Returning to the Still Life: A Studio Reflection

Lately, I’ve found myself returning to a time-honored tradition in painting: the still life. These quiet compositions—humble, unmoving, ever available—are both easy and challenging. They are always close at hand, requiring no travel, no scheduling, no permission. Just light, form, and attention.

Unlike portrait painting the subject does not move. Light can be controlled. The limitation is that when using food, such as fish, fruit, or vegetables . . . time is against the artist due to spoiling. Same with flowers.

Three small oil paintings emerged recently from our studio, Dos Venados, from this renewed practice—each one a meditation on color, composition, and presence.

The first, Riñon Tomato, Vase & Rose, bursts with energy. A thick yellow rose blossoms from a small blue vase, flanked by two crimson riñon tomatoes—plump and wrinkled like elder hearts. The brushwork swirls with vitality, capturing the tension between delicacy and ripeness. The glass reflects a world within a world.

The second, Mamey and Rose, is quieter, more intimate. A rose, deep pink and velvety, rests beside an open mamey fruit. The earthen pod is shaped like an offering bowl, its curve embracing shadow and light. The rose leans in, almost whispering—a conversation between softness and sustenance.

The third, Tilapia with Lemons, is a nod to classical still life in the tradition of fishmongers and feasts. The silvery tilapia, slick and glistening, lies across a dark plate, accompanied by two whole lemons and one sliced open, its pulp like a sunburst. The turquoise background shimmers with broken strokes, suggesting both water and tablecloth, abstraction and realism.

Each painting, though small in scale, affirms something enduring: the joy of close observation, the dance of brush against canvas, the timeless appeal of the ordinary made luminous. Still lifes remind me that mastery isn’t always about grandeur—it’s about presence. And paint still has the power to stop time.

Here are a few other previous posts about Still Life painting processes:   Still Life 

Contributing Something Meaningful

For nearly four years now, Amy and I have welcomed neighborhood children to our home each Sunday afternoon for free art classes. It began as a modest gesture of goodwill after settling in our village outside Oaxaca. We simply wanted to share the joy of creativity—our small way of contributing something meaningful to our new community.

At first, we weren’t sure how it would go. But the children came. Week after week, they showed up eager to paint, draw, sculpt, and create. We provided all the supplies, refreshments, and a safe, welcoming space. Some of the kids had never held a paintbrush before. Others arrived shy or withdrawn but slowly came alive with each project. It became more than just a class; it became a ritual, a relationship, and at times, a refuge.

Over the years, we celebrated their milestones and mourned their struggles. We laughed, got our hands dirty in paint, baked cookies, told stories. There were difficult moments, too—times when boundaries were tested or our trust was shaken. But we always came back to the table, ready to continue.

This last Sunday, the table remained empty.

Amy prepared everything as she always does, with care and hope. But no one came.
We knew this day might come. The group has gradually dwindled. The children are growing up, moving into adolescence and its distractions. Some families have moved away, others are preoccupied with school, work, or simply life. It is a natural turning of the page.

Still, it is bittersweet. Our Sundays have been marked by the joy of shared creativity, and now, that rhythm has quieted. But we do not feel regret. We feel gratitude. We gave what we could, wholeheartedly. And we received so much in return—smiles, trust, unexpected gifts of warm tortillas, and the quiet reward of seeing imagination flourish in a child’s hands.

Service doesn’t always come with ceremony or closure. Often, it ends not with a farewell, but with an absence. And that’s okay. The door is still open. Should any of the children wander back, they will find the table ready, the paints and brushes available, and our hearts open.

Whatever happens next, this chapter has been a blessing. We carry its memories like colorful alebrijes—imperfect, vibrant, full of spirit—and remain grateful for the chance to have served. 

The Ever-Shifting Dance of Creation

As previously mentioned, focus has returned to words. Combing through decades of writing, essays are taking shape drawn from years of travel and introspection. A foundation is forming, and at its core, the year 2008.

