A long overdue apology

Blinded by Wrath

Dear President Bush,

I write to you today to apologize for wronging you in my thoughts for many years. For excoriating you with the most bitter and hateful thoughts I could muster. I apologize for hating you because, as I saw it, you invoked war and destruction on innocent people.

Eventually, I came to understand that whatever sins I may have attributed to you live within me as well. That, by succumbing to Wrath, I was your brother in folly.

And thus, we being brothers, I can no longer hate you.

God is great.

Please forgive me, my brother.

Sincerely,
Dade Ross Cariaga

Humbled by life

Things work out

Of late, I've come into the habit of believing that everything is going to be okay.

Somehow. In spite of everything.

It happens that way for people like me. Peace just pops up out of nowhere, overwhelming one's worries. Revealing them as absurd. Like laughter in the face of bigotry.

In mirror of more agitated states, I'm overcome with emotion quite suddenly. As I walk through Creswell Park, tossing peanuts to the crows. As I lay at night beside my wife, watching her shoulder rise and fall with her breathing. In thoughtful moments at the office, watching the nesting mother honker from my window as she sits her eggs next the parking lot.

But nowadays the emotion is joy. Is relief. Is gratitude. Rather than panic or despair.

Life is easier this way. And I know how lucky I am. The world is full of people who will never in all their lives know this kind of peace. Many people. All the way from here to Kabul, Afghanistan. And that breaks my heart.

But things work out. Things work out.

Birthday wish

I wish my thoughts were long, long thoughts,
Like sunset shadows cast on lawns
Or chasms spanning dusks to dawns

I wish my thoughts were vast and wide
Like filmy slicks spread on waters
Where inky squids birth inky daughters

I wish my thoughts were tried and true
Like timeless music with no beat
That everyone would know by heart

But Leonard Cohen I'll never be
So God please be good to my wife
Give what peace can be had in this life

Ritual

Old Man Hood

I have this little ritual.  An old friend I turn to in all times --kind and cruel, feast and famine.  Nothing so grand or reassuring as the Catholic Mass, but it's come to serve me well enough over the years. 

I take me up to Mount Tabor, to the top of the rounded old pate, and I stand by the Julija Laenen bench and pay homage to Old Man Hood.  I study him.  I try to fathom his intentions.  Of course it's hopeless, but I never tire of trying.  In winter, he often does not deign to show himself.
 

Witches' work?

From there, I go to visit the sapling white oak.  I have so much hope for this tree.  It's a gift that we, the people of Portland today, are giving to the people of Portland in the many decades to come.

On this day, ashes and crow feathers, carefully arranged around the slender bole.   My ritual intersects with another's, then.  Might it be the witches?

View from the Edgar Francis Conant park bench

The Edgar Francis Conant park bench affords a westward view out onto the canopy of my home.  A nearly straight shot down Hawthorne Boulevard.  The soil in which I've been planted.

In memory of Frank Conant and his dog, Rusty

My ritual is complete when I burn some incense at the feet of good Mr. Harvey Scott.  I'm sure, were he to speak, Mr. Scott would have some interesting tales to tell.  I chased an Irish sprite up this mountain, once.  But I caught her before she reached the top.  So, Harvey Scott didn't see us.  He's seen plenty, though.  Believe me.

In the pride of my youth, I would mock ritual as a crutch for the weak.  But years will change perspectives.

Submission is not weakness.  Submission is strength.  I've come to know that.

Happy little time

Remember, remember. Make note of times like these!

The garden is doing well.  Our blueberries are but a few days from producing record bounty.  We'll have squash and tomatoes next month.  The raspberries have been tart and plentiful and --who knows? --we may even have watermelons by September!

We've got a nice relaxing road trip through Oregon and Northern California in our near future to look forward to, as well as a couple big, exciting international voyages further out.

The new kitchen still looks great, and the new paint makes the house look --well, maybe not young; she's 97 years old after all --but fine, happy.  She's a happy house on the inside and the new paint makes her outside look happy too.

