I recently got word that my octogenarian father is in the hospital again for the third time in the last three months. I am fairly sure the end of my father’s long and epic life is near. And though I have basically come to terms with not only the coming end of his life but my own life as well, human beings, real ones, were never meant to live forever.
But I do not welcome the coming sadness, never-the-less. There will always be something in the mysteries of death and darkness that is to be feared… and avoided for as long as possible.
One of the most important avoidance measures is to light a few candles. A candle holds back the darkness for a while. And of course, I mean that in only the most metaphorical of multiple senses.
There are many ways to light a candle. I have lit three in this essay. I lit them with my ink pen and my drawing skill (modest though it may be). And drawing alone is not the sum total of the ways a candle may be lit.
Each of the novels I have written is also a candle. They may be useless piles of pages that nobody ever reads, but they are the summation of my already long life and work as a writer. I may not be well known, and probably am not as talented as the better-known writers, but I really do have something to tell. And being published where someone may eventually… even accidentally read some of it, there is no telling exactly how far into the darkness my light will reach.
And the even-more-amazing fact about the reach my candlelight into the darkness has is this, my candles were only lit because my father first lit the candle that is me. As I have passed the candle-lighting responsibility on to those who read my writing, and to my children who have many more candles of their own to light.
I love you, Dad. Raymond L. Beyer. My next novel is dedicated to you. Let’s continue to hold off the darkness for as long as we can… together.
No one here is asking to live forever, but you would think horsemen could be a little more sympathetic and not layer on quite so thick a layer of never-ending disease. And yet, I am reminded that I do plan to look at the benefits of the worst things that happen to me in life, and what good things they lead to. I have been ill enough in my life to become quite good at it. Arthritis has slowed me, but not stopped me. I still get around quite speedily, even though I often require a cane to do it. I am still not on insulin for my diabetes because of my diet and exercise efforts. I have learned how to cope with illness and keep going in spite of it.
Ginger Ale
Long about the middle of October every year I have to partake of the miracle that is Ginger Ale during pollen season. And believe me, in Texas, pollen season lasts until the parched grass and dry air sets in again during the droughts of middle July through September. Sometimes in a wet year (which used to be rarer than now) the tree pollen, mold spores, mountain cedar, and ragweed fill the air year around. Ginger in any form is a god-sent cure-all for ailments of the lungs, ears, nose, and throat. It reduces inflammation, dilutes mucus, and helps you restore the breath of life. I have developed a real taste for ginger products of all sorts as a result of the medicinal boost it gives me every year. It explains my addiction to gingerbread. Also why I often put ginger root in a pot on the stove filled with boiling water and then inhale the fumes. I love Ginger Ale because it makes me feel good.
Simon’s Cat on YouTube is another kind of Ginger Ale for me. Admittedly it is a mental sort of medicine, not a drink or a cookie or a steam inhaler. But watching those simple black and white cartoon antics that are so realistically catlike makes me laugh and increases serotonin in the brain, and it provides a very real depression medicine.
Now, I know full well that I am connecting two very unlike things and calling them both Ginger Ale on the mere passing similarity of the medicinal benefits. But life is far more metaphorical than it is literal. And that is why I continue to maintain that poets live better lives than the rest of us even if they die young for love of beauty. And it is better to be a cartoon cat than a literal king.
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