The Infinite Degrees of Santa Claus
December 21, 2009
WHEN I WAS ABOUT SEVEN YEARS OLD, things were easier to figure out. It was getting close to Christmas, and we were as excited as ever with the prospects of presents and the impending visit of that magical fat man. Of course there were smarter children in our neighborhood who didn’t believe, who told us that their parents had told them the truth—that it was all fantasy, that Santa was a story. Obviously, we knew that they were wrong. We knew and believed that St Nick would arrive late Christmas Eve in a sleigh pulled by flying reindeer, and that given the chance; our parents would probably fill our stockings with coal. Anyway, no one really knew. No one had seen anything, one way or the other, as we were all asleep when it happened.
“There he is! Look! There! Don’t you see his sleigh? Up there! You can just barely make out the reindeer in front….”
“Yes, I see it—at least I think I do. But it’s hard.” I answered.
So, that Christmas, being seven years old and in the second grade, I realized that if Santa was really just my parents, he, or rather they, would have to have hidden the gifts somewhere—and I went exploring. The top shelves in the pantry? The shed in the back yard? The back of their closet? And, the last most scary place to look was the cellar. The damp smell, the cool closeness, and all those sooty cobwebs hanging—we, the kids, never went into the cellar. So I decided then, by logical deduction, that it was the most likely place to find hidden presents, the place I didn’t dare look.
One afternoon while my mother was out doing errands, I decided I’d venture into the darkness beneath our old house. Slowly, I opened the door and descended the bare squeaky boards that were the cellar stairs, petrified of what I might find down there, other than presents. The furnace made those awful thumps and grunts as I quietly took each step, carefully checking above and below for imagined spider attacks. Finally, at the bottom of the stairs I turned and reached out into the emptiness, caught and pulled the chain attached to the fixture and bare light-bulb hanging in the middle of the room. “Nothing. Nothing! Nope, no presents here!” And I spun around and left as quickly as I could, tearing up the stairs, and then—as I turned to close the door behind me, I noticed what I hadn’t seen on the way down in the dark, that above me—high up over the stairs—on the shelf— were presents, the presents.
But, that is the enlightened story that I tell now. What’s odd is that I didn’t see them then. That day when I first went down into the dark, I came back sure that there were no gifts hidden anywhere in the cellar, reinforcing my steadfast desire to believe. I didn’t see the presents at that time. As I turned to close the door behind me, and glanced up at the shelf, I saw nothing. I didn’t see the presents stacked on the shelf until a few years later, after understanding more fully the true nature of Santa’s life. It was then that I saw what I was looking for, what I couldn’t see while staring straight at them. Suddenly I remembered, and there they were. Then, in my twenties, I looked and saw more than just the packages; I saw my parents’ love. Later, as a young parent, I looked and saw struggles and sacrifice on top of that. And, while that shelf is still a mystery in some ways, I’ve learned to have faith in its magic—though it doesn’t happen how the smart neighbor kids or I once thought. The presents had remained invisible until my experience and understanding grew to include their possibility. The real miracle and potential is that the shelf in the cellar continues to fill with gifts today, so many things that I can hardly imagine—before I learn to see them.
(excerpt from Chapter 13, The Infinite Degrees of Santa Claus, Talking to Tesla, The Mirror That Is The Door)
Notes, Notes, and Notes….
December 18, 2009
a post by Alex Bigney
IT WAS REALLY SNOWING! By the time I finished the driveway, the other end of it needed shoveling again, the best time to return to the house, to light a fire in the stove, and then to sit and stare out at the cold whiteness of it all from my warm place inside.
I like it when things with similar substantial aspects on the outside turn out to be essentially different on the inside. I also like it when things which are essentially the same, look dissimilar. Most of the time it’s fun to be surprised, fooled by mimicry, as in the clever use of marzipan presented in the windows of Sicilian sweetshops; or tricked by the hidden reality of trompe l’oiel environments, as in the faux wood grain or marble that decorates the interiors of some old buildings. So I’m also delighted with words in English which are spelled the same but can have several distinct meanings.
This is the season for notes–notes about the gifts I plan on giving, notes about ideas I plan on considering, notes on images I plan to paint; and visual notes, the sketchy basis for making pictures, notations that will grow into complete patterns and painted worlds. I make a lot of notes, where one mark or color is enough to bring a complete view to mind. (Where’m I going with this?) Notes on next year’s garden that already begin to grow inside me as the real thing.
