California state of mind

I stayed once On a boat, Marina moored, In San Rafael.

In my mind It was to be glamorous.

But in reality, not so much.

Where were the Yachts and The beautiful girls In bikinis?

The drinks And boat shoes With parties Into the night?

Instead, Moldy aroma, Galleys too small, hand-pump toilets.

Charming is Too generous, But certainly Memorable.

Sad captains That all appear To be divorced Dads who got little Else but the aging Houseboat.

Ironic that among All these bound vessels There are so many Souls unmoored from life,

Adrift in a universe That hardly knows they Exist.

Here, in San Raphael.

A view from an evening at Heinold’s First and Last Chance Saloon

Okay, so it was not quite so melancholy as my reflections sound. But it did rain the entire time we were on the water. And the characters really were quite shady. But we had fun. It reminded me of van-life, only you could drown. We had a great time, I recall, watching Jake Gyllenhaal host SNL and watching Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang late into the morning.

And San Rafael was a delightful place to live for a short spell. We took in a great film festival and met lovely people. I think this was the first time I recall the clash of a very posh environment with the homelessness problem. Of course this was more than half of a decade ago. So it was quite surprising then.

Jellybean loved this little organic Tibeten place. All vegan as I recall. And a view of the bay bridge from Berkley. Hey, how can you tell if someone is vegan? They’ll tell you.

WONDERFUL breakfast. PACKED early, but perfect for Sunday brunch.

Fishing vessel in Bodega Bay

A view up from our waterfront bungalo in Bodega Bay

#poetry #travel #essay #sketchbook

2018-10-15 19:55:08

The past is never dead. It’s not even past.

I'm reflective of romancing Iberia tonight. Which puts me in mind of my 2010 week in Rome. I doubt I'll ever be able to relive that time.

I love Roman Holiday. The film is anything but silent, yet when I visited Rome in the fall of 2010, I discovered a quiet reverence that emerges late at night—especially in the piazzas, where mist settles on the cobblestones and the noise of the day finally gives way to stillness.

Rome is so saturated with iconic imagery that no single vision can define it: the Colosseum, the Vatican, Trevi Fountain, Spanish Steps. A city of many faces and thousands of years, it offers as many impressions as it has visitors. But once you’ve walked its streets—smelled the roasting chestnuts, watched lovers linger near ancient stone—Rome distills itself to a single memory.

For me, it was a stenciled portrait of Audrey Hepburn.

We had spent the afternoon beneath golden leaves in the park outside Villa Borghese, then made our way through the winding streets back to our lodging near the Pantheon. It was late, quiet. We passed through an alley when a lime-green graffiti tag caught my eye. There she was—Audrey, staring out from the wall like a ghost of cinema past, etched into the stone like she'd always belonged there.

The first thing I did when I got home was cut my own stencil of Audrey Hepburn.

To most people, it means nothing. But to me, it’s a private seal. A reminder of that trip, that night, that reverent stillness. Of a city always caught between the ancient and the modern—where history echoes, but sometimes whispers.

#travel #sketchbook #rome #journal #memoir

2025-07-10 21:00:00

“To live in hearts we leave behind is not to die.”
 — Thomas Campbell

You may recall my forlorn farewell to an old friend from a few days ago. DE lived in Dust Meridian for nearly 20 years. Before that, it was two decades in the South Pacific and another ten in Southern California. He’s a mature man in his mid-sixties, so it came as a surprise when he pulled up stakes, sold both of his homes, and headed to the other side of the country.

He says it’s for his wife’s health. The allergies here in Dust are brutal for many. On top of that, years ago, she suffered a stroke that left her speaking with what sounds like an Icelandic accent. Her heritage and native tongue are Peruvian. She went from sounding like a southern girl to something ethereal and ancient—almost elvish. Like someone installed an Old Norse filter on her voice.

I thought she was faking it at first, but it’s a real thing. Foreign Accent Syndrome. Rare, but real. The result of a traumatic brain injury that causes someone to suddenly start speaking with an accent from a region they’ve never even visited.

In her case, it even shows up in her writing. She spells things phonetically now, based on how she hears herself speak. It’s charming, honestly. But also a constant reminder of how fragile the brain is. That same stroke could’ve left her unable to communicate at all. That would’ve been a terror.

My own sister suffered a hypoxic brain injury—lost her short-term memory, and now struggles even with simple tasks. She’s aware of her limitations, which might be the cruelest part. It occasionally lends itself to moments of levity, but mostly, it’s just tragic.

As for DE, I don’t doubt his reasons—physical or mental. His wife or his own. From experience, I believe the lifestyle and mentality here in Dust Meridian takes a tole on anyone with sufficiently curious or robust intellect.

That sounds harsh. Like dummies thrive here. Apologies—I calls ’em like I sees ’em. There are many fine minds here, many dear souls. But there are also plenty of fantastically difficult situations. My own family not excluded.

So no, I don’t blame DE for the move. It’s exciting. I’m a little jealous, if I’m honest. Not that I’d pack up three trucks and drive 1,500 miles to West Potato—but the idea of a fresh start, a new landscape, is tempting. Then again, he’s lived in three other vastly different places. Why not make it four? He’s tapped all four compass points while he still can.

My brother-in-law, RLW, volunteered to be part of the cross-country convoy, hauling DE’s belongings to his new home. That’s significant because RLW is the same man who buried his wife—my wife’s sister—just sixty-nine days ago. A partner of 45 years, gone in an instant. Snuffed out like a candle in the rain.

