Tuesday, June 30, 2009
SMALL KINDNESSES
1. Sausages
Last night I was hungry. I'm on this high-protein/low-carb diet, so basically my options are meat or cheese. While cooking up a pan of breakfast sausages, I had this memory from my childhood of my mother doing the same thing. My father loved sausages - any kind, but especially pork breakfast sausages. My mother spent a lot of time feeding my father, despite everything. And I had this image of her standing patiently by the stove, turning over the links little by little so that they would brown evenly on all sides. Given that sausages are round, and that they wiggle and jump in the pan, this endeavor takes constant attention for a good 20 minutes. And as I turned my own sausages last night, I imagined my mother, spatula in hand, hovering over the pan, gently coaxing each pork finger toward a perfect state of brownness, so that my father could relish every bite.
2. Gladys
Yesterday was the one-year anniversary of our return to San Francisco after our London sojourn. I marked the occasion by making a phonecall I've been avoiding for months. I called the once familiar world of 020 and spoke to Pat, the daughter of Gladys, the 85-year old woman who lived in the flat below our in Flanders Mansions. Visiting Gladys and playing with trucks in her peeling yellow kitchen is one of the few memories my son still has of his London home. Gladys was always happy to see us, always happy for small kindnesses like a 1/2 pint of strawberries we couldn't use, or the offer to pick up a few things from the shops when her supplies were low. Gladys lived on the same road for 65 years, in the same town all her life. She knew much about the details of the place - how the Tube workers used to plant wild-flowers on the berm below the tracks, the ages of the postman's children, how hot the summers used to be. When we knew her, she had not left her house in over 2 years. And so her world was 6 rooms - 4 of them shut in winter - and the views out the front and back windows. Everyday she would walk down the passage to see what was happening on the road - who was going to school, who was late for work, what cars were parked where. Gladys was important to me, and yet I visited her less often that I meant to. In the first 6 months after we returned to SF, I only wrote her once - a Christmas card with a pack of chocolates and a GG Bridge magnet to join the collection of birds on her fridge. She passed in February - thankfully in the hospital and not alone in her flat as she feared she would. I know her life was better for knowing us, and ours for knowing her. And yet, I still feel the weight of all the moments I could have spent with her balled up like a knot in my chest.
3. Monster
My son has been walking around terrified for the last week. He keeps remembering this dream he had. In it, he sees a monster, and while he watches, the monster's body breaks apart and his head begins to bounce toward my son. It never reaches him, because he always wakes up. But the terror of the nights has now invaded the daytimes to the point where Gman won't even go down the hall to his room to get dressed at 8am. He's been saying 50 times a day "I'm scared. I'm so scared of my dream." We've talked about the difference between real and pretend. We've discussed strategies for distracting himself, for redirecting his imagination. But the fear remains. And it is really getting in the way of our daily operations - he is literally hanging onto my leg, following me from room to room. And after days of this, I find myself deeply impatient with him. "Come on!" I think, "Snap out of it!" Even though I remember how frightened I was of pictures in my head when I was a child. Even though I recognize that the monster must represent some deeper and more inexpressible fear about a part of his life he is afraid might break or dissolve before his eyes. It seems that he needs constant little doses of love and kindness to get through the day now. And honestly, who doesn't.
Be well.
photo by Roman Delamare
Labels: Community Muses, Family Life, Mysteries
Sunday, June 21, 2009
HEART
For the 3 of you who have RSS feeds and will know to look for this post after a 6-month hiatus - thank you for reading! Future posts will cover the gap, but in the meantime, a love letter to Anne Bogart that I wrote this morning. Happy Summer Solstice!
Dear Anne,
I was sitting in my kitchen this morning reading the intro to and then, you act while my children climbed all over me. This seemed an apt metaphor for my experience of making art these days, which is less like that of the balletic diver on the cover of your book and more like that of the Hungarian strong man dragging his family in pyramid formation on his back slowly across the ring.
Nonetheless, your book is inspiring - encouraging - a source of sustenance and solace.
You have been on my radar a lot in the past few weeks. We literally kept bumping into each other at the TCG conference - you were on the stairs of the shuttle bus as I tried to back down from a full bus - we got squeezed into the same corner in the lobby - rubbed elbows at the food table at the party. I kept trying to work up the courage to speak to you, but never managed it. And there were so many people there who wanted to talk you (as I'm sure there always are). And you looked tired to me, maybe in need of some silence.
