“God keep thee! Push not off from that isle, though canst never return!” Herman Melville, Moby Dick
I gotta tell you, I have never started a story feeling this good and at the same time, not having a fucken idea of how to do this. There is a story I want to tell you a little later and it is about how all of us are islands, something I took from my last tale on my pre-dawn fishing experience.
I think I am a really shitty writer and I don’t feel at all bad about it, nor do I want any of you to take issue, because that is not where I am going. Although I know how to read, I am basically illiterate in the traditional sense of the word. In my present space, absent of most all stuff, there are no books. I have a heavy, dark wood bookcase and there are no books on it. It is not even my bookcase. I am keeping it for my landlords.
Somewhere in my drug muddled memory, I remember Frank Zappa being asked what music he listened to and he said he didn’t listen to any. At this point, I don’t really care whether he said it or not, because I can make use of it with you. I can say, without doubt, my writing has not been influenced by any other writers, because I have not read any. So, I may not be any good, but, at least I am an original.
You could probably say my style is stream of conscientiousness, a term I resented until a very dear person told me it is actually a way of writing that has many famous authors, whom I have never read. I kind of resented it, because it implied to me a complete lack of thought, haphazardly spewing words like a Jackson Pollock painting. So, maybe I am not such a shitty writer, just someone who lets words flow from his mind. Our minds are like a a gumbo of thoughts and feelings, with no manners, constantly interrupting itself, which makes me a chef.
I am not sure any us of are any good at we do, we just try our best and that’s what matters most. I am buried so deep in this writing business. I am on the page, undisguised and as natural and honest as I know how to be.
I think around forty years of sitting on a cushion and meditating has had much more than a subtle influence on how I explain myself to you. I was thinking about it this morning, in relation to this story, which I am still figuring out how to tell. Although, I got into it big time when I moved to Santa Fe, NM in ’87, I was definitely fooling with it, while in NYC. I remember having a summer home on a dairy farm in Honesdale, PA. for two years. I found it in a NY Times ad, when I was looking for a place for summers for me and my kids.
I distinctly remember getting up at sunrise and going out to sit in the fields and it was wonderful to feel so small under the rising sun. There was some kind of major meditation facility nearby. Once, I went to a silent weekend, which was a trip for someone as talkative as I am. The head dude got in trouble for boinking students and I lost track of the place anyway.
I am not here to sell meditating, anymore than I am going to advocate for a committed exercise program, my physical religion. Just imagine, you get up every morning before sunrise and you sit on a cushion, trying to move as little as possible, letting your unbridled mind do whatever it needs to do, before it runs out of gas and moves on. Thoughts and feelings lose their hold on us, because they run out of juice in the stillness. You go from the need to do, to the need to just be.
All of this is what I bring to this page I share with you. Now, the story I want to share I think is filled with analogies and metaphors, terms that I am not schooled in, owing to my braggadocio illiteracy. I think an analogy is like a linear definition, using different words than the first ones, a kind of comparison. Metaphors are poetic elaborations to amplify a word. What the fuck do I know?
Thank God, I can finally get to my story, which I am pretty sure is up to its ass in analogies and metaphors. First, I want to give a shout out to Herman Melville. He was a writer, who lived his words and he helped to make me possible. I am sitting in a fucken chair and punching keys, while this dude went out there and swallowed life. Thanks, big guy.
In my last story, I wrote about fishing in the pre-dawn hours and embracing the idea of living on an island, in the midst of the shit show that lights up our day. I went fishing again this morning, with this story in my mind and I went further. We are all like islands, floating in a seascape of humanity. I knew I was going here when I got into that above mini-diatribe about analogies and metaphors. To me, that writing stream flows back and forth, a further tribute to my lack of education in these matters. So class, that sentence begins with an analogy and closes with a metaphor.
In the darkness this morning, I was thinking about each of us being islands. We are the sole authority, ruling our island of self. There are no illegal immigrants, unless we grant them asylum. It is important to have free and open elections, and each time, we win with 100% of the vote. We determine what matters and anything deemed to be disruptive is dealt with forcefully. We are surrounded by all these islands and it is completely up to us, who we make treaties with. Sometimes, we will do it for the benefit of another island, always being vigilant to protect our very personal rule of law.
I feel very fortunate that my rules have no real outside influences. My island is unique and can’t be found on any map, because it has no precedent. Every one of us is an island and while the shape is identical to each one, the constitution of each is a work of art each one of us has drawn up and they are perfect just the way they are. When we sit and try to be still, we are also that island. In case you’re curious, each one is shaped like a heart and no two are alike.
I am thinking of you on Valentine’s Day and the idea of love. Unless we love ourselves, we can love no one. The rule of law on each of our islands is the rule of love.
Love yourself.