thoughts they catch on-the-go
sharing words with a stranger in the park
The guy in my spot told me to write something!
I look at the grass, the clover, stalks of dandelion cut off before their potential has been reached.
I look at the stump; old willow now missed!
My phone…
Should I write about him? About how guys in parks are now becoming very 'writerly' — is this a thing now?!
I smile to myself, look back at my phone.
Dig out my calendar; write a project plan.
Look back at my phone.
The notes app; where my heart is - a repository!
The thoughts they catch on-the-go. Those that I want to blurt out. Walking. On buses. In transit. On devices.
It says:
The melancholy has now passed; the grief now passes in unpredictable waves.
Cyclical.
Images of rising flood waters, you scroll through old phone photos, the night you drank Greek wine, took the bottle home ceremoniously, a t-shirt with the symbols.
That feeling of flooding rose on Friday, an unexpected time, watching a video at an event. In the moment you realised that was Alice, her mother still seated in the room. Not long past since a life lived this way, in these conditions, became too much.
It must not be in vain.
The amount of people, time, energy in this room to change something; something that is not one of 'your' things but affects so many, is humbling.
Humbling is the type of word you would have never used previously, but it presents regularly now. If you were at home; you'd Google its origins and etymology. Oh wait, you have the phone…resting on blanket, grass, clover, dandelion shoots.
'Humbled' is Old French, from Latin; 'low, lowly', from 'humus' - ground. Of course it is!
For in my humbling, I am grounded. I breathe deeply, a glow of warm sun on my back. I breathe and smile, lower body laid flat againt the ground.
I try to ignore the discussion of dehumanisation. Feel the firmness of compacted soil. But it's ok to eavesdrop. They talk of cycles of grief, of struggles - too loudly for my liking!
The scroll, the scroll..it happens all the time but what sits and what doesn't reveals a lot. On Friday (over pizza with friends), I declare my grief for the lack of close family I see, I declare my grief for the lack of grief that would be shed. For if conflict is not abuse, but abuse is not love; where am I left?
I am thankful for the ground, for the humus, grass, clover, dandelion stalks, crows, gulls sweeping overhead, multiple mumblings, gentle muzak; a meditation maybe? Grateful for a prompt.
I photograph, then rip the pages out (of my notebook) and hand to my park neighbour; it's a good spot, the best in the park. My favourite.
