"I like too many things and get all confused and hung-up running from one falling star to another till I drop. This is the night, what it does to you. I had nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion." -- Jack KerouacJust this morning, I was flipping through a locally published magazine in which, not surprisingly, Jack Kerouac was quoted. For some reason, Kerouac's words always stop me dead in my tracks. "San Francisco, San Francisco, you're a muttering bum in a brown beat suit." I have no idea what that means. But I like it.
Once, I read that the spirit of Kerouac lives in Boulder, which is interesting because he never even came to Boulder. People here are obsessed with him, his thoughts, his spontaneous prose and poetry. Annually, his most famous work, On the Road, is read continually at a public place in the city--a tradition that began years ago in the middle of Pearl St, spontaneously, I'm told. The writing program at Naropa, the Buddhist university in town, is called "The Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poets." His friend, the famous poet, Allen Ginsberg was one of the founders and actually did live in Boulder. (Sidenote: A coworker, a native Boulderite, told me just the other day that in high school he had the opportunity to sit on the lawn of the library and talk about poetry with Ginsberg for an entire afternoon. I can't tell you how jealous I am.)
I've been thinking more about my own ever-increasing obsession with his words. I still can't figure it out . . . I suppose that it has something to do with his love of life and his struggle to figure life out, and the way he so honestly and desperately illustrated the tension and harmony between the two.
Tomorrow I'm going to Denver for the day to attend a National Geographic seminar on travel photography. My suspicion is that I'll come back home incredibly inspired and frustrated. I have a camera but no money to travel. I know how to take photos, but not well enough to work for National Geographic or any other corporation or institution that will pay me to do it. I love life but I'm frustrated that I feel like I'm stuck, unable to fully experience it.
But I'm encouraged that I'm not the first to feel this way, that I won't be the last, and that I live in a town where most people feel the same--proven by their obsession with a dead poet who devoted his live to putting these frustrations into beautiful, spontaneous, poetic phrases.
3 comments:
Mandy...great words expressing your thoughts. how do we live in that tension between our reality today and our ambitions? How do we discover that outstanding quality of life that we know is possible? I concur, stuck really is no way to live. I find myself there to often these days too. Perhaps we are the mud around our own ankles...is anyone holding us back from doing the things we care about today? even if in seemingly small and insignificant ways; by choosing to act and to be open to what may come we become the people we dream about today. And perhaps we will awaken from that dream and find ourselves engaged in the very kind of life we hope for. limiting factors are only as strong as we allow them to be. openess to our Creator's power can free us to navigate the mud, the questions about when, how and who will pay for it..."Therefore i tell you whatever you ask for in prayer believe that you have received it and it will be yours." -jesus
Daddy says,
I've been thinking a lot about what you have written and wonder if you realize that you may feel frustrated and stuck in a world that others could only hope that they could enjoy or experience. Consider that some in this world live their lives each day struggling merely for survival. Consider also that you may already be living the most wonderous life that has been laid out for you. Your Creater has only the best in mind for you and I believe has lead you to Boulder, Colorado, possibly and most probably, so that others may see the life you are leading so that they may be inspired to seek what you have already found, that sparkling jewel of grace and forgiveness. It's easy to look on the other side of the road and think that the person over there is living a life that you long for, not realizing that the same person may be returning that gaze with the same thoughts. Don't think for a moment that God can't use you right where you are for his purposes. You know that He uses the most common of us for His most wonderous acts.
Live life to the fullest right where you are.
Love,
Daddy
a lot to chew on. ps: i enjoy your writings.
jd
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