It's a happy little time we've got right now, my love. Let's savor it. Let's let it linger. We don't know what we'll find a little further up the path.  But it's a happy little time, right now.

Springtime thoughts

The young year's sun is stark and pale. Menacing and actual as inevitable disaster.  But a thing distant enough that panic may be forestalled.  For a time.

These are today the sounds that buoy you out of your nascent slumber, that lift you into awareness:  the hushed lament of the wind in the boughs of Douglas-fir and hemlock; blithe, frolicking songs of warblers.   You will live within that spectrum.  As have I.

In the sunlight, dreaming of how conversations might go.  Or what if I had given her a book?  Or what if he were to ask me something at a time when I could answer?

Silly thoughts, those.  Across the river, the golden promise of spring enlightens the crowns of the West Hills.

Home for now.  I'll be back, my young friend.  For a little while.  And if, in your glorious future, you remember a dim, warm shadow that loved you as you slept, it is more than enough.

Mount Tabor sunsets

A sunset is a beckoning. A call. A gesture toward a mystery we cannot conceive. Just a few of the fabulous events I have beheld from the top of Mount Tabor. In chronological order.

February 8, 2010

On this day, up until the moment I beheld this sunset, my mind was occupied with thoughts of Sarah Palin.  She melted away when I saw that bright orange scar of light silhouetting Council Crest.

January 25, 2011

Cold and dry on this day.  The clouds seemed to spiral out from the sun.  An infinitesimal fractal of the Milky Way, spiraling out from the chaos of the Galactic Center.  President Obama was finishing up his State of the Union address on this day.

September 27, 2011

I wrote a little post about this sunset.  A farewell to summer:  Sunset eulogy.

October 3, 2011

This sunset was the perfect antidote to appalling revelations about Rick Perry from Texas.

December 2, 2011

Although Governor Kitzhaber spared the life of the murderer Gary Haugen, it is certain that Haugen will never see a sunset like this one.  I wonder, could a creature like Haugen be immune to it?  I doubt it.

March 22, 2012

On this day, the sunset underwent an amazing transformation.

March 22, 2012

This is the same sunset a few minutes later.

Watching a sunset, one can sense a wisdom underlying the foundations of human reality.  We can't conceive it.  Solace comes from simply knowing that it is there.

Everything comes apart

Spun around the orb enough times to know.
Everything comes apart in time, in time.

Foundations bend, foundations do crumble--
Rain melts clay men shaped with love and care.

Roseate dawns birth hope and joy and fear.
Dusky sunsets evoke both grief and peace.

You can't hold it against anybody.
Not you nor he nor anybody else.

There's no mystery, no puzzle at all.
Worlds will fall my friend.  Worlds will ever fall.

Springtime ramble

Firwood Lake in Laurelhurst looks much healthier since the renovation

Troubled world. Racial tensions are running high because of that thing that happened in Florida.  Republicans savage one another, each striving to prove he hates more bitterly than does his rival.  Cheney continues to exist.  Villainy appears ascendant.

Same pond 2010:  Looks like pea soup

In spite of all that, things are pretty good here in the Rose City.  The water in Firwood Lake looks healthy.  There are ducks, but not too many.  In years past, folks would feed them bread.  I did it a few times myself.  I didn't realize that, by doing so, I was helping to create an over-inhabited, unhealthy cesspool.  An all-you-can-eat refectory alongside the migratory highway.  People know now not to feed them.  There are signs up to remind.

Dogs frolicked among cedars in the leash-less area.  Having a great time by the looks of it.  A happy sight.

Maty called on my third circuit through the park.  "Honey, can you get me galette from Grand Central?"

"Which one?" I asked.

"The mushroom."

"Okay, honey."

"You're not too far?"

"No, honey, I'm gonna get it."

I turned west.  About 30 blocks to Grand Central Bakery.  My spirits rose.  Doing things for Maty has that effect on me.

