December 22, 2024: "Lucky Bastards," Clarence Odbody, Successful Suicide

My favorite Christmas movie of all time is It's a Wonderful Life.  Some people say it's not a Christmas movie because most of the film's action takes place outside of the holiday season.  I disagree.  It's a film that screams Christmas to me.

At the conclusion of the movie, Clarence Odbody, the angel sent to save George Bailey's/Jimmy Stewart's life, inscribes a book to George thusly:  "Remember, no man is a failure who has friends."  George's friends literally save the day (and his life).

Billy Collins learns about the primacy of friendship . . . 

Lucky Bastards

by: Billy Collins

From the deck of the swimming pool

you could see the planes taking off from LAX

and whenever my father visited his friend there,

the two of them would sit in the sun with their drinks

and kill the time between golf and dinner

by betting on whether the next plane would break

left or right, and if you picked the long shot--

one continuing straight over the ocean--you got double.

The time I was there with them, I watched

the singles and fives changing hands

as they laughed "You lucky bastard!"

and I learned again the linkage between friendship and money

and the sweet primacy of one over the other,

which is not to say that Sandburg's six-volume

biography of Lincoln or the writings of Lao Tzu

are not also excellent teachers, each in its own way.

I'm a pretty lucky bastard.  

My life is crowded people who love me.  I'm still not quite sure what I've done to deserve all this kindness and affection.  Since I've been writing about my mental health struggles these last 30 or so days, I've received lots of encouragement from my loyal disciples and friends.

I'm not gonna lie.  A couple times this past month, I've been standing on the bridge with George, staring down at the roiling black waters.  Don't worry.  I'm not going to jump.  I got past the moment, and I will get past it again if it recurs.  I've personally seen the aftermath of loved one's of a "successful" suicide.  (Such a weird juxtaposition of words--"successful" plus "suicide.")  I would never put my family through that.

This evening, I led a Zoom poetry workshop.  Only three people showed up--one really good poet friend, my wife, and myself--but it was a great time.  The theme of the workshop was Christmas.  We wrote about cards, ornaments, places, and people.  We laughed a lot.  Got a little teary, too.  At the end, we wished each other safe, peaceful, happy holidays.

I know I'm not a failure.  I have friends.  A lot of them.  Poets.  Musicians.  Teachers.  Librarians.  Artists.

They rescue Saint Marty from the bridge every day.

November 13: Simple Little Air, Saint Odo, Musician and Poet

...Scrooge's niece played well upon the harp; and played among other tunes a simple little air (a mere nothing:  you might learn to whistle it in two minutes), which had been familiar to the child who fetched Scrooge from the boarding school, as he had been reminded by the Ghost of Christmas Past...

Music is all through A Christmas Carol, from the boy who sings at Scrooge's office door at the beginning of the book to the church bells ringing on Christmas morning at the end.  In the passage above, Scrooge's niece plays a song upon the harp at Scrooge's nephew Fred's Christmas party.  Considering the title of the novel, it's no surprise that music pervades its pages.

Today's saint of the week is named Odo, and his feast day is November 18.  I chose Odo for a few reasons.  First, he studied music in Paris and wrote hymns.  Second, he wrote an epic poem on the Redemption.  And third, his name reminds me of the character Otho from the movie Beetlejuice.  Odo also happens to be the patron saint of rain, and, considering that snow is the norm this time of year in the U. P., I thought I'd put in a little plug for a form of precipitation I don't have to shovel or pay somebody to plow.

I appreciate saints who are painters or poets or musicians.  They remind me of the importance of the arts in the Christian tradition.  Stained glass windows.  Cathedrals.  Hymns and carols.  Psalms.  Artists have always held a place of honor in the Church.  Saint Odo was one of those artists.

I always worry that my writing won't make a difference in anyone's life.  It certainly won't feed anyone.  It won't clothe anyone or put a roof over anyone's head.  This post will probably be read by two or three people, if I'm lucky.  I'm not Charles Dickens.  I'm not Saint Odo.

