Of course, our food actually is being stolen, though not always in the literal sense. Many go hungry, but this condition is hardly a universal one, nor do I refer to any real theft of our wealth or possessions, though ample evidence of this, too, exists.

The sustenance we are consistently denied is spiritual in nature. In an age where we see no dearth of religion or its trappings, I do not believe I have ever witnessed (or even read about) quite such a bankruptcy of human warmth, tolerance or joy.

Charity has been supplanted by an almost fanatical absorption with self and the well-being of the individual, however ardently the holy writings of the world’s major religions might advocate the valuation of one’s neighbor over one’s self.

What if the true need we face as a planet is not a set of rules and regulations to which we must adhere, but rather a faith-like devotion to our own betterment as a people and a world. What if, rather than bristling with anger over someone else’s behavior because we happen to believe it immoral, it actually became possible to turn our concerns inward and our love and warmth outward rather than allowing the opposite to occur.

I do not mean to suggest that religion alone is at fault for the wrongs of Humanity. My father was a professed atheist; my mother a devout and passionate Christian. Neither demonstrated the slightest love for this planet or any of its inhabitants, my father believing we are nothing more than animals and my mother eschewing any connection with this world and focusing solely on the next. My grandparents, however, who during the last forty or fifty years of their lives never attended a church service, displayed a concern for their fellow man that would put most God-fearing folk to shame.

Clearly, religion had little to do with their goodness, nor with the outpouring of grief and friendship from so many of the people my grandparents touched when at last they lay, peaceful and quiet, in their caskets.

I take from their lives a profound lesson in kindness and the underlying goodness of Humanity. Call it a matter of faith. Though I see terrible things around me and speak to people whose primary concern has always been and always shall be themselves, I choose to believe that in the depths of the heart, the purity of childhood still lingers, waiting for us to shed the layers of cynicism and derision that we have built up around ourselves; impenetrable, calcified shells that imprison even as they protect. Only we have the power to release ourselves and breathe the free air once more, and this we must do before it is too late; before we grow so cold and insensate that we can no longer feel the cool weight of the keys we grasp in our very hands.

“To Friends”

Now that I, awash in gold-reflected light,
May ponder for a space such things tonight,
A thousand pleasant musings spring to mind
As drowsy threads from Morpheus’ spool unwind;
A warm embrace from host to treasured guest
Reminds this visitor of all that’s best;
Of friendship bonded close as sibling brood,
Of laughter shared midst fellowship and food;
Of stories told and painted pictures bright,
The warming bliss of wrongness set a-right,
For all the finest hearts and minds thus bent
Upon this week’s sweet journey fondly sent,
My fervent thanks for each of those I know,
Who shine with radiant friendship’s warming glow;
And even those I have not chanced to meet,
Whose names I know not, even these I greet.
May fortune fair and Providence each bless
Beyond the paltry words I here express,
And brighten every path for home-bound friends
As most this splendid gathering gently ends…

Maybe I still don’t, come to think of it. 5 months of long workdays, solitary weekends, friends who’ve stayed and friends who’ve gone (some of them by my own choice);  These elements can all build up until they become a calcified wall that both protects and imprisons… But these days, I’ll take the safety.

I find myself really struggling with what I’m seeing around me in the world today. How is it possible that there is even more division and strife today than there was during the past eight years? It is almost as if people have been that way for so long, they can’t remember how to be any other way. The media seems destined forever to elicit maximal pathos, drama, hatred and outrage from any incident or event, no matter how well-intentioned their target might have been.

We are in the middle of a crisis, in comparison to which our present economic woes pale in comparison. While I do not consider myself particularly religious, there are scattered bits of the Bible that I think contain wisdom.

The book of Proverbs lists 7 things that, according to the author, are hated by God; in fact, that he considers “an abomination”.

1. A proud look

2. A lying tongue

3. Hands that shed innocent blood

4. A heart that devises wicked imaginations

5. Feet that are swift in running to mischief

6. A false witness that speaks lies

7. He that sows discord among brethren

Look around you. Any of us can find numerous examples of these seven cancers feeding on the soul of Humanity itself.  What are we to do, when our very leaders (and I do not speak of one in particular, but nearly all of them;  perhaps every last one) embody the elements mentioned above? I am not naive enough to believe that these things are wrong because God dislikes them. Rather, they are wrong because they are wrong. There is a spark of awareness in each of us that allows us to differentiate between right and wrong. We are born with it and this is part of our innately precious nature.

Why then are we suffering from this crisis of conscience? Why do we look at everyone who disagrees with us with such disgust? Where has our sense of propriety, of decency, of patience and open-mindedness gone? This isn’t an American problem. It’s a global problem. 

There are still some good-hearted people out there, but all too often their goodness and love are inextricably bound to their faith, and the accompanying disdain for other faiths that their beliefs seem to demand.

Compassion mixed with blind religious ferver becomes cruelty and neglect.

Tolerance mixed with ecumenical rigidity becomes a crusade to abolish behaviors deemed abhorrant.

The love of one stranger for another evaporates when both learn of each other’s spiritual differences.

Every manifestation of The Church (regardless of which religion it might choose as its avatar), despite the clearest evidence of teachings that indicate its influence is not of this world but of another, will try to inject itself into politics, and legislate its version of the universe on everyone else. And it does this while smiling sweetly and murmuring in the world’s ear that this is for their own good, and that one day they will rejoice to have been thus forced.

If only we could plan a new world from behind that veil of ignorance John Rawls posited so long ago. How would we envision the world around usif we knew that we would have no choice, no say as to which position, which social stratum, which income level, religious affiliation or political ideology we might find ourselves born? It is easy to make moral choices for the world when you are convinced that your vision is the correct one, no matter how convenient it might seem to be that you happened to be born into it.

I have to believe that better days are ahead, for I can’t conceive of any fundamental way in which they could grow worse. The soul of Humanity is ill; perhaps deathly ill. What will we do to recover? Is there a cure, and if so, have we the courage to swallow the medicine and move on, the wiser for having lived through it?

