Without a Sound

The world is not quiet.  Even on a day when nothing much is happening, like today, I can hear the clock ticking, and birds singing, and down the street that kid playing with his model airplane yet again, and the air conditioning kicking in, and my cat’s stomach rumbling.

But sometimes, when I’m not paying such close attention, all that fades into the background and the silence wraps around me like a blanket knitted by a friend.  Time doesn’t stop, of course—it never does—but it stops glaring at me for a little while.  And I sink into the silence and rest in the absolute peace of it.

Sometimes, silence grates, like a noise that won’t stop, making me need to get out, to do something, to fill it with words or music or nonsense.  But sometimes silence is exactly what I need, and at those times it is more beautiful than music.

In Memoriam, Orlando: A Poem for Pulse

My heart is broken for Orlando, for the LGBTQ community, for the Islamic community who will take the brunt for this.  For all of us who have to live in such a violent world. 

Of all that I have seen about this gruesome attack—and it is more than enough—this story strikes me most of all.  I am praying for all of those families whose frightened calls will never be answered, and for those who will never be able to forget the scene with all those phones ringing next to the bodies of their owners. 

I wrote this as tribute and wanted to share it.  I know it can’t bring any sense to this awful event, but I hope that my prayers and thoughts will put a little bit of good back into the world.

OMG; what a Bulletin.

Did you hear?

The Slow Rise of hatred in the world,

ringing out in Chimes and Ripples,

Radiating in a haunting Signal.

I can imagine it—a dark room, its Pure Tones

silenced.  Blood on Silk,

a Wine Bottle smashed.

And the Sniper, looking for a Desert Sunrise,

his Playtime.

Oh, my Night Owls—

you followed a sweet Beacon

to Uplift one another on Waves of love.

Instead, your Radar was shut off.

Do you Stargaze now?

Are you in a new Constellation?

May peace now be your Cosmic right,

Over the Horizon where you are.

Meanwhile our hearts Faint

as the pleading tones ring out

from what you are not anymore,

a Circuit of hope against hope.

When they fall silent,

that will be the Apex of despair.

"Stop the Ringing" by Eileen O'Connor, June 12, 2016.

Throwback to Tears

Sometimes I go back through my journals for inspiration, or even just for curiosity.  I was doing that today, looking for an idea for this post, and I ran across something I wrote when I was home from college on a Thanksgiving break.  I know this because it was during that holiday that my computer crashed without warning, and that day stands out in my memory.

I live in fear of computer failure.  When I was thirteen, I lost a novel and a half when our family computer shut down and the hard drive was wiped almost clean.  My own precious first work, gone like smoke in the air—I cried for days.  I cried in the second instance, too, though I didn’t end up losing very much.  I can still remember struggling frantically with the computer, turning it on for the few moments it would allow to try and save my documents.  Though this time I was a so-called adult, old enough to have my priorities in order, I sobbed for hours in fear, anger, and shame.

It’s this last that gave me the spark I needed to start writing this morning.  I’ve spoken about crying on this blog before (see this post) and there is a good bit of embarrassment that goes along with it.  It should have been less so in this instance, as I was safe at home, no one but my family to see me.  But I made note in my journal of someone—I can’t remember who now—laughing at my copious tears.  I’m sure it wasn’t malicious—they just thought that I was overreacting.  It was just a computer, and the important things were saved.  What’s the big deal?

The big deal, of course, was the scare I received.  I live a large part of my life in my imagination, and my writing represents long hours of my life.  Some of my projects have received months of work, and far more time when you consider how much time I spent thinking about them.  More practically, I hope that these projects will someday be my career.  I know that most people wouldn’t think much of it, but it hurt when others couldn’t see how much it meant to me.

I don’t write this as an accusation to whoever it was that laughed.  I forgave them for that a long time ago.  Instead I want to use it as a teaching moment for myself.  When something is so important to someone that they are upset at the thought of losing it, it deserves my respect, too.  However trivial it may seem to me, if someone else puts significance in it, then it is significant.  I hope to remember that in the future.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go and make sure all of my work is backed up.

Ideas for Sale: Cheap!

I do not approve of mass production.

Those words, to me, summon up an image of running conveyor belts and cheap plastic parts.  It makes me think of someone who is making as many of something as possible to make the most money possible.  It makes me think of the videos we used to see in middle school social studies with factory workers turning knobs and pushing buttons in factories.  Maybe that’s a stereotypical reaction.  Mass production is a large part of our economy, enabling us to get things that we would never be able to afford otherwise.  As I write this, I’m sitting at a desk from Ikea that has numerous clones all across the world.  I’m typing on a keyboard that was mass-produced, looking at a monitor that was mass-produced, sipping from a mug that was mass-produced.  Maybe I don’t have any right to complain.  But I don’t like it.  Is it wrong of me to think that there should be some care placed into the things that we make?  Is it wrong of me to want some originality, some uniqueness, something that no one else has?  That’s the writer talking, the artist, that part of me that has to assign meaning to everything.

I suppose mass-production is here to stay, no matter what one irritated blogger with fewer than ten followers has to say.  But do we really have to follow the example of mass-production when we make rules for ourselves?  You know you’ve seen it.  “All abortions should be illegal.”  “All illegals should be deported.”  “Real marriage can only happen between a man and a woman.”

Let’s face it: humans are different from one another.  All of us have different beliefs, different cultures, different values, different motivations, clashing together in the soul to make immensely complex organisms that no other human can ever fully understand.  How can we all be expected to follow the same rules?  How can what is right for me be right for everyone else on the planet?  One would think that by now we should have a small understanding of this.  Yet we lay down laws that are supposed to rule over everyone, and we are surprised when there are loopholes and exceptions.  Wouldn’t it be better to address conflicts with an open-minded consideration for both parties, to hear them with compassion and decide what is right for them, not what is right for everyone?

But the thing I hate most is the mass production of ideas.  When someone says something and suddenly it is springing out of the mouths of everyone else around me, it infuriates me.  When my coworker rolls out these ridiculous theories about the way of the world with all the confidence of reciting gospel, because he has never had to think for himself: he has simply downloaded it into his brain.  When no one questions the things our leaders say, when we just echo what the media has interpreted for us, when we take any opportunity not to think for ourselves—that is when I want to tear down the assembly line, destroy the factory, and start teaching people how to make their own stuff again.  It might make things a little more expensive, a little more difficult, but I think that’s what we need right now.  Because if we don’t, we will end up with every house the same, every face the same, and every misery the same, all trapped together in an easy, lifeless existence.