All told it was two hours and forty minutes out of my day.  Five reps of financial services companies – four Canadian and one Belgian.  Their responses varied from “I can’t help you” to a fellow who did handsprings of service for 1:45.

What I want to do is sell my shares in a corporation.  I need the money.  Who would have thought that financial transactions between Canada and my new home of Belgium would be so difficult?  Clearly not me.

My brain isn’t the precise, analytical type.  And it’s not particularly adept with finance and computers.  Oh well.  This was the task at hand so I got to it.

I was told that I needed to do this, that and the other thing for the result to be produced.  Then I was informed that the result no longer can be produced because I’ve moved to Belgium.  Or that forms 23F, 18C and X needed to be completed.  And phone us back if you don’t understand some of the questions that require answers.

The last fellow was golden.  I started thinking “This actually can be done.”  He was so patient with my misunderstandings, my slowness of mind.  And determined that together we would jump through the hoops that international transactions placed before us.  At the end I thanked him with all my remaining energy.   Perhaps two weeks from now, the money will be in my account.

I’m sitting here pooped … and proud of me.  I’ve been wading in foreign waters, far from home.  I am humbled by my foibles.  So often in the world of daily tasks, I don’t know what to do.  Happily saviours are willing to step forward.  One of them is named Brian.

We need each other, you and me

I came awake in the wee hours with a song on my lips: Swing Low Sweet Chariot.  My quiet voice, the trustable one, said that I’d write about it today.  I smiled a sleepy smile.

Then the voice elaborated: “You’ll transcibe the first verse and then write a few words about it.  Same with the second …” 

Okay.

Hours later I looked at the lyrics.  Some of the verses moved me, some didn’t.  Did my large mind really want to tie me to a structure?  It’s not what it usually does.

Now in comes the small mind.  I looked at a verse and started focusing.  “How can fit my thoughts about this into the post?”  I started struggling, adjusting, fixing.  Soon one word appeared …

“No.”

***

Now I can breathe again! 

So … let’s look at a few verses of Swing Low Sweet Chariot and see what wants to emerge.

Sometimes I’m up, and sometimes I’m down,
(Coming for to carry me home)
But still my soul feels heavenly bound.
(Coming for to carry me home)

If I sit quietly, I know something: I am home. And it’s not just geography. Something more expansive than Ghent is carrying me. I’m floating in an unknown sublimity that’s larger than the events of the day, than the disappointments and satisfactions.

If I get there before you do,
(Coming for to carry me home)
I’ll cut a hole and pull you through.
(Coming for to carry me home)

If you get there before I do,
(Coming for to carry me home)
Tell all my friends I’m coming too.
(Coming for to carry me home)

As well as the stillness of home, I’m also moving. We’re travelling together, you and me, and the destination lies hidden behind the clouds. We know it’s good.

Maybe your eyes will fully open before mine do. And maybe I’m first. It doesn’t matter. We’re both watching “extra” things drop away. Life is becoming natural, a flow, an adventure to be shared.

***

This is better

I wonder who created feet.  Good job, whoever you are.

These long things are very efficient.  Without them, how would we keep our heavy bodies balanced in the vertical?  And it’s very cool how the left and right alternate to propel us forward.

My interests lie elsewhere however.

The hands are good at clapping but there’s real joy in slamming your ankles together.  The joy of the legs first so wide and then smushed in union.

And sliding!  Heading downhill on one of those wet plastic tubes is a hoot.  Or how about on a varnished hardwood floor, like John Travolta in Staying Alive?

Pirouetting is the best of dance.  Have you ever watched your feet in the spin?  I suppose not … or you’d end up flat on your face.

I wonder if my toes would wrap around vines so I could swing upside down in the jungle.

And then there are those cool folks with no arms who paint their souls with their feet.

Or have you ever thought how difficult skipping would be with no feet?  Surely it’s clear to everyone that skipping is essential for the full flow of happiness.

