Crosswalks and Capes
January 29th, 2008
My roommate Blaine sat at a stoplight behind another other car in downtown Seattle. In our lovely city one does not cross over into the crosswalk, or as I call it, the What the hell do you think you’re doing!?! zone. You might as well put the noose around your own neck and kick the chair out from under your legs. If you don’t, the bikers and walkers will string you up anyway, but with spite and Seattle anger, the kind of anger that hasn’t had its coffee yet. Better to go out on your own terms.
As Blaine sat in his car a family crossed the street on the crosswalk; a father, mother, and little girl, all walking in stride. About half way across, the little girl, maybe 5 years old or so, stopped and began waving vigorously at the man in the first car, as if she was in a beauty pageant but way, way too excited. She simply stood there and waved and waved and waved. Not stopping. Not caring what the man in the first car thought.
And as Blaine so eloquently put it, as only he can:
She Just.
Kept.
Waving.
After 3 or 4 seconds the father finally turned around and went back after his daughter. He put her arm down to put an end the incessant waving, said something calmly, but inaudible from inside the car, and pulled her along to get out of the street. He wasn’t harsh with her or abrasive, but he was simply being a father and helping his daughter keep up.
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The story above was relayed verbally to me from Blaine, but I can imagine the father putting his daughter’s hand down and telling her We don’t wave to strangers like that. It’s just not how you should act. Seemingly not very harmful, and can probably be perceived as a father teaching his daughter the way things are in the world. One does not stop in the middle of a crosswalk and wave at another person they don’t know.
It makes me wonder how many of these small, innocent moments in life mold us in a way that weakens hope. This little girl now knows, or thinks, that it is not ok to wave to people she doesn’t know. It’s not something you do. I assume that the father didn’t have a premeditated thought that Today is the day I will teach my daughter not to wave at strangers. And yet, it was taught.
And there are so many of these moments as a child. Things that are not socially acceptable are taught in subtle, and sometimes blatant, ways by adults and peers. Some things are completely innocent, but at other times I would say that hopes are being killed. Ways of perceiving the world, and how it could be, are altered. A child could not verbalize it in this way, but something inside dies when one is told We don’t wave to people we don’t know.
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In my opinion, towels are one of the most amazing items ever created. Douglas Adams, in one of my favorite books The Ultimate Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, says, “A towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have.” When I was a boy I would take the largest beach towel we had in our house and tie it around my neck like a cape. I was a super hero. I borrowed the name Spaceman Spiff from a Calvin and Hobbes comic strip because a.) I loved the name and b.) I couldn’t come up with anything that was better. I tried. Very hard. But I was stuck on it, so I borrowed the name. Thanks Bill Waterson.
We had this tree in our front yard that was perfect for climbing. I barely had to jump to reach the lowest limb that could bare all 95 pounds of boy, swing myself up onto the limb, and then prepare for take off. I crouched down as low as I could, looked around, and then took glorious flight from the blue sky to the green earth, soaring with confidence to the plush grass. I knew that I could save the world. I had to save the world. The responsibility was on my shoulders and I was ready.
Somewhere later in my childhood I learned that only little kids wear capes. Big kids don’t pretend. Suddenly it was no longer cool or acceptable.
And then that hope, hope of being great and saving the world, ends as you take off your cape and enter into reality.
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Life is full of seasons, and in many ways I have felt some hopelessness in the past few months. I would be dishonest if I said that I lived in complete hope, but of course I do not. I have fears about family, relationships, career, love, justice, and countless other things. I worry about ideas involving marriage and divorce. I have fears of abandonment, and so I am overly cautious when I am entering into friendships and especially romantic relationships. It is rare that I do not worry, and lately it is rare that I hope.
And so I’ve been wondering what it looks like to put my cape back on.
I think about people in my life, situations, personal struggles, and I try to remember where I took off my cape in those places, when I lost hope, and how I can retie the cape around my neck. I need my cape. To live well means feeling the air rush around my body, lifting my cape into a glorious flow behind my back as I jump from tree to ground, tree to ground, and tree to ground. To live well means having hope that relationship can work and work well. It means there will be good days and bad days, but the good can outnumber the bad.
