I've been thinking heavily in the past few weeks on not quite fitting in.  My most recent introspection of being an anomaly started with a neighbor in philly south.  She had seen me fighting outside in a pretty heated exchange and the next time i saw her, i just said good morning and smiled as i always do.  She of course asked if i was okay [from the fight] and i stopped with my grocery bags to talk to her.  First she said that she did not know i had that fight in me.  And after the discussion of strength, she said the thing I've heard so frequently in my life, "You don't fit in around here."  
She asked me about my education and where I lived prior to locking my door in this row house and a myriad of other questions to find a little more about a neighbor who has an air of difference but looked to find the things that made us similar.  (I suppose she was looking for a connection with the oddball girl as much as she does not understand her.)
Finally, I stepped away from her after expressing unequivocally that regardless of the person one thinks is walking before them, no one ever knows for sure the person that is behind the locked door. 
Now a few weeks later, I had an exchange with some family members during a large gathering and the message that I received was that i was not quite like anyone else at the table.  In the past i suppose it could be referred to as a black sheep.  At the table sipping on a glass of scotch it was as if i was on stage and did not know my lines.  Truly i do not think the things i say or do are unusual.  I had a friend who once said to me, 'you talk like the things you say and do are completely normal, but nothing you say or do is.'  My response was, 'it's not normal, but it is completely regular,' and with a longing to fit in to the normalcy, i finished my sentence with the words, 'in my world.' 
This week, [one or two] nieces used the words unique and different to illustrate that the painting i was doing [and hating] was unlike anything they had known.  [in other words, it's peculiar aunt essie, just like you.]  
So i left them and i was reflecting on all the times folks in my life said things to me that did not just make me feel like i didn't fit in, but said the words, 'esther, you do not fit in around here,' questioning my position in their world.  
In school, i recall someone asking me what i was.  'dude, you know what i wanna ask you?' i turned to find football player with a furrowed brow and perplexed look in his eye, 'what are you?'  
In work, 'I don't know if you missed your calling or if you just are in the wrong place, but you really don't fit in here.'
Even at home, 'No one thinks like that and no one does that.' 

I had a joke with my Lucy that i was mainstreaming when i would do things normal folks did.  But I was never certain if the things in which i engaged was all that normal or just the habitual acts of my regularity.  

So, the resounding message I receive from so many people around me is that i don't quite fit in, and it's not that i try fitting in to places, and maybe that's the thing that sounds the loudest with the folks i surround myself.  I don't know how i feel about any of it.  And I certainly have not drawn a conclusion about what i think on it either.  

In my life, I have heard accolades about my creativity.  (i have also heard some derision about my creativity.)  And the perception until now, within my head, has been that this creativity is the manifestation of the chaos occurring within.  Whether it's something I draw, or something i cut and paste, or something i say or something i write, the demonstration is met with emotion.  Now that emotion can be a smile curling in the corner of a lip or a guffaw -even sheer horror or utter confusion.  The reaction is usually profound when creativity explodes!   

Someone once said to me the artist sees things regular folks do with an irregularity that needs to be translated for those who do not see.   It's as simple as seeing the faces in the wood grain of the closet door and pointing it out to your big sister who just wants to get her hair brushed so we can walk to school.  

But last night, I was exposed to words ordered in such a fashion that made me really understand that all people do not see the faces in the wood grain. 

Moreover, there is a precision with creativity, not an explosion of chaos on the page (or canvas or whatever medium is chosen.)  I'm astounded when people are talking and I feel them struggle with words and give them that word they learned in vocabulary but never integrated into their vernacular.  It just hangs out in the corner of their memory devouring the leftovers from 'likes' and 'you-knows' disgorged from the speakers mouths waiting for their time to shine.  So i give people with whom i speak the words i know would precisely define their ideas and then a tangent occurs about my eloquence.  

And the eloquence occurs in the background for me and I frequently thought that some folks are just being lazy with their words and would rather use the same forty-two in their vocabulary arsenal instead of making the effort to get that wallflower dancing.    

But quite frankly that is not true.  Some folks do not have it in them to place words with their specific meanings together in a line with precision.  

