Author: Jnana Hodson

In downsizing to a remote fishing village in Downeast Maine, this eclectic writer feels everything's coming together.

MOSTLY FROM A LAST TRIP TO ENFIELD, MAINE

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

I was on my way to  the Metzlers’ farewell reception in the Grange hall as they wrapped up 19 years’ service in a rural community. As I often do driving solo, I slipped into a meditation and jotted down random thoughts and observations on the five-hour drive. Here they are.

31 May 2009, unexpectedly staying over and returning Monday, before an evening shift at the office:

Wells, Maine, en route – so long since I’ve gotten AWAY! (Excepting Ohio.) The commute … toll … York … driving a lot, same old loops for starters. And then beyond the usual fringe.

A pilgrimage. Saturday night major revisions to “On the Broad Penobscot,” which I would read at the reception – and see at that time it’s as much about marriage as kayaking.

Summer in New England:
When the air temperature
finally reads higher
than the open-roadway
speedometer.

 Driving the Maine Tpk. same time as Meeting for Worship: a driving meditation.

Tide way out, Fore River and Casco Bay – mud flats.

Seems so natural now.

No CHECK ENGINE light on for the past month or two, and then, sometime around Brunswick, on a tank of Mobil rather than Irving, on it comes again – and stays on.

Losing another Friend: Heather Moir. (Morning e-mail.)

Just before Bangor: What the hell am I doing? This long, gust-torn drive? So many emotions and memories stirred up! So I’ve been here almost 22 years now – NH from Balto – and they’ve been part of it most of that time. The one lover’s wounds still fresh and intense, then another.

Their efforts to establish a medical practice and to be ordained. The kids. So much time, so many lost years! The barn they took down, the crowded kitchen, the introduction to homebrewing, the treehouse. The trip taking Megan to China Lake and then R and I continuing to an overnight in Orono – and Carolyn’s “She’s a keeper.” (Our canoeing across the lake and, on our drive home, the long loop up through Rangely and down through Berlin.) Much sadness here, this transition.

I find myself running way ahead of schedule. Stop at the Weathervane in Waterville, and find the contrast between their fish and chips and those at the Shanty in Dover a revelation; the later doing everything right, the former cutting every corner. At the next rest area, I phone R and tell her she’s spoiled my appreciation of food – it’s like discovering great champagne, I tell her.

I skirt a serious thunderstorm, get only sprinkles, and then it’s sunny again.

Stop at Borders in Bangor, find a collection of Andre Dubus stories and Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer, as well as a Keith Jarrett trio CD.

In Enfield, I kill time along the Penobscot, where the sky has turned gray and the wind is kicking up whitecaps.

Clouds reflecting
in the pollen-covered
Penobscot current

(the river a mile wide in places?)

Passadumkeag
water striders
and sedge (reeds)

 – the public access landing

 river mussels

(A few days earlier, Sherry told of attending Andre Dubus’ funeral: he had insisted on being buried in the backyard, which created a controversy in the town. The coffin had a copper plate on top, which all of those present at the graveside service were to sign before the burial. It was all quite strange, she said, but there was lots of food.)

In the Grange hall, their motto: Unity in essentials, liberty in non-essentials, charity in all things – the Pilgram Marpeck!

In one conversation, a man was telling about his three-year-old grandnephew’s first reaction to the paper mill in Lincoln: Who farted! (How accurate! Who am I to complain, writer – user of paper?)

Only a portion of paper mill production is newsprint, office paper, or book/magazine stock. So much cardboard, tissue, etc. instead. Just for perspective.

Before entering the Grange hall, I drove down to Cold Spring Pond, looked across. R and I canoed that far? Amazing. With all of its clarity that day and the big boulders 20 feet down.

Their Jesse was in Budapest, but Margaret was quite present. As were Bill and Barbara – both after all these years. Other than that, I knew no one.

Was surprised D wasn’t present. Didn’t get a chance to inquire, either.

Good thing I went. Sense of closure. The poem went quite well.

Carolyn’s sister, Marsha: “You’re a deep thinker.” She should see what happens with Carolyn.

Raining during the gathering and through the night.

But next morning clear and bright.

A perfect day for driving – after the rain.

How dramatically the drive changes from Portland south – no more of the same rural quality.

