A Yellow Tree

Photo by Jeff Hire

I had planned, some months ago, a quiet few months after graduation. It has been a hectic year, and I was looking forward to winding down towards the end of it. Reality has been very different. Work has taken its toll. There is much to do for the holidays. On top of that, if I am even going to consider the possibility of more graduate school, I need to get applications finished in December, which is a tall order. Last month I found myself with a free day, a bunch of applications essays to write, and nothing but resentment about having to write them. In a effort to change my attitude, I went to the park near my apartment and found a beautiful yellow tree to sit under with a notebook and a pen. 

After a few minutes of silence, I asked the tree, why do I have to do this, anyway? What if I just give up, decide to shut this particular door altogether? The tree answered me, you can do that, but it is in your best interest to write these essays anyway. What are they really asking you to write about? It’s about what  you want to do, and why graduate school is a good place to do it. It would be good for you to know that, to have to write about it.

So I opened my notebook and started to write, as if I were writing to the tree, about what I wanted to do. When I got home, I had some translating to do. What a yellow tree will understand, a graduate admissions committee may not. But I left some of it as-is. I didn’t give in too much. If I’m not honest, how will I know if acceptance by an admissions committee really means I’ve found a place where I can pursue real, meaningful work?

Today, I have only one more application, and then I’m free… for now. It’s cold outside, and a bit icy, and I miss my tree. I would be a very good day to go sit under her branches, and ask her to remind me, again, why I need to do this.

An Advent Dream

I dreamed I was taking an acting class that met in the dark back room of a coffee shop. There were two rows of chairs, and I was perpetually late. Fortunately, the instructor was also perpetually late, so by chance, the class never started without me. A very cheerful woman was sitting on the dark stage talking to us in a very cheery manner about being artists. A man behind me, in the second row, said he was just not ready to make a change, to actually own an identity as an artist, or as anything other than a contractor, which was what he had been for the last decade. This stunned everyone into silence because he was universally acknowledged as exceptionally talented. Yet he said the one thing that was taboo, that change is frightening, that being an artist is frightening, that he wasn’t yet prepared to face that fear. I had to acknowledge that I wasn’t yet ready to face it either.

The cheery woman wanted to exchange phone numbers with me. I grudgingly obliged but found her annoying and thought her cheerful attitude was likely the result of delusion or denial about the difficulties in the world. Then I learned that she had a fellowship of some sort, that she actually made a very good living as an artist, and she was truly willing to support the idea of my doing work I loved as well.

I’ve had dreams before where a dream figure hands me a phone number. It seems to be an attempt by various pieces of my psyche to communicate with me, or with one another.

This strikes me as a particularly appropriate dream for the Advent season because Advent is all about the time of gestation and preparation before giving birth. When giving birth is understood as a metaphor that can apply to the act of bringing anything new into the world, it speaks to our lives in a new way.

Apparently, my psyche has a project that is gestating in the dark back room of a coffee shop in my mind. There is even an annoyingly cheerful fellowship recipient who knows how to do work she loves and make it pay. I’m not ready for any big changes just now, but I do have her phone number.

Promises to Elisa

About a year ago, the Deacon asked me what I thought a good brother was. He had given a great deal of thought to what it meant to be a good husband, but he wasn’t really sure about being a good brother. I was stumped and told him I’d have to think about it. Fortunately, the Nurse came up with a response that captured what was in my heart pretty well. It was about accepting each other as we are, and expecting only that each of us will be true to ourselves and what is in our hearts.

These days, the Deacon is no doubt busy thinking about what it means to be a good father, since his beautiful daughter, pictured here, was born just a few days ago. For my part, I am definitely thinking about what it means to be a good aunt, since this is a new role for me.

Today, I came back to the Nurse’s words, and they helped remind me that being a good aunt, a good sister, a good parent, a good anything, means being true to one’s self and one’s heart. I hope I will be able to serve this little one well in the years to come by doing exactly that.

So, little one, here are my promises to you: I will try to be a good aunt. I will try to show you, by example, what it is to be true to yourself. I will support you when you follow your own heart, even if it means disappointing someone else’s expectations (even mine). I will always be on your side, even when it means disagreeing with you in the moment. I will teach you everything I can about this beautiful world we live in. I will try to calm your parents down when someday you get a freaky tattoo. All my love now and in the years to come… Aunt Kat.