You Have To See What You Said

Tuesday, 10/8/24

Almost every week, I meet with three artists in a local coffee shop. They are all old enough to be my mother or grandmother. If their experiences and wisdom are rivers, I am the gulf that widens and deepens with their presence. Today, Debbie was the first to show. She is exuberant, curious, and incredibly fun-loving. We briefly talked about the senses, especially sight. In awe, she wondered out loud about all the things we’re unable to see simply because our eyes don’t allow it. While humans have three cones in their eyes for sight, birds have four, allowing UV vision. Under UV, birds are marvelous spectacles of color, rendering them tropical-looking. Dogs see in blue and yellow and respond to blue and yellow more so than any other color (e.g. the children’s show “Bluey”). We imagined what it would be like to see sound waves, wind on its own, and wi-fi.

Later that evening, the aurora was active. My husband Brian and I immediately went outside and gazed at the northern sky. Was that red cloaked in darkness that we saw on the horizon? We got our phones out and took 3-second exposures which revealed the red coloration of the sun’s charged particles. Suddenly the red revealed itself a little more on the horizon. I thought of Debbie and her awe over what we cannot see. How this aurora hung as if from string from the sky as we sat under the artificial lights inside our home. I do think of what we cannot see, sure. But I think more deeply about what we do see. Imagine if we had to travel somewhere special, under the right circumstance, just to see the wonder that is clouds? Sure, some people live under continuously clear skies, but clouds aren’t terribly out of reach. Look at how clouds vary! Look at how their formations are telling of the past or the future! Look at how quickly they move or change or how the fair-weather cumulous clouds hang up there rendering the sky into a two-dimensional painting! Like a backdrop. Like The Truman Show.

Wednesday, 10/9/24

In these days of climate change, politics, misinformation, and humans pointing fingers at one another, how can one admire hurricanes? Please excuse me as I marvel at the oh-so-small eye of Hurricane Milton. Pardon me as I watch all the live cams along the path. Let me know if the drone of newscasters is not the soundtrack you intended to hear throughout the day.

Brian split his shift today in order to work the hurricane. Between his shifts, he saw the ear doctor 2 hours away again. I feel like all I do is wait, he told me. His ear infection has been months-long now. I lost track of how many antibiotics he has been on: more than 5. He waits to hear back from doctors. He waits for culture reads. He waits in waiting rooms. Being patient. He administers medication into his ear with the help of gravity and waits until it has reached deep into his inner ear. He waits to see if an antibiotic is working. He waits for the medication to be ready at the pharmacy. Waiting, waiting, wading through it all, like hurricane victims making their way through the detritus of it all.

Thursday, 10/9/24

Parked on top of a hill above a lake, we waited for the aurora to arrive. The sun was setting behind us, the horizon line grainy pink as if a child drew it with a colored pencil. Brian, not as excitable as I am, was very excited. We knew the aurora was actively happening then and now, but it wasn’t dark enough to see it yet. This circumstance reminded me of fall leaves. The reds, oranges, browns, and yellows are not due to change but to chlorophyll’s leaving. The leaving reveals what has been there all along, just waiting.

 We waited for the curtains of the aurora to bellow into and out of view in the northern sky, like what happened in May of this year. The gloaming surrounding us had a certain hue to it, reminiscent of when a total solar eclipse is bringing its false darkness. I forget the word Annie Dillard used to describe the color. But in May, Brian and I stood under the dark sky of northwest Pennsylvania, hours from home where it was cloudy. We stared at the northern sky, wondering if our eyes were playing tricks on us as ribbons of color faded in and out of view.

It started happening, though, on top of the hill above the lake. We saw the unmistakable, cloaked red like a tendril in the sky. We took some long-exposures, revealing the featureless color. It didn’t take long for us to realize that the entire sky--not just the northern sky--radiated. Eventually, there were dozens of people on the hill with us. Only dimly lit by the light of their phones, I joyfully talked with many strangers. Brian and I brought chairs with us but we never sat in them.

A part of me wishes that more beautiful, rare things would happen. I wish I could always be on hills with strangers, pointing at something glorious, sharing awe with those strangers, despite lifestyles, beliefs, and constructs.

Platinum. That’s the word Annie Dillard used.

Friday, 10/10/24

I have been thinking deeply about sounds that bring me comfort. I won’t dive too deep, but here is a list: listening to my stomach with a stethoscope; rain/wind; the crunch of snow; “Gilmore Girls” in the background; QVC only during the Christmas holiday season; The Weather Channel (for the talking and the vaporwave); NPR voice; Anne Strainchamps’ voice; Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee’s voice; my friend Denice’s voice; my mother’s voice; birdsong; the sound of caterpillar droppings falling through the leaves of a forest; all the “frequency” meditation videos; fabric flapping in the wind; too much music to name; a crackling fire; thunder/rain; train in the rain; the flapping of wings; purring cats; any waltz; the sound of shower water pounding on my head when my ears are plugged shut; and more…

Saturday, 10/11/24

Night does not fall,

but rises its wings.

Murmuration at sunset.

Sunday, 10/12/24

Cleaning, organizing. I open a blank journal’s cover and find three live stink bugs. While cleaning one room, I flick stink bug after stink bug into a small wooden box with a lid. I put a rock on the lid when I realize that they’re starting to lift it. I take the box outside, empty it, and smell their stress.

Monday, 10/13/24

There is a regular that I often see at a local coffee shop. He looks incredibly busy; piles of books, papers, and ephemera covering his table. He is always well-dressed. I don’t know if it’s a tablet or a laptop that he uses but he speaks to it as if there is an audience. His legs are too long for his pants. He is pleasant. I have been intrigued by him for years. I used to see him somewhere else. Once I saw him at a grocery store. But now he is always here at this coffee shop. From the beginning, I am disappointed to say that I have always assumed that he was on the spectrum. I am disappointed because it’s the easy thing to think and also because I can very well be wrong. When I see him, my imagination goes wild and I love when my imagination goes wild. So, yes I think he has Autism. Not in the way that people claim these days on social media, but in a way where he likely can’t hold down a job, so he has to pretend to work. Or maybe he did have such work, but had a break in his mental health. I have no doubts that he is brilliant. I hear snippets of what he is saying to an audience or fake audience. He talks about words, written words, and words as images. I says “Respond to that domain”, “one chooses one word”, “in doing so the voltage conducted…proton, fission”. At one point, his voice completely changed and went back to normal again. “You have to see what you said,” he says.

I love that.

I love watching him.

I am glad that he is in my life in this small way.

I am glad to be a harmless voyeur.

I apologize for any misunderstanding.

And now, dear reader, he is writing on paper with both hands.