A year of surrender. A year of dissolving into the matrix of life. Traveling the world with no fixed plan, disappearing into The Dream. That journey reshaped everything—perception, identity, the sense of what is possible. Now, its echoes call to be gathered into writing, to be shared.

Perhaps, someday, they will find their way into a book, titled, The Weight of Air. A collection of journeys—both outward and inward—woven together with the same thread that has always guided me: surrender, discovery, and the dissolution of boundaries. But for now, the task has begun; offering through words and images, glimpses into worlds both spiritual and sensual, taking flight between wakefulness and dreaming.  

The first chapter is called, The Moment I Chose to Vanish. An excerpt: 

Into the Matrix

Preparing to give myself into the unknown, my thoughts were becoming doorways; portals into experience. The physical world, I understood, was where the true value of my visions would be revealed. A recurring desire took hold of me: I wanted to disappear into the matrix of the earth. Not to carry anything with me, but to become fluid and free. 

What did this mean? To disappear—to vanish from being seen as a separate, formed being and dissolve into oneness with life. Life, the vast, interwoven fabric where everything is connected—people, events, places, emotions, and time. I desired to be in this matrix, surrendering to the flow, allowing experiences to inspire and shape me rather than trying to control them. Children remained close to it, still forming in its embrace, unshaped by the boundaries that adults constructed. 

Looking back now, I see I stood on the threshold of an exploration—one that would take me beyond those boundaries, into a vast unknown. I had been preparing to strip away the artificial walls that society had built around life, to step into something raw and unfiltered.  

A Visit from the Village Veterinarian

Life in our small village near Oaxaca has its rhythms, and our two dogs, MaliNalli and Avion, are very much a part of that. MaliNalli, our sleek xoloitzquintle, is ever the graceful companion, while Avion, our sweet rescue from the streets, still carries a bit of his past with him. It took a long time for Avion to settle in—over a year of patience and reassurance before he began to trust us. Even now, he can be suspicious, but he’s protective of us and his buddy MaliNalli.

 

A few days ago, we noticed something off with Avion. He seemed to be in pain, limping and showing signs of abrasions on his underside. It looked like he might have gotten into a scuffle. By the next morning, his pain had worsened, and we knew we had to do something. We called the village veterinarian for the first time.

In the afternoon, a fine old gentleman, Dr. Mario Ruiz, arrived on his motorcycle, making his rounds. He was calm, professional, and kind. After examining Avion, he confirmed that the wounds were likely from a fight and that infection had set in. With a steady hand, he administered two injections and applied a healing powder to Avion’s belly. The cost for his services was incredibly reasonable—600 pesos (around 31 USD). He promised to return the next day, Sunday, for another injection, instructing us to give Avion a bath before his arrival.

In our quiet corner of the world, it’s reassuring to know we have such care close by, and we’re grateful for the tenderness shown to our beloved Avion. This morning we bathed him. I had to drag him into the bathroom. With tail between his legs, he whimpered and was rigid with fear, but when the warm water ran over him he relaxed. We were able to get him washed. 

He’s recovering now, resting a bit more. Hopefully, slowly regaining his strength. 

Small moments like these remind us of the community we’ve built here—both human and animal—and how we all look after one another in this shared life.

Brushstrokes and Shutter Clicks

A journey of experimentation in painting and photography becomes a dance between colors and shadows, brushstrokes and shutter clicks. 

In the realm of my photography, each new technique is a portal to uncharted territories promising a visual adventure that transcends the familiar.  A click of the camera becomes a brushstroke on the canvas of my visual narrative, weaving together my unique story.

Mastering new lighting situations, experimenting with unconventional angles, intentionally blurring images with hand movement, creating double images in the camera or delving into the world of photoshop, the process of discovery is my constant companion.

Joy lies in the unpredictability of the outcome, the serendipitous moments when a blend of techniques gives rise to a photograph that echoes the essence of my artistic soul. It's about pushing boundaries, embracing the unknown, and allowing creativity to flourish. 