Years ago, I saw a painting at the museum that appeared to be a mish-mash of colored spots on the canvas.  After noticing the title of the piece which was something like bicycles about the countryside ( i cannot recall the exact title or the artist.), i saw it.  I saw blurry spots of bicycles riding along paths leading to fruit markets and cheese shops and laid against a tree while riders picnicked.  it was so complex and yet, without the precision of the title, i may never have taken note to the detail.   

And THAT's the thing i'm getting at here (with ALL these words that I'm lining up, hopefully with a precision that will allow seeing things as i intend to present them) - this creativity is not the vomit of a madman that the regular needs to piece together for clarity.  It's the precision the artist has laid before the regular to define the objective of the message.  The disregard of the detail is the disregard of the objective.  It is seeing blotches of paint instead of the bicycles.  

I think the introspection and apprehension that goes along with exposing creativity is rooted in the need for understanding.  Not acceptance- understanding.  It is with precision that an artist decides on the method of exposure.  It is with precision that an artist decides the details in their work.  And i finally see that it is not the desire to have folks accept what you have to present so that it becomes a part of the masses, but just that they can see the faces in the wood grain as we do.

It's honeysuckle season!  I use an exclamation mark with that statement because honeysuckle for me is a scent in the air that wafts over my head as my feet step on the concrete and stops me in my tracks.  

I can liken it to the walk of a dog.  Walk, walk, walk then abruptly stop, step back, nose in the air to figure the direction of the wind pulling the scent into a widened olfactory sense- That's me with honeysuckle.  And maybe we have all walked down the street with someone who walks and stops for a moment behind, to tie a shoe or look in a window and I imagine for my walking companions, it's that moment of, "oh esther's not beside me anymore" with a double take, looking back to see my head cocked looking for the source of the fragrance in the air.  

I discovered my affinity for honeysuckle when i was young. When i lived in East Philly, there was a huge shrub/bush/tree of it growing at the end of the block.  I walked out of my way to smell it if i was outside for anything.  And moving back to [real] Philly, I had no clue how prevalent the honeysuckle trees were until walking around again in June/July of last year.  I became obsessed with finding the honeysuckles in Philadelphia and literally opened my nasal passages each time my feet stepped on the cement.  They are all over the city, pulling me into alleys and gardens, behind brick walls, pressed up against wrought iron fences....  
So, i'm waiting for the bus after something benign like buying a bulk quantity of toilet tissue, and i looked to the overpass of I-95.  Honeysuckle tree.  I did not smell it although I waited at that bus stop many many times.  I did not notice the sight of it prior.  I walked to the tree to assure I was seeing what i saw because I still could not smell the splendid redolence I had expected from the honeysuckles.  I reached up to a low hanging branch and pulled a group of buds from the tree and the moment they were in my hands the perfume filled me.  i rubbed the buds on my hands to have specks of the purloined florets fall between my fingers and walk back to the stop at which i waited again for the bus to return home. 

I stood and looked along the side of the overpass and noticed the line of honeysuckle trees extended as far as my eye could see in both directions.  (The highway and street curve, so we're talking about a three block stretch - not miles until the horizon.)   But, I stood there perplexed and pressing my memory why it was that when the honeysuckles are so distracting to me, it appeared a sensual anomaly, that this massive display of pleasance would go unnoticed.  

And then I thought about the honeysuckle - these specific honeysuckle trees.  The ones masked by the noise of traffic and smell of exhaust and I realize that sometimes it occurs that there are things that we know give us pleasure, but we disregard because we can't be bothered to work through the noise or stink.  

And then I'm faced with something noisy and stinky in my life that i work so hard in which to find the lovely - that one little pleasurable thing that makes the noise and stink bearable.  

This morning I'm struggling to figure out which is easier.  I suppose it does not matter because regardless of the stench, the lovely always presents itself with a resplendence.  

Someone once said to me, "In a world that stinks, I don't have to."  

The world does stink.  And, whether it's involuntary or a conscious search, I do look for the things that do not.  

On this grey and wet morning in Philadelphia, I am watching a rerun of Vincent and The Doctor.   To sum up, the episode is written to propose it was not something internal that was causing the madness within Van Gogh, but something external unseen by [most] others.  

