I have recently weeded the strawberry patch, which felt rewarding. The berries, which will ripen in a few weeks, are now free to harness the sun.
Today I started weeding our big back bed to find a place to put sunflowers I have started in small pots. It is a good spot for them to grow to their full, massive height. The weeding is not easy, as the current lush jungle there is over two feet tall. I feel impossibly bad pulling out the most exuberant growth in our yard, destroying tiny blooming things which has spent so much energy growing and bring so much benefit to the tiny creatures who live among them. I hate disturbing the creatures which have made their home there. I have this problem with gardening every year... To most people it looks like a lot of weeds, but I can't help but see a complete tiny world, filled with beings I know so little about. How can I demolish that, deciding their fate for them? Who am I to say who lives and who dies? The last straw was when I came across a tiny spider on the underside of a dried leaf, guarding her eggs with her life. I have no more emotional energy for weeding today. Where am I going to put 25 mammoth sunflowers which are outgrowing their first incubators?
In the Summer of 2003, a beautiful film called The Whale Rider came out, and Austin's quirky, independent university-neighborhood theater, the Dobie, was showing it. The Dobie was almost the only place I went to see films on the rare occasions, and I saw The Whale Rider with a friend there when I was in town for a couple of weeks. It was deep, complex, real, and inspiring. I rented it a few years later on VHS. More recently I borrowed it again from the library, and then when Anne and I were at Goodwill this Spring, she saw the DVD on the shelf and said, "Mom, you should buy this for yourself. I know you like it." Thanks to her prodding, I did, and I have watched it twice more, recently.
The story centers on a young girl in a small Maori town in New Zealand whose gift and destiny is in communicating with and understanding whales and dolphins - she discovers her place as a leader of her people, come full circle from the ancient ancestor, for whom she was named, that brought her tribe to New Zealand. Her grandfather, the chief, has such trouble accepting her; he is looking, desperately, for a firstborn boy to be the next leader. The setting by the sea is naturally spectacular and culturally genuine. The characters develop dimensionally with their own quirks and foibles in a poor town during the 1980s.
The film, it turns out, was based on a young adult novel of the same name by Maori author Witi Ihimaera, published in 1987. I am so glad to have listened to the audio version for two reasons. First, Mr. Ihimaera himself eeads the book; I appreciate hearing the author's own voice and intentions. Second, the book contains phrases, words, and chants in the Maori tongue, which language I would not otherwise be able to hear properly in my mind. Listening to the Maori intonation carries my mind to another way of being.
The novel covers more territory than the film, as the latter, of course, is limited by time. Along those lines there are some plot differences which, while noticeable, do not impact the overall arc of the story. One theme runs quietly in the background - Indiginous people finding their way in a quickly evolving, colonialist world. This shows up in the novel not just amongst the Maori in New Zealand, but also in cowboy-studded, freewheeling, big-city Australia and in the divide in Papua New Guinea between the ignored Native labor and the colonialist, high society.
Two more things I found wonderful about the novel... The story alternates between Omniscient Narrator and the voice of the girl's young uncle - an unexpected story-teller to me, as he is not the central character; he is fiercely protective of Kahu, his niece. The other: For a section the story follows the Whale family undersea, spanning more than a thousand years; the Whales seem to live in mythical time, both past and present, the bull Whale chief is seen with a magical tattoo on his forehead. - Then for a section, the story follows the Whale Rider's family on land; the First Whale Rider was both real and distantly mythical; the Whale Rider of Destiny lives in very real, 1980s circumstances, part of a complex family full of lovely, passionate, angry, strong, confused, tender, messy people. The story is bound into an arc which has a distinctly non-Western flavor. I love that non-Western perspective, because I frequently find myself trying to get into others' heads to break out of the assumptions of my own mind, background, and culture, trying to glimpse a sliver of the bigger Reality.
The Whale Rider, in novel form, reminds me in many ways of Jean Craighead George's posthumously published 2014 young adult novel Ice Whale, which I first picked up from the library on a whim around three years ago. In this case I am again glad to have the audio version rather than print, because where the author uses her own invented notation for whale speech in print, the audio book uses real recordings of whales obtained by a researcher from UW. Hearing the whales' own voices, though the translation is undoubtedly inaccurate, helps the reader to enter their world.
