kaleidoscoping chaos...: Finding Fallingwater...

This past Friday, we began our journey to Pittsburgh for a wedding of a close family friend. We packed ourselves and all our crap into our Suburu and we were on the road at 9:00am heading north from Washington, DC. En route to Pittsburgh, we would diverge, and take the road "not usually taken" to southwest Pennsylvania's Laurel Highlands. Our destination: Fallingwater.

There is no public transportation to Fallingwater. There are no highways to Fallingwater. It is a house with a name - Fallingwater. Almost sounds Native American - but it is just the name that Frank Lloyd Wright gave the house he designed - he named his houses. It was really Mr. & Mrs. Kaufman's weekend retreat. It is definitely the kind of house you would think of as a retreat - from everything hustle, bustle and city. It is in the woods, on a rock, engulfed by water - falling water...

Our plan was to meet my brother and his family at Fallingwater's Visitor Center a little before 1pm. My brother's family had booked 1pm tours. The Regular Tour for my brother, my oldest nephew (10) and my brother's friend and the Children's Tour for my sister-in-law, my niece (8) and my youngest nephew (5). Our family was going to get a Grounds Pass and walk around and see Fallingwater. Then we were all going to hang out a bit before we got back on the road and headed the 90 minutes on to Pittsburgh.

That was the plan.

We got on the road and I had to drive. I like driving but it is hard for me to navigate and drive. I usually navigate and Jocelyn drives. Jocelyn had to work the entire time in the car (including conference calls...) so I was driving. As you know, I love adventures, and I am always going on them - my big thing is to remember it is about the journey not the destination and getting lost is always part of the fun of getting there... if you know me, you know that I am often getting lost but not worrying about it. Jocelyn and I joke that we are the ones "taking the long way around" just like the song we love sung by the Dixie Chicks...

We got lost. A number of times. This meant it took us much longer to get to Fallingwater than we expected. It also meant we were a little bit tense - despite my whole play it cool theory - I was not so happy about getting lost... and being late. My brother and his wife never get lost and are always on time.

Jocelyn wasn't in the best mood either as she was working the entire time.

If you are a parent, you know that long car trips with kids aged 1 and 3 are never really that fun... the kids were fine enough, but it is not easy...

We got there around 1:45pm.

As soon as we got there, things were different. Our cell phones, blackberry and iPhone did not work.

No more checking the phone, it did not work...

Stop looking, checking, feeling for the vibrations, Stop...

Listen.

Hear.

Jonah heard it right away - just as we walked on the path to the Visitor's Center. He asked Mama immediately:

"Mama I hear something.. I can't see it... what is it Mama... I want to see it?!?!"

Listen. Hear. Listen.

It is said that Frank Lloyd Wright was so moved by the sounds of the water in these woods that it was the main inspiration for the house. You can really hear the water there. You can hear it so much, it is the kind of hearing that you can actually feel - like when you are in a loud dark club dancing to some amazing dance music and you close your eyes and you feel the music pulsating in your veins... like that but totally and completely different. At Fallingwater the sound is gentle and soft, constant but variable, natural and strong - and exciting.

We walked the path to the house on the "handicap accessible" route because Vera was in the stroller. The path winds you around the back. The first time you can see the water it is just a small stream with not a glimpse of the house. Instantly Jonah wanted to throw rocks in the water. Again he spoke, "I can hear it, I want to touch, I am going to throw rocks in it, I can't hear the rocks... I want to touch the water..." Vera's face lit up when she saw the water. She too wanted to jump in it - or touch it. She was wiggling vigorously to get out of her stroller, reaching for it desperately.

We meandered on the path by ourselves on what looked to me as the exact road that Robert Frost had written about so many years ago when I was in high school and memorized that poem for English class. This was "the road not taken." It looked exactly as I had imagined it would. I just never imagined how it would sound.

Its voice was amazing. The voice of water - cleansing, native, real, living, rushing, nourishing water.

We walked some more, until we could finally see the first glimpses of the house. The house is very cool. You can look at the house. You can see the house. You can even touch the house. If you take the tour, you can then "hear" about the house and "listen" to the stories about the house.

I couldn't because I was not on a tour. I was with my children and Jocelyn. I could hear them and the water and be at the house. In a way, it was magical in the not what I expected way. I could hear Jonah's fast, small and excited feet as he ran towards me and then in front of me. I could hear Vera's stroller's wheels as they struggled with the dirt on the path and the mulch and the wet leaves. I could hear her whining and pleading to get out of her stroller so that she too could put her little feet on the wet dirt ground and try to get to the water. The water that we all heard.

