Level

NSP Meditations, Oregon Beaches , , , , ,

I cruised the beach north to the South Jetty on a bright weekday morning, just after dawn. I was the only one around, not counting the gulls, which I don’t.

Something orange caught my eye and I moved toward it. Most likely, a child’s sand shovel. Hopefully, not a dildo like the last time I found orange on the beach.

I dislodged the object from the sand—neither child nor adult toy. It was a level, a cracked-in-half level, but an operational level nonetheless.

A level! I love levels. In fact, it is about the only handyman tool I know how to use because a human being can’t really make a mistake with it. Just read the bead and go from there. The mistakes come after reading.

Here I was at sea level and I discovered a level. In my 20 years of rambling the Oregon Coast’s socialist beaches, this was easily my greatest find. The dildo is probably seventh or eighth.

I did a little jig, continued my walk, and soon got the idea to apply the level to everything in my path: driftlogs, driftwoood rounds, forts, cairns, rocks, the jetty, an empty bottle of Russian vodka and more. I was mad to use my level! And let me tell you something fascinating: nothing around me was level. Absolutely nothing! My level proved that.

The use of the level instigated some uneven wordplay in my mind. At one point, I stopped walking, sat down, played with my level, and leveled out the wordplay into practical consideration and perhaps even metaphorical application.

Who has been on the level with me?

Who have I not leveled with?

Who wants to level with me?

Have I leveled with myself?

How many degrees am I off level in my life right now?

Who or what can help me become level?

Is there such a thing as a great leveler?

Do I want to live on level ground?

Can you create art on even ground?

Why is level such a sweet sounding word?

What level is Level 6?

The Leveling is a great name for a moody rock band.

How about a science fiction novel where a society evolves on uneven ground and comes into conflict with a society that evolved on level ground?

Do dogs prefer to romp on level ground?

Is there a poem or pop song associated with level?

How in the world did this orange level come to rest in the sand on this beach?

It was time to go, eat breakfast with the gulls, and build my super fort.

I would not use the level in the fort’s construction and I would not leave it behind to possibly delight someone else. I was taking it home for my writing studio where I could watch the bead and continue to ponder the meaning of level.

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Bonnie and Clyde Files 21

Bonnie and Clyde Files, NSP Correspondents , , , , ,

I met Jacque, founder and resident secular saint of the Angels for Sara Sanctuary at the front gate. She ushered Bonnie and Clyde out with ten or so yapping dogs behind her. She rescued them all from certain death and their victory song was sweet music indeed.

Clyde beelined for the trunk of my car, ravenous for treats, while Bonnie sniffed around some lawn gnomes.

Jacque and I discussed the phenomenal success of the sanctuary’s recent rummage sale. I told her she was an inspiration to me and thanked her for allowing me to spend time with Bonnie and Clyde. I tried to describe how they have helped sustain my spirit in the darkest period of my life and nurtured my creative mind.

I also told Jacque that I probably wouldn’t be around this winter to walk with the dogs in rain along the river. Then again, maybe I will. Perhaps in some sense, I will always be walking Bonnie and Clyde along the Lewis and Clark River, retaining the invaluable lessons and insights that unfolded with my crew, and put them to good work in the wider tiny world I’ll be inhabiting most likely for the rest of my life.

Jacque thanked me for my effort on behalf of Bonnie and Clyde and the rummage sale. She then produced two jars of homemade blackberry jam as a token of appreciation.

This is the way the world needs to operate: saving dogs, saving people, saving rivers, and blackberry concoctions and blackberry confections as reward. Who wants to create that country with me?

I noticed a new old dog behind Jacque and asked about it.

She informed that, Jane, a 17-year-old Australian shepherd’s owners had died, and relatives couldn’t keep her. A landlord had said the dog had to go.

The sanctuary took in Jane but Jacque had quickly found a foster home so Jane could live out the rest of her life in comfort. She was shipping out tomorrow. I asked who had adopted the dog and Jacque mentioned a name and said she worked at the Clatsop County Jail.

I know who she is She was one of my jailers and showed incredible compassion toward me and my fellow inmates. After my release, I wrote her a letter of thanks, particularly for one distinct look exchanged between us that indicated she understood. That exchange also involved her coming out from behind a rolling cart and handed me a lunch tray that contained what I would soon create as the worst cheese sandwich in America, but she came out nonetheless, handed my meal over, and that meant everything.

That look, that handing over is how the world should operate. The deputy deserves something blackberry, too.

Jacque had to go and we said our goodbyes. Bonnie and Clyde and I trekked through the pasture to the river. It was a hot morning on the North Oregon Coast and I slowed down my pace for the dogs. I wanted to run, but they just can’t handle the exertion.

We reached the river’s edge. I fed the dogs treats and then Bonnie flopped down in the water and Clyde flopped down in the high grass on the bank. I sat down.