This past weekend, I attended the NET conference which was housed at the university where I now teach. I attended a session where one of your company members described the current Ensemble/University partnership that SITI Company is seeking to broker with Columbia, and she shared that your endgame in this endeavor is to train a slew of "Warrior Artists" who can help reshape American culture. Hearing her say that took my breath away, because that exact phrase has been ricocheting around my brain of late.
These recent encounters and the force of the truth on the page this morning made me feel I needed to write to you to express my intense gratitude for your presence and leadership in the theater field.
We've met before, a few times. I was one of 30 hopeful directing MFA candidates at a weekend workshop in 1995. Then I was a participant in two separate Viewpoints workshops you led at the University of Iowa between 1996-1999. I've heard you speak. I've read your books. And most recently I've worked with one of your students and mentees AV, at the university where I teach full-time now.
Given how little time we've actually spent in a room together, it's staggering to me how much you've influenced my life. Concepts like the violence of articulation and vertical energy & horizontal energy have become foundational principles in my own directing and teaching. My memory of the quality of attention you gave to a small group of MFA directors one day in a cafe in Iowa City is often on my mind when I prepare myself to encounter a new group of people. The satisfaction of reading your words which capture and amplify truths I recognize fuels me in my teaching practice.
This is my first year in higher education - an intentional transition from the non-profit theater world that I undertook in order to support my family. I went to Princeton as an undergrad, and the aforementioned U of Iowa for my MFA. And despite how much I love school, I have always been distrustful of academia. There seems to be much hypocrisy in the academic environment, as well as a strong tendency to value intellectual knowledge and book learning over experiential knowledge and other more intuitive ways of engaging with truth.
And this is why I value you so much. Because you are both a deeply intellectual person and a bold practioner. In you, theory and form appear to be (miraculously) evenly matched. Your example offers me hope that I can construct a similarly balanced pedagogical approach in my new environment.
You are also a model of courage for me. I am trying to do something I have never done before - educate and train artists within a liberal arts context while at the same time empowering them to toss out everything they know and remake theater in their own way. I am trying to imagine/create/discover a more cogent and inspiring approach to artistic education than the ones I was exposed to in school. There are a lot of days when this seems an impossible task given how little I know. You are a model for me both in terms of how you translate your experience into ideas and conceptual frameworks, and also because of your ability to ask unanswerable questions and live with the unknown.
About a month ago, as the semester was grinding to a close, I found myself exhausted, demoralized and seriously considering quitting my job. But today - largely because of my re-exposure to you - I feel encouraged, energized, and inspired to get back to work. It's a beautiful word encourage - to put heart into. I feel my heart beating in my body again today - as I stagger across the ring, holding up myself, my family, and my students - all of us working together to maintain a fragile balance. All of us buzzing with the thrill of being alive in this moment.
Be well.
Labels: Creative Process, Creative Women, Directing, Teaching
Tuesday, December 02, 2008
DUST...
DUST in the wind. All we are is DUST in the wind. - Kansas
What is DUST?
DUST is the working title of the mainstage show that I am directing at USF this spring, a show that will be created from scratch by the ensemble of performers and the production staff during a 7-week period. The motivation for DUST comes from my life-long interest in creation stories (see What will DUST be about? below) and also from a desire to explore a certain kind of creative process, one in which the performance emerges directly from imaginations of the people who are working together in the rehearsal room.
I am trained as a director - specifically a director of new plays. This means that I have spent a lot of time helping playwrights get what they imagine out of their heads and onto the page. Sometimes this activity is called dramaturgy - the act of shaping and honing a text so that it can effectively tell the story it wants to tell. I love working dramaturgically, because I love language, ideas and stories.
But I also love images, movement and music. I often work with choreographers and composers when I direct a play, because as an audience member I appreciate a richly textured theatrical environment, one that engages all my senses. I also like surprises. I like to be amused, delighted even, by unexpected and beautiful moments onstage.
Most of all, I love to watch people do what they do best. I like to see performers really do something amazing, rather than just pretend to do it. That's why I want to make a play in this way - because I want to see onstage the best theatrical material this group of people can imagine and manifest together.
Things need not have happened to be true. Tales and adventures are the shadow truths that will endure when mere facts are dust and ashes and forgotten. - Neil Gaiman
What will DUST about?
