Most of the
commotion in my life came to a halt last Christmas, and I was left with silence,
but this time I was ready for it. For many years, I was caught in a tumult of heightened
emotions and physical activities-from living in big cities, getting divorced, being
a single mother, caring for an ailing parent, dealing with bankruptcy, negotiating
complex, personal relationships, moving from one part of the country to
another, and going through the pandemic.
The first all-consuming
silence I ever knew was in Portland, Maine, before gentrification, before the big city people came with their leaden soles and projects and moved the town into the
future with luxury condominiums, boutiques, world-famous productions, renowned
conductors… They took the town’s silence,
straight out of the Garden of Eve, and blasted it to the cosmos with drilling,
pounding, and hammering from their construction projects.
When I first moved
to Portland eight years ago, silence was everywhere: I never heard a sound from
neighbors or pedestrians on the streets downtown, as if talking should only
happen when necessary. Any noise was condemned and the slightest hint of it met
with complaints, unapproving stares, or a yearning to move to the more the quiet
and distant town of Buxton, as I heard mentioned by others on a few occasions. Only the loud giddiness of summer tourists
who came to drink beer, listen to live music, watch whales, lounge on beaches
was begrudgingly tolerated. Howling winter
winds, falling snow, tapping spring rains, drifting fall leaves were the
holiest and most natural of sights and sounds to be wholeheartedly welcomed and
enjoyed as the seasons saw fit.
At first, the
Maine silence rubbed me the wrong way, like a lover who stalked and insisted on
my affections even though I adamantly refused him. The
inspiration for my move was straight out of my coffee book of lighthouses, a
dream that quickly turned into a nightmare.
All my life, I had
lived in big cities--#New York City, Miami, Washington DC. Negotiating my life and its changes between
noisy distractions, led me to believe that navigating such challenges under such
distractions was an act of courage. Then I got divorced, raised my children,
and moved to Maine for a slower change of pace. At first, I expected more
noise, friends, and block parties. But Maine served up silence instead, and I
hated it. Yet Maine was like a loving, stern mother, feeding me a daily spoonful
of healing even though, at first, I refused her.
In the silence, my
deep-seated fears percolated to the surface- sleeping alone, being alone, being
imperfect…, so I distracted myself by dating furiously, recruiting friends who never
called me back, and hiking, even in bitter freezing weather. A year-long
painful ear infection remanded me to the couch where I contemplated the meaning
of my move to Portland with its subconscious pull to rise again from the ashes
of my past like a phoenix resurrected after burning in its flames, like the
city had done several times before rebuilding itself after several fires burned
it down. The Latin word Resurgam, I will Rise Again, was written on Portland’s flag
under the image of coiled but rising snake.
When I quieted
down a bit, I learned about the city’s
energetic tension of opposites where people aimed for perfection in creative projects
yet were impatient and unforgiving of imperfections in themselves and others;
they were rebels with or without a cause yet staunch protectors of their Mainard
history and culture; hardened intellectuals yet yearning to experience the heart
and soul of all things, fearful and judgmental of strangers yet committed to embracing
the humanity in all. I was those things too, and its reminders jabbed, nicked, and
stabbed me with the complexity of my truth in Portland’s house of mirrors.
My most pressing
fear was that Maine was mostly White and its White men and woman were, for the most part, all
things—Evangelist, murderer, beggar, philanthropist, neighbor, friend…. After many years of living in the
multicultural/ethnic hub of big cities, Maine’s Whiteness scared me and
reminded me of my forgotten and deep-seated resentment of my White European
father who married my Native Caribbean mother and daily held me accountable for
my lack of Whiteness. After many years
of teaching American Literature as an understanding of social, political,
historical, and judicial oppressions and limitations to achieving and/or living
the American Dream, to mostly minority students, I’ve learned that regardless of my students' race, gender, or creed, their dreams are always big, pure, and possible,
without acknowledgment to the hindrances of racism, prejudice, or social trauma, unless
a deep-seated personal wounding experience of it had diminished their sense of self-worth,
so that that same pain was reflected in their external worlds, and a heartfelt
belief in attaining their dreams was harder to come by.
Everywhere I went in
Maine, I ran into a reminder of my long-ago deceased, White father, pleading for
forgiveness, compassion, nonjudgment, and a freedom from the past, always ringing,
reverberating, reminding me to let it go with meditation, mantra, prayer, and
silence. Silence, I learned, was the gateway to penetrating and healing my
darkest hurts, and such darkness was as rich and fertile as the light; in Maine,
I had to make a 24/7-hour decision which way to go-soar like a seagull or dive deeper into the unfathomable darkness of a Stephen King novel--exhausting yet
therapeutic. It is no wonder that many years ago I dreamt of moving to Maine, when
I did not know why my soul yearned for it. When I left Maine for California, I was healed.
This last
Christmas, in #California, silence came for me again. During the last several months of the year my
mother passed away, I traveled to Miami to celebrate an early, quiet Christmas with
my adult children, and I caught Covid with three days of high fevers and severe
headaches, and two weeks of fatigue. After
dealing with a whirlwind of events, my life came to halt, just like life in a small town in Northen California, where most of its 7,000 Humboldt State University students went home for
the holidays, and the rest of its 7,000 residents settled into a quiet holiday
season. Even busses went on a Sunday schedule,
and no longer drove to my part of town.
At first, I
resented the town’s slowness and silence, but quickly remembered the value of solitude
and stillness. Yet the silence in Maine, with its powerful, deeply penetrating hues
triggered by changing seasons, was different than that in Northern California, where
on most days the sun blazed its rainbow light while the ground temperatures ranged
from a cool 35 to 55 degrees Fahrenheit. This time, I had to face my allegiance
to daily distractions and inabilities to get things done
I returned to the
drawing board of my to-do list, the list with seven items I could never complete
in Maine because I preferred to talk to friends on the phone, or watch movies, or nap,
or stroll around town, or drink tea... Now,
those friends had drifted into new lives, my children were grown and living
their own lives, and no one from the nursing home called to update me on my
mother’s condition. The soft, insistent sunlight falling on the cathedral of redwoods
outside my windows was a constant, daily guide back to my list, but first I had
to admit that I preferred cutting the hours from the hands of time and throwing
them away in the garbage as a way of sabotaging my days and subconsciously proving I was
not worthy enough to claim my time.
Living in an
apartment complex with mostly students at the university reminded me about the vitality
of dreaming big and daily, even though from spying their messy apartments, beer
bottles strewn all over their floors, and holiday ornaments left forevermore on
their doorsteps, I’ve recalled from my own youth, that most students did not yet
have the wisdom, maturity, experience, or focus to pursue their made-to-order dreams
because all dreams and causes were for them worthy and enticing enough to be pursued.. But I was now ready to pursue the dreams of my heartfelt and destined convictions.
This time, I looked
brazenly at what I needed to accomplish daily- online work, meditating, perfecting
my Spanish, researching a new book, reading, exercising/hiking in the Redwood Forest
outside my doorstep, stargazing, so I constantly reworked the hours and organization
of my tasks. Then I looked at hidden patterns that sabotaged my hours, like
taking too long breaks between tasks, or eating or drinking too many foods,
like dark chocolate or black tea, that caused insomnia, sleepless nights, and an
inability to wake up timely and start my disciplined day once again. I’m still at it, but every day I get closer
to completing more tasks on my list, while the sun outside asks more transparency of me and permission to allow its light to see right through me.
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