Looking at you…

faintly the handwriting reads: 

 

Karina & Bob,

Here’s looking at you in 1994

With best regards,

Howard

 

Back when he studied T’ai Chi with me for a few years, Howard was already older, a fine, eccentric gentleman. And a very good and well-known artist. With a deeply philosophical side to him which made him enjoy my way of teaching the Art and Principles of this ancient practice. He’d have questions, comments, always delighted by insights, his or mine.

 

In the hallway I often pass his small watercolor, with its (faded by now) inscription to Bob and me. Bob’s birthday will be in three days on May 18.  If alive, my late husband – who died in October of 2016 – would turn ninety-five this year. Suddenly I feel the presence of time in my heart, swirling about back and forth, swooshing from chamber to chamber, expanding. Howard’s greeting from 1994 – thirty years later, I am now seventy, about the age he was back then.  Suddenly I am engulfed by the dynamically shifting Cloud of Time, traveling not in a straight line, but spiraling, snaking, gliding, floating in all directions and none… smoothly… perpetual….

 

Remembering becomes looking forward – imagining a future. The Future turns its gaze back, seductively nuzzling the Past, which is pressing its weight into the Presence, which in turn is cozying up to the Future, each pulling the others into a waltz through Time & Space. Seeing all my artist friends, students and teachers from the course of my life co-mingling in an airy, light-filled, timeless studio, gathering for drinks and toasting. Our faces glow warmly, unique features highlighted softly by the eternal joy of being together, alive and well. All the people who made my life exciting, rich and transformative, in small and big ways. Teachers, mentors, colleagues, students, friends, comrades.

 

Here are as well my first cello and dance teachers, and the many others that followed, theater, voice, T’ai Chi, Jungian work, breath, Kum Nye, constellation and healing work. All the people I worked with so intensely: singers, poets, choreographers, directors, actors, musicians, costume designers, painters, sculptors, editors, photographers, sound artists, writers, builders, composers, journalists, repairers, therapists, printers, ceramicists, filmmakers, philanthropists, mythologists, astrologers, activists, dancers, lawyers, lovers, visionaries, acrobats, healers, storytellers. Many have moved on to other realms. Yet here, we are all together, not nostalgic – just present.

 

How could I best give everyone my thanks? Express my respect. Well, this gathering in expanded heart’s studio seems the right place. Now – looking at you… I send well wishes and gratitude. We spent many hours working and studying together, collaborating, discussing, fighting, celebrating. You all taught and inspired me, challenged and supported me. You learned from me, moved on, grew. And I grew, transformed. Life interwove me with many extra-ordinary people. (I stayed away from celebrities.) I recognize your features, exquisite eyebrows, hand gestures and body language, better than I can remember your names – first names yes, but not all last names, for that I will need to ask the internet later. We all have grown and are so proud of each other. We drink, dance, laugh, eat, gesture excitedly, and at times we seem pensive, wistful, immensely grateful to be reunited for a short moment in this realm of timelessness.

 

Then I wake. My heart is pulsing quietly, warmly, intensely. The fog has snuck up the hill, the trees outside the window, swaying and nodding mysteriously... Looking at you…

….signed: HM 1989

 

At one of the art sales in his studio, I acquired this painting by Howard which has been hanging in the living room ever since. Visitors remark on it, someone might recognize the painter. This is how we create family as artists.

Howard Margolis

1927 – 2015

Artist, musician, father, teacher, mentor, and social worker