Marty is a wannabe.  A wannabe poet.  A wannabe artist.  A wannabe musician.  A wannabe saint.



Niether of these guys is Saint Odo

March 9: Saint Catherine of Bologna

I'm afraid that yesterday's blog verged on the mean-spirited, despite my attempt to paint a portrait of my subject that dwelt on her human side; it's impossible for me to hate her. In fact, I have deep sympathy for her struggles with unhappiness and mental illness. If I can forgive my wife's sexual addiction, I have to forgive this person's flaws, as well. I just wish her flaws weren't so overtly hurtful.

Yesterday was just one of those days when I shouldn't have been around people. If you've ever seen Brian DePalma's The Untouchables with Deniro, there's a great scene where Deniro/Capone blows his cork. He starts ranting, declaring he wants everyone dead, ending with, "I want to go to the graveyard and piss on his bones!" (I may be paraphrasing here, but I'm pretty sure that's the line.) I was pretty much Bobby Deniro in full Al Capone mode yesterday. (Not a good thing to be on a day when I have to teach.) I pretty much try to avoid people and situations that will make me drag out my baseball bat when I'm like this.

So, that's my explanation for my posting yesterday. I'm human, and I was cranky.

Today, I'm trying to turn over a new leaf in honor of Catherine of Bologna. Born in 1413, she spent the early years of her life in the royal court of the Marquis of Ferrara. Basically, she was the companion of the marquis's young daughter. Eventually, she joined the order of the Poor Clares and became the superioress of a couple of convents. When she died in 1463, she was buried and then exhumed after 18 days because of the perfume rising from the soil. She's one of the incorruptibles, which means that her remains have never decayed. To this day, her body is on display in the chapel of the Poor Clares in Bologna. (Her skin has discolored, but she's close to 600 years old. We should all look so good at her age.)



The reason Catherine inspires me to loftier goals in my mood and work is because she is the patron saint of artists. During her lifetime, she was a painter and writer. One of her works is Rosarium, "a Latin poem on the life of Jesus." If Catherine had read what I wrote yesterday, she would have laughed (even in a crappy mood, I can still be funny), but she would have recognized the baser impulses of my words (I wanted to call my subject a "nasty bitch").

So, today, I'm trying to shake off my darker side. For those of you that know me personally, this is no easy feat. Think Moses parting the Red Sea or Obama passing health care reform. But I don't walk around all day with a thundercloud raging in my head. I do see the beauty in life.

For the last week, Spring has taken hold of the Upper Peninsula. Now, Spring in the U.P is a little different than Spring in Washington D. C. There are no cherry blossoms exploding on the trees here. But, the sap is flowing in the maples, and the snow banks are no longer taller than the Empire State Building. There's actual mud on the ground and water flowing down the streets. If I spend a little time outdoors, I can actually smell the frozen world thawing. On Sunday, there were flies buzzing around my front porch. They were very confused flies, not quite sure what to do with the cold, white stuff, but they made me feel like summer was within reach. Yes, even flies can be beautiful when they're harbingers of warm weather.

I just have to make a conscious effort to notice the small moments of art in my life every day. Last night, I put my son in his crib and watched him drift off to sleep. After a few minutes, I quietly left the bedroom, convinced that I was home free to simmer for the rest of the night in my bad juju. Just as I sat down on the couch with a book about a political assassination in my lap, I heard my son start crying in his crib. I threw myself to my feet and stormed into his bedroom.

"You better go to sleep, kid," I said aloud as I sat on the bed beside the crib. "I'm in no mood for this tonight."

Then I looked over at him.

He stretched his hand through the bars of the crib toward me, his fingers open and waiting.

I reached out and put my finger in his small palm.

His hand closed around my finger, and he smiled at me in the darkness. Then he closed his eyes and drifted off to sleep.

I sat there for a really long time and watched him just...breathe.


Painting by Saint Catherine of Bologna