I was a Religion major in college (with a double minor in Theater and Gender Studies.) I spent a lot of time examining stories in the Bible and trying to unpack, understand, and interpret them. My senior thesis was an original production that explored the creation myth in Genesis 3 (Adam, Eve & the Serpent.) I'm also eternally curious about people's ancestry, both personal and communal (as in collective memory.) I think a lot about the secret messages our DNA carries. I think about angels (I've also directed Jose Rivera's Marisol.) I like to tease my brain with What If? scenarios.
So, DUST is a container for exploring all these ideas. What cultural and personal stories do we tell about where we come from? How do we remember/imagine our origins as a species? What is controversial about these stories and how does it impact the way we live and relate to each other?
I'm interested in putting a variety of answers to these questions onstage. I want to offer plenty of ideas, stories, and images for the audience to chew on, as well as room for them to mentally insert their own stories and perspectives. The form of this play will take is likely to be more variations on a theme than a single straightforward narrative.
I want to shake off the dust of this one-horse town. I want to explore the world. I want to watch TV in a different time zone. I want to visit strange, exotic malls...I want to live, Marge! - Homer Simpson
Who will be part of the DUST creative team?
Director, Christine Young
Movement, Anjali Vashi (Viewpoints specialist & USF instructor)
Dramaturgy, Eugenie Chan (professional playwright & USF instructor)
Sets, Jamie Mulligan (professional designer & USF technical director)
Lights, Gabe Maxson (professional designer & USF production manager)
Costumes, TBA (likely someone who designs for dance)
Sound, TBA (likely someone who composes electronic music)
Assistant Director, Caitlin Shindldecker (PASJ major)
Stage Manager, Ashley Smiley (PASJ major)
Performers, 9 to 16 students of any gender/ethnicity/body type/artistic persuasion (ie. actor/dancer/musician)
I'm interested in creating a diverse and dynamic ensemble of multi-talented performers who are jazzed about the chance to collaborate and create something new.
We come spinning out of nothingness, scattering stars like dust. - Jalal ad-Din Rumi
How will DUST be made?
Because this is an ensemble-created show, performers will be asked to attend every rehearsal.
Some say God made the world in 7 days.
We're going to make a play in 7 weeks.
Our process will have 3 phases:
PlayTime (Weeks 1, 2 & 3) - Rehearsal begins Friday, 1/23 (weekend before classes start)
BuildTime (Weeks 4, 5 & 6)
Tech/Perform (Week 7) - Performances Thu 3/12-Mon 3/16
During our PlayTime, we will develop intimacy as an ensemble and do lots of creative brainstorming through the use of daily creative prompts. For example: after a physical warmup, I might ask everyone to spend 15 minutes writing a personal story that starts with "In the beginning...". We might then take that text and play with it physically, developing character gestures based on key phrases. Then, we might work as a group to create a floor pattern that represents one of the images in the text. Finally, we might splice all these things together into a scene. We will also have production elements to play with. The set, currently conceived as a 3-dimensional chalk board that we can draw on, will be installed during week 2. We'll have light and sound sources available as well during early rehearsals (for example, a video-projector, some flashlights, a sound-system, instruments). Part of our playtime will be spent exploring all the different ways we can use these things theatrically.
At the end of the first 3 weeks, the dramaturgical team (Christine, Anjali, Eugenie, Caitlin, Ashley) will spend a few days sifting through all the creative material we've generated in order to discover the best structure for our piece. I liken this to the quilting process - the performers will cut interesting shapes out of the theatrical fabric we have available to us - then the dramaturgical team will assemble those shapes into the most dynamic pattern they can discern.
Once we've determined the structure, during the BuildTime, we'll stitch the quilt together, fleshing out the missing bits, connecting the dots, making sure the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Part of this work will involve editing, figuring out what fits and what doesn't. We will solidify characters, create transitions, gather additional props, costumes and other production elements we need to tell our story.
Finally, we will Tech and then Perform our work during 5 shows. Our goal will be to create 60 minutes of performance material with a beginning, middle and end that satisfies us and an audience. The "2nd Act" of each performance will be a conversation between the audience and "experts" in the fields of Theology and Science who can talk about the stories they tell to explain/describe our origins.
Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life. - Pablo Picaso
How can I get involved in DUST?
Come to auditions (sign up for 1 of the 2 sessions by emailing me at cyoung8@usfca.edu). Or contact me via email or at 422.6733 if you have questions or want to be involved in another way.
