-speed.

The one-speed idea is a bicycle so spare that nothing is without immediate function.  Here you see no spring forks, iPods, or clusters of electronic doodads.  There are no fancy gear shifters, derailleurs or hydration systems. You don’t need a pulse and blood pressure gadget when you feel every heartbeat throughout your body.  One-speed cyclists fret over whether to retain the rear brake, hardly necessary and always mushier than the crisp snap of the front canti.   Ms. Raleigh has Paul cantilever brakes, front and rear; her front canti is a touring model which would stop a rockslide.  You must learn not to apply it too forcefully.  Although the rear brake is elegant and functional, it comes with its own clutter.  I sometimes forget my helmet. So it goes. 

With a one-speed comes an entirely different cycling reality; a deeper serenity and harmony.  You do walk up many hills and invariably coast downhill, but when was the last time you had such unalloyed joy as coasting down a long hill?  Gravity, usually your master, becomes your friend.  Walking your bike uphill you meet the world at the only pace known to your ancient ancestors. When was the last time you really looked at a horse? A cow? A caterpillar? Walking up Ardfield Hill was how I met May, my Airedale friend who sometimes gives me kisses.  There is nothing more innocent and sincere than May’s kiss.  She’s your pal.

If I’ve infected you, you may come to thank me.  Now we’re dreaming of taking a one-speed tour of coastal Ireland next spring, Ms. Raleigh and me.  Ms. Raleigh likes the idea of becoming a bikini bike again.   Me too!

(If you want to peek at an elegant one-speed, check out Rivendell Bicycle Works “Quickbeam” at http://www.rivbike.com/.  It’s not Ms. Raleigh, but he is an elegant machine; her American cousin.)

Peace.