The story of a place
is the story of the people of the place. And not so much, I think, the official story of the people - the history book history - but the stories people carry in their hearts, their individual stories, most of which I suppose shall never be spoken.
Part of our bias is that we need "events" to frame a history, big events to frame a great history. In actual fact, the true nature of place may not be told when we tell the conventional "what happened when" version.
How does a fellow go about turning over the rocks, opening the hearts that let us see this alternative history I am looking for, the history which whispers quietly. How does one find it, how does one write it? Are the journals I am exploring in my Wisconsin research one version of the task? Is this journal itself another version of the same task? Do we need to find ourselves in quiet moments reciting the important litany of our lives, our place, our people?
There was a little rain last night. It is a grey, overcast morning with a thick light we have to swim through, almost. One tree in Fairwater - at least - has changed color and shows a gaudy orange that's almost pink. I stop on Main Street, delayed for a moment by a semi backing into the lumberyard. At Weinkauf's just north of town the limbs of the trees in the orchard are heavy with apples.
Limbs of the trees
Out in the country more fields have been plowed or tilled. The farmers stay to their work whether you're watching or not. More and more swatches of land turn a smudged face to the sky.
Heavy with apples -
Who remembers
The blossoms?
Some few of them have lost most of their leaves but generally all the way to Ripon the trees are full and green.
How did I live so many years in Iowa without seeing how beautiful the soy beans are when they turn? I can't believe it is only this year they are so lovely. Do I notice it because I'm looking, and didn't notice in previous years because I wasn't paying attention?
Oh we are a grim-faced lot this morning, all of us, those driving to work, those loose-limbed school children on their way to the day's classes. What makes us so serious, sullen almost?
Perhaps we're so sullen because we've forgotten our own stories. We're listening to mass-produced falsehoods. The story we're being told bythose in power is patently absurd, and no one likes being lied to.
You ask some beautiful questions.
Posted by: Siona | September 25, 2004 at 12:01 AM
I agree: the narrative we need and the narrative we're getting are vastly differently. The answer? To write our own narratives. That's what I'm doing. That's what you're doing. The time is not far off when there won't be a dominant narrative, but a pastiche of stories. I think these blogs are part of the change. When the sons a bitches start to get me down, I take refuge here.
Posted by: Tom Montag | October 02, 2004 at 06:09 PM