When talk of the trip started, RLW had big plans. He’d trailer his motorcycle behind one of DE’s work trucks, help with the move, then spend a few days exploring West Potato. From there, he’d kit out the bike and ride west—through the Northwest, down to the Pacific. He talked of revisiting places he and his wife had seen, and discovering new ones. He didn’t say it aloud, but I suspect he meant to scatter some ashes along the way.

But as time wore on, the plans shrank. Late spring snow made the northern routes dicey. Then he nixed the coast. West Potato lies just beyond the Continental Divide, and soon enough, he cut out any idea of leaving the mountains at all. By the time he left two days ago, the month-long journey had been trimmed to a week.

A few hours ago, he texted that he’ll be back in Dust Meridian tomorrow night. Yep. Thirty days of freedom and healing, whittled down to just four.

There and back. Turn and burn.

His son, SLBY—the boy (a man in his thirties, forgive an aging Wolf)—tells me he thinks his dad just misses home. The quiet of the road was heavier than expected. That makes sense. My nephew wants his dad to get out and see new places, to build memories without her. A critical step in healing.

When I speak to RLW, he says it’s his son and grandson who are nudging him to come back. He can 'hear it in his voice' that if he was back, they would all be happier. Home is big and lonely and his son misses his family. Doesn't like being without his core. His people. His comfort zone.

Essentially, they are both arguing the other wants to be together again. They tell me what the other wants. But really, they're telling me what they themselves long for.

SLBY the boy has told me more than once this last few weeks that he can’t stand being alone. He’d grown used to the bustle—his wife, his son, his parents, all under one roof. They live in a mobile home, so sharing space really means sharing.

Constantly.

With his mom gone, dad out of town, wife at the chiropractor, and the boy at school, SLBY finds himself alone on a rock hurtling through space at sixty-seven thousand miles per hour. Working from home means his only company is the blinking cursor on a plastic display.

He’s admitted, with surprising emotional honesty, that he cries often. This from a man who, just a few years ago, was all whiskey, beer, and bravado. Guns and guts. Today, the bottles are dusty and the guns live in a safe—a large one, granted—but they’re just objects now.

SLBY has become the kind of man who can acknowledge his pain and grow through it. A shock, honestly. But a welcome one.

His father, RLW, has also cracked open in ways I didn’t expect. Always the quiet, stoic one—he now speaks freely about how much his wife meant to him. That she was his light. His purpose.

And being retired is salt on the wound. 10 years ago, he would at least have a job he had to contend with, coworkers and daily business to get back to. But now? His only obligations are those which he chooses. A full plate with his spiritual family, but that can be shelved much longer than it should be. Leaving him in self-inflicted isolation.

Since her passing, he sleeps maybe four hours a night. He cries often. I imagine these moments are private—the kind where your ears roar, your eyes burn, and you fight to contain the flood so others don’t have to feel it too.

Every time we’ve spoken since he hit the road, he’s mentioned that he can’t stop crying. Triggers are everywhere. A song. A vista in silence where she would have commented or asked to pull off and take a picture. The absence of agitation at his driving (the way he jerks the wheel in little increments). No one stuffing the door panel with trash.

But mostly—silence.

An imagination haunted by 16,425 sunrises and sunsets together... and all that is in between—the subtle golden rhythms of a life shared. Every small moment now echoing in absence.

My God, how do you move on from that?

Patience.

Patience and tears. And prayer that God will intervene and part that ocean like he did for Moses.

I told him as much. “It’s good you’re blind with tears. You probably need to really cut loose—and that’s hard to do with a seven-year-old always around, or your son who’s dealing with his own grief. I hope this trip gives you some catharsis. That it helps you begin to heal in earnest.”

Grief is the price we pay for love. The greater the love, the higher the cost.

Three thousand miles in four days. And tears, door to door.

Luke 22:1-6 Now the Festival of the Unleavened Bread, which is called Passover, was getting near. And the chief priests and the scribes were looking for an effective way to get rid of him, because they were afraid of the people. Then Satan entered into Judas, the one called Is·carʹi·ot, who was numbered among the Twelve, and he went off and talked with the chief priests and temple captains about how to betray him to them. They were delighted at this and agreed to give him silver money. So he consented and began looking for a good opportunity to betray him to them without a crowd around.

Mark 14:1,2 Now the Passover and the Festival of Unleavened Bread was two days later. And the chief priests and the scribes were looking for a way to seize him by cunning and kill him; for they were saying: “Not at the festival; perhaps there might be an uproar of the people.”

Mark 14:10,11 And Judas Is·carʹi·ot, one of the Twelve, went off to the chief priests in order to betray him to them. When they heard it, they were delighted and promised to give him silver money. So he began seeking an opportunity to betray him.

#essay #travel #memoir #loss #death #biblereading #100DaysToOffload #Writing

2025-04-11 09:35:00

Images are the reminders of the mortar that bind our lives.

It was always a dream of mine (and still is) to travel. And I mean travel as in get lost in places I never thought I’d go. Faraway places that people have to get map to find.

Quiet, forgotten places. They, like any small beautiful thing, will have their own unique beauty. And if no one else has seen it, all the better. It’s still amazing. And I find that irresistible.

A continuation of Dear Diary #61 – where upon i pontificate and put my hand upon the things behind.

The one about traveling more.

12:00am

Looking for photos of some places and ran across shots from 1997... three people who I would watch grow from tiny humans to real adults. They've changed and become amazing. Some failures, many successes. And I look in their eyes and think how they must have looked up to me all those years ago and formany years tocome.

