The Osprey on Christmas Morning

“I know that pain is the most important thing in the universes. Greater than survival, greater than love, greater even than the beauty it brings about. For without pain, there can be no pleasure. Without sadness, there can be no happiness. Without misery there can be no beauty. And without these, life is endless, hopeless, doomed and damned. Adult. You have become adult.”  ~ Harlan Ellison

“One of the challenges with pain—physical or psychic—is that we can really only approach it through metaphor. It can’t be represented the way a table or a body can. In some ways pain is the opposite of language.”  ~ John Green

“I have a duty to speak the truth as I see it and share not just my triumphs, not just the things that felt good, but the pain, the intense, often unmitigated pain. It is important to share how I know survival is survival and not just a walk through the rain.”  ~ Audra Lorde

The wind on Saturday was truly prodigious. Unpleasant, yes, but the old barefoot island hippie boy in me appreciates a big wind, regardless of how it affects me. I remember those winter storms that would roll in from the north, over Florida Bay, and you could see the cold front coming into play with warm air over the Gulfstream. Wow. Talk about turmoil! There was one Christmas morning when I went to visit my dear friend, Barbara, for a Christmas howdy, a world-class hug, some coffee, a joint, and fine conversation. Barbara was a treat, a down-home southern woman from the thick of the South in northern Florida. As I rode my bike north afterwards, one of those northern cold fronts was moving in. I made it as far as the Post Office before the rain came, then had to step inside the lobby to put on my rain poncho. From there it was pure adventure. The climax came as I was crossing open water on the Whale Harbor Bridge. The rain was dense and cold, the wind was as well, and the turbulent clouds hung low over the islands. Just to the north I spotted something moving in and out along the bottom of the cloud layer. I was like WTF. Here I was splattered and battered by the wash of fierce wind and rain, yet there was one other creature out there in the storm with me. When I finally got a good look at it I saw that it was an osprey, surfing on the incoming cold air in a heavy storm. Just like me. Magic at its best and most essential. But today is Monday morning in Taos, New Mexico, and my duty is to emerge from isolation, head out into the thick of a viral pandemic, into the thick of fascist murmurs, to put on my smile and showman’s hat, and sell essential stuff to people who maybe oughtta think about going home as soon as possible. Under my smile and hat I will be covertly fielding severe chronic neck pain, along with depression that carries similar vibes. Poor me, right? Yeh, whatever. But go I must. I’m gonna step out for a smoke first, then come back in for a hot shower. Say, did I tell you that Barbara was a breathtaking beauty? Yeh she was. I wonder where she is now. Sigh. I taught that woman all about black beans and rice. Ciao, chow, whatever.

Peace out, y’all. Goof gloriously.