Auditions for DUST are on Sun 12/7
Session 1: 10a-12p
Session 2: 1p-3p
Bring a piece of text you love (no monologues please).
A unique object
Your schedule/conflicts for January-March 2009
* Be prepared to speak, sing & move!
Labels: Creative Process, Directing
Sunday, October 26, 2008
GRASS
"The grass is never greener," I started saying to myself while living in London. "There's no getting ahead," or "No matter where you go, there you are," might be other ways to say this, but I've been working hard for the past 18 months to cultivate a "glass half-full" outlook on life, so I'll stick with grass. Grass grows in the spring and summer - there's no denying it. Grass withers and dies in the fall and winter - that's true too. But millions of human energy hours are spent each year in the effort to alter this natural equation - to make the grass greener, to make it last longer, to make it plusher, softer, less likely to be nibbled by bugs.
We do the same things with our lives. We imagine that if we can just get concoct the right chemical formula and apply it liberally to the affected areas of our lives, that we will no longer suffer the indignities of the natural cycle - withering, loss, dryness, disintegration, stagnation, being trampled from time to time. What is a good life? All around me I see good-hearted people struggling with this question. The struggle has all kinds of flavors. In this version of my life, I've been given a scoop of quick-melting middle class topped with a scoop of long-lasting post-modern alienation. You might be holding a similar cone. If you are educated, if you have an active mind and a reasonably healthy body, if you have managed to meet your basic needs but still harbor some kind of ambition toward making/gathering/achieving more, then you are probably sharing my struggle. Maybe you are wrestling with your conscience - wondering how your craving for a Pottery Barn leather sofa can be reconciled with your desire to serve meals to the homeless more often at St. Anthony's Dining Room. Maybe you are wrestling with time - trying to "be present" all the time, while keeping your house clean, getting your work done, playing with your kids, and being available to family and friends. Maybe you are wrestling with money - trying to live within your means, save for a rainy day, enjoy the moment, prepare for the future. Maybe you are wrestling with all these things in a 24/7 winner-take-all, no-holds-barred, anything-goes, knock-down-drag-out, monster-truck-grudge-match of mythic proportions.
Maybe, like me, you are so fucking exhausted and bored of this struggle that you'd like to strip off your tattered lycra wrestling suit and run screaming and naked into the nearest lane of oncoming traffic - just for a change. I mean, jesus, what is going on here? Why is it so hard to sink our toes down into the earth and grow the way grass is meant to grow in the soil of this particular place. Why is it so hard to accept that in the natural life cycle there are productive times and fallow times, times full of lush greenness and times punctuated by the crackle and crunch of deadness under our feet. Why is it so hard to be still and resist the urge to struggle?
Be well.
Photo (Winter Grass) by Idle Type
Labels: Community Muses, time
Sunday, October 12, 2008
WAVE
When I started my new job 9 weeks ago, I had this little schtick I would trot out for friends and acquaintances who would ask "Are you excited?" or "Isn't it going to be great?! This is your dream job!"
"Yes, I am excited" I would offer, "but I also feel like a novice surfer, eager to catch her first wave, but wondering if instead I will be smacked silly by an unforgiving ocean."
Imagine...It's twilight. I paddle out into the big blue, amidst a scattered company of expert surfers, full of puppy-dog eagerness to get up on my board and show my stuff. I've never actually done this before (except in those silly land simulations where they have you wiggle around on the sand), but I'm hoping with the right combination of focus, effort, and luck, that I'll stand up on my board at exactly the right moment, catch the crest of the wave, and enjoy a glorious ride to the shore. That's what I'm hoping for. But what I'm expecting is that I'll miss the right moment, be sucked into the wave, and that instead of elevating me, the wave will crush me down to the sea floor, and I'll wind up with a mouthful of sand.
And the joke was - since I knew this was going to happen anyway - I wanted to just drive out to Ocean Beach and fill my own mouth with sand (skipping the ocean part) - just get it over with.
Well, I told this story for a few weeks, and then I forgot about it. But it didn't forget about me. The wave that has been moving toward me for the last 9 weeks finally caught me this week, and just as I expected, even though I am sitting on dry land, metaphorically I am coughing and sputtering, trying to clear my mouth of seawater and silt.
I think a lot these days about human energy - how much it has been able to manifest in the world throughout history - and yet also how none of my friends seem to have enough of it right now. Everyone I know, despite elaborate life architecture and their best truest efforts, seems to be getting crushed down into the earth at least once a season.
