Reminiscences, Existence, Loss and other Stuff

   It was from a late night talk so long ago with Anne Everest Wojtkowski that I first was able to articulate the strange feeling that I had even as a very young kid that somehow the world was simply to full to grasp. There was just too much out there and never would I get it all. I would never even come close to comprehending enough to be of any use to making the world a better place. She was perhaps the only real genius I've ever spent such quality time with when I was young, foolish, melancholic, confused, neurasthenic, thirsty, directionless...   All qualities, except young, that I still suffer from.
  Anne said to me that she had days where she was so overwhelmed by the vastness of being alive that she could barely get out of bed. I could certainly relate and hearing a confession from someone I respected so much helped ease the discomfort that being acutely aware can burden one with. Especially from someone who dedicated such a colossal amount of her life to work and rarely slept. She normally had boundless energy.
  And all these years later I still get vertiginous thinking about all the books I want to read, (and write) all the concerts to attend, art to view, places to see, girls to kiss, wine to drink, fires to sit by, mountains to climb...   And there is now that terrible realization that I've done more of all those things than I will do in the future.  Please don't detect any self pity or loathing here.  It's just how it all plays out. As Mary Oliver wrote, "Our time is more gone than not."
 And I agree and might add we are only truly free for such a short period.

   So what do I do when I feel that the world is too much to comprehend? Walking helps. And driving. Movement in general. The train to San Diego once brought me back to earth on a day when nothing made sense. Air travel is less effective.
  I try to up my game by increasing my morning walks from four miles to six or seven. It usually takes almost two miles just to slow my breathing and rearrange my thoughts so that my mind coheres and abstractions and anxiety fades. Somewhere Emerson lamented that as one gets older mornings are met with a certain level of depression. He seems to have a point. But I combat the mind-fatigue that hinders my focus upon awaking by getting moving as quick as I can. Most days it works. The sooner I find myself sauntering near the beach the easier it is to think right.
  I've had a period lately of early rising. No matter what time I get to bed I'm up before sunrise. And I'm not usually well rested. My sleep patterns are askance. The mornings have been misty and I stroll to the harbor accompanied by the mournful fog horn, the sound from which mysteriously seems to come from everywhere. Somehow this is both comforting and melancholy. Why this is I don't really know. But like most mornings I have more than enough other whys to ponder.
  Why, for instance, am I not on a few month break someplace peaceful finishing my book?  I honestly can't come up with a decent answer to that one.

   Entropy was another word I first heard up at the house on 85 Ridge ave.  It took me a long time to understand what it meant. And after years of meditating on it I'm perhaps a little closer to understanding the basic idea. It's a subtle concept. It explains how a closed system ultimately reaches its maximum state of disorder. (And to think that our universe is a closed system is a mind numbing thought.)
  And all change is the result this transition from order to disorder. This is what the second law of thermodynamics talks about.
  My physics teacher friend unleashed a lifetime of contemplation for me with that one fascinating word, entropy. I can't remember what book she was referring to that afternoon but Anne was passionate about the concept.
  As the Buddha so famously muttered, "All compound things are subject to decay." Which is as real to me as my own heart on those mornings when I wake up shaky and feeling like I'm rusting from the inside out.



  Nature abounds with metaphor. If one only looks close enough. Or sometimes the metaphor crashes down when you least expect it. When I pulled into the driveway at the house in Wawona this past July the first thing Ellie told me was that the old tree along the path to the swinging bridge had fallen.
  I've had my eye on this dead tree for close to thirty years now. The first time I saw it, with its rotting trunk and needle-less crumbling branches, I surmised that it most likely wouldn't make it through another winter storm. Little did I know. I found myself saying the same thing year after year after year. Stubbornly that old pine held its ground. And I began to wonder if that smooth grey trunk would outlast me.
  In a way it will. It takes a tree about as long to decompose as it did to live. Most of these pines live a hundred or so years. I'm guessing I'll be long gone by the time the forces of nature return that massive slab of wood back into its original mineral components. I imagine it has at least fifty years of slowly decaying away to look forward to. The odds of me walking that dusty path fifty years from now are zero. But such is existence.
  So early the next morning Ellie, Emma, and I go to inspect the remains. The giant fell parallel to the trail where some year in the future when bacteria and the elements have left nothing but a slight mound of nutrient rich soil Spring flowers will bloom more abundantly where the trunk now lies.
  But for now it is still mostly hardwood. Eventually time and decay (ENTROPY!) will complete an eons old process. Life and then death and then new life sprouting out of the detritus that was once a grand and majestic tree that saw many turnings of the seasons.
  It is odd that I was flooded with thoughts of my own mortality on that beautiful morning while hiking with two of my best friends' young daughters. The girls are laughing and energetic without worldly cares. They are smart, happy and witty. And me musing darkly about extinguishment. Of course I kept my brooding to myself and told the girls stories of past hikes and all the sights we were going to see in the next few days.
  After an afternoon of lazy lounging and a massive dinner accompanied by exquisite bottles of wine my mood shifted. Gone were the thoughts of my own final days as our conversations swelled around our mutual love and appreciation of life's more generous offerings. We laughed late into the night as corks popped at regular intervals. Pak kept all our glasses topped off until one by one we drifted off to our rooms.
  The last half an hour it was just Pak and I and, like always, we rehashed our good fortunes. When I finally made it to my room, the same room that I had last year, I had a pang of loneliness. The bed seemed slightly too big and too empty.

