Doing the Beauty We Love II

I count myself lucky. I took early retirement from an inner city school district that, bless its desperate heart, provides life-long health insurance to retirees. As long as the district doesn’t go bankrupt (again), my wife and I can enjoy some peace of mind regarding healthcare that citizens of other developed nations take for granted. More good news: New computer programs have given people like me the means to produce books and recordings on a scale unprecedented in the history of artists. Plus now there’s the Internet, of course, which enables us to market our works worldwide without corporate entertainment vendors calling the tune. It’s a new day.
Some of my friends are mystified that I would risk economic instability at this time in my life in order to serve that jealous mistress called “the muse.” Conventional wisdom says you work full-time at your day job until they escort you out the door, beefing up your pension well into decrepitude. Then, just maybe, you won’t end up on the dole one day.
I try to explain that if my life is rich, I don’t have to be. I may never be able to fully retire, but if I’m doing what I love for a living, why would I want to?
To paraphrase an old country tune, I see most of humanity looking for happiness “in all the wrong places” They mindlessly ravage this lovely, fragile Earth in a confusion of fear, delusion and zealotry. They grope blindly for a little ray of joy in gas-guzzling mini-tanks, bank account breaking homes, and blood diamonds. How can I go along with this madness when I know a certain kind of poetry set to music, or a particular story well told, could reveal a whole new, happier, less self-destructive approach to life that would be better for all concerned. This is my cause and I’m sticking to it.
Remember Julian Sands in “A Room with a View,” howling his creed from atop that spindly sapling? “Truth! Beauty! Freedom!” he cried before the young tree collapsed beneath him. If he mentioned “Financial Security!” I must have missed it.
The Bhagavad Gita, one of India’s sacred texts, says, “It is better to do your duty badly than to do another’s perfectly. You are safe from harm when you do what you should be doing.” I believe that. The universe seems to take care of characters like Henri Rousseau, who didn’t pick up a paintbrush until his forties, or Henry Miller, who wasn’t published until about that same age. Goethe’s oft quoted adage – “Whatever you can do or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has beauty, power, and magic in it” – applies to people of all ages. And so, as Rumi, that ancient Sufi master, wrote, “Let the beauty we love be what we do.”
Until the world understands that real security doesn’t come through building missile defense systems or investment portfolios at the expense of the planet, but through developing the insight to know better, I’ll be writing my songs and stories and blog posts, letting the beauty I love be what I do. So here’s to Truth! Beauty! Freedom! And the boldness to champion them at any age.

Tad Toomay’s first CD “Touch the Sky from Where You Stand” is available at www.cdbaby.com. Learn more about his work at www.tadtoomay.com.