August 3rd
In the end, this summer will not stand as one of the better seasons in my life. Situations have gone awry, trusts have been broken, and the days often dissolve into a sort of grey, seamless patchwork. The baser parts of myself have been interfering with my metaphysical goals. The harsh side of love is that it often involves not being loved in turn; that it requires giving with the full knowledge that nothing will be received. It is hard sometimes to feel unappreciated and alone, but it is far worse to let circumstances cause you to withhold your own love and care for others. Love has to be a one-way street before it can become anything else.Today I drove out to Indian Creek and put my swim-trunks on, locked my truck and walked down the pathway to the water. I absentmindedly took some photographs of the water and wished for some matches. The creek always seems a fitting place for any sort of reflection- after all it was in those waters that I made my first half-hearted attempt at better understanding myself, of living more mindfully in the world around me, of touching whatever rhythms exist beneath the rattle and shake of everyday living. I stepped into the frigid water, felt it wind around my ankles like a blanket. I thought of Rumi: "There’s no room for lack of trust, or trust. Nothing in this existence but that existence." I looked toward a cabin up on the hill that I had helped build, years ago. I tried skipping some stones but never made it past five jumps. Mostly I stood there in the creek, admiring the moving water and the sun’s valiant attempts to break through the dense canopy overhead.
"You need to return to certain places to see things as they are," I imagined the trees saying. I realized again that this is all a circle, some sort of cosmic raga tying us all together and tearing us apart again. What comes to you must go away- what goes away will someday return, though perhaps in another, unexpected form.
There was something alive in the air as I toweled off with my shirt and gathered my things. Looking back, I almost imagined I had left my sorrows somewhere behind me, lost in the turgid waters of the creek.
September 20th
The first winds of autumn are finally blowing in to settle our nerves and give us room to breathe. The last days of summer are thick and remorseless, and its hard to feel good about anything in their midst. This summer it was hard to feel good anyway, but that is all behind me now- or at least it’s all hundreds of miles away.
I am enjoying myself for the first time in a long time. I left my friends house tonight, took in the stars in the clear black sky, put on some Van Morrison in the truck and took the long way home. There are good people around if you know where to look. Sometimes I don’t believe it, but I have to keep repeating it like a mantra till it sticks.
These early fall winds, the last gasps of the summer just at their heels, feel charged with possibility, with the feeling that anything can happen. For once that doesn’t strike me as ominous- and for that, if nothing else, I am hopeful.
I am enjoying myself for the first time in a long time. I left my friends house tonight, took in the stars in the clear black sky, put on some Van Morrison in the truck and took the long way home. There are good people around if you know where to look. Sometimes I don’t believe it, but I have to keep repeating it like a mantra till it sticks.
These early fall winds, the last gasps of the summer just at their heels, feel charged with possibility, with the feeling that anything can happen. For once that doesn’t strike me as ominous- and for that, if nothing else, I am hopeful.
