Reflections on a 67th Solar Return* - Part I

 

Tuesday (September 1) I celebrated my 67th birthday. Like the day I was born, it was a hot one. My Mother never let me forget it was the hottest day in 1953 when I was born in Good Samaritan Hospital on the shores of Lake Worth in downtown West Palm Beach. All of my life my Dad would tease me by calling me “Yankee” - a culturally contextualized slight for families with Southern roots like mine - because I’d been born across Lake Worth “within sight of the Kennedys.”

I spent my birthday doing things I love as I think everyone should. First thing on the agenda, coffee mug in hand, was to conduct a virtual Morning Prayer for St. Richard’s parish from my home computer. It was the Feast Day of David Pendleton Oakerhater, an indigenous man once imprisoned here in Florida in the old Spanish fortress, Castillo de San Marcos, in St. Augustine, only to emerge a Christian missionary and become an ordained Episcopal deacon in Syracuse, NY. 

I love the synchronicity.

Truth be told, I’m not terribly fond of these virtual processes. I think the term “virtual” is generous given the benefits they supposedly provide. And there are a lot of headaches involved. But in a time of pandemic, I recognize virtual is the best we can do for the time being. And so I began my day at my desk talking to a computer screen, leading a religious service.

Go figure.

 

“Where Mayberry Meets the Twilight Zone”

 

The next part of my day was spent in one of my favorite places, the Cassadaga spiritualist community about 45 minutes north of here. I love the Victorian homes and the intensely spiritual sense of the town. Andy always goes with me as I meet with my medium for my annual check-in. He says the town has a good vibe to it.

After my reading, I always spend a little time in the little shops there. Last year I came away with a tee-shirt bearing one of the unofficial mottos of the town: “Cassadaga – Where Mayberry Meets the Twilight Zone.”  This day I was looking for a post card for my Wiccan friend, Luci,  and some polished stones to display in ceramic pots around my home

Supposedly each of these stones bears some kind of spiritual power. The lapis lazuli stone was advertised as bringing “inner power, love, purification, intuition, positive magic, self-confidence, manifestations.” (Wow, I could sure use some of that!)

Now I don’t know if these stones will bring about “positive magic” but I am clear that stones generally carry valences that impact those around them. One only has to spend a half hour among the weathered rocks along the shores of Iona in the Inner Hebrides or the tidal pools at the beach at Pacific Grove, California to know that. These are decidedly deeply spiritual places.

I was struck by the practice that I observed all across Israel of small stones atop grave markers left in remembrance of departed loved ones. I believe a bit of the energies of those who leave visible tokens of their ongoing devotion remains present in the stones they leave behind. 

I have taken to engaging in this practice myself. When I visited my Mom and Dad’s grave in the National Cemetery near Bushnell a few weeks ago I left behind two small polished black pebbles atop their grave, one for each of them. As I placed each stone I reminded them that I love them, miss them and am always happy to encounter them in my dreams as I frequently do.

“Deep Calls Out to Deep”

From Cassadaga we drove east, headed for the Atlantic, through some of the last vestiges of natural Florida left before the arrival of the bulldozers. I grew up in a 1960s Florida that was just beginning to blast off into a frenzy of unregulated population growth. The coming of air conditioning and mosquito control would eventually make Florida the third largest state in the country in population before I turned 60.

There is a mournful sense among these remaining woodlands and their unseen inhabitants as we pass through this day. How anyone could understand the replacement of this natural beauty with gridlocked highways, endless strip malls and soulless tract housing to be “development,” I am not sure.

 

It would only take us an hour to get to another of my favorite places in the world, the beach at Cape Canaveral. There we would order our lunch from a local pizza joint on A-1-A that has perhaps the best spinach pie I’ve ever eaten. From there we’d drive the mile over to the ocean at Cherrie Downs Park. The boardwalk among the sea grapes there has just been rebuilt and today there was no one sitting in the pavilion at its end. With a roof over our heads to keep the intense noonday sun at bay, the onshore breeze coming off the ocean kept us cool as we ate our lunch.