As a painter and photographer, the synergy between the two crafts fuels a perpetual cycle of inspiration. For years I have experimented as painter and photographer, using my talents to bring artistry to images I make on canvas and with a camera. Decades of dedication to both disciplines only serve to enhance the thrill of creative adventure. The well of creativity seems deep, and does not diminish. 

And now I am jumping into the world of artificial intelligence, or AI. I have only just begun, but immediately find the results astonishing. I understand computer work is all only numbers and code and will not replace what I accomplish by hand. Yet, as I say this, I am cognizant that I have only been using digital cameras now for about twenty years. When a picture is taken and recorded on a chip, it is all numbers.  Then it can be read by computers which translate information into actual images that can be printed. 

AI creation with touch-up editing in photoshop

Ultimately, my thrill of discovery in photography is a celebration of my artistic spirit's boundless curiosity. It's the joy of finding beauty in unexpected places, capturing fleeting moments that resonate with emotion, and continuously evolving my artistic journey. The same is true of my ever evolving artwork in paints. Since moving to Mexico my subject matter has changed dramatically⏤from exuberant landscapes, I have gone to gritty spectral images of skeletons. Though now I have gone back to still life and portraits. But it can change at any time. I am not so much painting for the public anymore It is for my soul. 

"Victory of War" oil on linen

AI creation with touch-up editing in photoshop

Excitement of discovery is my lifelong companion.

Wellspring of Inspiration

 

In our casa in the village of San Pedro Ixtlahuaca, near Oaxaca, in southern Mexico, Amy and I have found solace, inspiration and a canvas for our artistic souls. We love our classic adobe home, surrounded by plants, fields and mountains, set in a typical Mexican community. 

We serve our neighbors by giving art lessons to children. We offer projects and teach skills, provide all the materials while including refreshments. Children go away happy and proud, taking with them their artwork to share with their family. 

Our quiet life allows us to immerse ourselves in the rhythms of this world while still offering the enchanting proximity to the vibrant heart of internationally acclaimed Oaxaca.

Two or three times a week, we embark on a short journey to the city. There we buy foods we cannot find in the village, visit a marvelous ex-pat lending library, buy art supplies, and purchase the best artisan breads and pastries at a popular bakery. Sometimes I stop to swim at Hotel Victoria where we bought a membership that gives us access to the pool. Amy relaxes under an umbrella and we share lunch.

I always carry my camera to find opportunities for street photography. 

Usually we come upon a celebration happening⏤with music and lively street performances. 

Oaxaca serves as a melting pot of creativity, where artists from different backgrounds converge to express themselves. Engaging with this artistic kaleidoscope fuels our imagination and provides fresh perspectives to infuse into our creations. Galleries showcase a diverse range of works, from traditional folk art to contemporary masterpieces. Furthermore, now we both are represented at one of the Oaxaca’s finest art venues: Cuatrosiete Galeria. They gave us an exclusive two person show during peak tourist time: this years Dia de Muertos celebration.

When we return to our rural village, I exclaim how exciting Oaxaca is. It is wellspring of inspiration for two artists like us. We carry home echoes of Oaxaca's vibrant cultural symphony. Our quiet life is a canvas onto which we paint the stories, colors, and melodies we've absorbed during our time on earth.

We now have a new website showcasing our Mexican inspired art: Dos Venados

Keeper of the Key

"Keeper of the Key, acrylic on canvas, 40 x 70 cm

Amy´s newest painting from our studio in San Pedro Ixtlahuaca, Mexico, outside Oaxaca.
In her own words:

The seated figure holds a key that invites one to explore the inner self. Like Turtle, her Mother, she is still and yet clearly present. Her garment of blossoming beauty represents the bounty of La Madre Tierra and a tribute to growing things.
She is grounded as the result of life’s long journey. Like Mother Turtle, she waits and watches in silence. She, like ourselves, always will remain , the Ancient Child, born from life giving waters, the splendor of moonlight and the magical realms of spirit, of which…we ALL possess the key to journey within.
Quetzalcoatl, the feathered serpent reminds us that though we may be surrounded by forces we cannot comprehend…fear will not be our response. 

