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| Trouble in Paradise |
I say shelter because today it's raining. There isn't a soul on the lake but a solitary loon cruising up and down the shoreline diving for breakfast. The seasonal birds are back and right now I can hear chickadees, robins, nuthatches, and a blackbird singing to the steady beat of rain striking the old fiberglass roof of my little cocoon. I love this time of day. I love this experience of simply being surrounded by and present to the natural world of water, waterfowl, birds, rain and green shoots springing up everywhere.
Sometimes I fantasize about leaving it all behind, braving a chunk of wilderness somewhere far away from the world of concrete, electronics, noise and buzzing machinery. The world we have traded for forest, grassland, water and mountain. Increasingly, I need more of the natural elements, less of the fabricated and artificial. I seek to be away from the madness of the pace of life. I want more of and gravitate toward the sanity, stillness and deep, deep quiet of the kind I find in this early morning.
An eagle just burst into the scene winging his way through the rain. He is most likely in search of something to fill him up or perhaps bring home to hungry little mouths. In all likelihood this huge and beautiful bird isn't flying in earnest across the lake just for the hell of it, he's on a mission of food, mate, progeny, or territory. Nature is straightforward and simple that way. I think it's one of the reasons I hunger for it so.
There is nothing duplicitous about the natural world . . . What you see is what it is. A bird is a bird and does what a bird does. The same with trees, mammals, rodents, wind storms, rain, fish and fowl. That's not to say that because it is straightforward it can be fully understood. The natural world functions differently than we do because it has a different kind of 'mind' and language we can never really know. Thinking it is something we can conquer is yet one more example of human arrogance. We can know the natural world in part, it is not obtuse as much as foreign to our understanding. Our planetary operational systems are available to be known to some degree, predictable within the parameters of inherent design. I find that comforting, and welcoming. So different from our world.
Just the simple fact that the human mind can think of things beyond its knowledge, or experience sets up a world of possibility. What regulates thought and consequent actions? Conscience? Morals? Culture? Weather? Religion? Race? Community? All of the above and more? We are a complex matrix of unlimited potential for creating reality as we choose, consciously or not. From where I sit I think we are THE scary animals on this planet. We are capable of pretense, deliberate deception and outright destruction to fill our needs and desires as sanctioned by our created reality! Terrifying when you look around and see the result of our inhabitation. I recently read a quote by Terri Swearingen, an eco-actiivist . . . "We are living on this planet as if we had another one to go to." Chilling and true.
I know I'm not capable of making it in the wilderness. Even as I fantasize about leaving it all, I know I wouldn't last long. I'm too much a product of the civilized world of humankind. Civilized, interesting term for the chaos of fragile political stability, soaring violence, hunger, disease, and spoiled natural resources we, the civilized have brought into reality. I don't like most of what I see in the civilized world, and it is my world. I am a part of it no matter how I yearn to be a part of the orderly, sensible world of nature. The world where creatures live and die according to a rational structure of balance, taking only what they need for survival, not for excess, greed and unbridled, unnecessary dominance. Dominance is exercised in nature when it is fitting, appropriate and needed to maintain balance and order. If only we could say the same.
I know it's not all bad out there in the world of humankind. There are many people I know dedicated to truth, to good wholesome living doing marvelous things to promote good will and health for all. People work tirelessly for cures to disease, finding innovative ways to protect our environment, and provide the means for all to have food and shelter. I know this. The optimist in me says we can win the day . . . The realist says, 50 years ago? Maybe. Now, not a chance. Is that good news or bad? I honestly don't know. Maybe we're not meant to be around forever. Maybe in the not so distant future we'll disappear and those who have been long-suffering under our regime will once again know the paradise available on this blue planet.
Well, I've stayed out here as long as I can, and my fingers are cold. I am not equipped with downy feathers to ruffle up and stay warm. My fragile human body needs to go inside and warm the morning rainy chill out of my bones. If it's true that we do recycle around from lifetime to lifetime, maybe I'll return some day as a hardy creature with feathers in the brave new world . . . I should be so lucky . . .
That’s what this artist is thinking about today . . .
About the painting . . . "Trouble in Paradise" is large, 48x60 and thickly textured in an attempt to express the meaty frustration and anger I feel for the spoiling of our planet. Housed in every stroke and ridge of paint is my rage, confusion, astonishment and disillusionment with the way our species (including me) has trashed this paradise.