Finally in this worship of the lower appendages, consider Hollywood’s fifteen pairs of beautiful feet:

1.  Emma Watson

2.  Ariana Grande

3.  Nicki Minaj

4.  Kylie Jenner

5.  Kristen Stewart

6.  Miranda Cosgrove

7.  Katy Perry

8.  Demi Lovato

9.  Emma Roberts

10.  Victoria Justice

11.  Dirk Tanghe

12.  Jennifer Lawrence

13.  Scarlett Johansson

14.  Jennifer Aniston

15.  Ariel Winter

***

Who can resist this mélange of sole and skin and bones and toes?

Not I

Perhaps I don’t need to write.  Just look at the photo.  A woman soaring in her song.  A man pressing the strings of his guitar in sweet runs of notes.  And that lamp!  It welcomes people from the Oudburg to the sanctuary that is the Gregor Samsa bookshop.

Harry owns the shop.  As well as shelves of pages that will stir your soul, he hosts concerts … once or twice a week.

Last night there were about ten of us.  We were privileged to hear the outpourings of Anima Amici.  Paola sings South American songs with a sprinkling of jazz.  Ramsy loves his guitar.  The two of them spent the evening smiling at each other, and at us.

It didn’t matter that the songs were mostly in Spanish.  The beauty was transmitted from performers to audience.  Melodies from Cuba, Colombia, Brazil and Argentina graced our ears.  Maybe even Peru.  And as we absorbed, we got to sip on our wine, beer or apple juice … all under a wooden ceiling with handhewn beams.

Long ago in Toronto, Canada, my wife Jody and I got to hear The Three Tenors in an immense stadium.  We were so far from the stage.  The sounds were exquisite but partway through I realized I’d been watching closeups of the singers on the Jumbotron.  I was watching TV! 

And the good news?  Harry doesn’t have a Jumbotron.  I was just a couple of metres away from Paola and Ramsy.  I saw the shine on their brows, the mouth wide open, the fingers working their magic.

At the break, I asked Paola to translate a few of the lyrics she had sung, some tender moments.  She told me about a love song from the first set: two people, one loves the other, the second does not love back.

“So sad.  Isn’t there a happy song?”  >  “Yes.  We’ll do it in the second set – in English.”

Good.

It’s called Throw It Away:

Throw it away, throw it away
Give your love
Live your life each and every day
And keep your hand wide open
Let the sun shine through 
'Cause you can never lose a thing
If it belongs to you

https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=POO-n-NLbss&feature=share

It was wide open in Gregor Samsa last night

Once before in my blogging, I decided to write within a stream of consciousness. I don’t remember what happened. I want to do it again. My fingers will take the lead … and keep going. At the end I’ll correct the spelling but that will be the only adjustment.

Will it all be gobbledygook?  Maybe.  Will there be gems of wisdom embedded in the flurry of words?  Doubtful.  Will there be punctuation?  Probably not.

Okay.  Here goes …

***

I wonder what the world is becoming within me.  Because it’s inside me, this planet , in all its agonies and blessing gs.  I feel it ruminating inside, pretending that it’s countries and races, pretending that it’s something g other than me.

The colours splash – all of tgem- and some that never existed in my mind.  They spread an join, leak into each other  dissolve the petty lines that we create.

It feels onward is he only way to go. Firalward.  Always reaching g towards the other. Notcretreati f from them.

What are you made if. Dear friend?  Who are you in the dark alleys of life and in the briflght sun.  I want to know yoy- tge glow and the warts, the crying and the the ju.pi g up and down.

Something. Is over, dine with, extra … ileaving into tge part.  I wave good ye.  And forward again I wave hello to hatever lurks in the must.  I welcome e it all. I feed on it all. I am nourished.

How many come this wat?  I don’t care.  I just need a few good companions. To look in each other’s eyes and see glory.  Yo seethe fliw of blood and spirit, to be taken up into the river and carried diwnstreM..or perhaps ipstreM.

What if it’s all upside down?  What if I ‘m getting younger, not older..  I. The birth canal, ready for a blasting g out onto the universe?  That would be fine e.

Tomorrow is a white canvas.  Dies any body have a pai t brush?  No it’s okay …  found m own.

