November 3, 2015 – Deep space, deep faith

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When my husband Joe moved in with me, in my little house in San Anselmo 17 years ago, he brought with him his portable Jacuzzi spa. As Marin-cliché as this is, there has always been a hot tub in our backyard since. They are just one of the great things (along with, of course, black Labrador boy-dogs) that came along with my sweetheart. Most nights, just before bed, I wrap myself in a towel, and go outside into the dark and slip my bare body into the warm water. I leave the jets off, so it’s still and quiet. The temperature is just right, warm enough that it feels really good, but not so hot that I have to get used to it. It’s heaven. It warms me to my bones, so I can crawl into bed with a really warm body and can fall asleep right away. I don’t know about you, but if I’m cold when I go to bed – especially, if it’s my feet for some reason – I just cannot get to sleep.

While I’m soaking, I gaze up at the night sky. Most nights seem to be clear around here, so I can almost always see the stars. Sometimes I can pick out the Big Dipper – pretty much the only constellation that I can easily recognize. Now and then a plane goes by, and I imagine the human beings up inside it, most likely headed to SFO. Part of the month the moon is up and full enough, to cast shadows in the backyard. It’s a special time – I’m alone and really present to being alive on our little planet, amidst a vast universe beyond my comprehension. I feel small in the very best way.

There’s something about this time I spend out there in the dark, that re-frames my challenges and worries. It has me feel both insignificant in the grand scheme of things, and very precious at the same time. The ways in which I worry if I “do enough” to further the causes of good settle down, and I can be happy that I get to appreciate beauty and make art, and have people in my life who love me and who I love too. I am also really embodied. It’s intensely pleasurable to be submerged in warm water, breathing cool air, and I cannot help but be aware of how good it feels to be incarnate.

Betsey’s photo from Route 97 in British Columbia, ©2015 Betsey Crawford

I read a post a couple of weeks ago, written by a treasured person in my world. Betsey and I met at the Sausalito Art Festival two or three years ago, and she showed up the very next Friday to paint with us. She and I now belong to each other. Since the early part of the year, Betsey has been on a road trip to follow the wild flowers from the Mexican border to Alaska. She takes absolutely exquisite photographs of the flowers and landscapes along her way and posts them, along with her always perceptive, often funny and sometimes provocative thoughts at: theSouloftheEarth.com. This post was called “Wayside Beauty”, where she shares the magnificent scenery that she passes, as she drives her truck and trailer along the highway – stunning photos included. Nature that has been untouched by humans has a particular kind of magic, that can be like looking up into the night sky – it evokes a particular kind of wonder.

In addition to appreciating the beauty Betsey saw though, I had another reaction to this post: “but what about the beauty we create?” I’d just returned from Paris, having gorged on human-made beauty in the form of art, architecture, style, design and use of color. And then there was the beauty of sound – the bells of Notre Dame, and the concert in St. Chapelle – the other day I heard Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, and it took me right back to listening to the sounds Mozart crafted, coming out of the musicians’ instruments, while surrounded by all that stained glass – a moment with its own kind of wonder. Then there was the beauty in food – to look at, to smell and oh, the taste! We humans have ideas, inspirations and then we create things that weren’t there before, or we transform what was to something altogether different. What we create can be just as inspiring to me as a pristine landscape.

One of my favorite of Monet’s: (Les Roses, oil on canvas, Paris, Musée Marmottan) I loved seeing it again a few weeks ago.

Certainly plenty of what we have created is not beautiful. We seem to be seriously waking up to this now, in our impact on the environment and the climate. This is behind the idea that humans are viewed as separate from nature – as counter to nature – nature vs. humans, natural vs. synthetic. The thing about this that puzzles me is, how can we not be nature? We evolved out of other creatures – we and our consciousness are part of the evolution of the universe – of all-of-creation. And our creations are also part of-all-creation. Nothing that we make, not Impressionist paintings or stone cathedrals, not plastic candy wrappers from Halloween or chemicals that pollute our waterways, nothing that we make came from anywhere or anything else than nature. We and all our trappings are nature – part of all that is.

I just have to believe that the point of evolution of life on earth is not that life, or even human life goes to hell in a handbasket. I believe we are going to continue to evolve, and come up with creative solutions for the problems we’ve created. Crisis is what draws creativity from us. When things are all going along smoothly we aren’t spurred to act. I’m hearing the word “partnership” all the time these days. I think it’s where we are heading. Co-creating the future – humans and nature. Partnership, as I’m learning from Alison, is an act of what she calls “human spirit.” It’s not something that comes out of our – largely unconscious – survival instinct. In order to be in partnership, we need to be in relationship. My evenings with deep space, Betsey’s reports from the wild lands between here and Alaska, and painting the beauty I see in a flower – all this connects me – I am part of nature.

I tend to the trash at my mom’s office where we paint. I’ve set up three bins: compost, where our used paper towels go, recycle for metal, most plastic and glass and the garbage, which ends up in the landfill. Not everyone reads the signs or knows where it all goes, so I regularly re-sort it. And usually when someone sees me, they ask about what goes where. Sorting trash is not my favorite thing to do, but I do it because I care, because I’m compelled – to do my “part” to be in partnership with nature. I really work to not get preachy and righteous about it, but I do want help, I do want others to join me in re-using as much of our resources as we can and putting as little as possible into the waste fields, where still the vast majority of what we discard ends up.

Over the weekend, I read a quote attributed to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. which has been echoing in me. It included the phrase “deep faith in the future.” As I read it, I realized I have this. I am absolutely faithful in our future. Because there is so much suffering and violence in our world, to stay out of despair I have to have faith that everything is alright in the end, and if it’s not alright, it’s not the end (I love this line from the movie, “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel”).

Gazing up into deep space before I sleep feeds my faith. It brings me out beyond even the massive human challenge of climate change. It expands time and space out to infinity. And, it brings me right into my space, my body, and this moment. I sleep and then wake to do my part – record the beauty I see in paint and write to you, and sort trash and love my loved ones.

Love,

Cara