The Omniscient Narrator follows a story with a long arc, too - 1848 to 2048. As in The Whale Rider, the narrative alternates between sections telling the story of the Whale family underwater and sections following the Indiginous family on land. The central cetation figure is a bowhead called Siku, born with a white mark on his chin resembling an Eskimo dancer. The central human figures (as their lifetimes are shorter than the whales), are a line of Alaskan/Russian Yupik people named, each in turn, Toozak. In the wake of the great sin of the first Toozak, who was tricked into pointing the commercial Yankee whalers to new herds of prey to decimate, each Toozak, in turn, works to propitiate that unintentional but grievous error and fulfill their destiny of protecting Siku into the future. Unlike The Whale Rider, the narrative alternates following a third family as well, a family of Tom's, colonizer people from New England. The Yupik family evolves over the 200-year course of the story, but not so much as the Yankee family, which begins the book with a commercial whaler and ends the book with a research scientist bent on umderstanding. The novel is well researched in all its scientific, historical, and cultural details, and yet there is something about the Yupik narrative which feels very slightly Western to me; I can't quite put my finger on it. The author, as in one of her most famous works which I have dabbled in, My Side of the Mountain, shows herself to be a true naturalist, fascinated with the interaction of people and our environment, a staunch advocate for respecting and collaborating with Nature, rather than overpowering her. Conflict between the philosphy of reciprocal living with the gifts of the earth and the inherent greed of capitalism and commercialism is in stark display from the first chapter. This was my second time through the novel.
The mystical communication between human and Whale is not quite as stark and magical as in The Whale Rider, but it is there and an important part of the story.
One more book I love that features dramatic communication between human and sea mammal: Ring of Endless Light by Madeline L'Engle, published in 1980. As the fourth part of the five-part Austin Family Chronicles, it is one of my favorites, and like each of the five it can be read as a stand-alone. Though following the same family, the five novels have vastly different flavors, styles, and settings, and this one takes place on a (fictional) island off the New England coast. A coming of age story, it is narrated entirely by the main character, Vicky Austin. Major themes include finding love, finding a vocation, growing apart from ones family of origin and discovering what that means and how to love anew, and most largely, understanding and accepting death. Vicki's family is on the island for a summer stay to be with her grandfather as he slowly loses his battle with cancer. Vicki ends up dating three vastly different teenage boys that summer, one of whom, Adam, really seems to be someone special. Adam (who first appeared in L'Engle's Poly O'Keefe series) is a marine biology student with a summer internship at a research lab there on the island. He is doing a research project with wild dolphins, and has made friends with one in particular, whom he calls Basel. Vicki, whom Adam invites to meet Basel out at sea, finds that she has an almost mystical way of communicating with the dolphins, where they can read her thoughts and she, theirs.
There is a traditional arc to the novel's narrative, and the dolphins play a key role in Vicki's growth, acceptance, and healing. Despite the science-fiction element, this particular novel seems deep, rather than kitschy, and is steeped in L'Engle's best writing, marinated in philosophical and theological questions and the best science of the time. I have listened to Ring of Endless Light four times in the last year on an audio recording.
In both Whale Rider and Ice Whale, there is one reference to the story of Jonah. In all three books, the oceanic mammals save a human they are connected to. The human hubris rampant in our culture pales - we cannot do all the saving ourselves and must learn to entrust ourselves to the goodness of others.
...American composer Alan Hovhannes wrote a piece for orchestra and recorded whale song called And God Created Great Whales. It in mentioned in the fifth Austin Chronicle, Troubling a Star, which is set in both New England and a trip to the Antarctic.
This weekend I flew down to Texas to be there when we buried my grandmother's ashes in the little country cemetery off a dirt road in the Hill Country and to be a part of her grand musical memorial service at the old, soaring, city church of my childhood. My grandmother lived 106 1/2 years, and was deeply connected to both her family and our church where she had been a member for the last sevety-six years of her long adult life.
Around twenty-five family members came out to the old Round Mountain Cemetary on Saturday morning. People, most especially my mother, told stories and prayed and used my grandmother's favorite Little Shovel to take turns scooping dirt into the hole where my dad lowered the gourd holding my grandmother's ashes. She is now resting next to my grandfather who died twenty-nine Springs ago. We also scattered handfuls of native wildflower seeds into the blooming meadow in what folks said was the most beautiful Hill Country Spring in a long time. "Roberta picked a good Spring to go."
