My father was a man of vast experience which often revealed itself in lessons or entertainment, one was never quite sure which was which. He had so little interest in dogma or doctrine that the respect reserved for elders was often as not laced with a patronizing tolerance of his unrealistic eccentricities - the perfect “taoist.” Reflecting back on my own unkindness and lazy respect for this complex and in many ways inscrutable human being, I struggle to reconcile the remarkably high standards for personal integrity which he nurtured and his unorthodox instruments - a mix of curiosity and accommodation informed by an unflagging allegiance to the most tender of human emotions - love. His concept of love was not found in the hothouse of modern advertising or cultural whims but through a devotion to learning about the whole of human history as explained in the written word - any word: good, bad or banned. He was well-described by Camus’ quote “
The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion. ” However, he was not defined by any real struggle - yes, a paradox.
My father committed himself deeply to his beliefs which often set him apart from - wives, children, community standards - armament of the conventional; nor did this resistance to the status quo manifest in culturally destructive behavior almost as though he anticipated John Lennon’s “ Imagine “ and was conducting his own war on hatred and cruelty while developing concepts for a better world. That he was an high school English teacher, very nearly gives credence to the deepest fears and convictions of the rigid right about the cause of our nation’s fall from grace. The dilemma for any zealot attempting to frame this argument is that my father had no doctrine I knew of, outside the principles of decency and love. It sounds maudlin and sappy; it is not. When the big tent revivals were becoming institutional in the conservative bastion of Southern California he spent years as a member of the American Indian Church - a decision which would put him on the fringes of both congregations but closer to his concept of g_d. His understanding of love was not based on paid admission to the “ love show; “ his knowledge was gained in the battlefield - matrimonial, patriarchal, romantic and professional. He was mortally wounded by love and brought back to life by the same, so much so - he could not be denied.
I know, I tried - I ran, I raged, I blamed. I did everything but accept the superiority of his strategy which had nothing to do with politics, affiliation, assertion or occupation. You could talk shit with him, but not at him. He had the good fortune to know selfrespect as well as his own heart - he was a writer, a poet and an inveterate reader impervious to anything that did not directly further understanding about anything. I asked him once in my best snide Young Turk voice, “why’d you become an English teacher?” I said this not to learn but to elevate myself at his expense believing if I had to be in the wastelands, so did he. “ I love words “ was his reply. His focus was intense and unrelenting in pursuit of this love and he used words to good end - craftiest of the crafty - seditiously Socratic without a morsel of bullshit because he was driven by curiosity rather than certainty, hubris or supposition. His constancy took the form of loyalty as long as you took the bit in hand and worked out your own solution, the capacity for which I’ve grown to appreciate enormously as I move toward my own end. His support was often in the form of quips; He anticipated “memes,“ and it was from his last most persistent homily which prompted this essay. “Going down the road“ had become the universal solvent to most every existential dilemma or query - “ how ya’ feeling Pop ? “ . “going down the road“ . . he’d smile.
The well-schooled might take exception to this facile approach to wisdom - a wise decision, for the consequences of applying this pat answer reflects the difficulties of implementation for any of the philosophies predicated on the simple: buddhism, taoism, christianity or islam. For Pop, implementation came in the form of a contradiction - how to go down the road in bed with a broken thigh knuckle and alleged dementia. A preexisting heart condition precluded any reparative surgery rendering him incontinent and at the mercy of today’s “ best medical practice.” What would be the difference between having the cards my father was dealt and ones we are all dealt daily? - water poisoned for profit with the remaining water sold to those without lifeboats; a national election where I gambled +/- 1% of all I had saved to help elect a man who now wants to take back 1.5% from me to support the unmanned murder of grandmothers in a war without end, which pales compared to the previous; or previous to the prior - my father’s predicament, after all what are the masses without the individual? The notion of going down the road is not novel per se, only rephrased from one of the many human anthems - Sol traversing the heavens by chariot; Perseus paddling the river Styx or even Lao Tzu’s “ The Tao.” It is the scale and commensurate utility this oft sung procession is capable of expanding to which might prove useful, especially given the let-it-ride stakes to which the least responsible amongst us have exposed us all.
My interest today is to mobilize what remains of my life. Like father, like son - I like to write, but I carve stone, paint and draw as well. To get to one or all of each of those daily is a busy day, so if I’m not getting in front of one or all, am I stalled? If I was that same Young Turk sassing my old man; not a problem, plus I’d have drunk like Bacchus for good measure before I passed out a 1,000 miles down the road. I’m not that kid; it’s a chore for me just to get in 40 hours week, but the more difficult task is acknowledging I ain’t Sol ambling over the heavens, and I’d have to see the terms before I paddled any river Styx as a hired gun hunting Medusas. The more I’m disabused of fantasy and distraction the more I can create - fucking paradoxes. The most that can be said on this trek is that I’m not alone. Bob Dylan has sung recently “gone walk down that dirt road ’til someone lets me ride.“ Mr. Dylan learned it from somebody, who learned it from somebody else, just like I learned it from somebody . . . Though there is a great effort afoot to inhibit our collective abilities to individuate or be apart, much less learn, from: parents, peers, education, or assimilation - we are all making our own journey, and we have been from the beginning of our recorded history. We may not like where we are, but the possibility that we are not on a spirit quest of some fashion or another is not likely. Whether it is marching downfield with 60 seconds on the clock; searching for lost America armed-to-nines ‘cause lord knows what kind of commie pink-o bogey man has been placed in the highest office of the land by the liberal illuminati elite depriving the rest of us, good G_d fearin’‘Mericans our “manifest destiny,” or even Mr. Natural “just passing thru,“ we is on the move, going down the road . . .
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muse
She commands my interest this great womanTo see, to contemplate, to make wonder.All those joys, wounds - the many parts of manThat skirt or shrink from light, are known by her.
Yet flesh and bone the mortar of this homePay fealty to reality and ageWhich explains why fantasy tries to roam While he begs for help just to turn the page.
How much more emptied be this vale of tearsWithout a heart so tender or so kindAs those who help others share their fearsOr fight the numbing "no, never you mind."
She's all these things and many times moreThat's why i sing what fun is this - Alors!
jts 11/08/2017
http://josephtstevens.blogspot.com
http://stoanartst.blogspot.com
reprinted with permission - all rights reserved
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