The Garden of Eden
Thursday, January 9, 2014
TWO WAYS
By
Francis William Bessler
The Garden - Revisited & Revised
Greetings from your Bella Vita host!
50 years and maybe a bit more. Last year marked my 50th year of writing. So now it is on to the 50 + marker of my life - in terms of writing. How long I will go on is anyone’s guess. Like anyone else, I may die tomorrow; and then closure would be automatic. Wouldn’t it?
More than likely, however, at some point, I will determine that I have “written enough” - and simply stop writing. At some later point, I will die; but when I do die, I will have left all my thoughts & works behind - at least partially for a “new me” to inherit from the world of the future when I am born again.
I do believe in being “born again,” but that can be taken literally or metaphorically. Lots of us experience some epiphany - or mind opening - during a given life - and are “born again” within a given lifetime. I am quite sure that I have experienced a number of those “born again” experiences in this one life too because I have experienced seeing in a different way quite often.
At one time, I will look at a tree and see just some trunk and some branches; and another time I will look at that same tree and take note of a whole new thing - right before my eyes. Those branches are not just lengths of wood; they are sources for wonderful leaves that spring forth in the Spring. It is not that the tree changed. It is only that I will have changed to see it differently. And it might not be that I have changed either. It might be that I have chosen to look at the same thing in a different way. Do I see the branch of a tree in the Fall as just a piece of wood that looks dead - or do I look at a branch of a tree in the Fall as home for wonderful growth in the Spring? It all depends on a little thing called “vision” or “perspective.”
I guess that happened to me long ago. I read about the famed “Garden of Eden” as offered in the first book of the BIBLE - GENESIS. The author of that book gave me a glimpse at a place he thought could describe “Heaven.” I reveled in that story, but I did not like his way of ending that story - with Adam & Eve being banished from “Heaven” because of some act of disobedience; but I was turned on to the possibility of a “Heaven” - even though “that” author decided to banish people from “his Heaven.”
In truth, I would have probably written the ending differently - with Adam & Eve being happy and having babies and having a good ole time - and I would have allowed my people to realize how wonderful their life in Eden was - without stopping it like the “other author” of GENESIS did; but then that is me. I must admit I am a bit of an idealist and see no reason to write stories that end in bitterness - like the “other author” of GENESIS did.
Let’s face it, folks! What ending would you have preferred? Look at the ending that the “other author” of GENESIS offered to the famed story of The Garden of Eden. Adam & Eve are banished from “Heaven” and they go on to have kids in pain with one of the kids killing the other. What a Beginning! Look at what misery that ending has caused because it ended without hope - except in some vision that one day mankind might return to The Garden of Eden - once he and she got things right and fell down on their knees and worshipped some god or other. But has that happened in 6 million or 6 thousand years - or whatever? NO! That ought to tell us a thing or two about waiting to “get things right.” Right?
How long must we wait to get back to The Garden of Eden? In my opinion, we have had that Garden of Eden thing wrong for all time since that story was written. We have believed what that “other author” offered about it and have been completely oblivious of “another ending.” I do not believe we will ever return to where we never were in the first place - as long as we believe we were ever banished in the first place.
The key to living in “a” Garden of Eden, I think, is to realize that the whole world is The Garden of Eden - or every place on this Earth and beyond is “a” Garden of Eden. Why? Because that which makes a true “Garden of Eden” is simply the Presence of a Sacred God; and since God must be everywhere, being Infinite, then everywhere must be “a” Garden of Eden.
When we finally put on some new glasses and see a tree for more than some trunk and branches and look at it for its mysterious and wonderful happening right in front of us, including its dynamic roots below the surface - then we will realize that we are in “a” Garden of Eden - and we will stop believing in what that “other author” of The Garden of Eden offered. We will stop “worshipping gods - or a god”; and we will begin to “Admire Life” that comes not from a “god” that is outside of it, but from a “God” that is completely within it. At that point, my friends, we will have it all - and we will know that no one can take that realization from us.
I have been writing for 50 years, but the gist of my writing has been in the likes of “another author” of GENESIS. I have disagreed with the original author for most of my life - seeing what he did not see that a garden is not something that depends on us for its growth and mystery and wonder. A garden is something that is on its own. The key to knowing we can never leave a garden is to know that it is wondrous on its own - and to know we can never change that.