Good men believe they have gifts they must share.  Gifts they would die to share.  If they are lucky, they find people who honor that about them.

On the river

Willamette River ran high today...

The river was high today.  The early spring snow that fell Thursday morning, already slushy with the dawn, was gone by late afternoon.  Gone to the river.

...because of the snow yesterday.

I paused by a bench on the Vera Katz Esplanade, right down at the level of the water.  Flotsam drifted by.  The fuscous water slid at me, passing under my feet.  For an instant it seemed I stood at the prow of a sloop pushing her way against the current.

On the river --when you're on the river --whatever slides by on the river banks --thirsty fields, cities, lovers shy and brazen, acts of heartbreak, acts of heroism --is passing distraction, mild curio.  It is human to invest yourself in it.  But foolish. 

Because the river sweeps you past it all.

Raging wind

Yesterday, the wind came howling down out of the Columbia Gorge.  Not cold, but fierce, angry.  Last night's repose was disturbed by rattling windows, flexing jambs.

This morning, I emerged to find chaos.  The ranks of recycling, yard debris, and garbage containers my neighbors and I had deployed along the curb last night were in disarray.  Here and there lay a casualty, where the assailant's full force had fallen.  One neighbor's yard debris container lay full length on the asphalt, lid flung wide, contents spilled out like brain matter.

The scene brought to mind a time back in 1993 or 1994.  My (ex-)wife and I lived in southwest Portland, in a cold little house on 52nd Street, with four giant Douglas-firs in the back yard. 

We were considering a remodel of the interior of our house.  Our marriage was not going well.   

On the day that the contractor came to assess the job, an east wind had been raging for days.  The Dougs bent and swayed with the force of it.  They sighed endlessly, as if grief-stricken.  Occasionally, a loud crack signaled a broken bough.  Already our yard was carpeted with blue-green needles and limbs.

The contractor was a jolly fellow, broad-shouldered and hale.  He had long curly hair, pulled back in a ponytail and an open face and a booming laugh that defied the wind.  His stride was bold, his smile unafraid.  His presence echoed in the house, like an opera singer in an empty auditorium.  It was strange for us to have so much noise --happy, carefree noise --after having become used to the noise of the wind.  In later days, we would recall his laugh. 

During the consultation, he posed questions that we had trouble answering.  What was it that we were looking for?  How much did we want to invest?  When did we want to make a decision?  As he spoke, my wife and I kept our eyes on him.  We didn't look at each other.

The consultation ended and the contractor left.  The house fell back into cold silence.  But outside, the incessant roar of the wind threatened, as if it were seeking us out for some evil purpose.

It raged on for days.  We couldn't decide what to do about the house.

At some point in that time, it occurred to me that human endeavor is frail and pointless. A few days of raging wind could destroy everything.

Then, one morning, I awoke to find that the wind had stopped and I was left with dead, cold certainty. 

And so I got up, went outside, and set about cleaning up the yard.

Rolling over the chronometer

Freshly shorn and 50

Today, I'm 50 years old.  God help me, I'm proud of it.  I find dignity in that number.  Fifty.

The way I see it, if you've managed to make it to fifty, you've qualified.   You've demonstrated a certain competency just by staying alive that long.  Which is not to say that there isn't any luck involved.  Certainly not!  Health, wisdom, strength, prudence, temperance, charisma, intelligence, money... even if you have all that, you're still going to need a good dose of luck.

Well, I've had plenty of that.  Luck, that is.  Lots of it.  I didn't have any say into how I came into this world, but if I had, I don't know how I could have asked for more.

I was born in Good Samaritan Hospital in Corvallis, Oregon, at 12:06am on January 27th, 1962.  Half a century later, I live 81 miles away in a vintage house in inner southeast Portland. In the interim, I've made my home in Klamath Falls, Salem, and Redmond.  Always in Oregon.  Oregon is my home.  I hope I am here, in Oregon, when I exit the stage.

