I've mentioned before the rare gift it is to find kindness in a stranger, but, I think it's important that we never take for granted the kindness that comes from those who consider us friends and families.
A dear friend of mine recently moved to the Ukraine. I've relayed this to my relevant connections who hear about my life with regularity. During those exchanges, my very good friends ask how I'm coping or if I'm well or how my friend is faring overseas.
It was my pen pal who, without the precedent of a conversation or question, other than just knowing what had happened, sent me a card yesterday. Though we make time to write back and forth at least two letters per month, she is very busy with school, her six year old, and her new job as school librarian. Nonetheless, during her daughter's piano lesson, she took the time to pick out a card (a card disgustingly appropriate for me with a tea pot on the front and two dainty cups and saucers) and write me a note. She was thinking of me. Feeling the pain with me. Hoping the best for me and wanted to take the time to let me know that moment.
The idea of not taking people we know for granted comes from the Obvious Truths as well as an experience I had this summer...
My step-father has very good friends that have known me and my half brothers all our lives. For all the things they do for us, I've handwritten Thank You notes for Years. Once, when my step-father's load at work was particularly hellish and overwhelming, his friend took time out of his weekend to help my Daddy. I was so touched by his friendship and loyalty to my step-father (I mean, the man has a day job of his own that is taxing enough) that I wrote him a letter thanking him for that as well.
So, here we were, my brothers and I all graduating at the same time (I from W&M and they from high school) and these friends of my step-father hosted an intimate cake and coffee evening for us. Gifts were distributed so, as I always do, I sat down that evening and hand wrote my Thank You.
My brothers, for the first time apparently, did the same thing. After all the years I've been expressing my gratitude, they've not once acknowledged me the way that they acknowledged my brothers. The gentleman friend wrote them a letter thanking them for the notes that THEY wrote completely leaving me out.
When I expressed my hurt to my mother, she understood. When she was younger, she had a special "thing" with her younger brother. She had a bicycle with a basket on the front and, when he was still small, she used to ride around with him in the basket. One day, her sister did the same thing. It was only the one time, and her parents finally acknowledged how cute it all was and took a photo. Not a single photo exists of my mother and her brother... when it was their "thing."
So, I think it's crucial and makes us better people to acknowledge the good, even if it's a consistent and not unexpected good, from those we love and who take the time to love us, too. Take no one who loves you for granted.
Friday, September 19, 2008
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Marichi
All I know is her name... and I've only met her once before talking to her today.
When I first met her, we walked out of a hot yoga class together. The room is heated above 100 degrees, so, most of us are a sweaty mess coming out. You feel a little self-conscious, obviously, so I wasn't in the perfect mood to chat. She just smiled and made it easier to talk. After a month of other emotional oppositions, my upcoming marriage came up in conversation.
The smile, which was warm initially, broadened ever so slightly and brightened the room. "I am so happy for you," the lovely stranger told me.
I felt something new on the way home. It was a precious thing to meet such unnecessary kindness and she re-entered my mind periodically over the next week.
Is that enough to justify what happened today? I feel as though I must have known her in another life.
Tuesday mornings are Restorative Yoga days. This sort of yoga focuses undoing the work you've done during the week, during other harsher yoga routines, etc. More props are used to support the body so that each pose is relaxing. We also try to meditate and practice deep breathing. While all of that sounds like a nice but boring hour and a half vacation, it brings out, just like harsh yoga, all the weaknesses, sorrows, and inner thoughts up to the surface.
I felt the need to wait after class for her. She usually stays in the room a few minutes more after class to meditate in silence.
"How are you?" I asked her this as genuinely as I would my mother, my best friend, my fiancé. I know it's usually just a greeting with people you do not know, but I truly wanted to know.
She nodded quietly, the smile had changed. "It's been okay."
"How was the weekend?" I knew she had started her yoga teacher certification training that past weekend.
"It was good," she said affirmatively.
"...and your week?"
She just looked me straight in the eye.
"Less good I guess?"
"My grandmother died." Her eyes began to well up.