I was speaking with one of my best friends today online (check him out at http://blog.urbanbohemian.com) and as we talked, the subject of the 1980′s was raised. I mentioned that the decade was ridiculous in a lot of ways. We like to look back on occasion and laugh at the 80′s; the hairstyles, the fashions, the music, the movies. But I think we’ve forgotten one very important thing about the 80′s. They were transformative, and they were all about laughter. Some of the very best sitcoms on television were created during late 70′s and 80′s. Many examples spring to mind, but my intent isn’t to take everyone on a stroll through their own nostalgia. What bothers me most as I look back at the way things were is the feelings I get when I compare them to what we see today. Comedy, in some form, is everywhere, but so little of it seems to have the purity of some of that older work. We have become jaded, cynical, even cruel. If you really stop and think about it, who do we laugh at today? Others. Who is responsible for all of our unhappiness dissatisfaction? Others. Who always seem more stupid, more ignorant, less deserving of happiness than we do? Others.

In the 80′s, we laughed at ourselves. Today we laugh at others; it’s as simple as that. I wonder if it’s possible that laughter is only a curative medicine when its motives are pure. Looking around me today, I see a lot of laughter, but it’s a derisive, divisive thing. It’s the laughter of a schoolyard bully who sees the world through the darkened lens of his own insecurity and masks it with contempt for others.

Look at today’s comedians. Their schtick is laced with invective, mockery of others, the reinforcing of stereotypes, and class warfare. My gods, what ever happened to innocent little Chrissy Snow stopping outside of Jack Tripper’s bedroom door and overhearing something that horrifies her, only to find out later that she’s completely misunderstood the situation and that no one was doing anything untoward or dishonest. Today, you’d never see that sort of scene in a sitcom. The humor would come from two cheaters being caught in flagrante delicto by an outraged spouse or boy/girlfriend.

Sitcoms used to exist to make America laugh, even while teaching us lessons about situational ethics, racial interaction, ethno-religious tolerance, even politics. It drew attention to people in dire need of society’s attentions, and mocked those whose lives didn’t demonstrate a purpose purer than, say, the desperate need to score on a Friday night, or launch some devastating and snarky insult. 

Cheers, Perfect Strangers, The Cosby Show, Who’s the Boss, Family Ties, Three’s Company, Growing Pains… the list goes on. Look closely at each of those shows and a pattern starts to emerge. Families who didn’t quite fit the mold of stereotypical America. There was always a quirk; always something that might cause others to look twice and shake their heads with amusement. 

Now, I’m not trying to suggest that sitcoms today are the opposite. There are few out there that have carried on this odd but grand tradition, and make us happier, better people as a result. If you take a good, close look, however, at what passes for television and cinematic comedy these days, a startlingly different picture begins to emerge. For one thing, so-called reality television shows us daily not what America should be learning, but what they actually -have- learned. The more realistic television becomes, the less it resembles the humanity we all claim to possess. I see people sniping at each other, marriages dissolving, petty vengeance, rampant economic elitism, all bundled inextricably with the medium. It’s a bitter pill we’re all swallowing, but the laughter makes it more acceptable. 

Laughter, in the sense that we experience it today, isn’t a medicine. It’s a poison. We’re laughing for all of the wrong reasons, aren’t we? Laughter, at some point, must be able to spring from something other than mockery or derision, shouldn’t it? If it doesn’t, aren’t we in danger of succumbing to our basest urges and turning the world into another schoolyard with roving ruffians pointing their fingers at us and snickering? Or worse yet, are we in danger of -becoming- the bully, and denigrating those around us just for a laugh?

Gods help us if we have begun turning that corner, folks. The recurring mantra of a movie I once enjoyed (“Toys”, starring Robin Williams) was a phrase that rings true, to me; “Let Joy and Innocence Prevail”.

Perhaps someday it will again.

“This is what I write when I haven’t anything to write. These are the words that spring to mind when there are no words; when the buzzing of flies fills my head and creativity is nothing but a word sitting in a dictionary on some shelf deep within a forgotten library.”

“I hate these times. They fill me with dread and foreboding. Nothing to do but hunker down until hope comes.”

“I sit next to a swimming pool on the back deck of my building. It is Fall now and the thing really should be closed for the season. The water is still blue, but it is somehow fainter; perhaps a trick of the fading light of Summer.”

“It is empty; no one swims within. It seems lonely and forlorn, preparing for a long Winter sleep beneath a tarp. I have to resist the urge to jump into it, just to save it from its next extinction, if only for a few more hours.”

“The evening sun glints off of windows some ten stories up the building across the street. The effect is both warm and cold.”

“Yes, I do believe Summer is finally finished. At least, I hope it is. Autumn has always been my time; that part of the year that speaks to me most and fills me with its potent combination of beauty and angst.”

“The sky was a hazy blue today, but now it is a muted, dull gray. Through the clouds I see hints of the azure of before, but they are quickly vanishing into the gloaming.”

“In the distance I hear scattered voices yelling in a park for some athlete they have come to support. He might not even be that good; or she, but they are there anyway, cheering.”

“Suddenly (how do I not see it coming), as I sit I realize that a fog is rolling in from the lake. Gods, it’s fast. It has already wreathed the high buildings around me in paded obscurity.”

“There! One of them in the distance just vaniched even as I wrote the words to describe it.”

“I love the city. No where does it happen quite like it does in Chicago.”

“A bell is tolling now…odd. It’s not the top of the hour yet. The chimes come faster now; tones, music. Somewhere nearby a service is starting. People are worshipping, I suppose. It is Sunday, after all. If I strain to listen, I recognize the melody as “Fairest Lord Jesus”.

Ah, the memories that old hymn engenders; some good and some ill, from a simpler time in my youth, yes, but an unhappy one on some levels; a time when I pretended that I didn’t know things about myself that should have been plainly obvious.”

I thought I’d share a story I wrote a couple of years ago. All rights, naturally, are reserved. 