Movement below me, in the river, caught my eye. I stood up and took two steps to investigate.

Hundreds of wild salmon fry (not fake hatchery brood) darted around in the shaded areas of the water. Later they would become fingerlings, rear for a couple of years as they moved down the watershed, interacting and changing with saltwater. They would transform into smolts, then make the perilous run down the Columbia River to the ocean. Perhaps a couple years later, with luck, they would return to the streams of their births, spawn, fertilize eggs in the gravel, die, decompose and nourish the watershed; the anadromous cycle at work in all its evolutionary glory.

Whenever I witness the cycle, and I feel lucky to have seen it several times, the sight never ceases to astonish and connect me to my role in the watershed—my religion as it were—the oldest one in human existence, the one with no sacred texts, prescribed hierarchies, pulpits or pews.

This religion seems so obvious to me, even more so by the river. You can hold it in your hands and wash it into your face.

For some reason, I remembered something my father, an ex preacher, has always suggested (not preached) to me. A line from the Old Testament, not sure what book: “Cast your bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days.”

Why that particular passage entered my mind at this particular moment was strange to me. Perhaps water was the connection.

Bread upon the waters. Cast your bread upon the waters. What is the bread I have to cast at this disrupted, marginalized time in my life? Where is the water?If I do cast, will I find the bread after many days? Could be years, decades. Never.

I can’t give up. There is bread still within my soul. I’m still baking.

A swallow dived across the surface of the water. Then another. I reached into my pocket and felt around: one treat left. Okay, I thought to myself, extend the metaphor, make it more corporeal, watch one unfold in real time. Use that damn Bible! You’re an ex-preacher’s kid!

I cast the treat into the river. It began to drift slowly downstream. Where would it end up?

A sound emanated behind me. I turned. Clyde had splashed into the water! He gimped ten feet and wolfed down the treat!

The bread metaphor just leavened a bit more.

“You damn treat hound!” I roared. Then I laughed and I heard my laughter echo lightly downriver.

Clyde rolled out his tongue Rolling Stones-style and returned to shore. I gave him a rub on the side and we three headed home. We skipped along together and the swallows dropped in to escort us.

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Fort Chivalry Part 2

Driftwood Forts, NSP Meditations, Oregon Beaches , , , , , , ,

Someone or some people or some entity had completely repurposed my super fort in a design totally unknown to me. I circled it slowly, inspecting, touching. Three massive pillars of driftwood were sunk deep upright into the sand and supported the entire structure. It was one of the biggest forts I’d ever seen. Ten people could comfortably commune, foment revolution, vape or drink Rainier inside. It couldn’t possibly have been built by a single person. There had to be a crew in a febrile state to build!

There was no front entrance, and in fact, a little fence of sticks and large fire pit (moat?) five feet deep protected the front of the fort.

I took a pathway lined with with sticks and stones and entered the fort from the rear. In the sand, in the very middle, rested my beloved bleached round of driftwood with its 168 rings. A round table adorned with a sand dollar, charred piece of wood, rock and a shell, everything seemingly arranged with mysterious intent.

This round probably weighs close to 400 pounds. It had been moved approximately ten yards from its previous position the morning before.

I sat down at the table and broke out breakfast. I would feast upon the table.

My mind began assembling a dream: an ancient round table inside a driftwood fort. The Knights of the Round of the Fort Table! With a beaver stick, I dubbed the fort “Fort Chivalry” and also dubbed myself a knight. I drank deeply from my plastic chalice and worked on a secret handshake.

Then I noticed it, to my left. I went over and handled the goods: notebook paper, a couple sheets, damp, with blue lines bleeding down the page. There wasn’t a writing utensil around.

I immediately divined that someone or some entity left this notebook paper behind at a magisterial fort repurposed from my super fort in order to communicate with me.

I sensed a seduction in play.

Why not? Clearly, fort masters of exalted quality had left their mark here. They had earned my respect.

I whipped out an OTA Keno pencil (my favored writing utensil of late) and wrote on the paper:

Knights of the Fort Table

Make Your Oath Here:

I pledge to honor the ocean.

I pledge to never stop building.

I weighed down the paper, left the Keno pencil tucked under the charred wood, and walked out of the fort. The smoke and fog seemed denser. I used another pencil and piece of wood to rig up a sign for the fort. I aimed for the South Jetty and began throwing chunks of watermelon at the gulls. I laid down a trail like I always do with bread, cheese and apple wedges. They always follow. I desperately wanted one to follow me this morning so I could write the first (and probably only) sentence in the history of world literature about a gull who who ate fresh crab and watermelon for breakfast on a smoke-filled, foggy beach.

Not a single gull followed.

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Fort Chivalry Part 1

Driftwood Forts, NSP Meditations, Oregon Beaches , , , , , , ,

I approached the super fort I’d labored off and on for almost a month, most recently 24 hours ago. It kept rising and rising, spreading and spreading, like the construction of a new battleship in dry dock.