After we decided we were done at the cemetary, we drove six miles, as the crow flies, to the house of my mom's second cousin, where we had a barbecue picnic (this is a ranching family...) on Jane's covered patio, overlooking beautiful, rolling pastureland. I, along with two other of the young ones (i.e. under age 60), crossed the cattle guard to go look at the old, decaying farmstead across the lane. This piece
of land has been in that part of the family for a hundred years, I would reckon.
The service Sunday afternoon required rehearsals on both Saturday evening at Emily's house and Sunday afternoon at the church. Some years ago, my grandmother had hand-written a list on a sheet of lined paper, torn from a notebook, of all the music she wanted at her memorial. There were several major organ works, some favorite hymns, a few large choral works, and a request for special music by the grandchildren. If we had been able to pull off the whole list, it would have been a two-hour concert. As it was, my mom and I sorted through the options, which she then which she ran by our organist and choir director. At the service Keith played two of the big organ pieces for prelude and postlude. The congregation sang A Mighty Fortress is Our God. Kim led the choir with Emily on harp in Rutter's arrangement of Amazing Grace for the anthem. Linda, Emily, and I played a transcription I wrote of Kreisler's Liebesleid for violin, viola, and harp for special music. (I remember my grandmother telling me she had once been to hear Fritz Kreisler perform in San Antonio; I assume it was while she lived there 1942-1947. The house seats were sold out, so they added chairs on stage, and she sat right up close to hear his recital. Liebesleid is one of my favorites of his compositions, and it means Love's Sorrow.) And finally the choir, organ, violin, viola, and members of the congregation offered Handel's Hallelujah Chorus. In addition there were remarks written and delivered by my mother and several key components of the Presbyterian order of worship, with all three pastors participating.
After the service, there was a reception at the church with cookies and fruit and punch, and a slideshow of photographs my parents had put together. I saw and spoke with relatives and old family friends, and met some new people as well. There were some folks I had not seen in years, some even in decades. We are all a lot grayer and more wrinkled, and it felt wonderful to be in a familiar place, filled with familiar people, despite the sad occasion.
For those of you who did not grow up Presbyterian in Central Texas, I now tell you about Mo Ranch. As the name implies, the property was once a family cattle operation. Stretched out in the semi-arid Texas Hill Country, it straddles a small river. The river is quiet here, but has dug its channel deep between the hills over the eons. Limestone cliffs and outcroppings, shallow soil, and scrubby junipers, live oaks, and spikey grasses encompass the flowing water. Some of the river is canoeable here, and some swimable for those who enjoy communing with the water moccasins and tall, tickly river grasses. There is an area upstream where the river runs shallower and wider over a water-smoothed stone slab, pocked with small, naturally eroded tubs. The sun heats the shallow pools; it is warm and pleasant, and the tubs are a marvelous place to sit in a bathing suit and commune with black leeches. A towering catwalk spans the chasm of the hills on either side of the river, so that visitors can traverse from the lodging and indoor gathering side of Mo to the outdoor vista chapels carved into the opposite hillside, while contemplating the vertiginous drop directly beneath their feet and having their hats blown off in the powerful, wild wind.
Though not required, it is common (and considered welcoming) for Presbyterians to baptize infants into membership, so baptisms in church are usually a laying on of a wet hand from a font; dunking infants is not anyone's idea of a good time. The first time I saw a baptism by immersion was in this river, when a couple of college students attending the church decided to formally join. This deep, natural water setting seemed much more interesting and dramatic and historically reminiscent of Jesus' baptism than the ritual I was used to in the church sanctuary.
Mo Ranch has been owned for decades and decades now by the Presbyterian church, and is used for church retreats and such, in addition to hosting school groups on ecology trips. Our church had an annual weekend reserved in the Spring. I also attended a youth weekend conference once or twice in January or February, called "Mid-Winters."