“Apparition”

I still remember my grandmother’s chair. I remember the soft creaking of its ancient wood as she rocked before the dying embers of our fireplace. I remember her fingers flying over swaths of crimson yarn as they emerged magically from beneath glittering needles. She would hum softly; haunting songs that floated upon the silken whiskey of her voice; ancient rhymes set to tunes we’d never heard before.

Ah, that sweet humming. It had always been the most comforting sound in the world to me. At the precocious age of 12, how could I be blamed for idolizing her? Nanna had been an elegant and simple woman, wise beyond anyone I’d ever known.

What did it matter that she could barely read and had learned nothing of mathematics or science? She could feel foul weather approaching in her very bones. She told us once that she could hear the pumpkins growing in the patch and we believed her, for she always seemed to know just the right time to go out and pick them, plump and fragrant and brilliant orange, from their thick vines. 

She could conjure wondrous meals from the ingredients hidden deep in cupboards or stashed away in the dim, cool pantry. She could brew powerful medicines that chased away summer colds, scattering them to the winds like dried daffodils. 

She had been the embodiment of all things familiar, all things loving, all things happy, from the even rise and fall of her shawl-covered breast to the delicate clicking of the sewing instruments moving between her warm, wrinkled fingers.

One day the humming stopped. As I think back, it seems to me that at some point Nanna just started fading away, but it has been so long ago that now that the details of her passing are nothing more than a mist diminishing to nothingness; a dream of surpassing sweetness dispersed by the light of dawn.

But I remember her.

-

In the months following Nanna’s departure my brothers and I mourned, as children do, by burying ourselves in heedless play. Breathless, we would tear around the house whooping and hollering at the shadows, dancing in candlelight to the music that only children can hear, playing games only we could understand and basking in that insulated innocence that adults inevitably trade away for the comfort of stability.

My brothers asked about her constantly. Zachary, the youngest, was particularly tenacious in his unwillingness to let her go. Michael, his older brother, had stolidly accepted the change, but he had become more sullen and despondent with each passing day. It was difficult enough to bear their grief with them, but my own sadness at times threatened to overwhelm me.

I had long ago lost count of the nights we’d spent upon the parlor floor, watching her in her chair, drinking in her presence, wondering at her soft manner, feeling the long years of her life radiate from her like heat from a candle. My brothers and I would gaze with longing upon the crackling logs that shot warm sparks up the chimney flue. We craved the heat they generated, for Winter was always so harsh and unyielding in our New England home.

 The boys at least had their trousers and sweaters. I was forced to make due with a woolen dress that refused to stymie even the tiniest, most insignificant puffs of arctic air. The cold always found ways to enter the big house through this crack or that hole, sprinkling us with icy tingles when we least expected them. There seemed no sure escape from the frigid fingers, always poking and prodding us as we skipped down the long halls of our house seeking warmer climes.

  -

 One evening the wind howled outside the rattling windows with particular ferocity. I could almost feel it squeezing the walls into concavity in its haste to enter and transform our home into the same wintry tableau that existed outside. But the fire drew us into its protective nimbus and we bathed in its glow, chatting softly and watching the coals.

 “I’m tired of the same old games.” Zachary offered with such sullen melancholy that the room seemed to dim a bit.  “Every day it’s the same. We run, we play, we eat…  I miss Nanna.” His eyes, a vivid electric blue, melted through a mop of unruly blond hair as he regarded me.

 It broke my heart to see him this way. “I miss her too Zachy. We all do. But we must move on. She would want us to. She’s gone far, far away to a place from which she can never return. She’s with the angels now.” I adopted my best matronly smile.

 Zachary was unconvinced. “How can you stand there and say that? You are such a liar, Amelia!” His tone became petulant.  “She’s not far away. Sometimes I can feel her, like she’s still sitting in her chair, and I know you can too. How can she be gone if we can still feel her?”

 Michael piped in, nodding slowly. “He’s right, Am. We can talk and talk but it’ll never take the pain away. We’re stuck in this house all the time and all I can do is think of Nanna and miss her. She was the only mother we had after mama and papa died. What are we supposed to do without her?”

 Somehow I repressed a sigh that had formed in my throat. “I don’t know, Michael.  I wish I could just wave a wand and bring her back, but I don’t have one. I dream every night that she comes back to us, and I pray for her soul, but…” I looked at them both, shaking my head. “I know I’m not Nanna. I’m not trying to be, but you’re my responsibility now. I’m your sister, don’t you see?” I blinked away a forming tear. “I don’t have all the answers.”

 Michael stared at me for a moment, then looked back to his shoes, one of them carelessly untied. Children…

 “We can bring her back, Amelia.” He mumbled.

 It wasn’t a question. I turned to look at him. “Michael…”

 ”We can. Nanna said it could be done. It was a long time ago, but I remember. And she said she’d watch over us even after she was gone.”

 It was true. Nanna had spoken of such things, but always casually, and never openly in front of us. She and Grandfather had enjoyed talking of such things; life after death, spiritualism. It seemed to be all the rage in polite society during those years; something to titillate the senses and fire the imagination; something beyond the normal dullness of home life.

 “Michael, don’t even think about it. Nanna warned us not to meddle in things like that. She believed in it but that doesn’t mean that I do. And it doesn’t mean that you should either.”

 Michael cast a furtive glance at his brother, as if silently seeking support.

 Zachary said nothing. But I could see a spark deep within the azure depths of his eyes. He had considered it too. He believed as Michael did.

 “Michael, I said no. It’s out of the question. Even if it were possible, what if something went wrong? We don’t know anything about bringing back the dead. Just suppose it worked? What then? Even if it were real, what on earth would we do?”

 Both of them shrugged but said nothing and I knew I’d scored a point. “I don’t know. I just want her back, Am.  She shouldn’t have left. There has to be something we can do. And you’re wrong; if Nanna believed it then we should too.” He stared into my eyes, resolved.

