On my weekends while at UCLA, I liked to bicycle to the Veterans Administration Hospital and visit with retired soldiers. I befriended one. The following is how I described him in my journal after our first meeting on Sunday, November 15, 1970:
He was seemingly blind, from gazing for hours at the sun. He leaned like a tipped statue against a clump of poles in the middle of an empty field. Nearby, two elderly men were doing their wash in big outdoor tubs and setting it out to dry. I drove by on my bicycle and turned around, slowly rolling across the field, as though drawn by an invisible cord, to where this lone man stood. So surreal was his world, I entered it to learn about God.
Never once did he stop trying to see the sun. His wrinkled, blistered face jerked from side to side; his eyes blinked and moved constantly. His face was a contorted squint—but his soul fought every moment to stare at the sun regardless, every muscle in his cheeks struggling between command and reflex. And his eyes, short, blond crusted eyelashes, ever blinking, mucus rising up and over his pupils, his eyes watery, the opposite of tears. His lips were flaked with scabs, toothless. His clothes were almost dust, and stuffed into his belt was an old book wrapped in a rag—a book that looked as though it had survived deserts and storms. A relic. His boots were floppy, untied, the soles falling off…big boots that had climbed mountains and tried to breathe in thin air.
“Sir, what are you looking at?”
“Don’t you know?”
“Why are you staring at the sky?”
“Well, I look into the sky because it is eternal.”
“What do you mean?"
“It goes on forever."
"But looking at the sun is hard to do for very long."
"Yep. Looking at the sun. How do you spell sun?"
"S-U-N."
"That's right. The sun. S-U-N spells sun. The sun is full of life."
"But why do you look at it, really?"
"For you."
"It’s awfully bright. It can hurt your eyes. Are you blind?"
No answer.
"My boyfriend is blind. He can't even see light. Can you see?"
"What time is it?"
"Oh, about 9:30 or 10:00."
"I've got a lot more time."
"How long are you going to look at the sun?"
"Till 11:30, when I go to dinner."
"What do you do after dinner?"
"I go play pool or I read."
"It must be hard to read if you stare at the sun all morning."
"You don’t have to worry about me staring at the sun."
"Are you are having a battle with the sun?"
"Could be. The sun is pretty strong. I am going to keep staring at it."
"I don’t know anyone who has stared at the sun as long as you have. I think you are winning."
"Maybe. Maybe I have won."
When I left and said goodbye, he raised his arm to begin a gesture, and slowly let it drop.
Musing--my innermost voice speaks to me in symbols. These moments are the closest I have come to myself. Like the feather in my hand—a free thing, yet neither my hand nor the feather is free until it is dropped, and so do I write.
I am not one to seek my soul or ever find it in simple, contemplative meditation alone. The closeness comes gloriously and through pain—applied concentration. Like riding my bicycle uphill into the sun, into wind, pedals turning slowly wheeling--may my body share my soul’s exhilaration!
When I write, I stop wanting to cry.
This paper dabs my laughing tears
And my crying tears
And my eyes to see if there are any there at all.”
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