Thenk something would break. And everything changed. andd now I think... one's eyes would burn with anger, a second with indifference – having largely forgotten me... and the third... the third, I think perhaps she would see me and I would recognize disappointment and sadness, but understanding and compassion.

And for that small gift... I thank God. For that kind of love is hard to find.

And I see other photos of a life lived robustly and wonder how I landed here in Dust Meridian, in teh middle of the night with tears in my eyes, wondering if everythign is gonna be alright.

I don't mind the scars, honestly. I have so many. We all do. I'll bet your scars make you in to teh person you are too. Would you trade them? Some, maybe. But mostly, who want's to forget who they are? Give up the life they've built, the loves and achievements. The goodness that flows from them?

No, the scars are okay. It's the raw wounds that I think both can agree we'd rather do without.

I broke my left leg when I was seven. Tibia and fibia. I was jumping on the bed in the upstairs of my parents house when she got jealous of my superior jumping skills (obviously) and pushed me into open air at the zenith of my jump.

Crack.

It was miserable. Even now I cannot stand the sound (real or fake) of breaking bones. There's nothing like it.

But I want thememory. The blue walls, the carpet that reminded me of a topographical map. The slanted ceiling. How my mom carried me to the car. All of it.

it's almst as if the worse the pain, the better the memory.

I miss random Saturday's like this. Just a bunch of friends together doing something nice for other people. Nobody getting paid. Everyone happy and suffering doing something kind.

That seems to have been washed away. A closed chapter in a book the I need to take down off theshelf more often.

But don't we ALL need to take our books off the shelf more, both figuratively and literal?

I don't care how good 'real' art is, I think my books might be the greatest thing I ever create.

I am currently finishishing 69 and 72. When I travel, my only real goal is to fill them with as much experience as I can possibly manage. Even if no one ever reads them. They are priceless treasures and I wish more people understood the value of recording the mortar of their lives.

One thing about pain, nothing assuades it like kindesses for others. I'll be glad to wrap my project this week and find something good to do for someone else for a little bit.

Just let them be the twinkle in the night's sky. Only astronauts can go to space. The rest of us worms are doing just fine right were we are.

If you are in one these 10k+ images, thank you. I love you. If you aren't, maybe one day you will be.

Glorious sunrise on the coast of Ghana.

Jericah!

We're so coddled here in the west. In places like this, there was every opportunity to fall to your death. Or drown. Or get picked off by bandits.

We were in the middle-of-nowhere on the northern border of Ghana. You could see Burkina Faso across the river. The kids there had never seen a white man before. That alone was enough to make me a super star in this little village. When my sketchbook came out, they were mesmerized. The simplest scribbles absolutely captivated them.

That was 2010. I like think they're all artists today.

This is how 'real' adventure happens. And let me tell you, in the moment, it's not great. It takes a certain kind of personality to enjoy suffering just so you can have a great memory. Eating dust for 3 hours is just such a suffering. It's not 'break-your-leg' level of awful, but it's pretty bad.

This guy got married without realizing it.

Fires there weren't for entertainment. Here a small boy cozy' sup to the flame for warmth and safety.

I dont' know what it was, but Pfizer should get on whatever they're selling. Fishing isn't a sport in Ghana, it's a way of life. Every village had a different corporate sponsor. if you had Vodafone, you vilalge was red and white. If Zain, blue and Yellow. Whisking through at speed you knew immediately who had wooed the village elders.

This shot was when I realized that humans really lived like this. It wasn't just imagery in National Geogarphic.

A father carries his son to worship. The boy (about 3?) will be nineteen in 2026. This photo, which he has no concept or recollection of, captures what will likely be an indelible feeling: first learning to worship the Creator.

Fishmen are proud and hard working. And their boats... IDK how to describe them other than to say they are works of art.

I made an excelelnt watercolor painting of this shot. I love the color and the composition.

Farmer's day is a national holiday and the beaches are flooded with young Ghanaians out for soccer and the cool ocean breeze.

Yes, it's real.

Ghanaians have a great story about the humbling of the warthog, requireing them to bow when they eat. There are endless proverbs and folk tales in West Africa. I don't know why we dont' get more stories from teh continent. I guess because the West considers them 'black' stories?

IDK, but Africa was the least black place i ever went. They were just humans, like all of us.

The ONLY respite in the humid days after the monsoons.

the people are easily the best thing about the country. But in second plae, wthou question: the food.

As the guest of honor, I was usually served the fish with the head on. Unsettling, but you got used to it. And it's so delicious, who cares. This thing was swimming that morning and filling my stomach that night. I love coastal living.

The slithering snails were offputting to the rest of my party, but I found them mesmerizing and then later, delicious.

Well, dear reader, I managed to burn away a full day. I'm exhausted and despite saying I didn't want to stay up until 3am, the clock tolls at nearly that hour now.

Somehere a clock is tick, tick, ticking in the silence of a dark room while a house sleeps.

I have never had good horse sense.

#travel

I believe that there is one story in the world, and only one, that has been writing itself over and over again—one story. The story of good and evil.

Originally published 2025-04-08 13:24:24

There’s a farm road I take when I need to cross town and I’m not in a hurry. It skirts the city, wrapping around it gently, and deposits me where I need to be. There are many things on this farm road.

There’s an old sign shop with “JUNK” splashed across the yard. There’s a big red barn—metal and modern, but designed to look like something out of a North Carolina postcard. There’s a row of country homes, spaced so widely apart you couldn’t walk door-to-door without turning it into a day trip. You have to drive to visit all your neighbors out here.