I tie it back on again and again and again. Every morning is another dawn to wear my cape.
I tie it on with the hope that life can be lived well. I tie it back on with the hope that I can reveal my terrible faults to my friends and know that they, too, have faults, and that we cannot truly be close until we are willing to share our shame. I am trying to tie it on where relationships have been broken and where hope has been lost, because I know that living with a cape, living with hope, is a better way to live.
Good one. I have an eight month old and I already wonder if I will be able to balance wanting to protect him and wanting him to fly.
Also, tell Blaine he sent me two ‘Love’ shirts. Ask him if he wants the second one back. I still have it here in the packaging.
These are great thoughts. I’ve done the same thing… stopped wearing my princess dresses and forgot how to live in hope. Hope is so necessary to survival… thanks for the reminder. You write beautifully.
P.S. Love the AWANA shirt. That’s perfect. :)
Awesome.
Again, perfect timing of what I needed to hear. I got Blaine’s Starving Jesus dvd in the mail and was able to complete the series(finally!). Ignorable Calling go to me…deep..in to me..
Tell him your the best advertising he has…and he should pay you…in coffee beans….yeah…coffee beans.
i have often struggled with the thoughts of how to raise kids, if i ever have any…and one of those thoughts surrounds the treatment of “strangers.”
there is a balance of teaching your child to be safe (because unfortunately kidnapping and various other harmful activities run rampant in the world) as well as sharing a simple greeting to someone. i dislike that the society i live in is so afraid of one another…but i try to change that every single day with a smile and a hello.
i use to use towels as parachutes when jumping from trees or roofs. i miss that.
have fun with your cape.
You have such a beautiful heart! Let it fly, my friend, let it fly!
My sisters never stopped waving to strangers. They still wear capes, too. Figuratively and literally.
Good gravy, you’re brilliant.
Where the hell is my towel?
thats it. I’m wearing my one piece pajamas with the feet and waving to everyone.
Wow. That was challenging! Thank you.
Side note/real reason I’m leaving a comment…
I’ve been a big fan of your photography for a little over a year now - it’s raw, clear, simple, beautiful, and un-messed-around-with - I like your work alot. I’m trying to get a new blog off the ground called, Revamp The Icon about photographers, videographers, and graphic designers whose work is influential.
I think it would be great if I could post a couple of your photos with short descriptions of how and why you took each shot - the process. I would be glad to promote your new site joshualongbrake.com there too of course.
Please let me know what you think.
Blessings,
Daniel Rhoten
That was very sweet to hear. Maybe, when we grow up, we become less human and all of this realization of hopelessness is an effort to get us to remember that it’s okay to be human…to be embarrassed, to hurt, to long for hope, to weep, to live…to wave at a stranger.
When I have kids, I have no idea how I will raise them…with lot’s of hugs and kisses and freedom to be ‘foolish’…I think they may raise me. Ya know?
I had the same thing, only not with capes. Whenever I would cry, my father would tell me that it was no reason to cry. Even my mother told me it wasn’t okay to cry after I went through a period of time where I cried at random things (like a crippled man in the grocery store). So, even today, I still have the thought that’s it’s no okay to cry. When something really moves me to tears, I feel I am too old to cry. It bothers me.
Thanks for the post.
-Andra
I felt every word you said, you know in the place down deep when you totally get what someone is saying. Keep putting the cape back on, b/c even if life teaches us, it’s not practical or “don’t bother”….I have to still believe that one of these times it will be worth it, and that one time will be glorious and the other less hopeful days will quickly fade away in the new light.
“Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything that it’s cracked up to be. That’s why people are so cynical about it. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don’t risk anything, you risk even more.” -Erica Jong
oh and in case your “real” cape isn’t handy or can’t be found….a towel held together at the neck w/ a clothespin does the trick too.
edna says: no capes. i think she meant that if you wave to strangers in the crosswalk you’re lible to get run over. maybe a child can tell the difference between safety and friendlieness. i’d like to think so at least. still, i like your point.