I listened to Jocelyn's silent anxiety and patience as she walked and talked to Jonah and her iPhone sat silent in her pocket.

I could hear it all. I felt it.

We were all tired. Even a bit cranky. But we were there. In the forest. By the house called Fallingwater.

We walked around to view the house sitting atop the waterfall. I kept asking the kids if they remembered the pictures I had showed them, if they remembered building the house in our own house. They were not listening to me. I made myself stop talking about all of that. I told myself to just listen and be in the place. Listen to it, listen to them. Hear it. Hear them.

That is not so easy to do.

We took the obligatory pictures. You know the pictures that you look at with your eyes. The things you see. Nothing you can listen to or hear.

I know my kids. Then it was lunch/snack time. We headed to the cafe. We had yet to see my brother's crew. We could not text them - no service on our phones.

As soon as we walked into the cafe, Jonah said it first: "I can't hear it anymore." He was right. Between the air conditioning, the refridgerators, the music playing, and being in an enclosed space - you could not hear the water anymore. We had lunch/snack. The kids were a bit rowdy but not terrible. (Ok maybe Jonah took a bunch of salt shakers and spilled them all over the place and then licked the salt off the table... and spilled a number of little vases on the tables making more of a mess - but he is three...)

At one point, the four of us were sitting down at the table and Jonah was on Mama's lap. Jonah was talking about how we were all there, and named us all: Mama, Jonah, Mommy and Vera - as he says, "the whole family." Then he grabbed Mama and said I love you so much and then said "cheese" - Mommy take a picture. He then did a little "love" photo shoot with Mama - it was priceless. When we were not able to hear the water - the pure living and loving water, Jonah wanted to make sure we were able to see each other, love each other, know each other and photograph it...

And then through the window we saw them. We ran out of the cafe.

Immediately we heard the water, the forest, and our cousins screeching with delight! Finally, Vera was able to run and laugh. The sounds of the water were drowned out by the silly noises of children playing and laughing and loving. I suspect that is how it sounded when the Kaufman's gathered their clan at Fallingwater.

From what I have read (and it is not much), the point of Fallingwater is that it built on the waterfall so that the house and life in it becomes one with water fall - the Kaufman's had expected the house would view the waterfall and they were surprised by the initial design, but then they were excited by it. I expect you learn all about this when you take the tour. One day I hope I will visit it again, maybe with my kids and we will hear all about it on the tour.

For now, I will remember what Fallingwater sounded like to me. The waterfall, the stream, my son's footsteps, my daughter's yearning to be free, the birds, the raindrops, the cousin's laughing, Jocelyn's silence...

And since Friday I have tried to listen to myself more and to hear those around me better. I tried to listen all weekend to my extended family. I tried to listen at the wedding to the amazing vows the couple wrote to each other. I tried to listen to Jocelyn's tense voice as she tried to move in between her work world and our family world and keep it all in check. I tried to listen to my mother's voice when she spoke to my children and their cousins - and to me and my brother. I tried to listen to myself when I spoke to everyone and when I didn't speak. I tried to listen and to hear.

I tried.

I often failed.

I yelled way too much at too many people. I lost my quiet patience too quickly. I tuned out too often and did not hear things that may have been wonderful. But I tried. I am going to continue to try. Each day. Each night.

I always had good hearing. Since becoming a parent, I often joke that I can hear my kids breathing all night - no matter what - especially since we have a monitor and my son desperately needs his tonsils out. I think the challenge for me is to really listen to my kids and my spouse and not just hear what I think they should sound like or what they should say. It is really hard to do that. It is even harder to listen when you can not see. I think Frank Lloyd Wright was right about that. When you build your house on the waterfall, you have to really listen and hear the thing that sustains you and gives life to what is good - you can't just look at it and think it is pretty.

When I can do that.

Really listen and hear myself and my loved ones - my story will be titled:

Fallingwater Found

Until then consider me in my quest of Finding Fallingwater...

Fallingwater is a great blessing - one of the great blessings to be experienced here on earth, I think nothing yet ever equalled the coordination, sympathetic expression of the great principle of repose where forest and stream and rock and all the elements of structure are combined so quietly that really you listen not to any noise whatsoever although the music of the stream is there. But you listen to Fallingwater the way you listen to the quiet of the country... Talk to the Taliesin Fellowship, May 1, 1955