I think a lot these days about the phrase "Work/Life Balance" - a odd term that I think comes from the corporate world (and which implies that one is not alive at work), but which seems to have infiltrated nearly every work environment, even the alternative ones.
I think a lot these days about my foremothers - my great-grandmother and her friends - and how they probably would have laughed and scoffed at this phrase. "Life is Work" they might have said. I doubt most of them would have thought to want some "Me Time" at the end of a day of kneading, baking, sweeping, feeding, scrubbing, scouring, carrying, cooking, scraping, hanging, ironing, fetching, serving, mending, and minding. They probably wanted less from their lives than we do. But maybe they weren't so twisted and tormented. So guilty and grasping. Maybe they never thought "of course" as the cold waters closing over their heads or felt as oddly comfortable as I am with the feel of grit between my teeth.
You can't turn back the clock though. In our post-feminist, pre-apocalyptic, 21st century urban environment, inside this global pressure-cooker, there seems to be only bigger/faster/stronger/higher/harder waves coming at us, with no calm in sight. Are they even surfable anymore? Is the only solution to find a little protected cove and cut yourself off from the rest of the ocean? Is the storm ever going to pass?
Photo by wentloog
When I started my new job 9 weeks ago, I had this little schtick I would trot out for friends and acquaintances who would ask "Are you excited?" or "Isn't it going to be great?! This is your dream job!"
"Yes, I am excited" I would offer, "but I also feel like a novice surfer, eager to catch her first wave, but wondering if instead I will be smacked silly by an unforgiving ocean."
Imagine...It's twilight. I paddle out into the big blue, amidst a scattered company of expert surfers, full of puppy-dog eagerness to get up on my board and show my stuff. I've never actually done this before (except in those silly land simulations where they have you wiggle around on the sand), but I'm hoping with the right combination of focus, effort, and luck, that I'll stand up on my board at exactly the right moment, catch the crest of the wave, and enjoy a glorious ride to the shore. That's what I'm hoping for. But what I'm expecting is that I'll miss the right moment, be sucked into the wave, and that instead of elevating me, the wave will crush me down to the sea floor, and I'll wind up with a mouthful of sand.
And the joke was - since I knew this was going to happen anyway - I wanted to just drive out to Ocean Beach and fill my own mouth with sand (skipping the ocean part) - just get it over with.
Well, I told this story for a few weeks, and then I forgot about it. But it didn't forget about me. The wave that has been moving toward me for the last 9 weeks finally caught me this week, and just as I expected, even though I am sitting on dry land, metaphorically I am coughing and sputtering, trying to clear my mouth of seawater and silt.
I think a lot these days about human energy - how much it has been able to manifest in the world throughout history - and yet also how none of my friends seem to have enough of it right now. Everyone I know, despite elaborate life architecture and their best truest efforts, seems to be getting crushed down into the earth at least once a season.
I think a lot these days about the phrase "Work/Life Balance" - a odd term that I think comes from the corporate world (and which implies that one is not alive at work), but which seems to have infiltrated nearly every work environment, even the alternative ones.
I think a lot these days about my foremothers - my great-grandmother and her friends - and how they probably would have laughed and scoffed at this phrase. "Life is Work" they might have said. I doubt most of them would have thought to want some "Me Time" at the end of a day of kneading, baking, sweeping, feeding, scrubbing, scouring, carrying, cooking, scraping, hanging, ironing, fetching, serving, mending, and minding. They probably wanted less from their lives than we do. But maybe they weren't so twisted and tormented. So guilty and grasping. Maybe they never thought "of course" as the cold waters closing over their heads or felt as oddly comfortable as I am with the feel of grit between my teeth.
You can't turn back the clock though. In our post-feminist, pre-apocalyptic, 21st century urban environment, inside this global pressure-cooker, there seems to be only bigger/faster/stronger/higher/harder waves coming at us, with no calm in sight. Are they even surfable anymore? Is the only solution to find a little protected cove and cut yourself off from the rest of the ocean? Is the storm ever going to pass?