 It was hopeless, of course. I could see that the two of weren’t planning to let go of the idea. I wondered how many other families bore their grief in this way, talking to each other about summoning the spirits of those who had passed on. We were worse than rank amateurs. Even if it were possible to bring Nanna back, in what form would she arrive? Would she really want to be disturbed from her rest? Did Michael and Zachary really believe that she would just sit back down in her rocking chair and start humming and knitting again like she used to?

 “No, Michael. I won’t do this with you. Whether it’s real or not, it’s not right to interfere with the dead. You can believe it or not, but either way it’s a mistake. I won’t have any part of it.”

 Michael’s face hardened. “Fine. We’ll do it ourselves.” Rising suddenly and turning on his heel; he marched out of the room with Zachary following close behind, mimicking his older brother as best he could.

 I realized then that nothing I could do would make them understand. They would have to come to terms with the loss in their own time and in their own way. I slumped down into the red velvet upholstery of the chair behind me. From its depths a plume of lavender-scented dust rose into the air, catching an errant beam of light that emanated from the hurricane lamp in the window. I looked around me. The place needed cleaning. Perhaps later that evening I would begin the job.

 At that moment the remorse returned in full force and my shoulders sagged beneath its weight as I recalled how clean our house had always been under Nanna’s watchful eye. Every piece of wood and glass had always been free of dust and smudges from our hands. I can still smell the polish she would sprinkle on a large, white cloth. That scent was the very essence of freshness. It had made the house smell lived-in and alive.

 I began to weep.

 -

 Morning came. That same cold light poured through the dormers whenever it could manage an occasional escape through the obscuring clouds hanging low in the sky. I felt drained. Even a full night’s sleep hadn’t helped much. With each passing day the sense of isolation and helplessness seemed to grow more acute.

 I listened for the familiar shouts of my playing brothers but heard nothing. That was odd. Normally, they rose much earlier than I did, running about and playing as they crashed into walls and upset planters. I gathered my robe tightly about me and wandered out into the hall. As usual, a puff of cold air greeted me, reddening my cheeks slightly as it passed. I crossed the hall to poke my head into the boys’ room. It was empty.  Suppressing a moment of prickling unease, I inched my way in.

 The boys’ bedroom was cool and clammy. I shuddered, despite myself. How could the two of them sleep in this? Moving over to the large walnut credenza between their beds, I turned out the lamp resting upon it and hurried back out of the room before the eerie stillness suffocated the last of my frayed nerves.

 Closing the door behind me, I turned to look down the hallway. My breath caught in my throat as an icy blast of air reddened my cheeks. My hair flew about my face for a few seconds, my heart beating violently within my breast, before settling to my shoulders as the gust vanished. Cursed Wind! Even though it could not pass our walls at its full fury, the moldering, chilled breath of it seemed to sink into the very bones of the house so that it seemed every object that didn’t generate its own heat instead radiated waves of cold that could be felt upon the tiny hairs of the arms and legs.

 This wind, though, was different. Part of my mind wondered at its origin while the other babbled in useless terror at the unexpected harshness of it. I pulled the robe around me more tightly and moved swiftly down the hallway, descending the wide staircase as quickly as I dared.

 From the hallway behind me, a door slammed.  I cried out and redoubled my speed, tripping just as I reached the bottom and tumbling to the floor in a heap of cotton robe and blond hair. My head struck the polished wood of the floor.

 I lay there for a few moments, pain rolling about my body like a peal of summer thunder, booming and rumbling its way into eventual silence. Gingerly, I pushed myself up to a sitting position and rubbed my aching forehead. Pain has an odd way of dispelling fear. Certainly my panic had vanished, though I could not dismiss what I had just felt and heard.

 “Michael?” I called out in a tentative whisper. “Zachary?”

 Only stillness answered me, and I was suddenly filled with a powerful urge to find my brothers. I called again. This time my voice rang out more sharply than I had intended.

 Michael’s boyish voice returned. “Amelia! We’re in the library…”

 I frowned. Michael had never spent large amounts of time in that room. Ever the boisterous, physical one, he had always preferred a ball or mallet to the yellowed leaves of one of Grandfather’s many books. Intrigued, I rose and followed his voice, wincing slightly as I put weight upon a sore ankle.

 The library was one of the largest rooms in our house. Grandfather had spent countless hours there organizing his collection, reading and writing far into each moonlit evening. On many nights we would take turns sneaking to the door of the cavernous room and peaking in at him. The delicate scratching of his pen would bleed into the silence around him, punctuated only by the occasional snap from the glowing fireplace, or by the solemn sound of him clearing his throat. Eventually, Grandfather’s head would rise, as if he could sense our presence, and we would scurry off to sit once more in the parlor with Nanna.

 The library door was ajar. I walked in, though it felt strange to do so when I had so often been shooed away from it on the nights Grandfather had cloistered himself within. My brothers were sitting in two of the overstuffed leather chairs near the fireplace. A cold illumination emanated from the high narrow windows a few yards from there, set into the west wall.

 Still, the library seemed warm enough compared to the unearthly chill I’d felt in the upstairs hallway. Perhaps the walls here, packed thickly with the collected literary treasures of a lifetime, provided more insulation the one might expect from such a drafty old house.

 Michael smiled at me with that peculiar expression of pleasure mixed with guilt that boys his age seem perpetually to wear. His voice was hushed as he spoke.

 “I think we can do it, Am…”

I lifted a brow, smirking. “Oh? What can we do, then? And what are we all doing in Grandfather’s study? And since when have you taken a liking to books, Michael?”

Zachary piped up next to Michael in the same conspiratorial tone. “We’re reading about dead people!”

 All of the color must have drained from my face, because both of my brothers grew more serious, their eyes narrowing with the realization that they might be in trouble for sharing their intentions.

 I kept my voice level. “You’re what?”

 “Amelia, don’t get mad,” Michael said, his voice turning plaintive.

 Zachary closed the large dusty volume on his lap with a soft thump. “We’re doing research, Am! That’s a grown-up thing, so we’re allowed in the library. Isn’t that what Nanna always said?”