The stranger part is, my eyes began to tear up as well. I don't even know her, and I started to cry with her. I gave her a real, steady hug... something, as my loved ones know, I rarely offer. We talked for a few minutes about the strength of the soul and the delicate fabric of the body... and our gratitude for our yoga practice to move us through the healing of all our wounds.
There are these random, beautiful experiences where one connects to a perfect stranger... someone who owes you nothing but chooses to offer friendship and kindness. It's a blessing that occurs in a split second because of the years of strength it took to develop a heart, character, and sweetness.
Namasté and Blessed Be.
When I first met her, we walked out of a hot yoga class together. The room is heated above 100 degrees, so, most of us are a sweaty mess coming out. You feel a little self-conscious, obviously, so I wasn't in the perfect mood to chat. She just smiled and made it easier to talk. After a month of other emotional oppositions, my upcoming marriage came up in conversation.
The smile, which was warm initially, broadened ever so slightly and brightened the room. "I am so happy for you," the lovely stranger told me.
I felt something new on the way home. It was a precious thing to meet such unnecessary kindness and she re-entered my mind periodically over the next week.
Is that enough to justify what happened today? I feel as though I must have known her in another life.
Tuesday mornings are Restorative Yoga days. This sort of yoga focuses undoing the work you've done during the week, during other harsher yoga routines, etc. More props are used to support the body so that each pose is relaxing. We also try to meditate and practice deep breathing. While all of that sounds like a nice but boring hour and a half vacation, it brings out, just like harsh yoga, all the weaknesses, sorrows, and inner thoughts up to the surface.
I felt the need to wait after class for her. She usually stays in the room a few minutes more after class to meditate in silence.
"How are you?" I asked her this as genuinely as I would my mother, my best friend, my fiancé. I know it's usually just a greeting with people you do not know, but I truly wanted to know.
She nodded quietly, the smile had changed. "It's been okay."
"How was the weekend?" I knew she had started her yoga teacher certification training that past weekend.
"It was good," she said affirmatively.
"...and your week?"
She just looked me straight in the eye.
"Less good I guess?"
"My grandmother died." Her eyes began to well up.
The stranger part is, my eyes began to tear up as well. I don't even know her, and I started to cry with her. I gave her a real, steady hug... something, as my loved ones know, I rarely offer. We talked for a few minutes about the strength of the soul and the delicate fabric of the body... and our gratitude for our yoga practice to move us through the healing of all our wounds.
There are these random, beautiful experiences where one connects to a perfect stranger... someone who owes you nothing but chooses to offer friendship and kindness. It's a blessing that occurs in a split second because of the years of strength it took to develop a heart, character, and sweetness.
Namasté and Blessed Be.
Friday, June 6, 2008
The limits of "love"
Here's something funny that's been on my mind the last 24 hours.
In our American society... then again, you could apply this in several European societies as well... love between lovers draws lines between you and every other person you ever meet. There's the occasional couple who is mature enough to have no trouble with a partner's "friends" and of course the swingers and otherwise, but, for the rest of us doves, it's still a monogamous thing, and possession thing, a security thing.
What are the reasons? What makes us believe that our lover relationships interfere with our ability to make friends? Most may tell you that they've been burned before by being trusting of a person who insisted that the co-worker or the secretary or the barista was just a friend only to find that if you look through the coffeehouse after hours or stop by the office to drop off some dinner that friends with benefits just entered into the contract you never signed. I think we all feel this one...
But how does that happen? Has the limited scope of our view in the roles we play handed us choices that needn't be made? In other words, did we get the idea in our head to "cheat" because we didn't have some appropriate way to include someone seemingly significant in our lives. Roll your eyes, if you want, and I'll even roll mine in remembrance of things past... Some people are dishonest slobs, but for the few who love us and make mistakes, did they feel there were no other options?