Photo by wentloog
Labels: Career Anxiety, Community Muses, time
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
RESURRECTION
It has been 7 weeks since I last posted - a spiritual number - the length of time it has taken for me to fully absorb that I am where I am - San Francisco. I have loved and been loved by this City, but it's different this time. I feel like the woman in the made-for-tv movie who gets one last chance to live as she always knew she should. Note: this is different than the way I want to live. I want to stroll through my own mental corridors, thinking, reading and day-dreaming without interruption. I want to spend all day poking around on the internet, following interesting trails and satiating my curiosity about unnecessary topics. I want to exercise everyday, shower everyday, take my vitamins everyday, drink plenty of water everyday, and keep my house clean. None of these desires feature regularly in my new life. But still, gratitude persists. Despite six-and-a-quarter hours of sleep every night. Despite the constant presence of sand on the hard-wood floor. Despite the rush-hour bus commute home. Despite poorly styled hair and unkempt toe-nails. Despite the 137 unanswered messages in my email in-box. Gratitude is my bread and butter these days. Because look around you? Nearly everyone is suffering in some small or large way. How have I missed this for so long? Everyone has: a mother undergoing hernia surgery, an aunt who narrowly escaped a ruptured brain aneurism, a son who punched a girl at school, a husband with suspicious lumps in his side, a colleague who’s afraid she's made an irretrievable mistake, a friend who thinks he might not love his partner anymore. There’s no if, only when. When will the strange angels knock on your door? And how will you receive them. Admit them. Admit them. They may bring sorrowful tidings, but they also bring the light.
Labels: Family Life, Rebirth
Friday, July 11, 2008
SHATTERED
We've done it. We've schlepped ourselves and our kids (no sign yet of the 51 boxes) back across the world to where we started - San Francisco - our beloved City by the Bay. We've been here 10 days already, and have experienced very little jet-lag and no culture shock at all. As I suspected, it feels almost as though we never left. The shops and house colors in our neighborhood are the same. Our friends seem unchanged (except for the addition of several small humans to the tribe.) The discourse in our news rags and between people on the street seems eerily familiar. The only big difference is that our flat was pretty crapped up by the tenants - picture us from now through at least next spring hunkered over buckets of solvent while we attempt to remove paint from every light fixture, doorhinge, doorknob, and nail in the joint. Nonetheless, our belongings (which were stored off-site) are pretty much intact, and Lord Limescale (still looking for the right West Coast handle) is an extraordinarily handy fellow, so he has the know-how and chutzpah to repair, replace and repaint our flat to its former glory.
And yet, to borrow a florid phrase from the English, I feel a bit shattered. There is the obvious fact that both our space and our daily routine are fairly chaotic at the moment. But on a deeper level, I feel like I have literally left behind a piece of myself, a shed skin. Like a cartoon shadow, there is something two-dimension and unstable about this new life. For now, it lacks the will or infastructure to stand up on its own.
As we were leaving England, many people wished us "safe travels." This is a common courtesy in America too, but something about the phrasing and consistency of the British wish stuck with me. Traveling is dangerous. When you are out of your home space, the odds are much higher that you will encounter something unexpected, something you aren't prepared to deal with. Every new city, every new form of transportation poses hidden obstacles and threats which must be learned and overcome. Maybe that's why the Odyssey remains Western culture's favorite narrative. Lately, my son has demanded daily that we serve up different versions of this quintessential travel story (mostly with a Giraffe or a Zebra in the lead role). Perhaps his hunger for epic tales reflects his own sense of dislocation, and a need to glorify our travels before he can put them to rest.
More soon. Be well.
And yet, to borrow a florid phrase from the English, I feel a bit shattered. There is the obvious fact that both our space and our daily routine are fairly chaotic at the moment. But on a deeper level, I feel like I have literally left behind a piece of myself, a shed skin. Like a cartoon shadow, there is something two-dimension and unstable about this new life. For now, it lacks the will or infastructure to stand up on its own.
As we were leaving England, many people wished us "safe travels." This is a common courtesy in America too, but something about the phrasing and consistency of the British wish stuck with me. Traveling is dangerous. When you are out of your home space, the odds are much higher that you will encounter something unexpected, something you aren't prepared to deal with. Every new city, every new form of transportation poses hidden obstacles and threats which must be learned and overcome. Maybe that's why the Odyssey remains Western culture's favorite narrative. Lately, my son has demanded daily that we serve up different versions of this quintessential travel story (mostly with a Giraffe or a Zebra in the lead role). Perhaps his hunger for epic tales reflects his own sense of dislocation, and a need to glorify our travels before he can put them to rest.
More soon. Be well.
Labels: Family Life, time