I'm also reminded of A Beautiful Mind when i see stories of madness.  In fact, in recent days I shared with my [non-time-traveling] doctor my experience in watching a movie that appeared to be one thing and twisted to reveal internal madness.  Honestly, I got to the end of A Beautiful Mind and thought, "isn't that interesting that John Nash saw so many things that others could not?"  i really did not understand that he was a schizophrenic.  I remember the look from the person with whom i watched the movie, speechless for a moment, finally explaining Nash's mental illness.  I saw something completely different.  In fact, I longed for the intuition that would allow me to see the things most do not. 

And this morning, this small bit of madness explained again on my television reminds me that the things that cannot be explained by others is not only dismissed, but frequently mocked.  And I wonder where the disregard of the unseen and unexplained originates?  Is it fear?  Is it apathy?  Is it frustration?  Is it something grander that I cannot fathom?  (yes, I am still proposing that internal madness may not be entirely so.)

In this episode of Doctor Who, Van Gogh tells the incomparable Amy Pond that he hates sunflowers.  Vincent explains that they are "always somewhere between living and dying.  Half-human as they turn toward the sun."  And he of course paints them brilliantly giving every petal the proper number of brushstrokes illustrating the moment between life and death that he sees the moment he paints.  Half-human.  Sunflowers are most certainly not human, but can be personified to be such because many cannot bring themselves to see the importance of life turning to the light, so it must be comparable to something lesser minds can process.  

There is so much absurdity to which we acquiesce and allow.  Madness seems to be dismissed.  Of the two, I'll take madness over absurdity anytime it is offered.  With madness comes a deeper understanding en route to 42.  Absurdity is the distraction from the path leading to it.  

 Who has the perception to see what these great men of madness see without their explanation?  And, [in my opinion more importantly] why aren't we listening as all the madmen and madwomen explain what they see? 

It took me six years to write the bulk of Reconstructing Edward.  The edits happened quickly because I just wanted to get it done.  Currently, printed copies sits all over the house and an electronic copy is on the flash drive that pokes from my laptop as I key these words. 

In November, 2013 i discovered National Novel Writing Month and wrote the bulk of Sevy's Cosmica Sidera.  Six months later, I have edited, re-written, received notes - some of which were encouraging, some of which were not so complimentary- and I wait for my proof copy so that i can see my words bound and printed on paper. 

April, 2014 hosted a virtual writing camp.  Again, i wrote the bulk of Be The Clown and when I had creative exhaustion, I wrote some short stories about some minor characters so that I could listen to the story my Beatrix is trying to share.  The overall note that I need to heed is that the story is slow to start.  I don't want it to be slow, but I really like the way the story is laid out.  

July is another one of these writing months.  

Three years ago, [perhaps?] I was fortunate enough to spend some quality afternoons with my children who frequently patronize my quirks.  We were on a historical scavenger hunt of sorts collecting historic tales from roving storytellers gathering at benches in Olde City.  One  of the stories I was so impressed with was the tale of Margaret Matson.  The only witch trial held in Pennsylvania was held in 1683 when Margaret Matson was accused of bewitching her neighbor's livestock and practicing magick.  And in all stories, there is usually one or two things that really sticks - and for me, within this Matson story was the declaration by WIlliam Penn.  When agreeing that she had in fact flown on a broomstick, Penn brought the court to silence when he professed, not [then] nor ever will it ever be illegal to ride a broomstick in Pennsylvania.  

So, this is my next project.  And I'm so excited about it!  But I'm thinking about all the previous notes on my writing.  - A professional editor told me that one of my manuscripts needed help to cut the extraneous adjectives - can't have descriptive discourse in a literary piece!  

And it occurred to me while I was trying to figure out how to bring historical fact together with character fiction in this piece that has become very personal in my thoughts, that I really don't care about these opinions.  The most helpful notes I have received are from others who write.  And the notes that I find myself drawing in are those that make my writing something greater, not acquiescing to an uninterested reader.  

Bottom line, this morning, I am feeling as if I just need to write what I write.  Six years of careful consideration of words and agonizing over every nuance is just unnecessary.  There is definitely merit to just getting things done with all the passion and verve presenting itself in sprints.