   A few days later we are hiking down from the top of Sentinel Dome. Six kids and seven adults. Pak and I are the last in line.  Our group is scattered in front of us. It is a pristine day and the views from the summit were splendid. We lounged on top for almost an hour.
  Pak and I talk about our old plan to spend a night on top of the dome. We know it's against park regulations but for some reason we feel an exception could be made for us. We have lost track of how many times we've made this hike. I'm guessing it's close to twenty.
  Pak and I know how to leave no footprint.  We wouldn't need much for our camp; light sleeping bags and ground pads, a tiny stove for soup and tea, nuts and fruit, water, a fleece, a headlamp and not much else. We've been talking about this for years and one day it just might happen.
  Pak then reminds me that this would also be a good place to have our ashes spread. We've talked of this before as well. This is also probably against park policy but I imagine it's unenforceable.
  "Me first I hope." I say with all sincerity.
  "That would be unbearable." Says Pak with deep emotion.
  We walk in silence for a minute and once again I am struck by how lucky I am to have such a friend.
  So I commit to having half of my ashes flung from that summit to mingle with (in the far future) Pak's. I'm pretty sure we are both serious.
 And the other half? I always wanted them somewhere on Mount Greylock. On the trail between Stoney Ledge and the summit. Mide has talked about having his ashes spread up there too.
  I expect someone (Joanna? Ellie?) to hike the Appalachian Trail (or better yet, the Hopper Trail) and on a secluded bend in the path in an appropriate grove of hardwoods to cast what's left of me to the mountain air. And also I'd like to leave a small vial for Ellie.  I'd also like her to have the old iPod with thousands of songs on it.
  But as I've said, I hope this is a long time from now.

These are the tears of things,
and the stuff of mortality
 cuts us to the heart.         Virgil


We, Los and me, were speeding across the desert on the way to Vegas. Los likes to keep the X5 right around 95 or so which means we were making pretty good time. We were looking forward to our traditional lunch at Spago and meeting up with Julie and Makima. Grace would be flying in tomorrow too.
  We had tickets for Dead and Company at the MGM. All of a sudden my phone started lighting up. Gregg Allman RIP.  Whew...  I had to catch my breath.  As I've written elsewhere celebrity deaths usually don't affect me. Garcia, Vonnegut, Hitchens, Lennon, (I was unable to go to classes the next day.) Harrison (Both George and Jim) all shook me for different particular reasons. And now I have to add Gregg to this list.
 The Allman Brothers was the first rock concert I saw. They played the now torn down Springfield Civic Center. 1979. Enlightened Rouges just came out and the band was riding high. That album has been part of my life's soundtrack. Those songs bring me back to a wild time in my life.
 Over the years I'd caught the band whenever I could; SPAC, Hollywood, The SB Bowl, the Arlington, and they never failed to live up to their reputation.
 We drove through the heat of the Mojave in silence for a while. Then I played some ABB and inadequately tried to explain to Los what it all meant to me. Like he always does he tolerated my rambling stories.
I'm generally an optimist. I always think there's going to be one more glass of champagne, one more sunset, one more kiss, one more concert. But I'm also a realist. All things must pass and usually they pass too soon. Now that voice is gone forever. That unique sound of soul/rock/blues will never be heard again. But at least we had it. And loved it because is satisfied the sadness and melancholy in our own hearts of sorrow.
 The day went as planed, pretty much. We wandered the Strip, had a late lunch, took a break in our 51st floor suite at the Encore overlooking the pools and the Wynn.  Then we met Makima at the MGM for the concert. It was opening night of the tour and the energy in the casino was electric. The show was solid. But "the moment" came during the encore, Knockin on Heaven's Door. A few minutes into the song the big screen behind the stage showed an old picture of Gregg singing, his long blond hair hanging down. There was a collective sigh from the audience. And then I looked around and saw many many tears, my own included. I would guess that ninety percent of the people at the MGM that night had seen the Allman Brothers. The band, all of who knew Gregg, never flinched. In fact, Oteil, the bassist, was the ABB's last bass player. It was a beautiful eulogy.

  All these things are a continuation of a love story. And as Gregg used to sing so beautifully,  "Sail on. Sail away..."