 I shook my head, suppressing a smile at Zachary. He couldn’t read. Most likely he’d been looking at the pictures in the tome. “This was Grandfather’s private room. We should respect his privacy, even if he is gone.”

 Michael grimaced. “We can bring her back, Amelia.” I didn’t like the way he looked at me just then. “Maybe Grandfather too. I’ve been reading about it.” There was a matter-of-factness in his voice that sent a shiver up my spine.

 “They are both gone, Michael,” I tried to reason. “They can never come back. They’ve passed on, don’t you see? They’re with God now. Why would we try to take them away from happiness to live in this old place again?” I looked around me. “The dust alone would send Nanna into fits.”

 “Some of Grandfather’s books say that the dead can stay near the places they loved the most when they were alive. You know how much Nanna loved her chair by the fire in the parlor.” Michael looked over to Zachary, then back to me. “Maybe she stayed around like the books say…”

 I smiled, though I didn’t really feel like doing it. “It’s natural to want her back, Michael. I do too. When people die, they go to Heaven or to Hell. Nanna and Grandfather were both God-fearing folks, so they have to be in Heaven.” It was the simplest logic I could come up with that he would understand.

 He shook his head slowly. “Sometimes it gets cold in our room, Amelia. It happens fast and I get a scared feeling inside. The books say that means a spirit is nearby and that it’s upset.”

 I fell silent at that. So it hadn’t only happened to me. There were still nights that I felt the chills come and go. Somehow, I could always tell which were caused by drafts in the walls and which ones seemed to have no physical cause or reason. It was the latter kind that always caused my stomach to knot with apprehension.

 After a moment I looked up. “Michael, these are things we oughtn’t to meddle in. Even if were possible, what then? What would we say to Nanna if she were sitting right here with us?”

 He didn’t hesitate. “I’d ask her a lot of things, Am… But mostly I’d just like to see her again. I miss her. I miss hearing her hum and watching her knit. I miss her bedtime stories.”

 “You can’t have those things back, Michael.”

 “Can’t I?” His voice was so calm and rational that I looked up to make sure it was still him speaking. He stared back with his deep blue eyes and I fathomed, just then, how serious he really was.

 “Michael, NO.” I made my voice as firm as I could. “It’s wrong.”

 He smiled and my blood thinned. “I want us to try it, Amelia. I want us to call her. You want it too. You just don’t want to admit it.”

 It was my turn to plead. “Michael, I don’t want anything bad to happen to you.”

 “It hasn’t yet.”

 I froze. “Oh God, Michael. You’ve already tried?”

 Zachary giggled, completely missing the seriousness of this conversation in his youthful exuberance. “C’mon, Am. We’re not doing any harm. It’ll be fun!”

 Michael shrugged. “I don’t care if it’s wrong, Am. I’ve been trying it. Sometimes I think I’m really close, because it gets cold, but other times nothing happens at all. I think today I figured out why.”

 I slumped down on a nearby footstool, shaking my head slowly.  Suddenly worn out, I looked up at his face and was drawn into his intensity. “Why didn’t it work, then?”

 He looked over to one of the windows and the light pouring through bathed his face in gold. “Because it was just Zachary and I. I think it takes three people who believe to really make it happen.” He ran a hand through his nut-brown hair. “That’s why we need you to help.”

 “And where did you learn that?” The bitterness in my voice was tinged with resignation.

 “From the Bible. This book I read today says that the Bible tells us where two or three are gathered in his name, there he is in the midst of them. Zachy and I can’t do it by ourselves, so maybe that means there has to be three.”

 “Michael, for Heaven’s sake. The Bible was talking about God, not ghosts.” I protested.

 “So, God is a spirit, isn’t he?”

 “Well, yes, but…”

 “Well what, Am?  The book even said that children are better than adults at doing it because they have more faith.” He looked to the empty fireplace. “I have faith.”

 Deep within, I began to relax. As unnerving as this conversation had become, it was obvious to me that Michael was simply dealing with his grief. In all honesty, I hadn’t thought his connection to Nanna had been so strong, but here it was. Michael’s persistence could be explained easily enough. Is there anything a boy won’t do, anything he doesn’t believe possible when it comes to something he desperately wants?

 What is more, I thought with a small shudder, children can accomplish some astounding things through the force of their will, the wealth of their creativity and the power of their innocence. I looked into his eyes. All three were there in abundance.

 It was at the very moment that I decided in earnest to help them. Even though I believed, on some level, that we were doomed to failure, the very act of making up my mind seemed to lend me strength. At the very least, the exercise would be a welcome respite from the repetitive lameness of our daily routine. Every morning we would wake, find food in the pantry, run about the house, playing. At first, these diversions had given us great joy, but with each passing day they became emptier of meaning. Though I had not spoken of it to my brothers, I longed for change.

 I saw the change in Michael’s expression. His grin widened. He knew he had me. I knew too.

 “All right, then.” I relented. “When…”

 “I think tomorrow night is supposed to be the best time for it. The books say it’s one of the times that the curtain is supposed to be the thinnest between the worlds. I guess that means it would be easier for us to see things on the other side when that happens.”

 I didn’t like the sound of that. “Does it have to be at night?”

 “Well… the book didn’t really say it has to be dark. I think it just has to be peaceful and quiet. That’s normally at night.”

 I nodded. “All right, tomorrow night then. But if it doesn’t work, then we’re not trying it again. If it doesn’t work, you have to accept that Nanna is gone.” I made my voice as stern and authoritative as I could.

 Michael considered that for a space and then nodded slowly. We had a deal. I hoped he would live up to his end of the bargain when nothing happened. I hoped I had it within me to live up to my own obligation. For one night I would have to put aside my disbelief and join my brothers in their unshakable faith. I owed them at least that.

 -

 Evening of the next day dropped like a blacksmith’s hammer. The day itself had been long and tiresome, each of us refusing to discuss our coming undertaking before it actually transpired, as if the mere mention of it might sever the gossamer strands of intent and belief that gave us any chance at all of succeeding when it was all said and done.

