It is raining outside and the sound of it is very pleasant to me right now. Rain doesn't always put me in the best of moods, but there are certain times that it's just what I need and this is one of those times. Now that I've moved my bed, I can hear it better. There's something about my position in the room that lets me hear the pitter pat on the roof clearly. It's gentle, calm, light. I don't like the sound of cars in the rain, so if only I could transport my house to some more isolated spot...
I want to write and I don't know what to write about. I don't feel creative so much as observant. Looking down, I see my hands and a couple of scars (clumsy burns) leading me to think about other scars. I realize that I used to be more aware of these things... for instance, I haven't thought about my first scar in a long time and now I look at it remembering where it came from. I was in the grassy area next to my Grandma Hackbarth's apartment and I fell down near the light pole and the air conditioning generator (?) on top of a short rusty metal pole (more of a stick) hidden in the grass. It cut the skin directly where the front of my ankle becomes my right foot--a tiny little vertical sliver which has faded with the years. I don't know why it means something to me, but it does and I hope it never really goes away. I see my knees too, always pink for some reason while the rest of me is so pale. For so long, I've loathed my pink knees. Why are they pink, anyway? Only now am I beginning to not care about their strange pigmentation. Why shouldn't they be pink, after all? The birthmark on my thigh, the moles sprinkled out here and there like constellations (my favorites hovering above my left wrist and on my right cheek bone), a writer's callus on my right middle finger, the tattoo celebrating emergence into the known/unknown. So often I criticize my body rather than appreciate it and it feels so much better to appreciate it--what it does, where it takes me, how it houses and encourages five of my senses, how strong it is to sustain me despite its simultaneous fragility. I am left with a feeling of gratefulness for the rain and the body.
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2 comments:
I think some of the most creative expressions come when one is not trying to be "creative". People fecklessly labor through olympics of pretense and vanity, ultimately arriving at nowhere.
Sometimes all we have is the small bravery of our observations -- what we know (our pink knees), what we see (the constellations of our bodies), and what we hear (the song of the rain on the roof).
I'm about to call you -- sorry I've been cooking for the past 4 hours!
Love forever,
Puppy
(p.s. my word verification is 'diptish')
They say that, if you listen to your body, the imminent rain will make your knees ache. And so aching becomes a listening that is (in its own way) no longer painful.
I likewise have witnessed my body transform lately vis-a-vis the lenses I've used to scrutinize/love it. I owe a lot of it to the farm, and to you, and to our mutual openness. I swear, when I begin to get discouraged, I hear your voice:
"these are sturdy legs. they do sturdy work. they are beautiful."
I love you so much, Caitlin. I can't wait to see you.
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