“Swimmers”

Tucson, a painting by Felix Pasilis

Tuesday, April 29, 2008 very early morning

"Swimmers"

The sky is filled with small cotton ball clouds. After there not being a cloud in the sky for weeks, it is very pretty this sky speckled with clouds. It changes the look of the sky, and it is a nice new look. Our afternoons have turned so warm, that I am not fazed at idea of the coolness and dampness clouds mean. Our winter was so long and so cold, that I was never happy to see the clouds. I wanted every ounce of warmness the sun brought. But I am at that luxurious stage now, few days before May, we can afford a little coolness and dampness. We can enjoy the sight of puffy white clouds set in our blue sky. We can enjoy a new sight up there. The green of the trees has changed color too now that May is the day after tomorrow. When we arrived at Billie's pool yesterday, the mesquite trees were all adorned in green velvet. There is one time of year when the green turns into velvet, and it is so pretty and very luxurious, the way velvet is always luxurious.

Billie is in charge of all the pools, beside being head lifeguard at his pool, the Catalina pool. I have friends at that pool too. Most people just have a favorite pool and only go to that one, but Bill and I have two favorites, Catalina and Fort Lowell, so we go to both, and have friends in both places. I really don’t know how to describe pool friends. You swim there day after day, year after year, and only see each other in the shower. I imagine for the longest time chitchat in the shower would be “is the shower warm?” or about the temp of pool, or about the weather. It doesn’t go beyond our immediate shared experience. And then gradually you learn a little more. You find out the reason the girl blows dry her hair every day, even tho it takes a long time, and dresses so nicely, is because she is a teacher and has to go back to work, and she doesn’t want them to know she just came from swim pool. And the girl I have become friends with recently, over this past year, her name is Sherry, I found out during the winter she cleans houses for a living. But I found out yesterday under the shower, she is a photographer, and her photographs will be in the show of women artists next week.

It’s an inside out way of getting to know people, but feels so natural. You know how they swim, because they are in the lane next to you or occasionally share your lane. You know them naked under the shower. You know all their outfits, you watch them put on their underpants. You know how they shower and wash their hair. But it is forever before you find out anything they do in the outside world. Literally forever, it can be a few years.

Wow two huge black birds just arrived at top of tree outside Caren’s house. They are as big as seagulls. I wonder if they are crows or ravens. They are the biggest birds to ever arrive right outside my yard. I live in a world of very small birds. Most are sparrows. The morning doves are bigger, but a pigeon looks huge when it arrives in my yard. So you can imagine how big these black birds are, they are twenty times bigger than a pigeon. I have never seen such a huge bird in a branch which sticks up outside my window. They are so huge, the branch bent under their weight.

And it wasn’t just a branch, it was an actual tree limb. It is a huge event, like visiting royalty. All the little birds flew around. It caused big stir and excitement.

I don’t know the men at Catalina pool as well as I do the women, because I am never in the shower with them. But I now exchange warm hellos with the ones who have been arriving every day for years. We are familiar to each other. One guy mentioned few years back, I don’t know if it was to me or I overheard it, he was professor at the university here, and I got the idea he was law professor. But in the autumn I asked him, and he said he is anthropology professor. So of course I told him I used to be Girl Friday to Bob Carneiro, the anthropologist at the Museum of Natural History in New York City, and to my surprise Jeff (that is his name), it turns out knows him.

We never had another conversation, just friendly hellos, till yesterday. I was swimming in the first lane, by the deck, and he came out all dressed after his swim. He had been worried the water was too cold, so I asked him if he had liked it. And he said “yes, it was perfect.” And then for some reason he stuck around for conversation. I saw him do this last week, the same thing. He dressed after his swim and had long conversation with girl lifeguard about dancing, he loves to go dancing.

And he talked about dancing with me too. I said “what kind of dancing do you do?” And he said “every kind.” And he named all kinds of dancing I had never heard of. And described them all to me. Many are variations of folk dancing, or square dancing, or reels, but he also likes country western, and all other kinds. When he finished describing the dancing he had done over the weekend, which is a kind of reel, I said “O Jeff, you have a great life.” What do I know! I thought, it’s a nice life being anthropology professor at university, and swimming every afternoon, and going dancing in the evenings. As I said to Jeff, “nothing is as much fun as dancing.” And as soon as I said “you have a great life,” he gave that kind of laugh. I know that laugh. I should have recognized what it meant the instant he laughed it. But it just wasn’t where my mind was at all yesterday afternoon, in the middle of swimming in that delicious water, in the bright happy sunshine. It is a strange laugh of release, when your life is total trauma, it’s a very sincere laugh from the bottom of your soul, where you laugh at your predicament. That is the kind of laugh he gave when I said he has a great life. And he said “dancing is good because it’s an escape, it can take your mind off what is going on in your life right now.”

I forget about the world of suffering when I am not in it. It is a world which doesn’t exist for me when I am not in it. And I wish there were some way I would not feel so hurt for someone else when I discover they are in it right now. I would not want anyone to feel hurt for me when I am in it. When I am in it, I know, despite the unbearable stress, that I am a soul who is growing. No one has to feel sorry for me, or hurt that I am having this. Because as stressful as it is, a beautiful new growth and blossoming is taking place. Life is being renewed. But maybe it is not such a tragic thing I see Jeff with compassionate eyes now. It is a reminder we are all one, and having the same life. We are all each branches off the same tree. We belong together....

Bill said what I saw is the black hawks which circle high up above Tucson all the time but never alight. I guess I am lucky they alit for me, they have huge wing span

I can't find pic on net of hawks I saw, but this painting by Ron Bower comes close. Altho my hawks were completely pitch black

Ron Bower has nice paintings of birds, to see them click here