I've beheld a marvelous tale thus far.  I rode the railways across western Europe.  I traveled the highways along the western slopes of the Andes.  I roamed across the plains in northern India, and the savannahs of sub-Saharan Africa.  I've seen the painted canyons in Utah and Arizona, the grandeur of untamed Alaska, the paradise of Hawaii, the dazzle of San Fransisco, New York, Los Angeles.  I say all this not to brag, you understand, but out of gratitude.

I've never lacked for friends.  True friends.  Loyal friends.  Dear friends.  I can't begin to name them all.  I wouldn't want to omit any of them.  They know who they are.  Nor do I lack for uncles, aunts and cousins whom I am proud to have in my family.  I'm grateful that not a day has passed when there was no one for me to turn to. 

I want to express special gratitude to my four grandparents, Bob and Gertrude Metzger, and Ross and Jenny Cariaga, all of whom have passed beyond, and each of whom offered gifts of wisdom and love.

And thanks as well to the Great Whatever for blessing me with my brothers and sisters, Eric, Paige, Mia, Calee, Chae and Seth, who are my best friends and most trusted counselors. 

And thanks for Dad.  For Ross Cariaga, Junior.  The mercurial, larger-than-life personality that cast his shadow over everything for the first 30 years of my life.  It was not always easy orbiting that star.  Rage, not anger!  Grief, not sadness!  Joy, not contentment!  After Dad, I was ready for anything.  He was only 59 when he passed.  A mere 9 years older than I am today.

The two women who are first in my life are my mom, Bobbie Batey, and my wife, Maty Bombay.  (No honest man will have any other.  Is it not so?)  Mom taught me the vital importance of compassion, of kindness, of using one's strength to protect, to nurture, to love.  And Maty --well, Maty teaches me wisdom and nobility each and every day.  They've both endured a lot from me and, even on my worst days, their love never faltered.

My dad used to say that the one wish he asked of God was that all of his kids would outlive him.  He got his wish.  And, even though my wish isn't nearly so quantifiable, no matter how it goes from here, it's already been granted for all the reasons I've mentioned.

I know you don't get any guarantees in life.  You never know what is coming down the pipeline.  And I've known hard times and grief and fear and, in my worst moments, hatred, despair, self-pity.  That comes with being fifty, too.  But when I step back and take in the entire tapestry, with all its squalor and glory and its infinite complexity, I can see that, once it is fully woven, it is going to be a marvelous, beautiful tapestry.

Hindus, in accordance with their belief in reincarnation and karma, hold that one's life is the sum total of all previous lives.  Indeed, that one's enlightenment, one's contentedness, is a function of the good deeds committed during previous life cycles.  Well, if that's the case, I have only one question:  What did I do to get so lucky?  What the hell did I do?

Fifty years old, humbled, and grateful.

One, one, twenty, twelve

Yesterday, I climbed Mount Tabor, seeking the counsel of Old Man Hood, as told.  But he, immersed in his gloomy contemplations, wrapped himself in obliterating fog and would have none of it.  And so I was propelled blindly into this next arbitrary demarcation of planetary rotation without so much as a glimpse to affirm his constancy.  Time's march is inexorable, of course, beyond even his desires.  As the wicked Scottish thane observed, we are such brief candles.

These occasions, naturally, bring to mind recollections of the milestones along life's highway.  Grandpa Metzger passed 13 years ago today.  He left this earth confused and befuddled, which did a disservice to the man he was.  But no one gets what they deserve in this life.  As Matthew wrote:  "... for He maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust."

Nonetheless, this New Year's Day dawned bright and hopeful and I, determined to have a good start of it, set out for a walk with the morning sun on my back.  To the river, and thence to the heart of the city.

And I did pause to snap some photos while mid-span on the Morrison Bridge.  Chancing to glance eastward, I saw that Hood was out in all his glory.  As if to say, "Yes, even so.  No need to look to me for advice.  Carry on.  Forge ahead.  The path you choose is as well-chosen as any you might learn of me."

