Walking Away From The River

Walking away from the river was one of the hardest things that I have had to do in quite some time. It wasn't the walking away as much as moving where I had to go. Back to work to earn my pay. I was leaving the tumbling water of the Pere Marquette river. I was vanishing from the startling autumnal color change of the riverbank landscape I had spent the day on. I no longer could feel the rhythm of the fly rod and reel and the drift of the line. No longer feel alive with tension and excitement as a salmon battled for its place in my mind. Even the day-long misting in the air that filled the day was gone. No longer drifting down the river with the current, watching the beautiful scenery of the pristine Michigan north country slowly, like slow motion, flow by. Already the memories of the salmon caught were going to start toward the distant, fading place in my mind that memories congregate. Even the sounds of the people loading boats and the generators at the campsites and the trucks pulling the boats seemed out-of-place from where I had been.

I was feeling joyous and darkly strange. I think it has to be that I am blessed with this life and able to embrace and love it. Fortunate to be in love and feel loved and to soar above pain and loss and feeling sorry for myself. I knew it was real, but it felt miraculously surreal. Dreamlike. I was leaving one moment and entering another.

But I had pictures on the camera to prove that the moment I was leaving had been real. Pictures that just hinted at the real mysterious glee that was in my heart that day. I can look to the smiles and the waders and the fish in the pictures and remember. I remember so much more than they depict. I remember.

And soon, I will walk away from work to a river again.

Kind of Sucked

Had a rough last few days. Seems that happens at times when you engage and participate in this world. Most of my rough visions involved my officiating youth football.

Dumb coaches that don’t know the rules. How many times do I have to tell them that the rules for high school football are not the same as college and the NFL. They may play their youth games on Sunday but they play under different rules.

Did not hear a single positive coaching voice from the sidelines. If we screamed at our own 4th and 5th grade children like some of these coaches, they would take them away from us. What happened to coaching? The definition of coaching to me is watching the game played and observing the young athletes and offering how they can improve their play. Not to degrade and humiliate them in front of their peers.

What happens next when that doesn’t take place -- happened Sunday. The kids started blaming each other and their bullying continued. I even tried to explain to one 6th grader how you couldn’t talk like that to his "own" players and his opponents. He mocked me by repeating in “that” sarcastic voice exactly what I said. I promptly hit him (and his team) with an 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. I then took the time and explained what he did to his coaches. He remained in the game without any attitude adjustment efforts by his coaches. I wouldn’t have played a snap after that if I had lipped off to an official. The coaches held you accountable for your actions in my youth. You don’t hurt your team and get away unscathed.

One young man broke his ankle. I knew he was hurt by the string of profanity being screamed. I didn’t know that a 7th grader could string that many profane words together so easily. He had obviously done it before because he was good at it.

The EMS that came for him seamed to saunter in slow motion to help him. They really sauntered. This kid was in pain and he needed to get to a hospital and get treated. Quickly. You don’t call emergency personnel to a injury scene to get you to some help…slowly.

Same game. Another ambulance. This time a concussion and a prone player on the sidelines. And I had to keep telling the coaches that they couldn’t coach the kids while they were getting this kid to the hospital. They actually could think of something to say to their team that was more important than that young man laid-out on the sidelines.

I grow more and more disenchanted with grown-ups that haven’t grown-up. I understand more and more why my wise wife likes to be quietly left alone.

Listen to Time

“Enjoy life freely, O Babur, for none enjoy it twice”.
--Babur, King of Kabul

Have you had a similar conversation with yourself like ancient Uzbekistanian Babur had during his life? I sure have, and I, like the king, need to remind myself to enjoy my time.

Also, I think that you can actually hear time when you really listen. You can hear whispers of memory. When you think of someone, can you hear what they sounded like? Is the voice of a person embedded in the brain as well as their physical image? When you look at a picture of lilacs, can’t you hear their rustle as well as smell their scent? I probably would sneeze.

Likewise, when I pet a dog, I feel every dog I have ever stroked. I really can't even control the urge to reach out and pet dogs. It's irresistible. I can smell the dog, the cedar shavings, the living companions of my past. I can see my children with puppies playing around them, sharing the joy of each other. Puppies enjoying children, children enjoying puppies. Hounds trailing game. Snow on the ground. Stiff winter breeze and the smell of December. I need to keep gathering these sensations for as long as I can.

So I am going to go out and continue to add memories, moments and experiences so that time will be captured. Why if a powerful ruler of a nation had to remind himself to enjoy life and not let it slip away, I can do the same.

Hear the voice of old Babur from across the ages.

My duty is to listen or his words would have been recorded in vain.

Kidnapped Brain

"You think to hard".
That is what my friend told me after reading my past blog posts.

Really. I was slightly taken aback by this. But he was definitely right.

I guess what I am really trying to do is chase away all these deep demons that lurk in the back of my mind. Not demons that are leading me into temptation, but ones trying to confuse me whenever my mind starts to get still.

Mitch thinks: "Beautiful sunset". Mind is kidnapped and takes off at a sprint with: "Why is there a sun and a moon and a universe and was it created by God or is it just a illusion and why is that color so pleasing and what does it all mean..."

Really. That is why I try to keep my mind focused on new tasks and interesting hobbies. I need to have a constant visual flow from my senses to my brain to keep it congested so the merging, disruptive "hard thinking" has trouble taking over the time scape of my existence. I sometimes joke that I think I may have a form of ADHD, and that is why I have these intense out of body mind adventures when I sit down and write out my thoughts.

The best part about this is that it has yet to effect the joy that I take from living every single day that I wake up on the right side of the grass.

I wonder, am I like other people in this way?

Now about grass, do you suppose God...

Great Stories

Tell me a story.
In this century, and moment, of mania,
Tell me a story.
Make it a story of great
Distances, and starlight.
The name of the story will be Time,
But you must not pronounce its name.

--Robert Penn Warren

Look around you these days in the media and all you seem to see and hear are various cautionary news stories. In newspapers and magazines. Radio. TV news broadcasts. Web sites. All are filled with stories that would break your heart. Some that may make you rejoice. Many will make you cry if you have a heart. Read most of them and the root of them seem to be fear. Fear of unknown risks, our own government, terrorism, and the predator next door.

But where are the great stories, the great discoveries, and the universal truths? Where are the great revelations that stir passions in the souls of man? Our children are hungry. Our young men are dying in deserts trying to bring peace to citizens in the face of those that wish nothing but the turmoil of war, violence and repression. These times seem destructively serpentine--a snake appearing to wish nothing more than swallow its own tail while strangling mankind.

I suspect that time will reveal to the next generations the greatness of the people that live now, as it revealed to our generation what WWII veterans gave the world, what Martin Luther King risked for equality and what a lone man standing in front of a tank did at Tienanmen Square.

A child will be on a knee, somewhere in the future, hearing a story that is about a time before. I hope that it could be me to tell them. And hopefully they can be great ones like the ones I have heard.