Many years ago, I wrote the text for a children’s book I called, “The Turtle’s Daughters”. I created it as a pageant piece for a grand elementary school event in St. Paul , Mn. The event was sponsored by Art Start/ Art Scraps of St. Paul, an amazing non profit that brings art experiences to underprivileged communities. Several artists were hired to  work within the schools to help the children create images and objects which would be part of our procession. On an overcast Saturday afternoon, over 1000 children and families participated along the banks of the mighty Mississippi river. We honored Turtle Island (Our Earth) and her lovely water daughters, the great rivers of our planet. I read my story, accompanied by a Native American elder who softly played his flute, which mesmerized the atmosphere allowing the story to come alive.

Children of many cultures from several city schools came together to march with their creations in a marvelous parade. Some performed my tale as a dance, complete with a moving gossamer blue river made from yards of fabric. Many groups carried handmade animal banners, large painted cardboard deer and buffalo. Children carried puppets: flocks of papier-maché  birds, turtles , frogs, and many more creatures. 

Our purpose? A call to grownups to wake up, see, and acknowledge that “progress and profit” should NOT be our main goal, as human “Beings.” Together, we must work as one to protect the fragile beauty of Turtle Island, and of those of fur, feather, and fin, who have no voice…  whose survival also depends on the well being of our sacred planet.  

The students answered my call that day. They became “Child Warriors of the Healing Earth”. Although, I never submitted my story for publication, I have never forgotten the power and beauty of that somewhat rainy day moment in time.

Nothing could have stopped us.

The memory lives with me still. Every now and then, I add another voice through my imagery to make that story live on.

Bendito Sea

For more artwork: Amy Córdova Boone

 

Winds of Despair are Blowing from Every Direction

War is only a cowardly escape from the problems of peace.  -THOMAS MANN

The spectre of war continually afflicts the world. Center stage now is the conflict between Russia and Ukraine; with wider implications for the planet. 

Here are some cogent and insightful remarks regarding war. 

Mostly from Bahaí writings:

Today there is no greater glory for man than that of service in the cause of the Most Great Peace. Peace is light, whereas war is darkness. Peace is life; war is death. Peace is guidance; war is error. Peace is the foundation of God; war is a satanic institution. Peace is the illumination of the world of humanity; war is the destroyer of human foundations. When we consider outcomes in the world of existence, we find that peace and fellowship are factors of upbuilding and betterment, whereas war and strife are the causes of destruction and disintegration. All created things are expressions of the affinity and cohesion of elementary substances, and nonexistence is the absence of their attraction and agreement. Various elements unite harmoniously in composition, but when these elements become discordant, repelling each other, decomposition and nonexistence result. Everything partakes of this nature and is subject to this principle, for the creative foundation in all its degrees and kingdoms is an expression or outcome of love. Consider the restlessness and agitation of the human world today because of war. Peace is health and construction; war is disease and dissolution. When the banner of truth is raised, peace becomes the cause of the welfare and advancement of the human world. In all cycles and ages war has been a factor of derangement and discomfort, whereas peace and brotherhood have brought security and consideration of human interests. This distinction is especially pronounced in the present world conditions, for warfare in former centuries had not attained the degree of savagery and destructiveness which now characterizes it. If two nations were at war in olden times, ten or twenty thousand would be sacrificed, but in this century the destruction of one hundred thousand lives in a day is quite possible. So perfected has the science of killing become and so efficient the means and instruments of its accomplishment that a whole nation can be obliterated in a short time. 