I know women, some women, have a slightly tidier compartment in which to store "friends" and "boyfriends"... Hell! Most of gals have used that as an excuse for breaking it off with men who took them on dismal dates. I can't say I have myself... or, at least I don't remember using that excuse, but that's because I didn't buy it. I knew that friendship was rarely ever an option... not so much because I didn't want the friendship... more because I knew that the person with whom I was involved could see nothing less than a romantic endeavor with me.
And then there's the ones of us keep this lack of progression at a stand-still by not allowing ourselves to trust those who do love us to have friendships outside of the romantic commitment. This is a scenario I think most people, the ones who have been hurt or never took the chance to be hurt, know something about. My pathetic but potent example is my relationship with my mother. After my father left us (I was six months old) and we had the struggle of my childhood and pre-adolescence, my mother became a teacher giving her a chance to be acquainted with other children. The bond between women and young children is both maternal and scribal... taking notes and writing volumes of behavior, experience, patterns, etc. My mother is a kind and loving person who became fond of a little girl here and there that reminded her of me. Rather than see that my mother was able to form a teacher-student connection between these kids, I could only see and understand the mother-and-child combination and felt hurt and threatened. My mother could never love another child like she loves her own children, and while I know that, my inability to see the scope of possibilities of her relationships with others accumulated into fear and resentment of potential loss. We have a lot of "there can be only one" mentality about some of our strongest bonds.
While this is gorgeously human, it limits love. Love doesn't sound like the sort of force that should/could possess people. Love is meant to be freedom itself... allowing for happiness and light in every form that person can offer. We have so few words to describe its many forms... maybe that's the culprit! Those charming gentlemen towards the end of the Renaissance who had the brilliant idea of standardizing the language. Not to say English of the Renaissance and Early Modern period couldn't use the help, but where are the words for love? The French have a handful of words for types of affection and, as we all know, Eskimos have several words for "snow".
I'm not saying the scope of what love can be should ever be bent into something destructive. Moreover, I'm not saying I'm nearly mature enough to confront the possibilities of where love, in this society and others, has to go. I do know that I love other people in ways that are unique to each individual. No one is my best friend like Anya, yet no one is my Penelope or Beth. No one is my love as David, yet no one has been there as my artist once was a great, sweet collaborator and friend or my Russian teacher very much a father or uncle to me. Yet, we all have a responsibility to those loves, the great and unique, to find the expressions that belong singularly to them that the love we have for others will merely belong to them rather than threaten those we love most daily.
In our American society... then again, you could apply this in several European societies as well... love between lovers draws lines between you and every other person you ever meet. There's the occasional couple who is mature enough to have no trouble with a partner's "friends" and of course the swingers and otherwise, but, for the rest of us doves, it's still a monogamous thing, and possession thing, a security thing.
What are the reasons? What makes us believe that our lover relationships interfere with our ability to make friends? Most may tell you that they've been burned before by being trusting of a person who insisted that the co-worker or the secretary or the barista was just a friend only to find that if you look through the coffeehouse after hours or stop by the office to drop off some dinner that friends with benefits just entered into the contract you never signed. I think we all feel this one...
But how does that happen? Has the limited scope of our view in the roles we play handed us choices that needn't be made? In other words, did we get the idea in our head to "cheat" because we didn't have some appropriate way to include someone seemingly significant in our lives. Roll your eyes, if you want, and I'll even roll mine in remembrance of things past... Some people are dishonest slobs, but for the few who love us and make mistakes, did they feel there were no other options?
I know women, some women, have a slightly tidier compartment in which to store "friends" and "boyfriends"... Hell! Most of gals have used that as an excuse for breaking it off with men who took them on dismal dates. I can't say I have myself... or, at least I don't remember using that excuse, but that's because I didn't buy it. I knew that friendship was rarely ever an option... not so much because I didn't want the friendship... more because I knew that the person with whom I was involved could see nothing less than a romantic endeavor with me.