~*~

How vivid all this, these years later! And how precious the friendships and memories!

AUTUMN RAINS AND LAKE ERNIE

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 3 Comments

After a particularly heavy rain, a small pond forms in the bottom corner of the side of our lot we call the Swamp, over by the far neighbor’s driveway. When we first moved in, that meant Ernie, a retired pipe-fitter who’d built the tidy house and large garage a half-century earlier.

Somehow, we dubbed the puddle Lake Ernie and learned to watch it as a warning. Whenever Lake Ernie appeared, I needed to check on the cellar – make sure the sump pump was working.

Soon now, the ground will freeze and likely become snow covered. It comes as a relief, at least until the melting, when I have to start checking the cellar. Especially if heavy rains melt the snowpack.

GOING WITH THE GRAIN

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Just days before, I'd heard an excited account of a gathering of a dozen and a half "woodies" in southern Maine. A good number of the surviving wooden station wagons, as I was told emphatically. So there I was, tooling along Storrow Drive in Boston, when I came upon this Plymouth. Had to get proof, didn't I? Even though I was driving ...
Just days before, I’d heard an excited account of a gathering of a dozen and a half “woodies” in southern Maine. A good number of the surviving wooden station wagons, as I was told emphatically. So there I was, tooling along a misty Storrow Drive in Boston, when I came upon this Plymouth. Had to get proof, didn’t I? Even though I was driving in the rain …

BEYOND DRESSING FOR SUCCESS

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 2 Comments

Waiting in an airport lounge for their flight to arrive and begin boarding, a wife was describing to her husband the computer she had ordered (not just any computer, mind you) and then detailing the renovations required for the room they were upgrading, or perhaps it was a wing they were adding. He nodded in thoughtful agreement throughout. They appeared to be comfortably retired, and she was resolved that this was what she needed to sit down and begin writing her first novel.

Somehow, it all felt wrong.

Not the writing, but the matter of appearances, as though one begins the volume by posing for the back cover color photograph – tweed for the men, a tasteful blazer for the women. As though writing depends on the workspace itself. As though you just plump down in a picture-perfect setting and turn out a critically acclaimed bestseller. Or at least a hefty advance. It is echoed in the group photographs of famous authors one comes across in Vanity Fair, the half-dozen or more serious novelists arrayed in a two-story private library or a publisher’s corner suite overlooking Manhattan, the happily ever after with afternoon cocktails. Leather and brass.

I’ve long pondered the airport scene, attempting to nail down what has struck such a loud discordant note. Listen to published authors discuss their workspace and you often hear it comes down to a concrete block cell or a corner of an attic or even, thanks to laptops and wi-fi, a booth at McDonald’s – not an interior designer’s photo spread. We write wherever we can – sometimes, as I prefer, in solitude, or other times, as daily papers’ newsrooms, in a large office crowded with shared computers and telephones augmented by TV screens and police radio scanners. They write, I would hope, out of some urgency – some sense each one has something unique to explore and present to the world. It’s what Bukowksi called his daily “butt time.” It’s what you put in to be a writer, the dues you pay, the actual effort rather than any posturing.

This is not a matter of comfort. The best writing, I will argue, comes with discomfort. It’s hard, after all, doing good work. Finishing the first draft is just the beginning, leading into multiple revisions and a pile of correspondence (much of it unanswered, even when the obligatory SASEs are included) attempting to connect with an agent and publisher before embarking on the marketing of the finished work – one of the five hundred or so novels published that week.

Did the retired beginner actually complete a first draft? Or did she find excuses along the way? Did her health hold up? (Writing demands more physical strength than one imagines – especially in maintaining the mental concentration of developing the characters and plot turns.) Did she have a storehouse of memories and exotic experiences to draw upon or a long gestated outline to quickly fill in? Had she done her homework in devising a story fitting a tightly defined marketing niche – one that would easily sell? Had she filled suitcases with letters, notes, and snapshots to prompt specific details or sketched in a lifetime of personal journals? Did she possess crucial contacts who would come to bear on publication?

There’s more to writing than looking like an Author – whatever that is. Maybe in the ensuing years she succeeded. But at the airport gateway, she gave no awareness of the actual struggle ahead. I, for one, cannot wait for the perfect space to appear. Rather, I’ve settled in to work where I could and then plugged away, between sleeping and the commute to my paying job.