One of those houses catches my eye every time. The yard is cluttered with used cars and trailers. The owner clearly sells trailers, maybe even builds them. I can see the large metal building way in the back of the property—his workshop. It reminds me of my father. He built trailers in his garage, too. He built railings, worked on cars, created things from scratch. His hands were never still.

But I think about this man now, the trailer-seller, and his neighbors. The homes flanking his are neat and manicured, with green lawns and white fences made of old oilfield pipe—a crude material turned elegant by effort and paint. The trailer man’s fence is rusted and brown, like the rest of his property. I wonder how his neighbors feel.

We can't choose our neighbors. We can only be patient with them. I try to be a good neighbor. I suppose that matters. After all, we wouldn’t want everyone to be exactly like us. The differences test our patience. They shape our character. No man is an island.

We need our culture. We need our people. We need our worker bees and queen bees. We need our ditch diggers and maybe even our politicians. More than anything, we need the Kingdom.

Under the Kingdom, people will learn to be kind. If someone builds trailers in their yard, they'll do it with care. And if they don’t, neighbors will speak with grace instead of letting resentment brew.

I’m passing a house now that’s under construction. The roof deck is up, felt paper waiting for shingles. I can see the toe boards nailed across the steep pitch—the same kind I used when I was a roofer.

I remember those days. It feels like yesterday. I knew the work so well. Even now, I could get out of the car, pick up a bundle of shingles and a hammer, and by afternoon I’d have a good-sized portion of roof done. And yet, I’m not a roofer anymore. We aren’t always what we once were, even if the knowledge never leaves us.

Some of us were once lost, and now try to do good. But we still hold the capacity for bad. We may still desire it. Sometimes it slips out in moments of passion. When does that make us wicked? Only if we willingly choose the wrong we know to be wrong. Perhaps that was Lot’s wife’s failure.

Maybe she didn’t look back out of weakness. Maybe she was simply honest. She didn’t want to leave. Her life was there. Her home. Her identity. Was it so wrong to mourn what she was being pulled from? The Bible says she became a pillar of salt. We think of that as punishment. But maybe it was mercy.

Maybe God knew she wouldn’t survive the wilderness. Maybe turning her to salt spared her a different kind of death. Maybe it was the kindest thing. The hand of flaming fire and hailstone never touched her. Maybe that was the best ending she could have. As a bonus, we get a lesson on faithfulness.

I think about that as I drive. I think about myself. I ask a question I wrote the other day: If I am becoming her. I keep looking back. I can’t seem to stop. I keep desiring, wanting. I’ve lost things—goals, faith, the hope of being someone respected. A man of standing. A man of God.

Can I reclaim those things?

No doubt—no doubt.

But the real question is:

do I want to?

Luke 19:29-44

29 And when he got near to Bethʹpha·ge and Bethʹa·ny at the mountain called Mount of Olives, he sent two of the disciples, 30 saying: “Go into the village that is within sight, and after you enter it, you will find a colt tied, on which no man has ever sat. Untie it and bring it here. 31 But if anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ you must say, ‘The Lord needs it.’” 32 So those who were sent went away and found it just as he had said to them. 33 But as they were untying the colt, its owners said to them: “Why are you untying the colt?” 34 They said: “The Lord needs it.” 35 And they led it to Jesus, and they threw their outer garments on the colt and seated Jesus on it.36 As he moved along, they were spreading their outer garments on the road. 37 As soon as he got near the road down the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to rejoice and to praise God with a loud voice because of all the powerful works they had seen, 38 saying: “Blessed is the one coming as the King in Jehovah’s name! Peace in heaven, and glory in the heights above!” 39 However, some of the Pharisees from the crowd said to him: “Teacher, rebuke your disciples.” 40 But in reply he said: “I tell you, if these remained silent, the stones would cry out.” 41 And when he got nearby, he viewed the city and wept over it, 42 saying: “If you, even you, had discerned on this day the things having to do with peace—but now they have been hidden from your eyes. 43 Because the days will come upon you when your enemies will build around you a fortification of pointed stakes and will encircle you and besiege you from every side. 44 They will dash you and your children within you to the ground, and they will not leave a stone upon a stone in you, because you did not discern the time of your being inspected.” 45 Then he entered the temple and started to throw out those who were selling, 46 saying to them: “It is written, ‘My house will be a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a cave of robbers.” 47 He continued teaching daily in the temple. But the chief priests and the scribes and the principal ones of the people were seeking to kill him; 48 but they did not find any way to do this, for the people one and all kept hanging on to him to hear him.

#essay #existentialcrisis #travel #thoughts #bible

There are no strangers here; only friends you have not yet met.

“D’ya realize how long you’ve been in Europe?” the Irish immigration officer asked.

“Well,” I smiled. “I like to think that I’m less in Europe at this point than it’s in me.”

He was not amused. “What the feck does that mean!? What are ya? Some kind of poet or somethin'?”

I smiled and did a little performative bow. Kindness and charm usually worked wonders. But this morning, after stepping off the ferry from Cherbourg, France to Dublin, Ireland, Officer O’Flynn was neither charitable nor open to kindness.

I'd just disembarked the overnight crossing. I was a little bit scared, but afraid to let it show. I'd wandered around with barely a plan for months and expected it to work here. All of a sudden, things were a bit too official when I least expected it.

“Well, I don’t care what ya do for a livin’… ya show up in my country—no return flight or trip, no forwarding address—just a ‘trust me’ attitude! How would you feel if I showed up in your country, hat in hand and a promise not to overstay?”

I had the feeling in my gut that my natural answer would not be received well: Why, welcome to Texas! Try Pecan Lodge BBQ—it’s a helluva good time! Stay out of Austin, it’s more California than Texas these days.