The “other author” of GENESIS lacked that vision, I think. He made the existence of his garden dependent upon its occupants - Adam & Eve; and when he made Adam & Eve leave it for some self-serving reason of claiming we have to “earn” our occupation of a garden, he diminished his garden and turned it into an unforgiving desert. And what has that tale done to all of us since he wrote it? It has caused us to be distracted from the real wonder of our lives and has left us a legend of having to “look elsewhere” for our meaning.
Well, I am sorry - or maybe not so sorry! This “author” of GENESIS will not do that. I will not write in the next year or month or day - or whatever I have left - anything that derides life and makes its wonder somehow dependent upon my obedience to some law. I live in The Garden of Eden now - at this very moment and in this very place; and I will not allow anyone to take that Garden from me by some idiotic tale that disobedience will make it go away.
In my vision, however, whether I obey or disobey, The Garden of Eden is - and always will be. There is nothing I can do - or not do - to make it go away. I think it is for me to realize that this life is a Garden of Eden and start taking note of the wonder of all its inhabitants - and claiming myself as one of those inhabitants - and knowing what a wonderful life this really is.
Amazingly - or not so amazingly when we realize why “he” wrote it so that Adam & Eve had to be banished from their garden - the “other author” of GENESIS made the very existence of The Garden of Eden dependent upon the actions of a single duo; and when they disobeyed (as they had to do for the author to construct the story he was telling), not only were Adam & Eve banished from the garden, but the “Garden” disappeared entirely. Did it not? If you believe otherwise, where is this “Eden”? What happened to the proverbial Garden of Adam & Eve after they were banished from it? It just “disappeared.” Right? Where is it if it did not disappear? It’s gone. Right? If it is really gone, then its existence depended upon a single duo.
But I have lived with the realization that a “real” Garden of Eden cannot disappear most of my life - beyond my twenties or so - though I have had to negotiate through a great deal of dissent in trying to see things “my way.” Others have clung to the original story of The Garden of Eden and have declared that I have had no right to try and change it. After all, “it was written” as it was because that is the way it happened; and it is for me to come to terms with reality and get with the story as it was written and stop all my foolishness in believing otherwise. I have been told a thousand times that I cannot change anything, but still I have tried - and I will keep trying with whatever writing I do from this point on.
What will I write? Ah, for the time being, consider that to be one of those things “blowing in the wind.” Whatever the wind blows my way, I guess. That is what I will write about; but I am thinking about beginning with a bit of a discussion about the “birth” of the BIBLE - not so much from a scholarly historical standpoint, but from a philosophical standpoint. Perhaps such an article can prove interesting - and I do like to write about interesting subjects. I do believe an investigation of such an idea might prove very “interesting” indeed; and I might just do it. Yes, indeed, I wonder what the “wind” will tell me if I ask it a thing or two! Who knows?
Anyway, to finish this article, in 1963 or so, I began a song called TWO WAYS. I say I began it because after writing it a first time, I lost it. Having lost it in time, then, I did not really finish it when I first wrote it. Did I? In 2009, I decided to recall bits of what I had written and try to write it again. I will include it below to finish my “first” article of my 51st year of writing; and I will let that rewritten and finally completed song tell it like it is for me.
As I am writing this, we are beginning a new year! Let me wish us all a fantastic 2014 - and beyond; and may I please encourage everyone to close the book on the “old GENESIS” and dare to rewrite it in your own way - and hopefully make for a much better ending - and future for us all.
Thanks! (FWB)
Two Ways
By
Francis William Bessler
Laramie, Wyoming
1/29/09 – 2/4/09
REFRAIN:
There’s a road leading downward.
There’s another leading up.
These are the two ways.
But the road leading downward
is living like you’re lacking luck;
and the road leading up
is knowing it’s always a blessed day.
Everyone of us is lucky
because everyone of us has life.
But how many of us know we’re lucky
for being caught up in strife?
But what is strife, my friend,
but battling with life –
like taking the day out of time
and leaving only the night? Refrain.
So long ago, Jesus said it -
where your treasure is, your heart is there.
That’s to say, find your pleasure
in that which does not decay or wear.
For me, that’s the Natural
because the Natural goes on and on.
That makes it Infinite
and like the God to which I belong. Refrain.
There are two ways of going
through this life we have at hand.
We can love our lives as they are
or listen to some outside command.
Well, I believe life is precious
and a miracle that satisfies
while others see life as a way
to make others cry. Refrain.
Repeat first verse – then Refrain several times.