NO CAUSE REPORTED

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None of the accounts mention it, though as I find in online searching, none of them had an actual obituary, either. But within the span of a year, three special acquaintances – all in their prime – had died of what appears to be suicide if you read between the lines of the news releases.

One was my best friend ever of my adult years, until our lives turned in much different yet somehow parallel directions. The second, a high school classmate of deep intellect – a shared rarity where we were in that troubled period. And the third, someone who stayed a week with us before returning to some truly horrific visions in the realms of international policy.

All three were remarkable and important individuals.

Anais Nin once posited that each of us has a demon to battle, and my response remains, “Only one?” On another level, I wonder about those individuals who have never felt the despair that prompts suicide.

I suspect this is one of those areas of our spiritual quest and practice we rarely discuss. Where could we even begin? How can we possibly define life fully, much less death? We can speculate, of course. Yet the darkness and accompanying numbness are, for me, inarticulate as the void described in Genesis 1:1.

There are no answers, in the end. Only the dawning of Light, when we can greet it.

CANDY COLLECTORS

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 3 Comments

Getting ready for the trick-or-treaters tonight means bringing the box of decorations down from the loft of the barn, perhaps carving a jack o’ lantern or two, putting up some spooky lights, and making sure we have bags of candy ready for the kids who come knocking on our door between 5 and 8 p.m. (Dover’s officially sanctioned window).

For readers in other countries, I should perhaps explain America’s Halloween tradition of allowing children to go door to door, knocking or ringing the doorbell, and then calling out “trick or treat” and receiving a sweet morsel in return. In the old days, there was the veiled threat, “or else,” which often led to a prank like having your windows soaped – or worse. These days, it’s often a matter of having any pumpkins left out being smashed in the middle of the night, regardless of your good acts.

Over the years, though, the event’s lost a lot of its edge.

For one thing, as a result of tales about razorblades being found in apples and other urban myths, only commercially prepared and sealed products are acceptable as handouts – no more apples, little bags of homemade caramelized popcorn or cookies, or (my favorite) Rice Crispies squares. It’s almost universally little candy bars, door after door. Gone’s the wide variety you’d compare at the end of the evening. Of course, most kids get candy throughout the year, so it’s no longer the Other Christmas when it came to rare sweets.

For another, concerns about safety mean it’s rarer to allow children to roam on their own. In our neighborhood, at least, almost everyone’s accompanied by a parent – and many of them have better costumes than the kids. For that matter, they often seem to be enjoying it more, too.

The safety issue has led to some weird twists of its own. Manchester, for instance, moved the event to Sunday afternoon – broad daylight. As one neighbor kid at the time observed, how lame! There’s nothing spooky in that! And then there’s the going store to store in the malls. Even lamer.

The one vexing situation is the car that cruises slowly while their children go door to door. Get out and walk, please! You’re being asocial. Usually, these are people who don’t even live in the neighborhood but have chosen to live out in the country, “away from neighbors.” And now they want what they don’t offer in return.

I remember, especially, living in a neighborhood of modest townhouse rentals and seeing the BMWs and Mercedes cruising through. Nobody in the neighborhood could afford vehicles like those, and now we were expected to give their kids little gifts?

I had the urge for a little tricking on my own in return. If I only had a plan …

JUST THE NORMAL WHIRLWIND

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A comment from my sister got me thinking. “Sounds like you have a complicated life,” as I recall. Or maybe it was a “complex” life, as if there’s a difference.

My initial reaction was that my schedule’s always been that way, a balancing act of job, relationships, literary endeavors, spiritual practice, outdoors activities, personal care, and so on – sometimes more successfully than others, perhaps, and sometimes better integrated rather than segmented into less than harmonious compartments. And that’s even before we get to the piles and files.

Not that I think my situation’s unique. As I’ve asked before, “Do we ever get caught up?” Often, wondering how other people do it, seemingly so much better, at that, I’m left in awe.

Even so, Sis’ quip had me reviewing the itinerary for the past month or so.

There was painting the front of the barn and one side of the kitchen el, both of them flaking from their facing the direction that our nor’easters blast in from. Glad I got that project done before wet weather and early cold kicked in. (I could go off on a rant, though, about the complications of getting the right replacement paint, a consequence of one brand playing hardball with its dealers and leading to one more coat than I intended.)