The Promulgation of Universal Peace, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, pg. 123 

Gracious God! Even with such a lesson before him, how heedless is man! Still do we see his world at war from pole to pole. There is war among the religions; war among the nations; war among the peoples; war among the rulers. What a welcome change would it be, if only these black clouds would lift from off the skies of the world, so that the light of reality could be shed abroad! If only the darksome dust of this continual fighting and killing could settle forever, and the sweet winds of God's loving-kindness could blow from out the well-spring of peace. Then would this world become another world, and the earth would shine with the light of her Lord. 

Selections From the Writings of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, pg 320

"The winds of despair", Baha'u'llah wrote, "are, alas, blowing from every direction, and the strife that divides and afflicts the human race is daily increasing. The signs of impending convulsions and chaos can now be discerned, inasmuch as the prevailing order appears to be lamentably defective." This prophetic judgement has been amply confirmed by the common experience of humanity. Flaws in the prevailing order are conspicuous in the inability of sovereign states organized as United Nations to exorcize the spectre of war, the threatened collapse of the international economic order, the spread of anarchy and terrorism, and the intense suffering which these and other afflictions are causing to increasing millions. Indeed, so much have aggression and conflict come to characterize our social, economic and religious systems, that many have succumbed to the view that such behavior is intrinsic to human nature and therefore ineradicable.  

The Promise of World Peace, Pages 1-3: Universal House of Justice

Banning nuclear weapons, prohibiting the use of poison gases, or outlawing germ warfare will not remove the root causes of war. However important such practical measures obviously are as elements of the peace process, they are in themselves too superficial to exert enduring influence. Peoples are ingenious enough to invent yet other forms of warfare, and to use food, raw materials, finance, industrial power, ideology, and terrorism to subvert one another in an endless quest for supremacy and dominion. Nor can the present massive dislocation in the affairs of humanity be resolved through the settlement of specific conflicts or disagreements among nations. A genuine universal framework must be adopted. 

Certainly, there is no lack of recognition by national leaders of the world-wide character of the problem, which is self-evident in the mounting issues that confront them daily. And there are the accumulating studies and solutions proposed by many concerned and enlightened groups as well as by agencies of the United Nations, to remove any possibility of ignorance as to the challenging requirements to be met. There is, however, a paralysis of will; and it is this that must be carefully examined and resolutely dealt with. This paralysis is rooted, as we have stated, in a deep-seated conviction of the inevitable quarrelsomeness of mankind, which has led to the reluctance to entertain the possibility of subordinating national self-interest to the requirements of world order, and in an unwillingness to face courageously the far-reaching implications of establishing a united world authority. It is also traceable to the incapacity of largely ignorant and subjugated masses to articulate their desire for a new order in which they can live in peace, harmony and prosperity with all humanity.   -The Promise of World Peace, Pages 6-9: Universal House of Justice

There never was a good war, or a bad peace.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN

DreamCarver

Book making is a wondrous and beautiful process. The best efforts are preserved for eternity, but most fall into oblivion. The book Amy and I are working on, called DreamCarver, has already proven to be an enduring work of art. It was first published in 1993 and became a traveling opera, visiting cities across America.

Diana Cohn and Amy collaborated on it. Publishers Weekly wrote: “Inspired by the life of renowned Oaxacan woodcarver Manuel Jiménez, newcomer Cohn and Córdova (My Land Sings) tell of Mateo, a young woodcarver who bravely breaks with a generations-old artistic tradition. The subsistence farmers of the boy's village are known for their juguetes, tiny carvings of wooden animals "so small they could fit in the palm of a hand," carved by men and boys, and painted in fiesta-bright colors by women and girls. But Mateo dreams of carving life-size animals, with surfaces that tingle with vibrant, improbable colors and surreal patterns. "I see animals so big and bright that I will need to carve them with a machete!" he tells his disapproving father. When Mateo ultimately produces a glorious wooden menagerie—including a quetzal with majestic feathers—he wins over not only Papa, but the entire village, and a new way of carving is born. Cohn captures the boy's pursuit with straightforward eloquence, whether describing a child's heady experience of a fiesta or articulating the imaginative forces that set apart and drive a true artist. Córdova chronicles Mateo's artistic development in radiant, double-spread tableaux, setting off the text with festive decorative borders. She borrows the highly stylized characterizations and flattened perspectives typical of Mexican folk art, but she animates the compositions with big, bold shapes and electric, saturated colors. A fitting tribute to the energy and power of an artist's distinctive vision.” 

