"Gather" Us In

 

• My wife and I have found the opportunity to swim late this afternoon.  We shall hopefully get together around 4:00pm or 4:30pm to swim and wind down from the day.  

• Our new parish has Ash Wednesday services at Noon and at 7:00pm today, so because of work, my wife and I will be obtaining our ashes at the 7:00pm Mass.  

• After Mass, my wife and I will relax and consume a simple dinner of soup (and salad).  But, I will also give to her a few additional small gifts I have for her on Valentine's Day.  

• But, because of today's Ash Wednesday fasting (guided to be a single, simple, small meal), I gave my beloved a heart-shaped box of fancy Bissinger's Chocolates yesterday evening so she could enjoy some prior to the start of Lent.  And, I have also….. being delivered to her at work today... a dozen roses of a mix of red and pink.

Yet, there is one other facet of this day, which has been resonating in my mind, and has lived in infamy for these last six years.  Six years ago today, I began the arduous effort of laying down my pipes and pipe tobaccos.  

That is a grand total of 2,191 days (there was a leap year).  But, technically, I should say 2,189 days because I did indulge in the two nirvana-like bowls-ful of pipe tobacco (one in Chicago, one on my Dad's 100th birthday).  

Have I learned anything from this "adventure"?  

• My gut reaction was to answer..... NO.  However, that is not completely accurate.  I have learned the falsehood of thinking that my love of pipe smoking would diminish as time progressed.  I still feel the deep loss of this avocation of mine.  I have, however, become more adept at coping with this loss than I was at the beginning.  I am now rather used to feeling the emotions of that loss.... that initially overwhelmed me moment to moment.

What is my "next step"?

• I sincerely DO NOT KNOW.  Part of me wants to say..... perhaps "I proved what I needed to prove." But, that doesn't seem legitimate.  I never really thought I had anything to prove by laying down my pipes. I was doing so because.... well.... I was grieving (the loss of my FIL)..... I was worried (about health risks, etc).... I felt a need to atone (for all the wrongs I have ever done).

• I really do not know what will be my future path.  I could, so very easily step back into my prior "pipe clothes" metaphorically and just return to my prior self.  It sounds so comfortable.  But, would it remain so?  I could continue to search for a viable "occasional" pattern of some sort.  This too sounds enjoyable if I can wrangle it in appropriately. But, it also seems rather complex and lacking in any sort of "spontaneity".  You may laugh at me seeking spontaneity, which is not really a calling card of mine.  But, I do know that throughout my pipe smoking life, I would stumble across unexpected moments where I found I could indulge in a pipe when I initially thought not possible.  And, almost invariably those "spontaneous" moments were especially sweet, rich, and felt almost... "wholesome" which even remembering a few even now causes me to smile broadly.  Or I could stay basically where I am at, and continue to refrain, with perhaps some monumental trip somewhere in the future be a point in time where I might indulge in a bowlful.  I really do not know. I do know that I am not much of a "rolling stone" so it appears I may continue to become mossier.      

On Pandora right now, I am listening to the Bossa Nova hit, Inspiration, by the Gipsy Kings.  Please give this song a listen.  THIS is what I would like to be able to play on the guitar.  But, it is only a pipe dream.

I should probably conclude now, but I wanted to leave you with a beautiful pipe-related poem from a fellow I follow online:

Smoke Rings From My Pipe

                         by Malcolm Guite  (a Canadian/English Poet I follow)

All the long day’s weariness is done

I’m free at last to do just as I will

Take out my pipe, admire the setting sun

Practice the art of simply sitting still

Thank God I have this briar bowl to fill,

I leave the world with all its hopeless hype,

Its pressures, and its ever-ringing till,

And let it go in smoke rings from my pipe

 

The hustle and the bustle, these I shun

The tasks that trouble and the cares that kill,

The false idea that there’s a race to run,

The pushing of that weary stone uphill,

The wretched i-phone’s all-insistent trill,

Whingers and whiners, each with their own gripe,

I pack them in tobacco leaves until

They’re blown away in smoke rings from my pipe

 

And then at last my real work is begun,

My chance to chant, to exercise the skill

Of summoning the muses, one by one,

To meet me in their temple, touch my quill

( I have a pen but quills are better still)

And when the soul is full, the time is ripe

Kindle the fire of poetry that will

Breathe and expand like smoke-rings from my pipe

 

Prince I have done with grinding at the mill,

These petty-pelting tyrants aren’t my type,

So lift me up and set me on a hill,

A free man blowing smoke rings from his pipe.

 

* * * * * 

And a favorite quote of mine from the pipe smoking writer:

Edward Bulwer-Lytton (an 1800s writer who is perhaps most "famous" as being the originator of the often mocked writer's opening phrase "It was a dark and stormy night....".)

“A pipe is a fountain of contemplation, the source of pleasure, the companion of the wise; and the man who smokes, thinking like a philosopher and acts like a Samaritan.”

PipeTobacco