Then, there are the familiar combinations of musical notes, the seasonal songs and hymns that seem to carry me back in time, the notes of traditional melodies, the tunes passed down like gossip traveling from fiddles to feet, the toe-tapping stuff I’m addicted to (images of my nana step dancing in the kitchen with my dad late at night) interbred with my spiritual craving for communion with something bigger than me (memories of Sunday School, of congregational hymns in church, and the singing of heavenly-sounding choirs).
From what I want to remember, the little pieces of bigger themes–to what I can’t forget. I’m lucky. During this time of year the house is filled with notes, the music that my father, grandfather, and great-grandfather played, my kids preparing for seasonal concerts and parties. For me, these notes resonate the universe I live in–which is magic. Kirkmount, A forgotten village in the hills of Nova Scotia, the white-washed church and little graveyard, the place my dad knew as home–much of it has returned to woods and barrens. The one-room schoolhouse has recently collapsed, where folks danced strathspeys and reels all night to fiddles and the percussive banging of the piano. But in my house the lingering notes of the driven bow and irregular spiky rhythms are still heard, especially during these months when the celebration comes inside out of the cold and snow.
And finally, notes, the ones scribbled in a journal beside my bed where I jot down the conversations and contents of dreams, notes from another kind of place, not just from inside, but from in-between. I noticed the other day that on several pages I wrote horizontally and then rotated the book to write vertically spanning the height of the page, to create a cursive grid scrawled first across and then up and down. Then there are those pages where the notes refer to notes several pages before, notes written in circuits back and forth throughout the book.
Notes, the mnemonic doorways into memory. Notes, the sonic building blocks of music. Notes, a secret code to decipher at the right time and in the right way. Notes, notes, and notes….
…But It’s Not A Murder Mystery, If That’s What You Mean
December 4, 2009
post by author, Alex Bigney
“IS IT INTERESTING?” I asked again after reading another chapter to her. “And, who do you think will want to read it?”
“I like reading it. It’s a wonderful book—but it’s not a murder mystery if that’s what you mean.”
I was stunned. “…not a murder mystery…? Of course it’s not a murder mystery! So, what is it?”
“It’s different,” she answered, slowing down then in order to offer the thoughtful response she could tell I was seeking. “I think it’s beautiful—like a long poem. But not exactly.”
Finishing the first volume of my Tesla journal and seeing it now in physical form has felt a lot like finishing a painted image. There’s always some amount of lag between the euphoria of calling it complete and finally feeling the initial infatuation dissipate. The emotional experience becomes a memory to process. That’s when I begin truly to wonder how others see what I see, what I hope to have shared.
Yes, writing words for others to read has felt a lot like painting—including the eventual realization that the audience is important after all. In the beginning, it’s easy to claim that I’m the only audience to please—that it’s solely for my personal satisfaction. Often it takes a while to discover the truth.
“Hey! What’s the view from over there?” I call across the chasm that separates me the painter from me the person who lives with other people in a house, on a street, in a community, country, and on this planet. That’s how it feels anyway—to pick up my head from my work and to look around. “Is this experience just mine? Or does someone else care? Have I painted the image clearly enough that others can see it?”
I have been reading to her from her own copy of the book and have noticed that she has underlined parts with a red pen. “Nope, not a murder mystery. People don’t usually underline passages in murder mysteries.”
“I hope you like it?” I begged for more.
“How many times do I have to tell you how much I love your book? Why are you so insecure?”
“Isn’t everyone?” I grumble to myself, and to be heard. “I’ve painted enough that I’m confident most of the time about that—but writing…? Yes, I am insecure. Totally.”
“Well, I do love your book—and so do a lot of other people. But, it’s not a common book. You know that.”
“Yeah, I think I do,” I concurred, remembering the many other times in the last few months that we have had the same conversation. I reread a few chapters to myself again after that, as I usually do in order to be reassured.
“Don’t think I’m bragging but I like it,” I told a friend later in the day. “I really do. I like reading it. It gets my thoughts going—loosens me up.”
“Me too,” he agreed. “I love everything about the book! And you should know that.”
“But it always surprises me to find that I really do enjoy it,” I responded. “…sorry to be so insecure.” I took a deep breath and smiled. “Thanks.”
“You know, vulnerability is a strength,” counsels my wife. “…sounds strange but it’s true.”
“I guess,” I admit, “but it doesn’t always feel strong.”