We stayed in various lodgings over the years, but the most interesting was a old, patchwork field-stone building, Manor House. It dates from the 1940s or perhaps earlier, with lots of little sleeping rooms and a couple of communal living areas. Full of twists and turns, nooks and crannies and funny staircases, it would make a wonderful setting for a short story. One of the communal rooms held a billiard table, and this was a rare opportunity in my young life to try out the game. Once when I was around twelve, my dad and I were playing, and it just so happened that a few teenagers from another group were looking on. With obvious-to-me utter dumb luck, I was playing quite spectacularly, easily sinking my full complement of balls, stroke after stroke, and beating my father in a short time. The teenagers were extremely impressed. I felt unconquorable at that moment but went back to playing quite shabbily for every remaining match in my life. Ha!
The main building with the office held various meeting rooms, plus a dining hall and gift shop. Another small, patchworked field-stone building consisted of a row of four or five little, old classrooms with full-wall windows, opening to the outdoors. Another large, rounded, oblong, smooth-floored building of the same stonework could be set with chairs for meetings or worship, cleared out for these embarrassing and overwhelming youth dance/worship/ice-breaker things called Energizers, or used as a roller skating rink. There was an outdoor swimming pool with a diving board. A quiet stone chapel nestled under trees on a hillside. Outdoor aviary enclosures were home to quite a variety of vociferous birds...
When we went on these all-church retreat weekends, the official program would start with a small gathering Friday evening as people trickled out from town. There was usually a less formal/night-owl/outrageous-story-telling hangout after that. (It was at one of these uproarious late evening Two-Truths-and-a-Lie, watching grown men jumping over a sofa, that I first remember hearing about Seventh-day Adventists. One fellow from the church had grown up in an Adventist family and remembered Saturday nights spent cleaning at his church where they absolutely were Not Allowed to listen to the radio...) Our Saturday morning started with a short group worship service in the skating rink, then broke up into smaller groups for Sunday-school type activities. Saturday afternoon was free time, Saturday evening was for more theological gatherings. Sunday morning started with another Sunday school and then ended with a worship service and communion up on the far hill. Afterward everyone would head home at their leisure.
...Saturday afternoon free time might include swimming, canoeing, playing board games with friends, going for a hike, playing tether ball, using the ancient teeter totter on the playground, watching the birds in the aviary, flying kites, or going down The Slide. The Slide was this enormously unsafe, 30-foot high metal contraption next to the river. The top was attained by hauling up a rickety ramp with small, worn boards mounted across it as sort of steps. The hauling part was that you had to carry up this enormously heavy wooden sled, fitted with small wheels and a rudder, which would slip down into a slot in the middle of The Slide. At the top of this imposing metal edifice, one would hold back one's panic, sit on that sled plugged into its track, hold onto the side grips for dear life, and go plunging at breakneck speeds into the water below, which felt freezing upon sudden entry. There were no rails on The Slide. Then the idea was to dismount the sled as quickly as possible, and swim back to shore with the contraption so as to hand it over to the next dopamine-seeker while not drowning. This thrill was a major part of my Mo Ranch experience from a rather young age, but maybe even moreso for my father. He perfected the art of going down this roller coaster like a bat out of hell, perched upon his knees with his hands up over his head, yelling in delight. My dad is good at outrageous fun.
There was always some sort of theme to these retreats, and I remember only one. This particular year, everyone took the Meyers-Briggs personality questionnaires and then the adults attended small groups with their personality matches. My parents had already been really big on Meyers-Briggs, and I had studied my way through the book "Please Understand Me" several times. It was discovered that certain less-common-in-the-general-population personality types were very well represented within the congregation. It was the quiet engineering and deeply analytical and thoughtful/poetic/artistic types; that is no surprise. Perhaps the Scotsmen founders carried those sorts of genetics and the organization they set in motion attracted more of the same.
At an evening worship service one year I witnessed and participated in my first ever foot-washing ceremony. I later saw this quite frequently, as the Adventists never have communion without it. But the Presbyterians seem to reserve it for very rare, special occasions. I have only seen it in a Presbyterian Church once or twice since then.
The most spectacular terrestrial invertebrate I have ever seen walked slowly across one of the paved footpaths between bits of lawn at Mo Ranch one day on another visit. This would be the Giant Desert Centipede, which can grow up to a foot long. I saw two or three of its kin on that visit as well, and I have never seen such an animal before or since anywhere in the world.
