An Open Letter to DW/3M

An Open Letter to DW/3M                      

http://www.davidwhyte.com/the-three-marriages/

            

Dear David,
Thanks for writing your book,   The Three Marriages

I just finished a first reading, and it was a very timely book to me. Again showing the appropriateness of “when the student is ready….” 

 There were a few occasions in which I have seen some of the dynamics you talk about. One was when I was in grad school, after having dragged my whole family across hither and yon to try to pay some heed to vocation and heart’s unsilenced voice, I was in a graduate program that was wrong for me in so many ways. When walking across campus, I saw a banner across a sorority house, advertising for new members, that said “There’s Still Time!” I took encouragement from that sign as if it were the voice of God. 

At this time in the larger world, George Foreman was returning to the Ring. He had, famously, been humiliated in the famous “Rumble in the Jungle” against the great Muhammad Ali some several lifetimes previously. So, and the order of events here elude my memory, I would read about how George Foreman was returning to the ring at an age that no one in his right mind ought to, and that he intended to retire from the sport after becoming the Heavyweight Champion of the World, a title he went on to claim by winning the unified WBA, IBF and lineal titles. At this time, I was in one department in my university, but had found a similar program that was very right for me in another department. But I would have to be admitted to their own doctoral program as an internal transfer in the university. When I made my case to the man who would become my mentor and who would guide my dissertation, I told him that I was inspired by George Foreman, and that, after a frankly humiliating occupational history, I was stepping into the ring one more time. 

My gatekeeper, and then friend, was amused and inspired, and championed my admission to the program. That was in philosophy, where I learned to “unpack the ordinary,” which was the way my mentor looked at doing philosophy. He also encouraged me to write what I cared about rather than what I thought would be “marketable,” which I did. Doing what he advised helped me very much over the decades since then. 

Besides philosophy, I have always had a love for music. But as in all my loves, I feel an animus against letting out to the world that I feel the way I do. It’s never felt safe to me to let people know what I love. Yet, in reading Plato, in the midst of ordinary work, I found this passage. Socrates was in prison, awaiting execution within a few days. But one would never know by looking at him. Plato tells the story this way. 

 Cebes said, “Evenus asked me a day or two ago, as others have done before, about the lyrics which you have been composing lately by adapting Aesop’s fables and ‘The Prelude’ to Apollo. He wanted to know what induced you to write them now after you had gone to prison, when you had never done anything of the kind before. … Socrates said, tell him the truth, that I did not compose them to rival either him or his poetry—which I knew would not be easy. I did it in the attempt to discover the meaning of certain dreams, and to clear my conscience, in case this was the art which I had been told to practice. It is like this, you see. In the course of my life, I have often had the same dream, appearing in different forms at different times, but always saying the same thing, “Socrates, practice and cultivate the arts.”

In the past, I used to think that it was impelling and exhorting me to do what I was actually doing already; I mean that a dream like a spectator encouraging a runner in a race, was urging me on to do what I was already doing, that is, practicing the arts, because philosophy is the greatest of the arts, and I was practicing it. But ever since my trial, …, I have felt that perhaps it might be this popular form of art that the dream intended me to practice, in which case I ought to practice it and not disobey. I thought it would be safer not to take my departure before I had cleared my conscience by writing poetry and so obeying the dream. I began...

He began.
So I began.  Writing and singing. 
Recently, I had opportunity to perform two full-length performances, and it was a lot of fun. Later, I told about it to a small group, and someone came up afterward and said, “You sound like you really enjoyed it.” When she said that, I knew I was at a dividing point, and the temptation was to treat it as “business as usual,” that “someone had to do it.” But no, I acknowledged my true love of music, yes, I do, I find a lot of joy in performing. 

BTW, I freely admit that bringing myself to the place of writing music, or performing, feels a lot like looking at a blank page that cries out to be written upon. Performing and teaching are both my career.   Both bring great happiness and joy.  

In another area that you addressed in the book, I recently had (and still have) opportunity to buy a Martin D12-25 guitar, made during the years when I as a young man earnestly desired a Martin D12-35. Think “Masaratti” to get the feeling. But it’s been a long time since then. If I were to get the guitar, it would be an imitation of good things passed, not me, not now. There is a guitar that will be just right, but it will be something in the present moment, not a memory. Maybe something that hasn’t even been made yet, maybe something that I can’t afford but will when the time is right. 

Thank you for your encouragement and your insight.

B.

For more on the great George Foreman, see this link.