Rainy Sunday with the garden, Thomas Merton and NY Times

My son and I went to see "V for Vendetta" last night and we both left the theater feeling like we'd been on an andrenaline rush for 2 hours. I can't say yet if I "liked" the movie, although it kept me riveted and kept me thinking, two qualities that I believe make for good movie-going fodder.

Trouble is, I'm not sure what it was about. There were so many images, so many themes -- fear being the central one of them, I think.

It's one of those films that rattles you - -there is nothing subtle about it.

My son, on the other hand, loved it. Which I think is more the point. The entire "matrix mentality" resonates more with his age, I think. There is some kind of coded language that he and fellow 18 year olds share that I find like a secret language. He's still talking about it today and although he doesn't really share what he thinks the point of the film is, clearly it is something that means something to him.

Which may be the whole problem between the generations. Maybe my generation searches too hard for meaning, where my son is able to see, read, hear it and say, "OK, that's cool. It means nothing to me, but I really liked the lighting and music. He doesn't press it for some spiritual comment.

I asked him on the way home, "Do you think the "V" character is Osama Bin Laden"?

"What?" he says incredeously, almost stopping the car to pin me to my seat with his glare. "What ever gave you that idea?"

"Maybe it was the bombing of Parliament and the idea that this guys "V" was going after the government, kind of like Osama Bin Laden?" I offer this more as a question, suddenly not sure at all what I'm thinking.

"Patrick Henry was a patriot, y'know. We read about him in our history books. Maybe "V" is a Patrick Henry guy."

"Is there a difference?" I say this as a challenge.

To which he responds in the typical teenage fashion, "Whatever, mom", which effectively ends the discussion.

I've learned that no argument is too far gone that a trip through Taco Bueno won't cure, so we head that way and through greasy tacos and sugary cokes we talk about the music, the lighting, the things that matter to him and am amazed at how he organizes his world around these art forms.

Today, I beg off from church, intent upon my path that I'm working on outside. I'm getting excited about it. I've carefully laid out the watering hose, making a curving line that pleases me. It starts at the back patio and ends at the pergola, effectively connecting these two disparate parts, with a small bridge and ponds between.

Right now, it looks rather primitive, crusty old garden hose looping around in these arcs, but I can see the path, can see where I'm going with it. It is like most journeys, really, which start as an idea and germinates and grows until it springs forth in its form that I can grasp.

Creating a garden path, like so many elements of the garden, require a form of meditation, I think. You have to know where you start. You have to know at least the direction of where you're going, although how you may get there, the curves you take, may not be clearly defined. And the manner in which you go, the elements of rocks or wood or gravel, is something that really presents itself to you. It cannot be forced, it has to emerge in its own time.

And so my son has his movie and I have my garden and with each one we interpret the world around us, the common bridge being spirit that speaks uniquely to both of us, in groanings that we can each hear in our own way.