Still, there’s something about working outdoors on a crisp autumn morning. As I was moving a ladder into place, I looked up to see a bald eagle circling low over a neighbor’s treetops. Each round, backlit by the sun, the tail would flash white and then, a half-revolution later, the head. The next morning, an eagle circled high overhead. And then there’s the honking of the geese and their checkmark formations above me.

Outdoors also includes a host of garden-related projects in a race before the first killing freeze and, a bit later, deep cold and snow kick in. I see now I haven’t blogged much about the garden over the summer, at least since the groundhog invasion, but I did capture two of the varmints and relocated them to another state and the third finally moved on in its own time. In defrosting a freezer the other day, my wife was surprised by the amount of strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries we put up, along with the green beans and peas.

For now, we’re wrapping up the last of the tomatoes (Juliette’s been our workhorse out of our dozen-plus varieties), roasting them down to something that resembles sundried and then freezing them. And the eggplant gets a similar treatment.

The way the bounty of produce cooks down so much continues to amaze. A full pot of tomatoes, for instance, can reduce to a few cups of soup. How has humanity ever survived?

We’ll soon observe something similar with the kale.

In the meantime, I’ve been a bit hampered by something the doctor tentatively diagnosed as either plantar fascitis or a bruised heel bone, which requires icing and hampers my mobility while it (uh) slowly heals.

My Quaker activities, meanwhile, have included committee sessions in central Maine and on Cape Ann in Massachusetts, plus clerking a wedding and our Meeting’s first-time booth at the city’s annual Apple Harvest Day festival – and each event could be a story in itself.

One pleasant break came in the all-too-short visit of my old roommate from after college – our first time together in nearly four decades (ouch!) and a delightful introduction to his “new” wife of 25 years. (OK, we lost touch for a number of those, but the Internet’s been great for reconnections.) He may have lost his natural ‘fro, but his twinkling blue eyes and goofy humor are as sharp as ever. Again, this could be a story in itself.

The choir, meanwhile, is back in gear with weekly rehearsals that have become my regular outings to the big city. We’re excited to be preparing for performances in Boston’s Copley Square and Faneuil Hall at the end of November, which now looms closer than I’d like.

As for the writing? Well? Never enough to keep up.

No wonder I’m feeling a lack of balance or even focus. After all those years of wondering what “retirement” would be like, I’m still, uh, puzzled.

COMPOSING A REQUIEM

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When I first drafted this novel three decades ago, little did I expect it to be a requiem for a profession I’ve loved and served all my life. Now, though, as the history has unfolded, I’m left hoping against hope it’s not a requiem for community after community across America as well. Read it and weep – yet laughing along the way. We are, after all, still a resourceful people

 ~*~

Hometown_NewsTo find out more about Hometown News or to obtain your own copy, go to my page at Smashwords.com.

 

 

LEGALIZING POT

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 10 Comments

Another of the festering wounds of the ’60s and ’70s is the matter of illicit drug use. It wasn’t just hippies, actually, not once the troops in Vietnam turned to it, too.

It’s a troubling legacy on many fronts. For one thing, the United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world – much of it regarding drug traffic. In other words, there’s a demand for the product, and if you believe in a free market, maybe you need to listen.

I won’t go into the history of banning many of the substances that are now verboten, even if it suggests a political tradeoff in repealing the Prohibition. But the basis of declaring the substances illegal appears to have been made on reasons other than the ones officially proclaimed. Let’s be honest about tobacco and alcohol, including their ability to be taxed, in contrast anything you might be able to grow on your own. (This, let me add, is coming from a former homebrewer.)

On the other hand, the widespread, frequent use of mind-altering substances among the young – and I’m including tobacco, alcohol, and activity-inhibiting legal prescriptions – leaves me deeply concerned.

That extends to the parents who give their kids pot … or even allow them to sell it at school.

That, in turn, points to a divergence between hippies and stoners.

Faced with a decision on the legalization of marijuana, I’m not entirely sure how I’d vote. But I do know the current policy isn’t working – and is doomed to continuing failure.

Why can’t we have a frank discussion on the issue … without all the hubris?