And then there's the ones of us keep this lack of progression at a stand-still by not allowing ourselves to trust those who do love us to have friendships outside of the romantic commitment. This is a scenario I think most people, the ones who have been hurt or never took the chance to be hurt, know something about. My pathetic but potent example is my relationship with my mother. After my father left us (I was six months old) and we had the struggle of my childhood and pre-adolescence, my mother became a teacher giving her a chance to be acquainted with other children. The bond between women and young children is both maternal and scribal... taking notes and writing volumes of behavior, experience, patterns, etc. My mother is a kind and loving person who became fond of a little girl here and there that reminded her of me. Rather than see that my mother was able to form a teacher-student connection between these kids, I could only see and understand the mother-and-child combination and felt hurt and threatened. My mother could never love another child like she loves her own children, and while I know that, my inability to see the scope of possibilities of her relationships with others accumulated into fear and resentment of potential loss. We have a lot of "there can be only one" mentality about some of our strongest bonds.
While this is gorgeously human, it limits love. Love doesn't sound like the sort of force that should/could possess people. Love is meant to be freedom itself... allowing for happiness and light in every form that person can offer. We have so few words to describe its many forms... maybe that's the culprit! Those charming gentlemen towards the end of the Renaissance who had the brilliant idea of standardizing the language. Not to say English of the Renaissance and Early Modern period couldn't use the help, but where are the words for love? The French have a handful of words for types of affection and, as we all know, Eskimos have several words for "snow".
I'm not saying the scope of what love can be should ever be bent into something destructive. Moreover, I'm not saying I'm nearly mature enough to confront the possibilities of where love, in this society and others, has to go. I do know that I love other people in ways that are unique to each individual. No one is my best friend like Anya, yet no one is my Penelope or Beth. No one is my love as David, yet no one has been there as my artist once was a great, sweet collaborator and friend or my Russian teacher very much a father or uncle to me. Yet, we all have a responsibility to those loves, the great and unique, to find the expressions that belong singularly to them that the love we have for others will merely belong to them rather than threaten those we love most daily.
Friday, May 2, 2008
April is the cruelest month - T.S. Eliott
It took 26 years, but I get it now. There's something about that movement from winter into warmer, kinder conditions that just confuses the hell out of most of us. Particularly here in Virginia, the cold and hot seasons last so long... any semblance of calm seasons, spring and fall, and we don't know what to do with ourselves. Beautiful weather is something we're not used to... and I wonder if the rare blessing of a pretty day gets us uncomfortable.
Is it like too much of a good thing? Don't we know those other winters? The ones where life seems like a waiting room... and the news never gets better. Your birth father is in the hospital because he won't stop eating hot dogs and dreamsicles. Your best friend will probably have to move again and further away this time. That relative who keeps telling you you're fat as they shove another oatmeal and fake cream cookie down her throat. You are misunderstood and lose a connection to a friend forever and are walked on, discarded, no matter how much you try to defend your position. Your pastor or rabbi tells you to stop "giving power" to people... You can't control anyone but yourself.
So, can you? Do you find a way to accept the lovely day and control yourself?
April turned out to have nothing but grouchy things to say to me. She wanted to show me that Life isn't fair... how quaint. You've been hearing it your whole life, she must have tried to say to me, So, you might as well apply it and see why they say it. I must have shrugged and she took that as a challenge... Did I mean it that way? Probably... which makes me a little more naive than even I was willing to admit.
But, this time, April, has been here in other years, other months, and in other, less appealing ways. How do I take the time? How do I approach the phone call from a company that still thinks I owe it money when I've actually overpaid them? How do I see birds in the window that my cat tried to imitate in sound to lure them closer? How do I take a generally lovely Spring Day in Virginia in April when it's been a long, unkind winter?
I doubt I'm different from most. I swallowed hard with each piece of news that wasn't flattering to the season. I turned on Pandora and listened to Tori Amos and Regina Spektor... Hell, as I write I'm listening to Paul Simon ("April Come She Will") and something popular I don't recognize... the music understands, right? Good thing that's up to me... the music.
What else? The pastor said how I respond is up to me.
Great.
