Note: this was a year ago today. And yesterday, the swallows dipping over me as I swam…
Last night the full moon (the Full Buck Moon, one of the 4 supermoons of this year, when the moon’s orbit is closest to earth) kept me awake for ages. It hovered out the south window by my bed, like a lantern in the tall Douglas fir the bear mother sent her cub up a month ago when they saw me watching them. It hovered and there was no point drawing the curtains — they’re white linen and moonlight comes through them as bright as anything. I lay awake and thought. I thought of the long essay–well, a book, really–that I’ve been revising. I’ve described the book here. Yesterday, talking about it with John, I suddenly said, I forgot about Frank! He was puzzled until I told him about another painter, one who’d worked at the same place as me in southwest London and who was, true to form, much older than me, who’d asked me to take off my clothes when I was 21, first giving me a beautiful lunch first in Wimbledon with a glass of Château d’Yquem to follow, then the request. I was spared more of Frank’s attention because I was suddenly called home to Canada. I don’t share this with any kind of vanity or pride. I was foolish, I didn’t always make the best decisions, and in the essay I am careful not to let myself off any hooks. I’d forgotten about Frank so I spent part of the day writing a section about that period. I was thinking about that when the cat trilled at the side of the bed, wanting out. I thought until the moon made its journey to the west, out of sight. The morning came early.
Mostly I try to go for my swim before 8:00. I’m almost always the only one in the water, with John reading on a bench nearby. (He’s having a reaction to swimmer’s itch these days so reluctantly doesn’t join me in the lake.) This morning, with one thing or another, we didn’t go down until after 9 and the parking lot was half-full. The prospect of doing my meditative swim between the big cedars at either end of the little beach, back and forth, back and forth, an eagle overhead sometimes, swallows dipping over the surface for mayflies, dragonflies skimming the water, anyway, the prospect of others around had me say, Let’s just go home. Maybe we’ll go in the evening though it’s not the same. A morning swim energizes me for the day, both physically and mentally, because I think in the water too, deep thinking, working my way through writing issues, personal dilemmas, even new ways to cook kale.
A supermoon, an abandoned swim, and now some smoky haze in air that has been so clean and clear for the past weeks. One thing doesn’t always lead to another. The days don’t go as planned. An essay begun to work out my feelings about something that happened 45 years ago, with ripples that continued for years, even continue now, has grown to include Frank. I’ve watered the greenhouse with its two new olive trees and the cucumber boxes and now at my desk, I am wondering about the future. I am working hard on something I will probably never publish but I need to get it right. I need to swim to keep the workings of my mind clear and nimble. A polished red branch of arbutus has meandered into view.
You’re in your body like a plant is solid in the ground,
yet you’re the wind. You’re the diver’s clothes
lying empty on the beach. You’re the fish.In the ocean are many bright strands
and many dark strands like veins that are seen
when a wing is lifted up. (Rumi)
The undersides of the swallow wings are creamy, the dragonfly wings are tiny stained glass windows. Looking through them, you see the sky or the water, depending. Today I am the diver’s clothes, empty on the beach, no swimmer in sight, and the past, oh the past! It happened so long ago.
...Theresa Kishkan 