So instead I just smiled and eased out, “I can understand your point of view. I assure you, we mean no harm. Just here wrapping up an extended journey before heading back to Texas in the US.”

He flips through my passport book for the fourth time.

“So when did ya come into Europe?” he asks dismissively, flipping pages. “And why don’t you have any other stamps besides Spain?”

“December 10,” I answer. “And I went from Portugal to Spain to France to Italy to France to Italy to Switzerland to Italy to Switzerland to Italy to Switzerland to Germany to Liechtenstein to Germany to France over the course of more than two months, and not once has a crossing asked for anything. A few times I even stopped and asked them to review and stamp my passport. Always the same message: ‘We don’t do that here.’”

“I came with a return flight, but decided to overstay that and cancelled it, planning to rebook when I was out of time and energy for exploring the continent. Ireland is just the last leg, and I might add, the highlight of my trip. My Irish ancestors left here in 1648 and never looked back. I’m here for me, for my father, and for my art.”

O’Flynn is unmoved. Subtly rolls his eyes and stamps the book.

I light up. “Oh! Yay! Thank you. Don’t worry—I won’t disappoint your trust.”

The last thing I want is to get cross with the immigration police and get banned for life. I have a friend this happened to in North America. Left, and when he came back, his home of 30 years was locked out forever.

Wild.

But that’s the cost of romance. You can’t plan every grain of sand. That’s a pilot's move; a pragmatists answer. Poets just wander around until they can’t stand it anymore. It’s a terrifying and electrifying state. You are building the bridge as you cross it, like a cartoon character.

This all occurs to me as I sit in a solarium in western Ireland. The ocean is POUNDING and ROARING a sixth of a mile away. Four donkeys graze in the rain next to a babbling brook that runs down and away from me to the sea. The ubiquitous stone walls divide the landscape beneath me into paddocks. How beautiful that they never adopted the grotesque barbed wire we run everywhere back in the United States.

This landscape is very much like Officer O’Flynn: hard and unforgiving, but with good reason. This island has stood for thousands of years and is fiercely independent. It’s not possible to hold one’s own without keeping your face to the wind. But underneath the harsh exterior is so much beauty that it is tear-inducing. Life everywhere. Celebrated with good beer (nay, great beer) and trad music.

I need to live here for a year. I am not yet bored, and until boredom sets in, creativity can’t truly flourish.

I want to live here, make love here, grow weary of the place and let it grow weary of me.

Typical for a romantic poet-essayist.

I think I’ll go for a walk.

#travel #europe #ireland

Not my job to explain it. Thoughts on the foolishness of wandering through new lands without a goal other than to experience wonder.

Not everyone will understand your journey— and that’s okay.

Some will only see the miles, not the weather. The wrong turns, the nights you slept on faith because certainty never showed up.

You are not here to make your life legible to strangers. You are not required to footnote your motive or submit your dreams for peer review.

You’re here to live your life— to follow the pull when it makes no sense, to choose wonder over safety, to answer the call even when no one else hears it ringing.

Let them misunderstand. You were never meant to be explained. You were meant to be become.

#poetry #travel

I do not seek perfection. I seek truth, beauty and permanence.

Oh, JOY! What day was this I had? From suns first until the gong of midnight, I sought, and found—only joy. Only love, only ache of the most welcome and glorious kind. THIS is romance.

In truth, Wolf started his day quite low. But, the best way to lay down a heavy heart is to pour it out. So pour I did. And pour and pour and pour. I expunged myself of that energy with passion and determination.

I still felt (and feel) like an ill person who is healing. Not quite myself, but so vastly superior to before that it defies description.

Thank you to the assistive soul. Who listened and was kind and hurt because I hurt. And was loving but frank and pulled me from my bent, where I landed realizing that passion need not control us. It is an engine that must be tamed, used to great power, but never left to run un-throttled.

GETTING IT ON

We finally stepped out of the house, midday, bound for Thyssen museum. Not ideal, but I wasn't worried. I knew we would have adventure regardless of the when or the where.

First stop: Correo! For post card stamps. More lines! The Spanish LOVE a good queue. In fact, I think that is a Europe thing. We are disappointed when the clerk admits they are out of stamps. We'll have to find a second.

Strolling down the main avenue, I spot a thrift store, modernizingly named 'Vintage'.

Inside, I find a most delectable coat. As winter drives in, I am in need of a warmer wrapper.

It is a delight; warm, stylish, a little snug (fitted). I have grown very fond of the cut and fit of most Spaniards. They look and no doubt feel beautiful. Green with wood buttons and an abundance of zippered pockets. This is important for an artist and writer to stick all his stuff.

Look out Indiana Jones, I think I'm going to out-adventure your look!

Newly packaged, we decided the rest of the day, we'd lose ourselves in the visages left by great artists. So it was:

TO THE THYSSEN-BORNEMISZA MUSEUM!

Bus-hopping has become second nature. And I am enjoying metro rides and buses here in Madrid. It's like a game to arrive without missing a window. And then there are the people. Genuine Spaniards living life. I stand out.

Some buses see tourists, though not many. I don't think I've seen any tourists on the Metro.

SIGHTS SEEING ME

We get a big picture window cruising down the grand avenue which is packed with people. In a place we were the day before, I see a street artist I intended to patronize the day before, with attention if nothing else. I take out my phone and take a few pictures, just to record her geolocation.

Weirdly, she stands up and blocks the view of her work. Then, shoots me the bird. It's odd and performative. Reaching down she holds up a sign that says:

ME HAN ROBADO, NECESITO DINERO URGENTEMENTE. (I've been robbed, I need money urgently.)