It was a few minutes past dawn. While Astoria slumbers, I build forts. I brought along a breakfast of black coffee, hard boiled eggs and chunks of watermelon.

Visibility on the beach in the smoke and fog measured a football field, at most. Gulls ripped apart crab (some of it still writhing) at the wrack line. It’s a crab festival every morning for the gulls and they are fattening up. They gorge and gorge and then seem to fall asleep on their feet. I’ve even seen one fall over!

I kept building this battleship of meditation with my own hands, in silence, alone, in the early mornings, trying to empty my mind but typically failing. I had placed cairns around the fort, decorated it with feathers, shells, bookmarks, buttons, pennies, paper clips, buoys and rope. I had taken my cousin from LA to the fort and unnerved (in a good way) his quasi Christian soul with its Zen metaphors. I was going to keep building this super fort until it transcended mere super fort status (if any fort can be “mere”) and entered the pantheon of truly mind blowing driftwood forts on the Oregon Coast.

This fort had no name—yet.

There were four other forts in the pantheon that I knew of for sure. Two I had helped build. One I had discovered. One had harbored a vision from a Henry Miller novel. Undoubtedly others existed, but I had never seen them and never would.

My super fort came into hazy view. I came in closer. I passed two gulls who barely moved. Their eyes were shut. Then I stopped. I might have even taken a step backward.

It wasn’t my fort. It had been utterly remade.

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Bumblebees and Butterflies

NSP Meditations , , , , , ,

My gaze was transfixed by a clump of vegetation rooted in the sand distinguished by its tiny purple and white flowers. The flowers attracted bumblebees and butterflies. This was happening near my super fort.

So I sat on the beach and watched while I ate my breakfast. There was nothing else to do.

Such is life when you’ve just passed submitting 60 job applications and can’t get a job. That’s a statement of fact, not woe or lament. To rally, I start over every morning at the ocean and wait for a new kind of wave to roll in and take me somewhere new. That’s a fact, too.

I am more bumblebee man than butterfly man, but I could have sworn the butterfly was Oregon’s state butterfly, the monarch. Never before had I seen one on the beach. It is something beautifully incongruous to behold. It’s not supposed to be there, but there it was. I wish more people were like that., including myself.

If indeed it was a monarch, I sat on sacred socialist Oregon sand, near Oregon’s official state structure, the driftwood fort (constructed from wood produced by Oregon’s official state animal, the beaver), watched Oregon’s state butterfly, had Oregon’s official state sea shell, the hairy triton, in my pocket, while a jogger hauling like Steve Prefontaine, Oregon’s official state athlete, ran through the surf.

I damn near overdosed on Oregon right there.

Then a hummingbird whizzed by and went to the flowers!

I got dizzy, stood up, backed up a bit, then passed out, but thankfully, inside the fort. All was safe there.

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Foggy Revelations at the Fort

Driftwood Forts, NSP Meditations, Oregon Beaches , , , , , ,

Three hundred gulls feast on crab stranded on a weird high tide where the sand is banked at almost a 45-degree angle to the ocean, the “face” of a beach I think scientists call it. Face of the beach. I like the sound of that.

Fog envelops the beach, thick, quarter mile visibility at most. I can’t see the ocean but I hear the rumble. There’s a rumble going on.

I find a sand dollar and it reminds me of her. I leave the sand dollar behind and begin walking into the fog. Ten, 20, 30 yards, and the lessons slowly materialize. It’s a curious sensation to walk into thick fog and realize that things are becoming crystal clear. Clear as in what I must let go in my life.

So much already released this past year that I can’t list them anymore. To list them would mean they haven’t truly gone away.

It wasn’t enough, I see that now, in this fog.

There is the ultimate of letting go, not of hope, of aspiration, of dreaming, of someone, but of a Plan. Plans are useless to me. It is all about improvisation, responding with jazzy movements to turns of events or non-events. How do you improvise when nothing happens? When there is no ensemble playing with you? When there is no audience to take cues where to take a performance?

And there are no improvisations possible on an old performance.

I sit down and pull out a blue book and pen from my backpack and begin to write about the total extinction of myself, to release that one great thing that brings me the most terrible suffering—a Plan.

This writing emanates from the fog while I sit on an ancient driftwood round with 168 rings near a fort I built that virtually no one in the world would understand why I had to build. There was no plan in it, I assure you. I built with what I found around me, could reach, what drifted down from the watersheds without any plan of its own. Driftwood is like that.

Am I becoming human driftwood?

I think I just asked the greatest existential question of my life.

The fort will disappear with the next high tide. I’ll build a new one tomorrow morning, some unplanned, momentary concrete thing out of certain evanescence. Why build? I don’t know—yet. I do have my suspicions.

Note: I write this in a drizzle. The paper is damp. Already the ink is fading.

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