***

I don’t know.  That was probably three minutes.  It’ll take longer than that to fix all the typos.  Hmm … maybe I won’t fix the typos.  Take that, reality!

See you tomorrow

I woke up this morning to a message from my neighbour Dirk: “goodmorning brrrrruce, coffee?  and little breakfast”

My response: “Oh … breakfast!  I will come in five with bells on.”

I knew I had brought my Santa sleigh bells across the ocean.  Which of my five remaining boxes were they in?

I searched them all.  Nothing.  I tried some drawers – same result.  My face screwed up.  “They’ve got to be here!  I want my bell moment.”

Back to the boxes.  Buried near the bottom of one was the treasure I sought.  And down the stairs I rumbled.

As we talked and ate, I glanced now and then at the bells.  I remembered a story.  And here it is:

It was a long time ago, approaching Christmas.  I was a teacher of a blind child in an elementary school.  I was going to be supervising sixty 12-year-olds while we watched The Polar Express, a movie about a train taking kids to the North Pole to meet Santa.

After some very cool adventures, the young hero of the film was sitting with Santa in the sleigh.  I’ll call him Jeremy.  He had been a disbeliever about the big guy but had slowly turned to the light.

Santa gave Jeremy a single sleigh bell.  He put it in his pocket, which unfortunately had a hole.  On the Polar Express heading home, the boy realized that the bell was lost …

As the story unfurled, perhaps fifty of the sixty kids were enthralled.  So was I.  I had seen the movie several times and it was always young in my soul.

The last scenes are at home on Christmas morning.  A single present remains under the tree.  Jeremy’s sister Sarah hands it to him.  Inside is … the bell!  Waydago, Santa.  Jeremy rings it, and the sweet sound fills the room.

Mom and Dad come by.  Mom gives it a try.  Nothing.  “Oh, that’s too bad.”  And Dad … “Broken!”

“At one time, most of my friends could hear the bell.  But as years passed it fell silent for all of them.  Even Sarah found one Christmas that she could no longer hear its sweet sound.

Though I’ve grown old, the bell still rings for me, as it does for all who truly believe.”

As the credits rolled, the kids still sat – some lost in the ending, some antsy to get to recess.  I, however, had a finale:

I reached into my pocket and pulled out three sleigh bells.  I held them high.  Silence filled the room.  Eyes were fixed on the round, on the shiny, on the pure.

“I wonder if we can hear them ring”

I rung

My friend Eric Lichtman posted this John Roedel passage on Facebook.

Let’s listen …

“This isn’t how I planned for my life to look like,” I whispered under my breath as I walked to my car.

“Tell me about it,” an eavesdropping cloud replied to me from above.

I looked up and watched the cloud billow between looking like a dove and an open hand.

The cloud continued:

“I used to be a snowfield in Montana.
I used to be a dewdrop kiss on a lily.
I used to be a puddle in a parking lot.
I used to be a river in Mexico.
I used to be a glacier.
I used to be a waterfall mist in a jungle.

I used to be so many things.”

“Doesn’t that make you sad?” I asked the cloud.

“It used to – but not anymore,” the cloud replied while wrapping herself around me like a scarf. “I don’t think either of us were created to stay the same for our entire life.”

“I’m not sure I can let go of my old life,” I sighed.

“Oh you simply must,” the cloud whispered in my ear. “Because once you release what you used to be and embrace who you are meant to be now, something amazing will happen,” the cloud said.

“What’s that?” I asked while looking at my hands that were beginning to billow and shapeshift.

“You’ll start to float.”

And with that my feet lifted off the ground.

***

I hear the words “Bruce Kerr is …”. I also hear the words “Maybe not …”.

What will I be further down the road?

It’s a mystery, isn’t it? I could come up with some speculations which may or may not come to pass. I could draw forth some creative use of the English language to entertain you … but someone large is saying “No.”

And then there’s you – just as unknown as me in future days. What beckons us? What is not on our radar that yearns for expression? What seems incomprehensible?

Perhaps you and I will bring forth things that have never been seen before

Shall we float?