I get the desperation. But the reaction reads more like mental illness than desperation. I don't think I'll risk going back.

There is an accident and our bus changes routes. We jump off at the next stop and walk the quarter of a mile to the Museum.

HOW TO LOOK AT ART

Today is a great day to visit. It is hardly populated. In fact, I notice the city itself seems largely emptied of its pre holiday crowds. And I love it. I GREATLY prefer an empty museum to a packed one.

My most distracting experience in that regard was at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, where we saw a Magritte show. It was shoulder to shoulder—and not the way to see art.

Art requires the ability to take your time: step back, toe to the left and the right. See how the light penetrates some pigments but simply reflects off others.

And this modern and well-lit museum delivers. Plenty of room to roam and soak it in. And I drink for hours. Longed for favorites with Picasso and Degas, surprises from Okeefe and Remington. And so so many works by artists of little renown but amazing beauty.

THE TRAVELING EXHIBIT

Starting with Warhol/Pollock, it is an interesting experience. The curator is commenting on abstract versus figurative work. And I agree Warhol took figurative elements and pushed them until they are abstract.

His 'Oxidize' series is both appealing and off-putting. Warhol spilled body fluids on to canvas (sweat, urine and other undisclosed material) and let time do it's work. Weird but also kind of intriguing that he had the boldness to do it. The organic nature of it triggers my nose to run and on a second visit, puts in me into a fit of sneezing.

I read at the Banksy, 'The ultimate goal is to spend less time making the art than the public does looking at it.”

Warhol wins in this respect.

His shadow pieces manage to evoke a tear somehow. Something about they being empty places in his studio. And something about painting dozens of the same thing that is just vague shapes.

INTERMISSION

We break in the museum cafe. It is cold and we are tired. Worth the premium. I have a cream cheese croissant and water while my partner has a lintel soup.

I want wine, but I do not want wine. The evening prior saw me drink an entire bottle of brut and I do not want nor need the emotional or physical cost of more of the fruit of the vine today.

Post meal I do some drawing while she chats at me. Eventually, I am so tired I nod off. A welcome respite for 10 minutes. Until my slipping elbow knocks the plate to the floor.

TWENTIETH CENTURY MASTERS

We spend the next 3 hours discovering and rediscovering masterworks. There really is nothing as enriching a a museum. Maybe a library. But a museum takes less work! I love it. I want to spend every day here. I am just a tad envious of those who work at a place like this.

To spend all your time with these ghosts of delight. What stories they must tell the gallery attendants while they stand fast on their station. No doubt the reality is far less romantic.

Picasso mesmerizes me. I can see the craft and the care in what, upon first glance, looks like an effortless, childlike render. But there is so much tenderness and terror in his work. I especially love his rendition of women. The way the strips away artificialty, but we still see her beauty.

On my mind is the fears the women in my life have over getting older. And I imagine that though Picasso was a notorious womanizer, he was really quite tender in saying, 'hey, quiet your fears, let me show you your beauty apart from the standard you've been trained to expect. Be phenomenal in the beauty of your heart. of the parts that make you. The eye, the ear, the breast, the hand, wrist... that quiet source of life, the way the arm meets the breast. No, the physical beauty of youth is wonderful, but there is equal or surpassing beauty in an aging form.

I am smitten by so many works. My phone is filling up with photos I will forget. But, two pieces have moved into the lexicon of my memory:

1. Swaying Dancers – Edgar Degas
2. Woman with a Parasol in a Garden – Pierre-Auguste Renoir

The first because I have always loved Degas. If I imagined myself as Jack on the largest ship in the world, a vagabond artist drifting through the streets of Paris drawing prostitutes and strangers, then I was FIRST in love with the idea of being Edgar Degas.

His pastels and his dancers are simply fantastic.

When I look up at the modest sized, but incredibly delicate Swaying Dancers, I start to weep.

It—it reminds me of her. My dancer and muse. It recalls the gift I gave her I do not know how many decades ago. A poorer duplicate of a similar masterpiece.

My first medium and love is pastels. Nothing dries... it is vibrant the instant you press to paper. I love the dust, the smell and the drawing-like finish a painting has. To me, there is no greater master than Edgar Degas.

And this piece is fantastic. Delicate and expressive. Pastel artists must have good draftsmanship skills, and Degas has otherworldly ability to capture anatomy and pose.

The painting is such a surprise after so many Picassoes, Pollocks, Kirchers, Groszs. The dancer is mid pose and her tutu is like gossamer with magenta beading. The background figures all have stories of their own and the colors talk to me. They say, 'we've been waiting, Wolf, and so glad you've finally found us.'

I can't look away.

One of the BEST parts of the museum is the real color you see. Not reproduced or managed. the same vibrancy, or muting that the artist intended. Or at least tried to. Their voice straight into your heart without mediator. Degas painting sing when you see them in real life. Reproductions just don't do them justice.

This one is an aria.

I stay a long time with the piece. And a few others by Degas.

The second work I find that blows me away is Pierre-Auguste Renoir's Woman with a Parasol in a Garden. The initial hook is the color and texture. What shocks me is how similar it is to Path Leading Through Tall Grasses that hangs in the Musee d'Orsey. I check to be sure I am not crazy and find that Parasol and Tall Grasses are very similar. It is very self-satisfying to make this identity.

I feel smart.

But, though I would love to be the kind of patron that gets to spend all night with these unique experiences, 7pm comes fast and with only 15m left, I am sad that it is time to go.

My stomach does not have the same desire to stay with the masterpieces.