 The period of twilight, however lengthy it might seem on any other day, was almost nonexistent as the appointed time approached. The light of the sun seemed to extinguish in our growing excitement and plunge us into the dead of night. The wind rattled the windows in their casements as we sat in the parlor upon the thick carpeting and pondered what was to come.

 We spoke in hushed tones, casting occasional glances at each other. At last, I could avoid the task at hand no longer and I looked to Michael. “You still want to go through with this?”

 Zachary looked to his brother.

 Michael nodded. “Yes. I still want to go through with it.” He looked into the fire. “And so do you.”

 I had no answer for that. “Where will we do it? The library?”

 ”Here, I guess. The book didn’t say it has to be anyplace in particular. Just has to be peaceful and familiar.”

 ”Do we have everything we need?”

 He gestured with his chin a few yards off to a chest underneath the darkened window. “Yes…I’ve tried it before, remember? You just need candles and matches and chalk and stuff. And some other things.”

 I looked at the chest, wondering what else might lie inside. It was Nanna’s, I remembered, and wondered where he’d found it. “What other things?” I didn’t mean to pry but if I was to participate in something like this, I wanted to make sure we weren’t going to do something that would make me scream, like chop the head off of a bat or throw a live spider into a bowl. I may have been the oldest, but I had my limits.

 ”A cup of water, a knife, some ribbon and ashes from the fireplace.”

 ”So many things… What are they all supposed to do?”

 ”I’m not sure what they all mean. I just know you’re supposed to use them and do things with them. It’s all in the book.”

 ”Zachy, you’ve helped him before. Is there anything frightening in it? You know how I hate to be frightened.”

 Zachary laughed lightly. “I wasn’t scared!” he boasted.

 That didn’t help. The boy was fearless in every regard. Anything new and unknown, however terrible it might appear to me, he saw as an opportunity for adventure.

 Down the hall, the grandfather clock chimed with its rich contralto, another of the sounds I loved most about this place. The notes wafted into the dimness of the room and warmed me more than the fire. Eleven O’Clock.

 It was time.

 Michael rose and walked to the window, sparing a moment to look outside at the white vista; at trees covered in inches of snow while swirling masses of it danced around the sullen trunks and buried dead bushes under small drifts of ice and crystal.

 Bending down, he lifted the chest and, holding it to his chest, he moved back to where we sat watching. Zachary looked excited. I probably looked pale. The chest was opened. Inside, as promised, were a series of normal-looking household items. A magnifying glass, a spool of ribbon and thread, Nanna’s knitting needles. One by one, Michael lifted the objects from the carved wooden box and set them gently upon the flagstone before the fireplace.

 A stoppered bottle filled with a clear liquid (the water, presumably) and a wooden cup were the last to be placed before us. There seemed no rhyme or reason to the set-up. Perhaps there wasn’t, but Michael seemed to know what he was doing. I was perversely glad that at least one of us did.

 At last, the chest was closed. Michael moved it away and then slid the thick tome he had been reading yesterday off of the leather armchair above us and laid it upon the floor with the other items, opened to page three hundred forty seven, a chapter entitled in an old gothic script,

 Chapter Nineteen

“Pertaining To The Summoning Of Those Moste Deare”

 I closed my eyes, forcing down a wave of unreasoning fear and discomfort. This was for Michael and Zachary. Whatever came of it, I had to come through this once. They had to believe, and I have to believe, or they would go on bemoaning Nanna’s absence for months, maybe years to come. Michael’s voice was quiet, but confident. He had indeed done this before.

 I could hear the soft sounds of the items between us as Michael prepared them, rearranged them in painstaking order. Every few moments, he would utter something strange, like “unbidden shall ye stay…”, or “unto these ashes poured…” I felt dizzy, vaguely nauseous, as this went on. I never opened my eyes. I feared to. If I looked upon Michael or his undertaking, I feared I might break whatever spell he was creating in his childish enthusiasm.

 There was such longing in his voice, such hope. Hearing it was enough for me to level every ounce of my belief into making this work for him. If this were all the comfort I could provide him in his grief, then provide it I would, and with all my heart. His hand slipped into mine. I reached over to grope for Zachary’s and Zachary did the same with his brother’s. Thus linked, this ritual, this…whatever this was… began in earnest.

 A strange feeling crept over me. We were not alone. Minutes passed… or had it been hours? I concentrated only on the warmth of my brothers’ hands and the sweet crackling of the fire before us until at last I could stand the curiosity no longer and opened my eyes.

 Michael and Zachary were still as statues, their eyes closed as if they were deep asleep; perhaps they were… Their hair, though, lifted and tossed, ruffling as if blown about by a stiff breeze. But there was no breeze… In that instant, I realized that my own hair was moving, individual stands of it caught on some spectral wind and illuminated singly by the golden light of the guttering flames, whipping in front of my eyes and tickling my cheeks and neck.

 Between us, the cup of water, darkened by ash and tied with a piece of ribbon around its center, vibrated upon the surface of the open book. The clock chimed in the hallway, the sounds this time distant… no, more than distant; ancient and muffled, as if hidden away in some closet far from here.

 Twelve O’Clock.

 Michael and Zachary opened their eyes. The three of us savored this moment. Perhaps we had done nothing, perhaps everything. But whatever power there was between us, we could see it, feel it. The air was suddenly filled with the scent of Nanna’s perfume. We breathed it in. Bliss. The soft hum of that ageless voice emerged, as if from nowhere, from the silent static of the hissing fire.

 Zachary’s eyes widened at something beyond my left shoulder, and he whispered, “Nanna…”

 A tear formed in one of Michael’s cerulean eyes, but he said nothing. The eyes spoke volumes. I turned slowly, as if any sudden movement might shatter the spell and banish all of this back into the world of childish fantasy and nonsense.

 The rocking chair moved slowly, with purpose, the way it had countless times before. And Nanna sat within it, the translucent glitter of two knitting needles moving in the firelight, the long, faded blue dress swaying softly past stockinged legs and slippered feet.