It’s only a six-minute walk from my home. The Leie curves … and some fine human being decided that a bench should sit here.

As I approached, a large black fellow with headphones and backpack had spread across the entire bench. I said hello and asked him to move over so I could sit down. He smiled and did so.

And then the river took over … and its inhabitants. I heard what I would call warblers singing their hearts out. Accompanying pigeons sat in the trees and began their cooing rhythm. I was already being lulled.

I heard the clatter of bicycles on the cobblestones behind. Plus an occasional slow-moving vehicle. And then a spurt of fast feet – it had to be a kid, loving the day. I didn’t turn around to see.

I love curves. And today I loved the gulls flowing over the turn of the river – some right to left, some left to right. I could feel the air pressing on their tilted wings.

Later two mallard ducks followed suit … so fast and so low!

Little black ducks scurried around on the water, chasing away the mallards. A single white duck looked to be the queen in the park across the way. Her white against the green felt … royal.

Splatters of concentric circles started appearing on the river – and instantly disappeared. My glasses felt the drops. All was quiet.

The fellow was still there to my right, grooving to his music. His presence had become part of the Leie’s flow. He too was a being of the river.

The sky brightens

The circles continue

My eyes close …

…

And then there is just a shimmer of light

I’m going to a music festival in Brussels on May 27 and 28.  This is a photo from last year’s event.  Can you pick me out in the crowd? Not likely, especially since I was in Canada at the time.

Nothing special about me going, you might say.  Until I tell you that the Core Festival is about EDM … or electronic dance music.  Techno!

Most folks in Osseghem Park in late May will be in their teens or twenties.  Then there’s me – slightly older.

“You’re going where?!” is a refrain I’ve heard from some of my contempories. “You’ll be surrounded by kids falling down drunk, or high as a kite!”

Well, I suppose that’s true for some of the revellers – but certainly not all.  We thousands will be coming to love the music and the light show and the dance.

And oh … how I intend to dance!  I’ll throw my arms and legs out in any available direction.  I’ll get tired a lot quicker than the young’uns but so what?  I’ll rest a bit and then flail some more.

This afternoon I was walking in Ghent and came upon this:

O my God … Core is in my heart and in my city, at least on paper.  The poster called me, stopped me, and made me jump up and down.  “I’m going!”  Me … old fart.  Me … the newest of Ghentians.  Simply me … no better or worse than anyone else.

Look at who’s playing at the festival – marvelous DJ’s (that I’ve never heard of).  The closest to me knowing one is “Joy Orbison” but I think I’m mixing her up with somebody else.

I just stared at that poster.  Look at me – creating new realities in a new country.  Why not?

***

I love the story about the man, the cliff and the strawberry:

One day while walking through the wilderness a man stumbled upon a vicious tiger.  He ran but soon came to the edge of a high cliff.  Desperate to save himself, he climbed down a vine and dangled over the fatal precipice.  As he hung there, two mice appeared from a hole in the cliff and began gnawing on the vine. Suddenly, he noticed on the vine a plump wild strawberry.  He plucked it and popped it in his mouth.  It was incredibly delicious!

I won’t be in any mortal danger in Osseghem Park. But – my God – those two days are going to taste good!

In Rings of Power, mother and son are preparing for battle:

Theo: Remember when I was little, when I used to have bad dreams?

Bronwyn: I remember.

Theo: Do you remember what you used to say when you’d hold me in the dark?

Bronwyn: (nods)

Theo: Would you say it to me now?

Bronwyn: In the end, the shadow is but a small and passing thing.  There is light and high beauty forever beyond its range.  Find the light … and the shadow will not find you.

And so it is for me.  Many shadows have come my way.  No doubt this is also true for you.

Lost love

Lost health

Lost achievement

Lost money

And hanging like a cloud … lost self-esteem

***

It may interest you to know that I have the answer for all the woes of life:

Raise your head.  Be on the level with all those other eyes.  Seek out the horizon

And sometimes, just for fun, tilt upwards.  See the sky inviting you to realms beyond the veil

You are welcomed home