Though not free of doubt, I took it to heart and continued on my way.

First day of January.  Two-thousand twelve.

Lamps in the fog, oracle in the window

Three days from solstice I walked in the dark through Laurelhurst Park.  The cold had a bite to it.  Darkness rushed to its fell revelry.  Stalwart pathway lamps shone like the besieged heroes of a lost city.

I called my brother while I walked.  Brother Eric and I bemoaned our various physical infirmities, now that the bloom has come off our respective roses.  We've had more than one talk on this subject in recent years.  Time passes so quickly. 

Walking home along Hawthorne Boulevard, I experienced a --well, I don't know what to call it.

As I passed my favorite coffee bar, I glanced in and caught a glimpse of a barista I know.  A man in his early thirties.  He was standing behind the counter.  He's a tall fellow and easy to spot.  Dark hair cut short and close, and a distinctive handlebar mustache.  His face was lifted toward the ceiling, but his eyes were cast down his nose toward the person with whom he was speaking, a patron at the shop.

This image lasted no more than a second.  I did not break pace as I strode past the facade windows.  But in that instant I swear I saw my coffee-serving friend transmogrify.  His hairline receded to a point high on top of his head.  His chin became less pronounced, pulling back into his neck which grew thick and dark with stubble.  His shoulders slumped and his abdomen pushed out.  Creases grew from the corners of his eyes and mouth.

And then I had passed.

It was a puzzling thing.  Passing strange.  It seemed that the barista went from vital youth to humbled middle-age in a flash.

Of course, it wasn't possible.  But I had no inclination to double-back and lay the illusion to rest.  What if it wasn't an illusion?  What if I were to glimpse my own reflection in the divining glass? 

I do not care to see myself in the future.  There is no need.  I know what's coming and I'll get there soon enough anyway.

The good old nature and the good old humor

Hear him now:  "Attack it, son.  Get out there and attack it."

That is how he dealt with things.  When he was crowded by darkness, he lashed out with his terrible flames, dispelling the shadows, causing them to flee to the corners of his awareness.  But when his fury subsided, they always returned.  Despite his larger-than-life personality, his dazzle, his charm, he was yet an angst-ridden man, haunted by doubt.

Terrible ghosts followed him all the way to his grave.  They linger yet, haunting me and the others he left behind.

But he wrote his own last chapter, these 10 years gone.  The epilogue is for me.

The best times were when we laughed, when we traded jokes between us that no one else would understand.  When we were invested by the good old nature, by the good old humor.

Come then, winter.

A proselyte, a death

Alejandro

One morning when I was feeling I had done wrong by everyone, I stood beside Julija Laenen's bench up on Tabor.  Peering eastward to see if the Old Man would grace me with a glimpse of his wisdom, I became aware of the thunder and boom of a ritual drum.  A deep and sonorous music rolled across the hilltop and through the majestic Dougs.

Alejandro played his drum next to bronzed Harvey Scott.  Alejandro, reaching for wisdom, had come upon a fervent truth.  He seemed eager to share it with me.

"Every day is a ceremony," he said.  "I've seen how people have gathered.  In the last year I've learned so much and come so far. "  His thoughts stumbled upon each other as they raced to get out.

"On the day that I was born, they said I was the grandfather of the earth, that I came down from the stars to spread the spirituality.  I look to the East, to Quetzalcoatl.  To the West, where the sun will set:  the sun that will guide us when we die.  Every day we pray for the transformation.  To the North, is the final resting place.  To the South are the sun temples.  It is there that I will return.

"I've seen how we can become enlightened.  I've seen what we're capable of.  If we all come together in the way that our ancestors believed, we could change the world."

I fumbled for eloquence, but found none.  "I'm behind you 100%," I said.  "Change the world, will you?"