From our perfect vantage point in our home in Oaxaca, just a village away from Arrazola where the woodcarvers make the “alebrijes” magic animals carved of wood and decorated with complex designs in a riot of colors, we are remaking the book with new illustrations and bilingual text.

Amy said, “Back in 1992, my dear friend, Diana Cohn and I visited Oaxaca with the intent of creating a children's book about the origins of the fantastical, colorful alebrije carvings. We visited Manuel Jimenez , who is attributed with starting the entire movement. As a result of our love of the art form, we created the book Dream Carver, which was published by Chronicle Books, San Francisco. Since then , our agreement has expired and we requested the return of rights. 

Fast forward, rights granted ! Since then, I have spent the last many months reworking and creating new images, with the goal of enhancing those images and creating a bilingual edition. Diana and I have revised the text, so that the format of two languages is not compromised. Steve has spent hours photographing and doing incredible layouts of text and image. Pages now look breathtaking! I am still painting. A labor of love, for certain.”

The Dream Carver tradition is alive and thrives today. The original artist, Manuel Jimenez, now deceased, passed his tradition to his sons, and one of them, Isaias, continues with his family to produce marvelous works. He opened the DreamCarver Museum and had students create murals based on Amy’s illustrations. He is very eager for the book, originally in English, to be published as a bilingual.

Our goal is to have books in hand for a big celebration at the Museum during the Dia de Muertos festival November 1 and 2, 2021.

Santa Italiano

He called on New Year day around dinner time but my phone was turned off. When I saw I had a message from him, at 10:30 PM, I was surprised and happy. “Gosh, it has been a long time,” I thought. Amazing he is still alive—he must be about 89 years old.

Ralph Caprio, a second generation Italian American, always worked with my father and was a steady presence from the start of my life in Chicago. My father, Richard W. Boone (March 29, 1927 – February 26, 2014), always rose to leadership positions throughout his life, and chose to have Ralph beside him. When our family moved, so did Ralph. 

Handsome and spry, Ralph stayed a bachelor—always with girlfriends. He had style, and effused ebullience.  

All the Boone family loved Ralph. He loved us for the family he never had. In fact, Ralph was our Santa Claus. My parents had five children in eight years. Early on, we were very poor. Living in a tenement on Chicago’s south side, at Christmas, there were meager gifts beneath the tree. Then, on a cold Christmas morning, Ralph would arrive at our door, arms laden with the best presents for us kids. A knock sounded and when the door opened all of us little ones would shout with glee, “Ralph!”

I only had to debate a moment to decide to call him back. I knew it was almost midnight in Chicago on New Year day. I know Ralph has the ability to live on four hours sleep daily, and prefers living that way.

I called back and after a few rings a youthful, familiar voice rang out, “Hey Steve, happy New Year!” He mostly wanted to know how I am. He mentioned that my mother and father would be proud of me and then said, “I love you” before hanging up. 

Amy had been nearby when she heard Ralph answer, and remarked, “Wow, he sounds so youthful and bright!”

Yes, he has always been like that.

A Marvelous Garden of Humanity

I take solace in the little garden Amy and I have in our front yard. The plants need care each day to establish themselves. The soil is poor by nature in these parts, the sun can be brutal, and to add injury cutworms and other pests arrive to attack the tender stems. 

I have a personal relationship with each plant. I have nurtured and supported each one, so when a death occurs I grieve a little.

