My best friend, Ember, is leaving. She's moving back home to begin a new chapter in her life. She just finished her Master's degree and will hope to begin teaching art in a public school in the upstate.
In a town full of people that I've found to be insincere and aloof, Ember has been my one constant that goes against all of those things. Our friendship has always been based on honesty, openness, and never having to fear that being yourself will be frowned upon or judged (which is why we are the two silliest girls around). I have tried not to think about her leaving but she just called to say she's coming to town to start cleaning out her place.
One of her pieces of art in the show for her Master's was a window. I know, windows are typical in art. I've said before that windows are to sculpture what trains (and maybe flowers) are to photography. We've seen them a dozen times. But hers spoke to me as something different, maybe because I know her and I know the stories.
She found her old window from a dumpster on the way to the Dixie. The thought of her going near a garbage dump much less reaching inside of it to pull this window is hysterical. (She's terrified of nature and doesn't go for the messy either). She weaved webs in the corners of the frames using yarn and broke and cracked the glass in others. Minimal color was used, which is also very unlike her; she has a Disney palate in almost all of her other artwork.
I won't go in to the entire concept of this piece because that's for her to do and I wouldn't want my thoughts to influence anyone else's about a piece that isn't mine. But I will say something that she mentioned during a critique of the piece. She said that she knew this chapter of her life was coming to an end and that she still had things she needed to work on that she had put off during the last year(s). She claimed she needed to "clean the cobwebs in the corners" that had been piling up.
Like skeletons in closets, don't we all also have cobwebs in the corners? I know I do. I pray for those webs quite a bit. Mostly, I pray that I will find peace with their prescence and not fight the formation of them. Because who really can? It's only human nature to shove things aside, to deal with them later. And then you think that they're gone only because you've forgotten about them for a bit until they rear their ugly head again. And then that's all you can think about.
My friend Sayrah and I recently had dinner. We were discussing relationships and such and one of us said, "How do you get over something? How do people do it?" How do you clean webs that you've so dearly and secretly loved to look at? Which has led me to think that we never really "get over" anything. It's true that time heals and helps our memories lie down or live, whichever we desire them to do. Memories are like old toys, you take them out of their boxes in the shed, dust them off, let the touch of them remind you of a time long ago, a time when you didn't know as much, then let them entertain you for a while, then put them up until you remember that they are there later down the road. They look great and desirable even though we are well past the age of playing with them. But do we "get over" these old toys? Not really. Getting over sounds too much like giving up. Maybe we should say we "matured" these things instead.
"I matured that old boyfriend because he wanted to spend time playing video games all day."
"I matured being friends with her because she had too much drama."
That sounds better to me. It sounds fair, as if every party involved had a chance to meet you at the newfound place of Growing Up Land and chose to come along or stay behind.
But back to cobwebs. This previous weekend's beach trip was not so great. But one thing I did gain out of all of it was how much I appreciate silence and alone time. I walked on the beach, away from the group, for a couple of hours. It was serene, like a backbround on a computer screen. I didn't allow myself to think about the group behind me, the boyfriend behind me, new ideas for sculpture, what everyone back home was doing, what life was going to be like when I returned. Instead, I stayed present. I've finally learned how to sit on the beach without getting sand in my bikini bottoms so I did that for a while. I watched the water rush in and blanket my hand while it sank in the sand. I saw the little holes in the sand make small bubbles when the tide rolled over them. (Although this did make me cautious because I'd already been pinched by a crab the first day there and was terrified that they were all out to get me after that.)
Silence. Touch. Warmth.
It was nice. I wish I could do it once a week.
There's a line in Pulp Fiction where Mia Wallace/Uma Thurman says something about knowing you've found someone special when you can, "Just shut the f**k up for a minute and comfortably enjoy the silence." I'm not so sure about knowing if that makes someone special, but I do know how it feels to shut up and enjoy the silence.
I've started my silence, my cleaning of the cobwebs, my reformation, my understanding of what is okay and what's not okay in my life, by deleting my facebook account. I'm sure you're thinking that is very trivial and meaningless. But it's not.
Facebook (and probably the other social network sites) is part of the reason that I think our society, my generation especially, is so disconnected from each other. You can say, "Hey girl, we need to catch up soon!" on facebook knowing that it is never going to happen but it sounds like a nice thing to say. And it has crept out from computer and cell phone screens into the real world. Hence, the lack of sincerity among us. I saw something on pinterest that said, "I'd rather have grown up with the hippies than with the cell phones."
Damn right.
So here's to wishing blessed while I discover these newly cleaned corners.
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