SunShine Dialogues Five

HELEN KELLER:
The most pathetic person in the world is someone who has sight, but has no vision.

JONATHAN SWIFT:
Vision is the art of seeing the invisible.

Vision:

Vision and observation are closely linked. Observation can help you see or define the vision. The vision puts the future there.

A vision is a powerful thing. Until you experience that power first hand, you will not understand the kind of power I am talking about. Cynics who sniff and sneer at people with a vision will never understand. Even as they sneer the power of their vision, a world of bland regularity, insipid colours, and lacklustre emotions, comes true before their eyes.
They do not have the awareness to understand the world they live in is the world they put there.

In a way, vision is a form of magic. Vision put a climbing rose close to my deck where someday I hoped it would wind itself about the railing and offer me a spectacular view of bloom and scent close to our al fresco dinning area. Vision put a pond at the centre point in my garden long before the real pond arrived and long before I new that spot would center the garden. Vision makes reality of dreams.

When I first arrived at Wren Street House almost ten years ago, my back garden boasted an expanse of grass with some “landscaped” sections. Since I am an avid gardener, the visions began immediately. I stood on that lawn and conjured up in my mind what I wanted to see until my eyes ached. Long before the borders and beds were dug, I used garden lime and lengths of watering hose to lie out a design.

I didn’t have the money to hire a landscape gardener, or even a helping hand. I built my vision on the sweat for my own brow, bit by bit, whenever I had time to spare.

The soil in my garden is extremely rocky. Digging out beds pitted me against 20 and 30-pound rock, each one needing to be moved to another place. Digging down sometimes into gravel or rock, took time and effort. But my vision sat in front of my face like a pair of glasses.

When it came to digging the pond, I did it all myself. I dug down four feet. I wanted to be deep enough to allow my goldfish to survive the winters. I laid in the plastic cover and build the rock surround exactly as I viewed it though the clarity of my vision.

Please understand that I am not a handy man. Changing a dripping tap is a challenge for me.

One summer I build an arbour. While I slaved away, my neighbour poked his head over the fence and asked about my project. I stood amid my half built arbour. I asked him if he would help me out if I got stuck. He said. “What plans are you using?”
“I don’t have any,” I confessed.

“Well then you can count me out.”

Three years later it has aged into the landscape and supports an autumn blooming clematis and a climbing rose in it’s second season. Am I proud of that arbour? You bet the hell I am.

Now ten years later, I look out at a garden that matches my vision, yet so much more than even that. What I saw and worked hard to achieve happened.

I can hear the scoffers now. Can you hear them? Ignore them, they would blind you and have you live in their morbid world.

What is your vision?

I put my vision there every day for ten years. I persisted until the vision in my mind merged with the sight before my eyes.

Is it finished?

No.

My vision matured with me. I have projected another vision upon the screen of my garden.

You must do that.

You must remake your vision as you approach it, as proximity gives clarity to what where fuzzy distant objects. With clarity come refinements, flourishes, the smile on the
Mona Lisa.

Life is the canvas; your vision is the paintbrushes, your passion the paint to make it real.

What is your vision, or visions?

Take out your diary, write down a list of visions, and sketch them out, even roughly. Make notes, record thoughts, and track refinements. Refer back to the vision every chance you get. Use your skill of observation to add that magic touch, to make that blurred thought coalesce out of the mist into a bright shining photo.

With persistence of vision comes sight.

Remember to enjoy the journey.

A Vision:

Out of the swirling mist, I saw a dark form hover
At first I feared, what dark misery came to frighten me.
Then I strained to see the form more clearly.
I saw grey about the edges, perhaps a touch of purple.
Was that a hand or a head?
The mist stirred.
Back I stepped.
Should I flee?
Movement at the edge, blurred but quick.
A flash of silver, a splash of golden haze,
Quicker,
Something huge,
I strained to see.
A man, no men, many men, sun tanned and dressed in robes of fire,
Laughing men, coming straight for me,
And with them a gigantic form, still hidden, grey on grey,
Then another swirl of the mist,
Orange light with a fiery halo blazes behind the form,
A massive leg lifts and steps forward.
A long trunk reaches out for me.
I see gold bangles,
A Green and Indigo and red triangle on the massive forehead,
Large Ivory tusks,
I am lifted up,
The sky is blue above.
I am gently placed on a saddlecloth of flowing hues,
The brown tree trunks first then the palm splayed leaves,
The sun burns through,
Around me colourfully dress people in rainbow hues
Bang on drums and cymbals clash.
I laugh too,
The last mist burnt off by the sun disappears but a whole new world is born.
I am not afraid, but full of joy,
The new day is sprung and full of dancing.
Ahead a river sparkles in the sun,
Children play and splash in shallow pools,
Beyond, the mountains rise up to touch the sky of morning,
I stroke the Elephant softly; he is an old, old friend.
I am happy.
My vision came out from a soupy grey to grace me with this
Blissful day.

Nick Grimshawe

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