The turmoil in our world today grevious. Covid-19 virus causing worldwide destruction, many wars and conflicts have killed and displaced populations, corrupt governments are in power while desperate dying people languish . . . and now in America the racial divide is coming into sharp focus with the video taped murder of a black man by a police officer in Minneapolis, MN, USA.

All these issues are cathartic—but hopefully will lead to healing.

As my beloved daughter Naomi said when she battled her terminal illness at age 18, “Hardships can make us stronger. I don’t have complete evidence, but every situation has some good in it.”

My wife Amy particularly has been staying tuned to events in Minneapolis where severe rioting broke out in the aftermath of the police killing. She lived there from 1983 - 1992, was very involved in the community and had great success as an artist. Her sons are raising their families there now. Amy knows the neighborhoods that have burned.

I have lived in a city where race riots raged and buildings burned. In 1968, when Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, swaths of downtown Washington DC had storefronts broken, then looted and burned to the ground. Black radical leaders were enraged and called for armed insurgency against an America that had double standards for black and white citizens. 

I was in high school then and in a neighborhood far removed from ghettos. Still, I felt the rage nearby.

Now, 52 years later, disparities remain.

Like plants, people need the same tender care from the beginning of life. They must have fertile soil to grow in, have equal protections against disease, blight and pestilence. Each must be watered according to their needs; some more some less. Then we will see a marvelous garden of humanity, resplendent in color and form, shedding its grace in the universe in which it thrives.

Fists Against The Wall

Last weekend was the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, the notorious German concentration camp in Poland where in just two years over 1 million innocent people were put to death: men, women and children. The anniversary comes and goes each year and there are memorial events at the former killing grounds that attract fewer and fewer survivors and many visitors. For some reason, this year I began reviewing more about what happened. In high school, during a period when I read dense and important world literature, I also read The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, by William Shirer, (1245 pages). It is mostly forgotten in my mind after 50 years. 

Amy saw that I was studying and getting emotional about what had happened. She pulled a book off of her bookshelf, a small hardback. Saying nothing, she put it on my dresser. Within a day I had begun reading Night, by Elie Wiesel (September 30, 1928 – July 2, 2016). "In Night," Wiesel said, "I wanted to show the end, the finality of the event. Everything came to an end—man, history, literature, religion, God. There was nothing left. And yet we begin again with night.” ( In the above picture, he is in the second row, seventh from left.)

Simultaneously I looked online at pictures of the holocaust and the Nazi perpetrators. Photos of mothers and children being herded off boxcars to take them to the gas chambers, of skeletal forced laborers in horrid conditions, of despicable ghettos imprisoning isolated Jewish populations before being wiped out. I found myself getting angry and researching what became of the Nazi commanders, then seeing them hanged and thinking, “It serves you right.”

A page from Naomi's journal

“Auschwitz is outside of us, but it is all around us, in the air. The plague has died away, but the infection still lingers and it would be foolish to deny it. Rejection of human solidarity, obtuse and cynical indifference to the suffering of others, abdication of the intellect and of moral sense to the principle of authority, and above all, at the root of everything, a sweeping tide of cowardice, a colossal cowardice which masks itself as warring virtue, love of country and faith in an idea.” 

― Primo Levi, (Italian, 31 July 1919 – 11 April 1987)  Auschwitz survivor

I grew up in a non-religious household. No mention was made of God or religion. My father worked hard as a social engineer, alongside Robert Kennedy and Sergeant Shriver. HIs time was spent constructing solutions to injustice and implementing them. Once when a teen-ager and I had recently found God, he quoted Karl Marx to me: “Religion is the opiate of the masses.” I took exception, noting all the good that has come from Christian charity and the spread of principles of equality and love.

At nineteen I became a Baha’i, a religion teaching the essential worth of all religions, and the unity and equality of all people. Established by Baháʼu'lláh , (Persian, November 12, 1817 – May 29, 1892) in 1863, it initially grew in Persia and parts of the Middle East, where it has faced ongoing persecution since its inception. 