Wow this is fantastic. I too wondered this a while ago. When did I lose my hope? My need to see the world and everything it had in it? I think we all need to recapture our towel capes and head for the skies once again. Hope is most definitely necessary for survival and life.
Great post! And just like everyone else, I have had similar feelings.
Have you ever heard the Sara Groves song “It Might Be Hope?’ It really ties into what you’ve written. (plus, lyrically I think she’s amazing)
Been lurking awhile and really enjoy your blog.
I wondered the same thing a while ago…still do. My “epiphany” moment was when I saw a kid sprinting to the tide flats in Birch Bay with his mom chasing him to put on sunscreen. When did we start being so careful?
i like this post. it’s great.
&
johnny f’n rice!
crap. now i have to think about how i’m living my life in a way that makes me uncomfortable. not that that’s a bad thing… thanks for the thought-provoking and earnest thoughts. may we find our capes.
This was needed. Thank you.
You have helped me put my cape back on and wave to strangers in recent years. I am grateful.
hmph. waving at strangers is something you should do at least once a day. you go, little innocent girl!
bytheway, i was just googling and i came across your blog. maybe thats creepy. but its very inspiring and you are an amazing writer. The one post that actually came up when i was googling was the one about polaroids and Uganda: two things that are very dear to my heart. and i just thought you should know that that was an amazingly beautiful thing you did. i want a polaroid sometime. :)
God bless and have a lovely day!
um. woah.
SO, story: as i was reading, and you were talking about Blaine, i felt a very strange nag in the back of my head. so, long story short.. i “know” blaine. he came to michigan a couple times to speak for my youth group The Edge. I went on his facebook and looked at that his engagement pictures. you are a wonderful photographer!
oh, i love irony! haha. anyways, i thought i would share this with you. God is cool.
Hey Josh.
That.
Was, amazing.
I happen to agree and have been going on with this inner struggle of hope and friendships and relationships.
And this is a good reminder of how things aren’t perfect, but that’s okay.
As long as we have hope and faith, then everything will be alright, even if not wonderful, or amazing.
Because with our finite hope put in an infinite God, we can soar [this sounds like a child's book] as high as we want and have no worries of falling or failing.
So thank you, Joshua Longbrake for this.
It helped.
what’s a stranger?
i remember when you told me this story. so glad it made it to your blog. that little girl could teach us all a lesson. it has caused me to raise children a little bit differently.
I realize how much all of us have lost our capes, especially with the modern trend to be disillusioned and/or angsty twentysomethings. I fall prey to this at times, even though I’m usually the one who is optimistic and hopeful in my group of friends. We take turns, I guess.
I still draw pictures for people. Strangers even. I love when restaurants have paper tablecloths and crayons. And it’s the simple things that bring out that child-like view of the world. Now if only we could have afternoon nap time back…
[...] read a blog entry tonight that got me. The writer was talking about how much things change from childhood to [...]
the awana shirt totally makes that picture.
….i bet he got the timothy award….
Joshua - you’ve brought tears to my eyes tonight, as I remember my son, now 14, wearing his Superman cape to our church directory photo appointment (he was a pre-schooler) - we got it off him for the picture by convincing him to be Clark Kent for awhile. :) Time flies, and as it does, I wonder what I’ve wrongly taught my kids along the way. Hopefully more good than bad. Sometimes that’s enough.
I also love the crosswalk picture (and plan to buy it from your new site!) - it always makes me think of this Merton quote:
“In Louisville, at the corner of Fourth and Walnut, in the center of the shopping district, I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all those people. . .even though we were total strangers. It was like waking from a dream of separateness. . . . The whole illusion of a separate holy existence is a dream. . . . Not that I question the reality of my vocation, or of my monastic life: but the conception of “separation from the world” that we have in the monastery too easily presents itself as a complete illusion . . .”
Peace -
Mike
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