sometimes a metaphor

Jazz is the music of our lives. Rich and complex, even in it's simplicity, gifted interpreters weave the message from slim black scribble to unpredictable tapestries that express countless faces if you just change the lighting a bit. It's music that is at times easy to approach, and at others complex and inscrutable. If the solo is slow and we want it fast, it's still going to be slow coming, and we can resist or trust and enjoy the flow, trying to tune in to the mind behind the thoughtful hands meandering down the piano. If it's sweet and warm, then we are blessed and it carries us through our own avenues of memories and hopes like a friend guiding us through a sun-ripened afternoon field. When it's dark, rough, and dissonant, we can dig deep for the experiences in our lives to understand, process, and grow into appreciation of this change of tune. After a good session, we've been taken everywhere and have come back to the silence that was there when it all began.

Pop music is what we wish the world was but can never be. Repetative, forced up tempo, catchy but with so little variation that we can't grow and mature. It's addictive in it's simplicity, glossing over or skipping completely the subtler complexities and sadness that we find throughout our lives. It starts warm, carries us high, and wraps up without having addressed anything bigger than our desire to avoid pain. We cannot grow with this being the rhythm of life - there is no challenge and no way to revisit it while renewing ourselves at the same time.

To grow we have to acknowledge the sadness without wallowing in it, feel the pain and let it pass. We must also avoid addiction to the joys, for they will pass as well. Everything changes, nothing lasting forever, least of all ourselves. In this process of letting go of our attachment to both the sweet and the bitter, we begin to transcend and recognize the process that carries all of us onwards in the rushing stream of the beautiful mysteries of life. I think there is joy to be found in this process of letting go and beginning to watch the intensities of life from at least a little distance away. Lessons aren't lost, and it's not a life devoid of feeling and meaning. Rather we avoid losing ourselves in the attchment to the ups and downs. The beauty of life beyond our narrow sense of self is tangible all around us, in the eyes of friends, family, and strangers who are all the same. We can feel it laying in the sunshine and green grass, when a cloud passes over and we feel the faintest chill for the first time each September. It's the same as the buds pushing out in April, tender and destined for a luscious summer before falling and decaying in the street. It's the feeling of being made of the same basic elements as the stars in the night sky, just arranged a little differently in space and time.

May you find a little detachment, a little peace, a little quiet space on the side of the river to pull ashore and eat peanut butter and jelly on whole wheat while your kids play in the warm afternoon.