The Zen of Fireflies

These days I find I don't have a lot to write about. I think about a lot of things, yet they seem fleeting and/or trivial. I would rather stand on the back porch and dusk and watch the fireflies. There is a time to be a deep thinker. There is a time to think nothing and just watch something miraculous. For a lot of us, the latter is much harder than the former. Although explaining a miracle can detract from its effect, my curious mind gets the best of me every year and I have to research what makes fireflies glow. So, for those of you who have forgotten (like I do every year....)......
Fireflies have dedicated light organs that are located under their abdomens. They take in oxygen and, inside special cells, combine it with a substance called luciferin to produce light with almost no heat. Firefly light is usually intermittent, and flashes in patterns that are unique to each species (there are more than 200 species!). Each blinking pattern is an optical signal that helps fireflies find potential mates. Scientists are not sure how the insects regulate this process to turn their lights on and off.
So enjoy them while they are here! They don't grace our presence for long each year, and now is the time.

New Painting.........

Negotiating with Memory

This is a picture of my father, Robert Fisher, circa 1926, sawing wood in Indiana. A few weeks ago I went to visit him (he is now 94) in Florida. After years of talking about it, I finally interviewed and recorded him for about 30 minutes. He is a very mellow guy, and his epitaph could read, “What you see is what you get”. Hard as I tried to extract long lost stories and juicy details from the past, he seemed unwilling or unable to relate anything beyond facts.
He has had an incredibly interesting life, yet he is humble and unassuming. The experience got me thinking about the nature of memory: not just why and how we remember, but how our selective memories form a narrative of our lives. Do we all edit ourselves to create the persona of the person we want to be? How do we decide what to leave in, what to take out?

While I was pondering some of these questions, I began to read a book called A Fraction of the Whole by Australian novelist Steve Toltz. It’s a long, idiosyncratic, epic saga that reads kind of like a marriage of Dickens and Vonnegut. I came across this paragraph near the beginning of the book:
“Negotiating with memories isn’t easy: how do I choose between those panting to be told, those still ripening, those already shriveling, and those destined to be mangled by language and come out pulverized?.....in any case, mine’s a damned good story, and it’s true.”

How do we tell our life stories? Is blogging the new storytelling? Sometimes I feel like what I'm blogging about isn't "important" enough. But it's all mine, and it's all true.....in my unique life's narrative.

Calculating Happiness

A new constitution in the remote Buddhist kingdom of Bhutan requires that all government programs – from agriculture to transportation to foreign trade – be judged not by economic benefits but by the happiness they produce. The government has created a Gross National Happiness (G.N.H.) index, which names four pillars of a happy society: economy, culture, the environment and good governance. It then breaks these down into nine domains: psychological well being, ecology, health, education, living stardards, time use, community vitality and good governance. Mathematical formulas have been devised to track and measure happiness. Prime Minister Jigme Thiney sees this approach as a response to “greed, insatiable human greed” that is the root of today’s worldwide economic crisis.

Imagine if this idea catches on in other countries. Unlikely, but wonderful to imagine.

How do you define happiness?

Riverside Cemetery, Asheville

Spring is in full bloom at the historic cemetery in my neighborhood. Along with the dogwoods and azelas, I found two more interesting photo ops:

Kenneth Noland is alive and well (as far as I know) but he has already erected his mausoleum in Riverside Cemetery (he's from Asheville). Kinda creepy. or not.??

This has always been my favorite tombstone at Riverside. These people were obviously huge party monsters. Do you think they dug their own grave as a parting gesture?

I recently went back to Seattle, where I lived from 1994 through 1998. I have always said there is no place more beautiful than Seattle on a clear day. I was fortunate to have good weather for most of my visit. There is something about the light on the water there that is like nowhere else. I’ve seen some amazing light on water – on the Costa Brava of Spain, in Seaside Florida, at Big Sur, on the coast of Turkey…….but Seattle’s light is luminous - it feels like it is full of shimmering water droplets (which is probably is).

It was a wonderful trip - I spent time with good friends; I saw a lot of great art in the galleries; I took a ferry to Bainbridge Island; I saw a play; I ate a lot of good food (cedar planked salmon, yum). Though I enjoyed my time, I couldn’t help but notice an undercurrent of anxiety running through me – the source of it was, I think, a somewhat sinking realization that yes, indeed, I DO live in a small town. I know that “the grass is always greener…” and I’m not saying I want to move back there, but I was humbled by the knowledge that being a somewhat big fish in a small pond is not always conducive to growth. Being in a Big City is kind of like playing a sport with someone who is much more experienced than you are: it forces you to play better.

I just needed to acknowledge my moment of Big City Envy, a condition that sometimes invades my psyche. But now I am back to this “small town with a big footprint”. Glad to be home, trying to be where I am, to put one foot in front of the other and move along.

I Love Good News

It’s about time. I watched the news last night and to my amazement the news was by and large GOOD: ship captain dramatically rescued, Cuban-Americans allowed to visit Cuba; gay and lesbian couples invited to the White House Easter egg roll; the Obamas’ new puppy. Put this together into a children’s book and it would go something like this: Evil pirates overtake a ship carrying big mysterious boxes. The good guys rescue the brave captain, who then decides to quit the container ship business and start taking people, particularly gay couples and dogs, to and from Cuba. And they all lived happily ever after.

Another thing that makes me happy these days is the fact that a lot of smart people are choosing to study teaching over investment banking. What a concept.

And to make me even happier, I found an image of a penguin delivering the news. Now that's happy.