Century #15: Of Mind and Matter

Posted on September 7, 2011 by randomyriad

From the Journal of Martin Way

January 15, 1936

Life is hard, but engaging here, alone among so many friends and loved ones. Work is constant and physically exhausting much of the time, but my mind continues to wander even after I can’t move my body.

I try to talk with some of the men I work with at the construction site. They have only thoughts of concrete and flesh. That is fine and natural when you are so close to the earth all the time. My father is full of politics and words for words sake, arguments, ranting and business. In his eyes I have failed to be something worthwhile in the world. What am I? I think and do and live. I talk with my mother and it is all about family and worries. She also wonders why I am not in college since I haven’t failed any classes. I have no answer except, I had no feeling for what I would do after I finished. I could stack numbers and words and build walls of well-reasoned arguments. My instructors were impressed with my abilities, but to what end. I have to find a way to live that is true for me, if that is possible. I have begun to doubt it.

I can always go back to the university next year. I could get several recommendations, especially if I was to commit to a major in law or engineering. I have until March to figure something out. Maybe it will come into focus, a true path for me. I have no idea where that path is, but if I can’t find a way that seems to fit, I will go back and try to get more education and see if that uncovers a clearer way. I have an idea that I must continue to read and write, but also working with my body has its merits. I feel strong and capable in my physical labors, while my mental labors often leave me feeling as if I will always be close but never arriving at anywhere. I must always be searching for what is true, what is fundamental to being human and aware and myself.

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Around My House Today

Posted on September 6, 2011 by randomyriad

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Revisiting the Boilerworks

Posted on September 5, 2011 by randomyriad

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Century #14: Cold Light, Long Shadows, Tea

Posted on September 4, 2011 by randomyriad

From the Journal of Martin Way:

Allentown, Pennsylvania

January 5, 1936

The cold hard light comes in through the white curtains and sets them glowing. Bits of dust swirl and ignite in slanting rays that pierce the room through the gaps between the curtain edges. The room smells heavy of ash from this morning’s fire. I sit with a cup of tea and try to make my thoughts move beyond this cold room.

I am bound by the world into the sharp day. I cannot put myself beyond it. I am consumed into the cold light and long shadows. The vapor from the cup drifts up into the stabbing rays disturbing the perfection with a chaos of thin shadow. I am breathing that light and shadow play. It is part of my being. I can find myself there in its miasma of movement. I know if I drink the tea in this way I will taste my life. How is it that sitting in this way so aware of everything frees me from my place here and also places me here more firmly in my chair in this room on this Sunday afternoon? If I just am here without need for names or time I am free to be here.

Soon I will rise and go into the main house to eat with my family and friends. We will talk and laugh. That will be as it is. This moment is its own material. I collect and fold precious bolts of woven time, saving lengths to wrap myself when I am swept into the busyness of days. These moments of silence and attention inside the light of being tie me to the world and I can let it take me through my days. They slide too quickly into thoughts of oughts and shoulds. Idleness is so despised. I dwell in idleness even when I am busy with work and conversation. My soul is idle at the center of me and will not be drawn into the fray.  I know that happiness and misery are mutable, from one moment to the next inhabiting one soul or another at odd moment . It is openness to sensation and ideas, inhabiting the world without reserve that brings a comfort that moves with a person. I am aware. I see that I am the one who must stay in this moment. I am the keeper of my life, just as everyone else keeps their own. The river of events catches us and flings us into action. I must go do my chores and to supper, but how to be inhabiting my life through it all and not be swept away in the doing of it. Who will I be in that next moment when I rise from my chair, and who will I be when I sit down again to take off my shoes in the dark before the glowing embers of dying fire? Who will I be in ten years or at the moment of my death? A conglomeration of momentary pieces glimpsed in idleness? The accumulation of my actions and words as move through busy days? How will I know myself in that moment? What futile questions I ask myself, unanswerable. But, still I wonder.

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Century 13: The Ghosts of Privelege

Posted on September 3, 2011 by randomyriad

From the Journal of Lita Hopkins,

July 13, 1928

I am afraid that Hunter finds our life quite dull. It often seems sterile and still, not even a breeze to stir a curtain sometimes. I have been ill since yesterday, just a touch of fever. But, Nancy, my lovely Nancy, who spoils me, has seen to the house and brings me tea and bits of food which she insists I eat. She is devoted to me as if I were more important than her own life to her. I am often confused by the interactions of servants their masters and mistresses.I pay her well and do not expect too much from her, but how can she put my importance so far above her own. she is always going out of her way to do extra little things. She seems to move around me like I was a light for her to see by. I know myself and I am no shining beacon.

I asked Nancy why she was so accommodating  and eager to please me.

She blushed and said, “Lor’ a mercy, Mrs. H, you is the best mistress a girl cou’ ope for. Never a cross word and always talkin’ a me like I was jes’ anyone.”

“Where you previous mistresses so cross and overbearing?” I asked

“Not more ‘an most, Mrs. H, they was nice enough, but always lookin’ through ya like ya wasn’t there. Like you was a ghost not really a person. You know wha’ I mean, doncha?”

She has such a clear way of putting things. I almost always know exactly what she means. She has very little education and yet is able to cut right to the important part of any problem or express clearly what she wishes to say, once you parse out the grammar and pronunciation. I have no doubt she could run this house with more efficiency and competence than me, and I have had every advantage, education, upbringing, marriage. On what is my privilege based? Even so it would not work if I gave her too much authority. It would be an unfair weight upon her. What would my life be like without her? I would be quite destitute and lonely. Someday I will have to say goodbye to her, and it will be more like losing a dear friend or younger sister than a servant. I hope she feels she can be honest with me. It would break my heart to find out I had mistreated her in any way.

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