Friday Philosophy: Traveling Light

I have traveled light through this world.  I intend to depart it lightly as well.

I have few things.

What stuff would that be?  And who of my family do people imagine are going to fight over what I have?  Other than my books, my clothes and my record collection…which fits in an orange crate…all my “stuff” fits in the shelves and drawers of one desk (or, as has been done before, the back seat of the car I used to have, including the records).

And most of the stuff I have has no intrinsic value.  Bits of blown glass, a few shells, a couple of rocks, some carved wood, a couple of kaleidoscopes…

I’ve gone through my life with few things.  What more do I need than what I need to get me through the day?  This day.  Maybe tomorrow.  Next month seems a world away.  

I have the words that I have read in my head if I need them.  Elephantinely, I never forget.  But I have some of those books, to focus that memory if I want.

I used to be the co-owner of a complete collection of matching Agatha Christie writings.  After the divorce, it became a burden and was sold off to finance my attempted move to Seattle.  So was everything else that I owned.  Down to the point that, except for those books, which I mailed book rate, everything I possessed, from the clothes on my back, through my record collection and stereo, and arriving at a few trinkets, fit in my car.

I possessed the car as an aid to combating loneliness.  I was not a driver  until after I transitioned.  When my ex decided she didn’t want to drive me to my therapist in Little Rock, I had to rely on friends to drive me there and bring me back.  Friends were few.  And friends weren’t going to take me to Dallas to meet friends from my online lesbian community.  So I bought a car, accumulating more debt than I ever could have imagined before.

Here we are almost 13 years later and I finally have gotten rid of that car.  I lived the hell out of that car.

It’s also almost 14 years since I paid for my surgery.  Ten grand.  Try to get that if you have never usually even had $1000 at any one time.  And good luck trying to borrow money being a transwoman in Arkansas, no matter how long you’ve been teaching at the local university.  Or, like any woman recently divorced in that state, I had no independent credit history.

Fortunately, a dumb-ass credit card company sent me a guaranteed credit card because they thought I was a safe bet.  Talk about stupid.  I still have that card.  AT & T paid for 20% of my surgery.  Stupidly, they also raised my limit because of my increased debt, so could use that card to borrow money to pay off my AT & T bill every month when I was in Seattle.

I raised the other 80% of the cost myself.  Who needs to eat?  Rent was cheap.  I’d learned to be homeless in the Haight and I could learn to live on next to nothing again.  So I did.  When one needs something, one does what is necessary in order to get it.  Not “wants”…”needs.”  One cuts out the “wants.”

Don’t even get me started about insurance companies who won’t pay for needed treatment.  

I paid off all that debt after I returned to Conway.  I found a better place to live…so that I could have room to help other people in need.  I bought a big water bed.  It no longer is a water bed and is slowly disintegrating, but I still own it.  I don’t need it, but it serves a purpose.  A few chairs, a futon, a television.

And I own a computer now.  The one I had before this ran Windows 95.  Currently I have a Compaq Presario, running at 1.53 GHz, but with only 480 MB memory and 55.8 GB hard drive.  It constantly tells me that it could operate faster if it were a better computer.  And its color is off, leading to frequent surprises about what my art really looks like.

But I don’t currently need something better, so I haven’t gotten it.  I’m getting a new computer chair that will be better for my back that is supposed to arrive on Tuesday.  It’s a birthday present from Debbie.  I insist she get one for herself as well and also that I pay for them…because I also need Debbie to be happy.

Debbie has more stuff than I.  She was closer to her family and has control of more of the family memorabilia.  Most of the stuff we moved here from Conway belong to Debbie or Alicia.  I look around the room I’m in and I see my trinkets confined to the computer desk I got for Xmas one year.  It’s made of pressed wood and came from Staples.  One of the “assemble it yourself” deals.  It tilts a bit.

I have always rented.  I suppose I’m still eligible for the home loan I was assured of getting when I served in the military.  But I’ve lost track of that and have never really found the need to own a dwelling.  And I can’t currently prove that I served in the military, since someone once stole the briefcase that contained my discharge papers.  And my presidential commendation.  I haven’t needed to replace those things.

Debbie owns a condo in Los Angeles with her brother.  They inherited it from their mother.

One thing I’ve regained is debt, from moving here and working here even though we can’t afford it really.  And from an eye surgery that was required when I wasn’t insured.

One thing I do have is pounds upon pounds of portable storage, containing the words I have written.  Document everything, I was counseled.  I have.  So I also have boxes of printed memorabilia, some which has never been transcribed and some that are hard copies of the chapters of a manuscript or two yet to come.  All they require is someone who wants to print them.

Ah, but nobody knows it exists?  Sure they do.  At least some do.  They are the words I leave as footsteps as I travel lightly through this life.  We place hope in the butterfly effect.  What else do we have?  What else do we need?


Searching for Fertile Ground

Leaving Nothing but Footsteps

I tread

lightly

though life

Soft footsteps

shaped like words

sown

like apple seeds

along the years

Applying color

like a butterfly’s wings

to attract the prey

Don’t be concerned

I will not harm you

I need only what allows

the next moment

and the hope that ideas

germinate

after I have passed

I have tread lightly

through life

and intend

to leave it lightly

as well

And maybe just

a little better

for my having

been here

–Robyn Elaine Serven

–April 11, 2008

26 comments

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    • Robyn on April 12, 2008 at 00:02
      Author

    I would prefer to leave it better, but otherwise feeling relatively unmarked, other than it being realigned into a more healthy atmosphere.  

    Perhaps stories can be fleshed out in the comments.  One never knows.

    I probably should avoid the subject of the spending habits of my ex-wife.

    Music:

    Bob Lind – Elusive Butterfly

    Steve Chapin – Let Time Go Lightly

    • RiaD on April 12, 2008 at 00:32

    I think you’ve left deep imprints on those you’ve encountered on your path (me!)

    thank you for being you robyn! i’m so very glad i know you.

    • Alma on April 12, 2008 at 00:42

    Sometimes those that speak, or walk the softest, have the most impact.

    You didn’t blaze a trail for others to follow, but made room, and welcome, for others to walk beside you.  ðŸ™‚

  1. … I think it takes a great deal of work to leave a light imprint.  Ah those damned paradoxes!  Hee.

    Frankly, I think your best days are ahead.

    My 2 cents.

  2. but I just have to say that Bob Lind’s “Elusive Butterfly” was a huge favorite of mine in 1966. Its always eluded me why a 12 year old would attach so much to a song like that.

    I never had a recording of the song, but I listened to it in my head for many years. And now, with itunes and youtube, I can hear it “out there” again. Technology is a blessing sometimes.

    What a perfect song for your thoughts tonight. Thanks!!  

  3. I look at your art, and I read your words, and I know I am lucky to be here to do both.

    I can feel your pain when you write to us, and I hope it helps knowing we do listen. I cannot fathom the upheavals you have gone through, but somehow you have offset the negative with the positive in your creativity. I look at your art and poems and I just admire. I know I can never reach that place, mine is somewhere else.

    Would you trade it for anything? Everything ebbs and flows, but you will always have your art.  It will be there when your groove arrives.

  4. a backpack and a valise.

    Five boxes of books and keepsakes in my exes garage, lol.

    Technically, I don’t even own my computer!

    But no debt, thank the Goddess, I paid that all off just before my injury. To testify, I feel the freest and the best I have ever felt in my life!

    • kj on April 12, 2008 at 03:04

    reminds me of a piece of silk (altar cloth) the monks made (and sold).  a mandala.  gorgeous, Robyn.  

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