 And the humming; the flood of emotion and support and love and wisdom all encapsulated in the lips of an old woman, gifted to those around her with the selfless sacrifice of the ancient to the young, filled my being with a warmth I had long thought I would never feel again.

 ”Nanna…” It was my voice, only the merest whisper choked off by my emotion. “It’s us… It’s Am and Zachy and Michael…” my face was wet. “Can you hear us…?”

 -

The fire was dying, but there was no need to rekindle it. The household would shortly be asleep, another night of pining for the past, despairing for the future, clinging to the present.

The old woman rocked in her chair, her fingers moving without conscious thought or direction.  An older gentleman sat a dozen feet away at the window, sipping the last remnants of tea from a porcelain cup, watching sheets of snow showering the world through gusts of frigid wind. “We’d best go upstairs and get into bed, Ellen. This storm is getting worse, and the fire is dying.”

Ellen looked up from her reverie, taking a long breath and letting it out just as slowly. “I reckon you’re right. No sense in wiling away the whole night.” She looked down at her needles. “This scarf will wait another day, won’t it? I should be finished s….”

The man looked up, his grey eyes tender, brows furrowing as he watched his wife. “Everything ok, Elly?”

The woman nodded slowly. “Yes, I…  It’s nothing. A trick of the firelight, I suppose. Sometimes I could swear I see them sitting around me, just like they used to.”  She rose, then, pushing wearily on the arms of her rocking chair. “I miss them so, Henry.”

Henry rose from his own seat, smoothing his sweater and moving forward to offer his arm. She slipped her own under his. He leaned into press a kiss to her pale cheek. “We all do, Elly. We all do…”

The two moved off, then, toward the hallway entrance where the clock was just finishing its midnight carillon. Her voice seemed tired. “Don’t you ever wonder if they’re happy?”

“They’re in a better place…”

“Yes.” The softness of her voice betrayed wistful regret and the dullness of pain long endured. “In a better place…”

***

For some reason, early this morning I was reminded of a trip I took to San Francisco last year, around October. I was visiting an old friend of mine. Such a beautiful city… I saw some remarkable things; art, architecture, even the layout and topography of the city itself, full of historical oddities and quirks.

Outside the city, however, the natural grandeur increases exponentially. It was a Friday, and Ken and I drove to see the great redwood groves of Muir Woods just north of the bay area in Marin County.

Late morning and early afternoon were wet, to be sure, but oddly enough it never actually seemed to be raining. Instead, the droplets that clung to everything and plummeted to the forest floor seemed to come from the trees themselves, as if the clouds were not high in the sky after all, but in our very midst, dampening everything.

The drive to the woods had been marked by razor sharp turns as we climbed one side of a mountain through banks of velvet fog and swirling mists only to navigate those same jagged angles in reverse as we descended into the space between massive stone guardians; guardians which have protected the lesser (though no less majestic) giants nestled between their wide bases.

A narrow wooden path, dimmed by the shade of the trees, meandered deeper into the park, though in truth that word could hardly be used to describe such a place as this. A plaque near the entrance to the boardwalk read, simply, “Behold, the forest primeval.” A fitting appellation, indeed.

The scent there, ancient and damp, wood mixed with wild flora and mountain mists, almost overwhelmed me as I drew near. I had to close my eyes for a moment to keep from becoming dizzy from it. Have you ever taken in a scent so powerful and -old- that it makes your mind swim with thoughts that don’t seem to be your own?

Though there were others here visiting the grove, I noticed very little noise, as if the awe that pervaded this magical pocket of the world silenced all but the softest whispers from both child and adult.

My heart seemed to slow, as if it strained to match the grand and prehistoric rhythm that thrummed around me, at once utterly silent and deafening. The trunks, red and massive, surrounded by ferns and fallen timber covered in plush mosses, rose from Earth to sky, impossibly tall, their uppermost branches vanishing into the muted light above as it broke in scattered patches through the hanging clouds that had settled into the nooks and crannies of the valley; this place that was itself high above the regions surrounding the hills.

To draw in a breath here was to take into one’s self a perfume sweeter than any other; the scent of freedom, innocence, wildness and power. No religion could hope to compare with this; no building-bound worship, no matter how ecstatic and zealous, could hold a candle to these lords of the valley; themselves vassals of an even greater master.

As I walked further into the dimness of this faerie world I noticed other small bronze plaques, each nearly invisible amidst the brilliant greens and reds of this place. Each told a story about people who had passed through Muir Woods before. One of them, dated in the 1940′s, spoke of a delegation of diplomats representing the United Nations when it was still in its infancy. These individuals met among the very same redwoods upon which I gazed long before I was even born.

Perhaps they felt some of the same sensations I had experienced as they look ed at the tree before me. Perhaps they were drawn to throughts of peace and brotherhood by the silent giants around them. The plaque, a tribute to Franklin D. Roosevelt, who had brought the delegates here, called him “President, Architect and Apostle of Lasting Peace”.

I felt a pang of sorrow for a moment, that this gathering, so noble in its intentions, had given birth to the squabbling corruption of today’s incarnation of that august institution, but a sense of hope also flickered within me; the hope that one day we might again use descriptions like “Apostle of Lasting Peace” for our leaders, far off and unlikely as that day might seem in today’s world.

You cannot walk in a forest like this without feeling a desire for simplicity, tranquility and respect for this place in which we all live welling up in your throat like a cry that must be released and will not be denied.

President Roosevelt was right; the negotiations of international peace should be held in places like these; not in the cold, unfeeling fortresses of steel and glass that even today sap the will and hope from those within.

All in all, I think we walked about a mile into the forest along that wooden path. By the time we made our way back and out of the park I was calmer than I remembered being at any point before. It was as if I had laid my head upon the softest down pillow and emerged from a deep slumber on the far end of a lilac-scented night.

It is an odd thing that an experience like this should strike us as so rare and precious. After all, there are trees everywhere and that same sense of tranquil peace should be as readily available to those in such desperate need of it as it was to me, a few dollars poorer byt free then to enjoy the park’s splendor.

