A Painting for Her Nursery

I haven't done a painting in years, but a new friend reminded me what fun painting can be.  I'm realizing, too, that my preferred artistic outlet (theatre), is going to be less and less available to me as a new dad, so I am hoping to write more and to create more visual art as a coping strategy.  Film projects are more manageable, too, especially the shorter film projects.

Anyhow, this is for our baby girl's nursery.  It's not finished... I ran out of white paint partway through the sky, so I am eager to add another layer of highlights, then perhaps a few more detailing layers, but I have a feeling it may be hanging in there unfinished for a while.  My friend Bill has a blog about being a dad (and being a dad-to-be right now) and he put it eloquently when he spoke of the mistakes in their nursery mural: 

"Throughout the drafting, chalk-lining, taping and painting, we reminded ourselves that we were creating the mural 'out of love, not perfection.'

Becoming parents, after all, requires coming to terms with our imperfections."

Here it is, my imperfect painting for our baby girl... an abstracted view up the Susquehanna River Valley, looking north... sunrise, midday, sunset, and night (24"x48").  I'll add a photo whenever I can get it to a more finished state:

... and a little slideshow, too.

Holes, and Waking Up Ready

When people you care about die, they seem to leave holes in you somehow. The holes don't really ever go away, either, I've found. You just become more and more like swiss cheese as the years go by and the griefs pile up.

By the same token, when incredible things happen, it's like being adorned with some extraordinary power-granting gem (okay, yes, I made a Green Lantern reference), or breathing the freshest air or drinking the purest juice imaginable, or waking up invigorated and ready. That last one is something that I think has happened to me maybe six times in my life, so to me it feels like a pretty incredible event. Not a morning person over here.

One of my favorite students abruptly left this world a little over a week ago. Today was his memorial service. My administrators graciously let students and teachers attend, even though it was in the middle of the day. That's the right thing to do, and that seems to be what motivates them, in my opinion. Hence, I tend to like working for them. I've been around for students dying in the five or so years I've been working in public schools. This was the first time I knew the student so well... well, the first time since a classmate died in high school.

There's ready-made cliches for these occasions, and the fact that they're cliches makes them feel a bit wrong, even though they are actually wholly accurate. They are too young to die at this age. It isn't supposed to be like this. No parents should have to go through that.

Maybe part of why it hit me so hard is because Alexis and I are expecting a child at the end of August. We've already been through a miscarriage, so the whole event, while exciting and beautiful beyond measure, is also fraught with fear and a quiet sort of terror. I'm a little nervous about trying to be a good dad, but mainly I am just afraid of the random darkness of this fallen world sneaking up and snatching them away before this child really gets a chance to live it out.

It may be that, partly, but probably it's more to do with the fact that I knew this kid. I knew the intelligence that hid behind a quiet facade. I knew the soft heart that hid behind hard armor. I knew much more than a name and some grades and some anecdotal evidence. I cared. Once you're caring, you're already, on some level in this life, digging into yourself and building a nice comfortable hole in yourself, somewhere for them to live cozily. Then, when they're gone, you're left with that hole.

What a capricious, malevolent, cold world. What a wonderland of delights, too. When weighing the two extremes together, the highs and the lows of life, it's hard for me to regard it with anything but a strange blend of both wonder and terror.

Today I tried to mourn one of my favorite students. Tomorrow I find out if we're having a boy or a girl. And that, my friends, is death and life, sitting together in about as overwhelming a yin and yang as I've encountered.

I like art and literature because they strive to explain these great mysteries of life, and they usually do so (when they're doing it well) in non-dogmatic ways, ways that retain room for the mystery itself to still captivate and flourish.

I keep hearing a song a friend of mine wrote when I think about this new hole I'll be carrying around. "Death / He looked me straight in the eye / He said you're never too young to die / His words / They rang true in my heart / And that was the worst part / Oh, Death..."

Family is forever

I gave some serious thought to the idea of deleting that last post. I felt like I was lashing out at Penn State, and I love Penn State. Penn State is like a part of my family. Faults don't have to kill the love.

But what happened can never be undone, so I might as well own up to the anger of my reaction. I hope if anyone was hurt by what I said there that you might forgive my bitterness. I'm not generally the kind of person who lets bitterness linger and last forever. At least, I don't think of myself that way. If it makes any difference, I'm trying to forgive myself for that bitterness and anger, whether it was justified or not.

When Paterno died, I was deeply upset. It did have such a ring of tragedy to it. I admired the way his family chose to honor him, and I feel he deserved that honor. I finally went to the statue of him by Beaver Stadium with a lump in my throat.

When he died, story after story came up in my friends' facebook feeds and in news stories that told of an incredible number of anonymous acts of gracious kindness and remarkable generosity he did for people, routinely and over the course of many decades.

One key thing that changed my perspective on Paterno's role in this horrible Sandusky story was a short op ed piece written by a child abuse attorney. This attorney calmly pointed out a few factors about mandated reporter laws. First, Paterno was a mandated reporter. This has been acknowledged. Secondly, the people he reported to were exactly the people he was supposed to report to, by law. Had he violated the chain of communications, he could have jeopardized the credibility of his potential testimony. This was something I didn't know because no one was saying it in the media. Hearing this, I was able to finally see that Paterno actually did exactly what he was supposed to do. He trusted the men above him to do the right thing, and they hadn't given him any indication that he shouldn't. That broke my heart a bit, realizing this, in light of my initially buying into some of the vilification that had come towards him. I can now still think of him as a hero. He was not perfect, or a saint, but I can see goodness in him again the way I used to. Doing so makes me honestly a bit ashamed that I doubted the guy. It was so hard, when this horrible story exploded, to see anything clearly.

I am too emotionally tied to Penn State to let anger fuel my feeling for the place. If others feel that way, though, I can't blame them. And if still others feel more loyal to the place than ever, I can see their position too. I feel stuck in the middle now. Others have picked up the banner for accountability and change and are willing to shout and fight. Many of them have far more power and influence than I ever will.

What a hard end for Joe... scandal... doubt... public rage... lung cancer... betrayal... yet the man was calm and even happy because his family surrounded him. His son said he died with a clear conscience. I think that's amazing.

The black Nikes swish through the perfect grass; the khaki cuffs slap lightly after; the clash is over, the quiet re-settles, and the feet meander home through the cold, grey Pennsylvania twilight. The scoreboard is meaningless; the game was all.

I wrote this for Joe. He walked home after every game. To me, this is more about the grey misty walk into the mysterious afterlife. I hope the man gets to keep peace with himself, with his soul. He loved poetry. I hope he got to see it. It may not be a great poem, but it's from the heart.