I realized a long time ago that I can never live very far from an ocean. In the middle of the country I find myself becoming disoriented, losing my breath, overwhelmed by an almost claustrophobic panic as I drive through places with names like Iowa and Nebraska. It’s almost as if I can hear my soul screaming out “Where is the water? And how quickly can we get there?” Perhaps that’s not surprising for someone who was literally born on the shores of an ocean.

Standing in the sand looking out over the incoming waves is where I feel most at peace. I cannot go long periods without visiting the ocean. My soul needs Mother Ocean, as fellow Floridian Jimmy Buffet called it. As the psalmist said, deep calls out to deep.

I can never go to the shore without at least getting my feet into the water. So after lunch we quickly waded through the heated sand, much of it recently pumped from just offshore in a renourishment project, and down to the water. It was high tide and the descent from its eroded cliff to the water itself was brief and sheer. But the cool water was worth the clamber down particularly given the intensity of the sun overhead.

 

On the far horizon the gantries for the Space X launches were visible. I never cease to be amazed by the magic of the space program. At a very basic level, the space program is a part of my Florida soul as well.

At the water’s edge I would gather my second round of treasures this day from among the small seashells and pieces of coral rock that covered the beach. My pockets jingled with my finds on the way back to the car. But as much as I love the beach, it was just too hot to stay on the beach very long this day. And given my upcoming visit to the dermatologist to have yet another chunk of skin with its basal cells excised, it was better to be safe than sorry. 

 

Birthday Dinner, Cake and Presents

But the celebration of the day of my birth was definitely not over yet.

I arrived home to unpackage the treasures I had collected at Cassadaga and Cape Canaveral and found another waiting for me. My niece, Grace, who has lived with us for the past year, had made me a birthday card. I love her cards and they are special coming from her. I have learned a lot about being in the position of a parent this past year. Grace has been a good teacher. And I have come to have a lot more respect for parents as a result.

It was the perfect ending to a perfect birthday.

 

At the end of the week, my Brother, David, and Sister-in-Law, Ruth, would take the three of us out to dinner. It would be the first time I’d been to a restaurant since February. We ate out on the open-air porch surrounding Miller’s Ale House in Winter Park. We had the whole end of the porch to ourselves so it was low risk. The staff all wore masks and observed social distancing.

Dining out is definitely not the loose, easy and gregarious experience it once was, but I was grateful to have had this night even in the midst of what is hopefully a waning pandemic.

The night was capped off with birthday cake and presents at David’s house. Ruth gave me one of her paintings, an image of a Royal Poinciana (Flamboyan) tree in full bloom. I have loved those trees since I was a little kid in South Florida.Her style is very reminiscent of The Highwaymen who used to sell their tropical landscape paintings along U.S. 1 in South Florida. As a kid I remember seeing them with their paintings propped up against ramshackle cars along the shoulders of the highway. I particularly cherish having an image in their style to add to the many other images I have gathered from around the world in this unpredictable and unorthodox life that I have lived.

It would take me a week to read through and respond to all the birthday messages I got. That is a nice burden to have. Several people called and left messages. A few sent emails. Over 200 people sent me birthday greetings on Facebook. For a man who has spent much of his life feeling unsure of himself and his value as a human being, this kind of affirmation is, overwhelming. 

[Continued in Part II]

* The solar return chart is an astrology chart that's calculated for the exact moment the Sun returns to its "natal" or birth position.    

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Harry Scott Coverston

Orlando, Florida

  mailto:frharry@cfl.rr.com

  hcoverston.orlando@gmail.com

  If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things worth considering do not come in sound bites.

 Those who believe religion and politics aren't connected don't understand either. – Mahatma Gandhi

 For what does G-d require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your G-d?  - Micah 6:8, Hebrew Scriptures

 Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world's grief. Do justly, now. Love mercy, now. Walk humbly now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it. - Rabbi Rami Shapiro, Wisdom of the Jewish Sages (1993)

   © Harry Coverston, 2020

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