The greatest gift I could think to give someone, when it really comes to it, is time. So many of us have traded, rented or outright sold our time and spirit for a paycheck and a hundred barrels of debt. 

As I lay in my bed this morning, the sensations of the forest primeval stole over me and I was there for a short time again, bathing in the peace. If only we could keep that sense of wonder and awe at our world when we conduct business, help others, elect our representatives, speak to those of other cultures or religions, dispense justice, legislate…

I cannot think of a single facet of life that couldn’t be improved by taking into ourselves the loveliness of that grove of innocence I wandered, and making it part of our minds and spirits.

Invariably, the rigors of my job (mental rigors, I should say, or emotional ones, for I am not a manual laborer, much as I think my health would be improved by the career) drain what little creativity is left after the worries and conerns of this life have had their say. We are in the midst of a national election which, I am generous to say, is acrimonious in the extreme. Some of our greatest financial institutions are crumbling, every natural resource to which scarcity could apply seems to be skyrocketing in value, and people are losing their jobs and homes in increasing numbers.

And there, but for the grace of Providence, go I. I have a good job now, but for how long? Will I be the next sad case to be shown the door, sacrificed on the altar of corporate convenience and cost slashing? 

Yet, through all of this turmoil, I think it is important to remember that very little of this is truly important. Or, I should say, it is only as important as we allow it to be. The pundits and commentators and doomsayers would have us believe that the world is coming to an end; that all of the carefully laid foundations of the American Dream are being stolen away by the greedy, the ill-begotten, the opportunistic and power-hungry.

But the more I think about this, the less convinced I am that the source of our woes is “the other guy”, or the rich, or our boss, or our president. Could it be that we ourselves are the problem? How many of us wallow in debt, but bewail our state and blame it upon those who lent us money? Oh, to be sure, credit card companies gorge themselves on the hard-earned money of the poor and middle class. But does this excuse those who spent money they didn’t have with the lustful eagerness of a gambling addict?

Change is often painful, often chaotic and very seldom welcome. But, like that ingenious construct, Adam Smith’s Invisible Hand, there is a force which guides everything from one end to the next. Markets correct themselves in time. Those who overspend now learn not to in the future. Businesses crumble and are replaced with others. Aren’t we, in truth, watching nothing more than the social equivalent of a forest fire?

I have grown so tired of the constant campaigning, the rabid, saturating coverage of the media, shining their inhumanly bright spotlight on every minuscule detail they can find. I wonder if we are not witnessing the collapse not of an economy or a country, or even of a civilization, but of a state of being. Could it be that through forces we cannot understand, we are being guided toward a simpler life? One less fraught with excess and the panicked spending to fill holes in our collective spirit that only grow wider and deeper by the day?

Shakespeare might have quoted himself in observing the miasma of American life in 2008. “It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing…”  Perhaps we are at last being forced to slow down and stop the frenetic gathering of things to our bosom. Acquisition, it seems to me, is not nearly so satisfactory as creation. Switching from one imperative to the other, however, seems to me akin to changing the polarity of a powerful magnet. It goes against the grain and requires time and significant effort; even pain.

When my life becomes too chaotic, too onrushing and too inflexible and unyielding in its torrential, downward flow, I meditate on images of simplicity like the picture above. Long ago, in the early hours of night, people moved about their houses by fire and candlelight. They created some of the greatest literature of our time using nothing more than a feather plucked from a goose, or a porcupine quill dipped in ink. Imagine the peaceful silence of an evening away from the bustle of the city, only the call of night birds and insects to punctuate the stillness, and the knowledge that this world is too big to comprehend in its entirety; that only this moment, and this small space illuminated by the soft glow of wax and wick, exist for you.

How much stress could one have experienced when one didn’t have the Middle East to worry about, or the stock markets not only of one’s own country, but of a dozen others? We pack our homes with television sets, and then, without enough time to watch all of the shows we crave, we buy devices that will store our programming so that when we actually succeed in carving some free time from the block of unending business, rather than creating or touching the lives of other people, we devour more of what is sickening us.

We should not despair of the American Dream. We should only remember what it actually is, and what it most certainly is not. The American Dream is -not- wealth. It is not power. It is not religious intolerance, nor is it theocracy, no matter the belief system in charge. It is not a large house, or a gas grill. It is not a full to bursting pension fund, or an impressive 401K. 

The American Dream, my friends, is the knowledge that, even lacking those certain comforts, we enjoy Liberty, and the ability to choose our own spiritual destiny. The American Dream is what so many have been craving for decades now; It is peace and quiet; the special bond between neighbors, the celebration of a family at the holidays, the cry of an eagle that isn’t tied to the earth beneath its wings by mortgages or PINs, passcodes or instant messages, Blackberries, iPods and books on tape.

Keep all of those things for yourself if they make your life better. I’ll keep my mental image of a steady hand, writing meaningful things upon parchment, one letter, one word, one phrase, one sentence at a time, with the cool knowledge that we have all the time in the world to finish it, and nothing to lose by slowing to the velocity of sanity.

“Sunblind”

I once awoke and stared into a
Fiery dawn, rays of red and gold,
Bounding off of lakes and trees to
Crash against my unsuspecting gaze.
And for the merest moment 
Locked in place, I was transfixed, 
Bathing in the power of its glow;
Amazed at how intensity could grow
Until at last in golden waves of
Dazzling pain, I jerked away
And closed my wounded eyes.
As soothing coolness, restful dark 
Returned to ease my agony 
I thought of you;
That first amazing glance, filling
All my heightened senses with delight,
Awash in fervent heat that
Emanated from your jeweled eyes,
It seared an image of your beauty 
‘Pon the coldness of my soul, 
As if you were the sun and 
I the watcher from below.
Radiant bursts of everything you are
Envelope me in warmth and silken joy,
To grow until they’re painful to behold,
And though I turn my head once more, 
I see you even when my eyes are closed,
And brighter though you seem to grow
With every passing day, I cannot seem
To blink away the wonder of your face…