i, terrorist

driving to jersey city last week to pick up a piece of furniture that kieran found on craiglist, i had numerous close calls with careless drivers. oh my heavens, did i have such murderous reactions. it was the grenade in my hand or my car used as a tank to smash the idiot stopped in the middle of an intersection. i felt bloodthirsty - each car in the middle of this rush hour nightmare was my nemesis. blinded by my rage, i could not behold the faces of these human beings each struggling to get by - a soccer mom with kids in tow, the overworked dads, the tired truckers, an anxi0us teenage driver, the foggy eyed elder. no, there were no persons out that day, just automobiles pinballing in chaotic choreography, all bent on aggravating ME. so i press the pedal harder, slam the brakes, hit the horn, and vomit vulgarities. these enemy combatants, insurgents, infidels, terrorists.....

I, terrorist

so, if there is no separation, all is one. no one is my enemy. breathing and accepting.

for one human family,
jamie

street games

take it to the streets,

messages of hope and love and renewal

alive,

jamie

being

every time i speak i plant.
a seed of possibility.
so i want to speak life.
to myself:
i have been given 26 years thus far.
i am a child of God.
I am beautiful.
I am a husband.
I am humble.
I am alive.
I am open.
I am a father.
I am in awe.
I am in love.
I am resting.
I am excited.
I am patient.
I am wise.
I am becoming.
I am here, now...

These all are true. Yet, there can be such a deep defensiveness that guards my soul. i do not want to let life grow in my heart because it feels so wild - i'd rather hide. i do not want to give life to my wife kieran because it feels so weak - too much ego. but isn't now all i have. so let me try to take this next phone call at work with grace. it could be some anxious, stubborn, fearful mongrel of a person, who is desperately needing a seed of life. maneuvering the noise and confusion is where practice makes better. whether the noise of my mind that curses me and guards me. whether the confusion of my wife's reaction to a situation. there is an opportunity to receive life and give life. that's my goal.

and in this time of pregnancy that my wife and i are going through i have been pondering the concept of mother. i am contemplating the immensity of the reality: cells that join onto the inside wall of the mothers womb, grow into a human being and then depart as a separate entity.
i think that in some way, all of our lives we long for the womb. we want mother in each moment. the love we make and take, the pills we make and take - we want to find the comfort that we had in utero.
i think that the comfort is available to me everyday: a good conversation with my wife over a homemade meal, or playing in the garden. its not the same as the womb, not the same as mother, but it is the mother inside of me that is strengthened through these experiences of embracing beauty and life.
so, if i can just practice being aware of these opportunities to receive and give life, then i can take part in the healing that is the effect.

i may feel that old fear creeping in again, but it won't hold me back,
jamie

born again

as a young person, attending church, i remember singing a song: "bullfrogs and butterflies, they've both been born again". i like these images a lot. two creatures -tadpoles and caterpillars -begin with such different shapes and capabilities than the their future being.

a local woman in our town, who is a nature lover, gave my wife and i a monarch caterpillar to care for recently. we made sure to clean its little home and feed it milkweed often. it grew larger and larger, and one day it climbed up the side of the jar and wove itself into a chrysalis- a shiny green cocoon.

We have been waiting a week or so to see it emerge, and lo and behold as i walked into the kitchen this morning this is what i saw. a new being - a gorgeous monarch, trembling in its first moments of new life. i could barely breathe, it was so enrapturing.

so i am thinking about new life. yet, i feel perplexed, because sometimes i really feel like i am dreaming as i go about my day. i think that this concept is best understood by the symbolic imagery of christ's journey from the womb of mary to the womb of the tomb, and once the resurrection took place his walk continued with his friends whom he reunited with. i think that one of the most critical decisions i have in my life is to let go and be birthed by the present moment. whatever the situation is, whether trouble or pleasure, there is a cocoon to be found in. this warm, safe place is the place to dig in and die. but it means painfully letting go of what i have known. yet, to know myself in a deeper way, how else can it be done but to die. and when i emerge from the tomb, i will be a monarch, flying high.

to a day fully alive,

jamie

Kilimanjaro

kilimanjaro, a south african succulent plant.

it rests on the window sill to the left of me,

overlooking fire escapes on brick buildings.

I spotted the spiky blue-green fingers reaching out of a crowded table of plants at The Greenmarket at Union Square. It reached for me, to care for me while I work in a fluorescent lit building in claustrophobic Manhattan.

I hope that this plant will keep me sane. Like, Will, the master baker I worked with for two years, who brought a plant into his cubicle when he was a young engineer to use as a barometer. When the plant dies, time's up.

Searching out the window in my office, I spot a single, thin tree sapling lurching out from a narrow ledge on the fourth floor of a huge tenement. It is growing out of nowhere, like a magic arrow that struck the side of the brick wall and began to bloom.

There is wild everywhere, it cannot be stopped. Yet, it is a choice to yield to it and let it propogate in my soul.

to a day fully alive,

jamie