And so, go we do. Suiting up in our winter gear, we head out into the evening looking for what I describe as 'Spaghetti an' meatballs!'

There are several Italian places close to the museum, but as we've been living in the Latin neighborhood for the last month, I have come to sort of resist the tourist areas for meals. They are more expensive, crowded and usually not better by any measure.

DINNER TIME

Thanks to a very clever AI, I learn there is a place about a 20m bus ride away called 'My Pasta, My Art'. And so away we fly.

It is in a new part of the city. One we haven't traversed. A little further way in a new direction. I am immediately drawn. It has the population load of the Latin quarter but the old world charm of the most popular part of the city. In short, the best of both worlds.

It seems we have discovered the Bohemian part of Madrid. Shot full of artists, galleries and music halls. It is wonderful. Every few buildings is some new creative energy. I realize: I have found where I need to explore next before we leave next week!

We spot 'My Pasta My Art', but are immediately drawn to a small bookstore with black cat. We cannot resist bookstores, and cute bookstores are just mandatory. This one, whose name escapes me, appears like a glowing white gem in the night with it's huge window showcasing books in the lower half, and giving an inviting view of the shop.

Stepping in, my eye goes to a small basket of old books. At top is a pulp fiction novel by Erskine Caldwell 'A Swell-Looking Girl'. I see it was originally published in 1931 and this is a reprint from 1950. The cover has a demure-looking blond girl with red lips and a power blue peasant dress. It is the kind of book that immediatly pulls me in. The cover illustration is heavy with shadow leaving plenty of negaive space for the ample text.

Since we are in Spain, I decide to purchase a small copy of Spanish poetry. It is good to practice my Spanish and will be a good opportunity to see how another culture thinks by translating them line by line.

The latest find is a 7th printing of Heinlein's 'Stranger in a Strange Land'. I read the opening paragraph:

Once upon a time there was a Martian named Valentine Michael Smith.

Yes. Please.

Since the store is buy two get one free, I am out the door for a paltry 11 euros. That is until my lovely finds the postcards, and I find the stickers and magnets. So much for 11 euros. We leave 55 euros lighter. But a pocket full of books and swag. No one is complaining.

Stepping into My Pasta, My Art, it has charm. Warm and tiny. Tiny is normal for Madrid. But this is the right balance of squeezing us in. We settle at a high top table and start gawking at the decor. It's clearly swinging for the Roman fences. And winning. Rich detail without being gaudy. Plenty of mirrors in the right places to make the space feel bigger than it is.

I note that the place is FULL of attractive you college age women. Dress is varying levels of casual dressy. One young woman catches my eye when she struts up to her table across the aisle and peels her coat off to a comply nude back. She is wearing a tube top very well. Her skin is even and smooth, unblemished with age or too much sun damage. Muscled and soft in the right balance. Her long dirty blond hair alternately hang over her right, then left shoulder to the front, then when the 6' 2' swarthy server comes, it is tossed back to swirl across the landscape of skin.

I see beauty in women of any age. But it is hard to deny the incredible power of the very young. How we all long for those bodies we had those many years ago. But I remind myself, that the costs that gave us the form we have in middle age also pay the dividend of wisdom and experience.

It is the paradox of this life to want both our youth and beauty but also the wisdom and massive heart that come with experience and age.

The staff here is outstanding. They feel fun and friendly and genuine. It is so refreshing to have this level of engagement. It reminds me that at one time people called this the hospitality business. Now they just call it job.

The meal is beyond excellent. Tremendous, even. I want wine. But since I've already been too loose with the vino, having drunk a full bottle of brut the night before, I opt for modesty. My body thanks me.

We linger and chat and I draw. The waitstaff is always complimentary of my draftsmanship. It is fast and sloppy, drawn in pen, the way I like it. Not perfect, but done. I always suspect they are just fishing for a nice tip. But I think about dancing in front of others. No one past puberty has anything but the utmost respect for those who perform in public. It is entertaining even when it is not very good.

I know what I am. But I also spent the day looking at drawings by my predecessors and know that you don't get in a place like the Thyssen by sitting still. Do the work, good bad or otherwise, it compounds and one day a magnum opus is complete and everyone thinks you just materialize as successful.

As we wrap with coffee and shared tiramisu, we realize it's time to make the trek home. My wife is in rare form tonight, never suggesting either taxi or uber, preferring instead to wander the streets until we find a metro or bus terminal.

Now that we are through the major holidays, the streets at night have that romantic quality I recall from Porto just a few weeks back. Damp cobblestones, neon signs and small clusters of comrades drinking coffees or beer. The mass of people that are ubiquitous further south are absent, having spent their holiday buying a million things.

Feeling amorous, I pull my partner in close and hold her hand. Stealing a kiss makes her laugh.

'What's gotten into you.' she giggles and nudges me away.

My affection isn't play, it's real desire. But we're on different levels tonight, so I redirect it to energy for kindness and head to the bus terminal down the street. Sometimes the most loving thing you can do is just being there with someone. Her love language is quality time. So tonight, this is how I honor her.

I wrap my scarf a little snugger against my face. It's a protection against the cold and the rebuff.

The day has not been perfect in the sense that there were no flaws. We started late, sometimes got aggravated with each other, ran out of time, got cold... etc. clunkiness of being human beings. But in the sense that it was exactly I needed: perfect.

The absolute hilight was the emotional gift Degas gave me. It is a moment I will carry with me for a long time, if not all my days. Deep moments with art stick with you in an indelible way. A stain on the soul of the very best kind.

#travel #essay #madrid #europe #art

You cannot deny reality indefinitely.

