Lit Up (my arctic dénouement)

After three weeks of somewhat uncharacteristic but dismal weeks of hanging rain clouds and daily losses of six to seven minutes of daylight, the clouds parted to reveal the setting of the sun..."no big deal" many think- unless they've been to the interior of Alaska. As is to be expected here, this summer season I haven't shared the big dipper in the night sky with someone special far away, I haven't admired a sunset from atop a modest hill or "dome", I haven't had to curb my drinking/hiking/waking/thinking. The sun is always there. Until this night...when suddenly the sky was all lit up.
The glow caused by the setting sun triggered many thoughts, the first being the marvel of the Alaska sky. In summer when rains do fall they usually occur in contained and isolated areas, and do so swiftly and without much impact. ("Virga", I have learned). More often than not these patterns leave a spectacular rainbow to arch across the great blue. I have seen nearly a-rainbow-a-day some weeks. On other days the clouds appear like cartoon sketches or video-game symbols of what clouds "might" be, according to creative minds that render imaginary worlds.

But when dark has come, it comes on fast. That's when I know it is time to go. By season's end my skin crawls for something new, yet harboring saudades for the comforts of the closest thing to home I know. Conditionally, the anticipation of new adventure, new scenery, new people, new work exhilarates my soul; conditionally, because I know where I'll be going, who will be there when I arrive, and what I can hope to resurrect and dig in deep. But first:

While exchanging climates several times, I'll head out to the desert and partake in the notions of a temporary society with ideals that range from free trade and barter rules to free love and breaking rules and find my place just left of the middle. Like the stepping-out-of-one's-self that comes with oversea travel and the subsequent removal from one's own culture as he steps into this other realm, I hope not only to take in what transpires around, but to reassess a bit of the core as well. I'll leave early, but not for any sacrifice, subtracting my presence from the apex-the great ceremonial burn [reminiscent of my nature??].

Sometimes the best moments are the little rituals in life for which we build no hype but that keep us smiling into another day- sunsets and rainbows to name two. Though my preferred moment may be inconsequential to the masses, not unlike the man that burns in high expectation to highlight the cause for gathering, I too will be lit up.

(As the great choreographer David Dorfman once said in earshot, "perform little rituals every day".)

Do you?

Brontë

I like picking up morsels of information in unexpected locations, settings, scenarios and discussions. At the end of every day I wish to have accumulated one new bit of information (like, the Great Wall of China is 4,000 miles long...that one's from yesterday). Whether trite, useless factoid or priceless gem of wisdom, in my humble opinion, its advantageous to learn something every day. Even more, I like investigating the way people tick; what makes we humans so very different from one another in our desire for stimuli, our reaction to stimuli, and our internalization of stimuli?

Picking up an insight about human nature...well that's just priceless.


What struck me was a discussion I had about the literary genius of Emily Brontë, and her blaze of creative talent in the form of one and only published novel, Wuthering Heights. It is written by a contemporary gal of the literary scene (name escapes me now) in the foreword of one edition of Wuthering Heights that Emily never left the comforts of her own town, was not a pioneer of sorts, never experienced the extremes of emotion, never set out to discover "new life and new civilization". Rather, she was quite content to stay put, and even after leaving home to try her hand at the role of a governess, she wanted nothing more than to get back to the safe satisfaction of home turf. And fast.

And then she wrote a book...

I remarked, half bitten, doesn't creative expression thrive on literal and emotional experiences? Can it actually stem solely from the invention of the human mind? In the same place? Time notwithstanding?

Though I hardly call this art, here at earthseeandsky I muddle through ebbs and tides of land-tromping and try to glean something from each experience. I have my feelers out for new stimuli that I can suck up and mull over, and once habituated my "creativity" periodically wanes. Not that I need a new physical place, just to look in the nuances. It takes bits of new information or a fresh insight to rouse new writing (or painting).

On a personal level, I argue art has to come from something...art is 'creative expression'...which implies it has a reference point, and is a communication of some idea from this point. It may expand exponentially to the state of scarce traceability, but the point is still the nexus. Emily's genius, consequently, escapes me. But, I've yet to read Wuthering Heights.

The best part about this entry though, is that it slipped through the cracks...it was read before completion. And now its completion is different, thanks to human intervention, human reaction. And that is what I' m talking about.

In all my writing about nothing over the last year, what I realize just now is that the writing is only for the purposes of 1) increasing my desire for and attention to stimuli, 2) sharing my reaction to it and my interpretation of that reaction, and 3) for serving as a catalyst for you do the same. Its like a conversation face to face with a good old friend at our favorite neighborhood bar, on any given night, at the drop of a hat. We mill about over the what the how and the why of human nature until we've gone full circle and concluded nothing...and then I go and turn it into art.