A beloved Baha’i prayer by Abdul-Baha, the son of Baha’u’llah includes the exhortation, “I will not dwell on the unpleasant things of life, nor will I let trouble harass me .” But what if life itself is cataclysmic without hope? What if there is no pleasantness to enjoy? 

Certainly there were those in the concentration camps who had seen their loved ones marched to the gas chambers, had felt the sting of smoke in their eyes from the furnaces incinerating bodies, and lived without hope in wretched unthinkable existence. Some, like Job’s wife might have thought “Curse God and die!” They are forgiven. Wiesel himself, after surviving the death camp spoke in an interview: “Some people who read my first book, Night, they were convinced that I broke with the faith and broke with God. Not at all. I never divorced God. It is because I believed in God that I was angry at God, and still am. The tragedy of the believer, it is deeper than the tragedy of the non-believer.” (See https://onbeing.org/programs/elie-wiesel-the-tragedy-of-the-believer/ )

When my beloved daughter Naomi fell victim to cancer at seventeen, I had to watch her endure her own holocaust. Dreadful pain spread itself in her body. Doctors said she had little chance to live and she began torturous chemotherapy treatments, locked away from the world at large. Many times, during my own “dark night of the soul,” I found myself thinking, beseeching, how could a loving God allow this? Alone, I beat my fists against the wall and wailed. 

Naomi had to meet her own point of no return. Many times in fact. Did she not wonder perhaps if God had forgotten her? She once said, “I hope not to die a slow, painful death.” But that is exactly what God had in store for her. That was her fate. She fought hard for life, weeding out any semblance of negative thinking that might interfere with her healing. Yet the slow, inexorable death march toward the gas chamber continued. At one point, exhausted, she sought to take her life and be done with it. Like in the Jimi Hendrix song, Castles Made of Sand, where he sings: 

There was a young girl, whose heart was a frown,

'Cause she was crippled for life, and she couldn't speak a sound

And she wished and prayed she could stop living,

So she decided to die

She drew her wheel chair to the edge of the shore, and to her legs she smiled

"You won't hurt me no more"

But then a sight she'd never seen made her jump and say

"Look, a golden winged ship is passing my way"

And it really didn't have to stop, it just kept on going.

And so castles made of sand

Slips into the sea, eventually . . .

One fateful evening in Santa Barbara, California, Naomi swallowed pills, arrived to a lonely beach and walked into the Pacific Ocean to drown. She was saved when she saw a stranger walking and her conscience would not allow her to take her life in front of an innocent person.

She went on to live another seven months before dying at home with peace in her heart. Just before, she had a dream of being on a blissful cruise. In feeble handwriting she managed to write it down on a scrap of paper.

A number of times during the ordeal I found myself down on knees praying fervently for help. I could see the innocents being herded toward the ovens, clutching their little ones and asked, “Please help.” Several times the veils parted and to my surprise I saw angels, in complete tranquility, smiling. Over in a flash, I thought, “but how could you be smiling?” 

After Naomi died, we bathed and dressed her in her bed and put a ring on her finger. It is part of the Baha’i ceremony for the deceased. The ring says: “I came forth from God, and return unto Him, detached from all save Him, holding fast to His Name, the Merciful, the Compassionate”. 

And this is my belief, that this life is a sort of veil and it is lifted when we die.

For those millions who died during the holocaust, the experience was inscrutable. 

Death reaches us all. Some are born and live but a few moments, others longer, but in eternity, this life is but a blink of the eye for everyone.

On that glad night,

in secret, for no one saw me,


nor did I look at anything,


with no other light or guide


than the one that burned in my heart.

This guided me


more surely than the light of noon


to where he was awaiting me


— him I knew so well —


there in a place where no one appeared. 

Excerpt:

ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS, 16th Century

The Dark Night of the Soul