Some dreams—they are warm and squishy, the kind that you want to stay wrapped in forever. Others are elaborate concoctions.

Then there are dreams drifting in with hard truth that we didn’t realize needed telling—or maybe didn’t want to hear. Coming the way truth often does in midlife—plain, rarely apologetic.

Bombs in brown paper wrapping.

Tonight two dreams shape a heavy, unseen onus. In the first, I am walking in Spain with my wife and a longtime friend who has always required special attention and handling. It is an ordinary walk, the kind where you don’t see most of what you look at and instead proceed not with details, but impressions, the rhythm of the place.

On the road in this ether-vision, my beloved is angry with me. The mere suggestion that our friend will get wet sends my wife into a verbal assault insisting I go back and get an umbrella.

I cannot see the rain but can def hear the instruction.

Spain is, so many things. It is escape. It is reset. It is romance. Adventure, experience, expansion, suffering. But it is also existence, life that has to be lived. Cobblestones and movement—presence, but not yet boredom. Art needs boredom.

But before routine can introduce it, there is the distracting weight of being somewhere new. Simple things suddenly become challenging. Bus numbers, where is a train platform, how do you turn up the heat? Small things that gobble up time and brian waves.

In the dream, it is not rest. I am in motion, and doing the thing I came to Iberia for: to explore, to extract, to sup, to see, not the bricks or the cobbles, but the mortar between them and understand why it holds fast the way it does. Why does it have it's color. It's texture. The small things in life are the true treasures. Spain and Portugal have these in abundance and I am here to hold them and let them become part of me.

But, in this dream, I am not allowed to drink in and get drunk on the experience of existence. My attention is pulled away and demanded to abandon the walk and instead engage in the maintenance of another.

The anger, I think, is more about my own self-implied need to victimize my existence in order to feel worthy and valued. For some reason, I only feel validated when I fade into the role of servant. Diminishing my own self and want. I define this as holiness, and feel a failure when I am not holy.

This is a strange duality: to be created with hunger and then feel guilt for wanting to eat.

The friend, too, is less herself than a placeholder. She stands in for the world’s endless, reasonable demands. Someone always needs something small and sensible, and I am very good at providing it. The dream does not accuse. It simply shows the pattern. I am walking through my own life, and my role is to leave the path in order to fetch protection for others.

I sense some quiet resentment. Not shouted anger, because it has learned that tack won’t be answered. Trudge ahead, I was born a mule, I will die a mule.

The second dream arrives like a response.

Sketchbook #66—titled Romancing Iberia—is nearly full.

There is no one else in this dream. No anger. No instructions. Just the knowledge of pages used, of attention given, of something finite approaching completion. A sketchbook is not a souvenir. It is evidence. It proves that I was not merely present in body, but awake. That I noticed light on stone, the pace of streets, the way a place reveals itself only when it is not rushed.

The number matters because it implies continuity. This is not a whim. Sixty-six sketchbooks suggest devotion, a long conversation with the act of seeing. And the title—Romancing Iberia—is not about possession. To romance a place is to court it, to listen, to allow it to change you without insisting it stay.

“Nearly full” carries both pride and ache. It means I did what I came to do. It also means this chapter has an edge. Something will end. The fear is not that it was meaningless, but that it was fleeting.

Placed side by side, the dreams speak to one another clearly.

In one, I am useful. In the other, I am alive.

One is about assigned care. The other is about chosen attention.

One pulls me outward, away from myself. The other gathers me inward and says: Look. This counted.

There is no rebellion in these dreams. No explosion. Just contrast. And perhaps that is the most honest form of clarity. My mind is not asking me to abandon responsibility. It is asking me not to forget the difference between service and erasure.

The sketchbook dream does not deny the umbrella dream. It answers it. It says: even here, even now, under obligation and compromise, something true is being filled. Page by page. Line by line. Not for approval. Not for utility. But because noticing is how I stay intact.

So the essay closes where the dream wants it to—at the back of the book, with bulletpoof ink staining my fingers and hands.

And though i am not truly there, this comes from the dream and so seems an apropos addition:

Sketchbook #67 — Closing Page I didn’t come to take you with me. I came to let you leave marks. Stone warmed palms. Lighted awe and wonder. The grammar of walking— the ways and alleys reveal themselves only to those who do not hurry, who slow and press. I loved without owning. I watched without asking to be seen. I sat where others passed and let the day find the shape of me. If I carry anything home, it is not the place, but the posture: Head up. Hands open. Attention given freely. I was not whole here. But I was present. And presence, it turns out, is enough to fill a book. — W

#dream #travel #madrid #iberia #romancingiberia

Your Wolf spent the week at a writer's workshop. His FIRST writer's workshop. Blerg.

Just kidding.

Sort of.

It's been an incredible learning experince. LOTS of new things, some great exercises and TRRRRRIFIC people. On the other hand, I feel like a 12 year old who realizes that the drawing they just finished doesn't look like the thing they were drawing.

I learned a new term that makes me shake my head:

'Writerly'

As in, his writing is very writerly. Over written, acutely aware of the wordiness. An author in love with the soundof his own voice.

Guilty as charged.

The problem is: I L.O.V.E. overwrought prose. See my ecstasy over Richard Hamilton's The Royal Road to Romance.

I should probably change the name of the site to 'The Writerly Wolf'.

It is another glorious morning here on the edge of the world and I am too little rested. I stayed up too late.

The cost is that I need more sleep.

While I steal thirty more minutes, here is a few thousand more words from the week.

#essay #100daystooffset #writing #travel

Discuss...