I’m coming to this post via a sort of backwards completion process. Only the reverse of that. LOL.
Backwards completion is the method of visualizing your end point or goal and then figuring out how to get there. I did the opposite to come to the insight I hope to share in this post and this video compilation of images. One step in front of the other until I realized where I was.
First I shot the photos of the sunset. Then, unable to select a few to feature online, I put them all in a video. Searching for a song to match the length that it turned out to be, I re-listened to the Eagles’ great song, Desperado. It touched me deeply…as if he was singing it to me…and so it became the soundtrack for the slideshow.
Further pondering over the next couple days… of the meaning of the lyrics, the meaning of the images to me, of being able to be where I was to take them, the various thoughts I’ve been having about finally being here in some close manifestation of a lifelong dream, but not feeling fulfilled, and attempting to discover why, leads me to this moment as I write and try to share those thoughts.
The short version: It’s not fun/fulfilling/joy-giving/meaningful unless it’s shared with others.
I’ve been moved to take and share the photos and video compositions online for several years now, since my journey brought me first to Happy Hollow, and then here to Eagle’s Nest in Nova Scotia, as a way to share with others, since despite my best efforts to encourage and invite, no one ever seemed to be able or willing or even interested in visiting me at either home in the flesh. (with some very rare and very cherished exceptions, you know who you are…thank you.)
For some time that was enough, although the lack of real physical contact with others who appreciated the sanctuaries I had found and wanted to share did cause me some pain and depression if I found myself dwelling on it. But I, for the most part, had learned to focus on my own good fortune to experience these places and moments, and continued to share online through this web site, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, Flickr and others. The occasional “like” or positive comments from both friends and strangers becoming a nice added bonus of acknowledgment and appreciation and motivation to continue. And for the most part, that was enough.
But it’s not any more.
“Your prison is walking through this world all alone.”
While I find the song so autobiographical in many ways, I would change the last line in my case. Like the ‘desperado’ I have taken my own path through life, avoided the ‘typical’ burdens and tribulations and entanglements of a career and ‘success’ and even personal relationships—‘been out riding fences for so long now’—not out of fear of being loved or trapped, but simply out of not knowing how to take that path.
Most of my life I desperately wanted to ‘let somebody love me.’ But no one did, at least that’s how it appeared to me. It hurt a lot, for a long time. But I became strong and learned to love my solitude, and myself. Now my hope, my dream, my need is that somehow, somewhere, someone will let me love them. Let me into their life, by coming to join me in mine, and come share all this beauty, joy, peace…together.
I’ve ‘opened the gate.’ Will someone walk through it?
And “Let somebody love you…before it’s too late.”
If not…well, I still have George, and the kitties, and the chickens, and the ducks, and the meadow in Happy Hollow…and the eagles, and the great blue herons, and the seagulls, and the otters, and the deer, the long empty beaches and waves…and the sunsets and the sunrises…
The life of a ‘desperado’ ain’t all that bad after all.
Desperado
Desperado, why don’t you come to your senses?
You been out ridin’ fences for so long now
Oh, you’re a hard one
I know that you got your reasons
These things that are pleasin’ you
Can hurt you somehow.
Don’t you draw the queen of diamonds, boy
She’ll beat you if she’s able
You know the queen of hearts is always your best bet.
Now it seems to me, some fine things
Have been laid upon your table
But you only want the ones that you can’t get.
Desperado, oh, you ain’t gettin’ no younger
Your pain and your hunger, they’re drivin’ you home
And freedom, oh freedom well, that’s just some people talkin’
Your prison is walking through this world all alone.
Don’t your feet get cold in the winter time?
The sky won’t snow and the sun won’t shine
It’s hard to tell the night time from the day
You’re losin’ all your highs and lows
Ain’t it funny how the feeling goes away?
Desperado, why don’t you come to your senses?
Come down from your fences, open the gate
It may be rainin’, but there’s a rainbow above you
You better let somebody love you (let somebody love you)
You better let somebody love you before it’s too late.
by Donald Henley & Glenn Frey, 1976