We were at the top of Tabor.  The sun, our guide for the Great Transformation, shone proudly.

Alejandro returned to his drumming.  The throb and boom of his cadence buoyed my spirits as I departed.

A death

I descended to foggy surface streets, remembering the bold and mellow sun, shining on 20-year-old Alejandro.  But for 49-year-old me, the sun was a pale disc somewhere beyond the mist.

A murdered pigeon lay on the sidewalk. A scarlet spot marked the place where its life-blood had gone.  The eyes were closed, the talons clutched upon themselves, as if in ecstasy.

The ecstasy beyond all judgement and doubt.  The ecstasy that comes with arriving at a certainty.

Church of Tabor

Have another try at what I was groping for yesterday.  Maybe this time it'll take.

Today, I climbed up Tabor from the east side.  I was coming from PCC at the intersection of 82nd and Division.  I'd just dropped Maty off at class.

A warm pink light hung across the city.  Old Man Hood exuded a livid alpenglow.  It would already be deep dusk in the purple shadows on his flanks, where the westering sun did not penetrate.

I stopped to pay him homage on my way up, but I was deaf to any wisdom he might have imparted.  My mind was occupied by minutiae --all those things that I use to distract myself in these uncertain times.  Bills to pay, chores to accomplish, goals to consider.  Circular thought patterns brought on frustration and ennui and robbed me of my humility.  I began to imagine that I did not deserve the troubles that beleaguered me.

At the top, pilgrims were gathered at the altar that looks away west.  A congregation of lovers, friends, athletes, photographers, children, dogs --all sitting or standing quietly --paying homage to the sunset. I joined them.

Do you know what is most frustrating?  Just this:  I can't seem to remember to never take myself too seriously.  I wish I could.  It makes life so much easier.

Sunset eulogy

Hopeless yellow blooms
On the watermelon vine
Promise wee melons

Never to ripen
Displaced by jack-o-lanterns
Grinning in the rime

Dusk creeps like frostbite
Summer's gone.  Weep if you must.
But, friend, summer's gone

Rare, vivid palette
Of evening's call to glory
Sunset eulogy

Flawed yellow diamonds

The early dusk of autumn was settling over rush hour when I made the top of Tabor and looked out on the city to the west. The sky was thick and pale.  A warm wind carried traces of rain.  It wasn't yet dark, but headlamps marked the traffic crossing the river.  A string of flawed yellow diamonds.

Rush hour traffic on Ross Island Bridge:  the swollen artery of human endeavor at full pulse.  The heart rests between beats.

I crossed Tabor's crown, seeking out the Old Man to see if he might offer anything that would help me grasp the significance of the moment. 

"I'm sad that summer is gone.  I think about those people across the river and the flawed yellow diamonds.  I wonder how it will be when the lights go out."  That is what I meant to tell him. But he had veiled himself in his brilliant cloak, stranding me well short of his wisdom. 

So I just went home.  I took the most direct route.  Dusk was thick and heavy when I finally got there.

Beautiful sunrise

Beautiful sunrise

...see the sunrise this morning?

The day was announcing itself as we drove east on Hawthorne Boulevard.  Maty and I were enchanted by a rare and roseate dawn.

A layer of clouds reached out from the west, forming an inverted topography.  Stubborn patches of departing night lingered in cloudy folds, blue as any mountain lake. Westward, where nighttime was thickest, lay a forbidding, inverted ocean --mysterious, malicious, in full retreat.  To the east, where the sun was yet hidden by Tabor's silhouette, the cutting edge of daytime shone like the firmament.  Or like the Holy Host marching to victory across the coral cloudscape.

All of it inverted, of course.

We looked on, just as stars might do, were they to gaze upon us now and then and be stricken by our own beauty.

But shortly, events pulled us back to our grubby, summer-dried boulevard.  I regretted turning away while the moment lingered.  .

A sunrise is a brief and beautiful thing.  Perhaps we are thus to stars.