Truth at the Tideline

The League of Intertidal Writers has released its second publication, Truth at the Tideline. The publication was the result of a truth-themed writing workshop I taught in Astoria. It was an honor to work with these fine writers and guide them toward truth or wherever they wanted to go. We are building something special with this organization.

How timely a topic for these truth-challenged times on the Left and Right. No one has the market on truth. It does surprise me how pleased people seem to be with themselves with their surety. They just know. They expend no effort to test their conventional wisdom. They recline in a soft easy chair with their laziness. They are watching TV while doing so.

In the past two and a half years of my life, I challenged every assumption of truth I had for myself, my friends, my family, my country. After doing so, new truths emerged. I believe they were formed on a much stronger foundation, but that doesn’t mean I won’t continue to challenge them. I want to keep learning, keep probing the truth of received myths, including the State ones. I am not above it all. I am right there on the ground, soaked and permeated, in the willows, in the culverts, under the bakery, on the beach, on the river, out there, observing, not judging, trying to understand, trying to ascertain what I think is true is true. It often is not.

Below is a piece from the publication. It certainly challenged some time-honored notions of truth about finding love late in life.

The Truth About Love

Is there ever absolute truth in love? In my frivolous youth, before the crushing blows were delivered to my already sketchy heart, I believed in it all. The love at first sight, the soul mate, and of course, the forever diamond. But now I see love as a drug that I don’t mess around with anymore. While I fondly recall some great highs accompanied by laughter and seemingly endless joys, the memory of those bad acid trips with frightening anxious nights and morning regrets are at the forefront of my mind. Love which once was as sweet as the apple that tempted Adam and Eve in the glorious garden, is now rotting fruit on the ground. Certainly nothing I would even think of as tempting. While the pool of eligible people grows through the access of Plenty of Fish, OK Cupid and Farmers Only, promising easy love, I know that in the end there will be heartache and hardship. My days of Love and truth are as worn out as the Velcro strap of my heart, too old and used to attach to anything. So I leave the game of love to those naive, brave souls whose hearts still skip a beat when an attractive person gives them a smile at the grocery store. I will just buy my frozen fruit that, like my heart, is immune to life’s unpredictable elements, and be on my way.