Celtic Spirit Rides the Tide of the Universe
By C. Austin
The construction crane towers past the 7th floor hospital room
window from which I look. From this corner room I can see
construction on all sides. Despite the bleak economic conditions of
this city, here is a place of vigorous building.
Inside the window is a quiet room punctuated only by the sound of
my son breathing lightly on a hospital bed two feet away.
With machines that deliver IV fluids and log vital signs, sliding
curtains and plastic bagged medical supplies, I find little Celtic
"spirit," to calm me. The wind is locked out, I'm floors off the
ground and there is no artifact of my home or heritage to be found
here, save what is in my heart and on the bed in front of me.
Anyone who can recall the sudden hospitalization of a loved one
will remember the surreal habitat of an emergency room - the
questions, the fatigue, the speculation, more waiting.
Like the word "emerge," the word "emergency" derives from the Latin
"emergere" to "rise out or up," and "mergere" (merge) meaning to "dip,
plunge or sink." There is motion in the word emerge - a rising and
falling. The word contains the energy to create out of itself. In
the case of "emergency," there is both rise and fall and its meaning
"unforeseen occurrence" makes good, albeit disturbing, sense.
There is a note on my refrigerator that reads that Celtic people
have "an abiding sense of tragedy which sustains them through
temporary periods of joy." Though it is no better than a bumper
sticker slogan, its message has always resonated with me.
To feel the tragedy and joy of life in the same moment is the
curious ability to view two sides of the coin of life at once. Those
who can be mindful of joy in times of sorrow and those that can feel
the play of mortality even in life's lightest moments are a step away
from the mainstream.
Sigmund Freud once said of the Irish that "[t]his is one race of
people for whom psychoanalysis is of no use whatsoever." There is a
certain kind of disassociation in being able to ride the tides of the
universe - letting the kite string out and away while the body travels
a dusty path. That melancholic swaying through life is the legacy of
Celtic peoples. Sometimes that ability to sense vast swings of
experience proves too much - and the soul is cast adrift, careering
from one end of the spectrum to the other. But the soul that can
navigate those tides will find the gift of emergence in the forms and
patterns that become visible in unlikely moments.
It is that penetrating flexibility and vision that holds me now.
In the emergency room I watched the fall and rise of energy that
answered my son's need for help. In the hours that passed,
information and thoughts became visible and receded. Decisions I made
were based on the convergence of that which had gathered around me -
people, information - the flow of things.
I marveled at the perfect arrangement of things unknowable that
made the best possible situation for my son. There was an ever
present feeling that the whole of the story had been told, I just had
to follow the unseen path to the right conclusion, the stumbling of
humans against the background of a greater story.
At the conclusion of surgery, it had gone well. Yes, it was
appendicitis, yes, that appendix had burst - it was fortuitous that no
further time had been lost in stopping the spread of toxins into his
body.
My job wasn't to do - it was to see - to see the whole of what was
playing out through the magnificent arrangement of the individual
parts and players. It wasn't for me to be trapped in the role I play
in life, but to sense the moving energy and hold it long enough to
help another living thing, which in this case, was my son.
That is the gift that I hold close now in this room far above the
ground. It is the middle of the night now, the panoramic city lights
glitter through the window, far beyond this episode, which will become
smaller in memory as the days pass by.
And the view? Young buildings are rising to the sky, older
buildings fade from view. Though the older sections of town are
lovely, the future belongs to that which is emerging, scaffolding its
way into our world, through the events of our lives and the lives of
those we love - through the "unforeseen occurrences" that happily and
unhappily sometimes bring a greater perspective into view.
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