So, you accept you can't control what happens to you... You feel better in winter, you were accustomed to it. You even got to the point where you believed something sweet like "Things happen for a reason" and you locate all the good stuff that came out of something hard... Yes, your biological father has been hospitalized but you've reconnected with your siblings who now have more evidence that you're there for them... And what about that Aunt Gertrude or Uncle Barney who keeps telling you you're fat... you've lost 10 pounds just worrying about exams while your relative is 5'6" and over 200 pounds. And so what if your friend isn't who you thought she was... at least you know now before you pour anymore into that relationship than you ever should have... and besides, your best friend will probably write once in a while and call... she's been better and better about that in the past year, and you know it.
You tell yourself stupid things... comforting, but, not entirely accurate. Things like, "If that bitch hadn't dragged me to that party, I wouldn't be engaged to this wonderful man I know now" or "If she hadn't kicked me out over something moronic, it wouldn't have been so easy to leave and I wouldn't have this more comfortable apartment surrounded by my own things and a happier, calmer cat."
The Buddhists, I think, have a teaching about good and bad. That the two go in turn so much that no one can really call anything "good" or "bad". Things just... are. We are the ones who attach labels to events and people and things and we screw ourselves up that way... by not letting things merely "be"... Things just are.
Real helpful, right?
Because what things are are April, and April is the cruelest month... because she melted the cold of ignorance and revealed what was really in the water the whole time... because she's the bearer of uncomfortable news... but, at least someone told you.
Perhaps May will tell me how to not care so much about April.
Is it like too much of a good thing? Don't we know those other winters? The ones where life seems like a waiting room... and the news never gets better. Your birth father is in the hospital because he won't stop eating hot dogs and dreamsicles. Your best friend will probably have to move again and further away this time. That relative who keeps telling you you're fat as they shove another oatmeal and fake cream cookie down her throat. You are misunderstood and lose a connection to a friend forever and are walked on, discarded, no matter how much you try to defend your position. Your pastor or rabbi tells you to stop "giving power" to people... You can't control anyone but yourself.
So, can you? Do you find a way to accept the lovely day and control yourself?
April turned out to have nothing but grouchy things to say to me. She wanted to show me that Life isn't fair... how quaint. You've been hearing it your whole life, she must have tried to say to me, So, you might as well apply it and see why they say it. I must have shrugged and she took that as a challenge... Did I mean it that way? Probably... which makes me a little more naive than even I was willing to admit.
But, this time, April, has been here in other years, other months, and in other, less appealing ways. How do I take the time? How do I approach the phone call from a company that still thinks I owe it money when I've actually overpaid them? How do I see birds in the window that my cat tried to imitate in sound to lure them closer? How do I take a generally lovely Spring Day in Virginia in April when it's been a long, unkind winter?
I doubt I'm different from most. I swallowed hard with each piece of news that wasn't flattering to the season. I turned on Pandora and listened to Tori Amos and Regina Spektor... Hell, as I write I'm listening to Paul Simon ("April Come She Will") and something popular I don't recognize... the music understands, right? Good thing that's up to me... the music.
What else? The pastor said how I respond is up to me.
Great.
So, you accept you can't control what happens to you... You feel better in winter, you were accustomed to it. You even got to the point where you believed something sweet like "Things happen for a reason" and you locate all the good stuff that came out of something hard... Yes, your biological father has been hospitalized but you've reconnected with your siblings who now have more evidence that you're there for them... And what about that Aunt Gertrude or Uncle Barney who keeps telling you you're fat... you've lost 10 pounds just worrying about exams while your relative is 5'6" and over 200 pounds. And so what if your friend isn't who you thought she was... at least you know now before you pour anymore into that relationship than you ever should have... and besides, your best friend will probably write once in a while and call... she's been better and better about that in the past year, and you know it.
You tell yourself stupid things... comforting, but, not entirely accurate. Things like, "If that bitch hadn't dragged me to that party, I wouldn't be engaged to this wonderful man I know now" or "If she hadn't kicked me out over something moronic, it wouldn't have been so easy to leave and I wouldn't have this more comfortable apartment surrounded by my own things and a happier, calmer cat."
The Buddhists, I think, have a teaching about good and bad. That the two go in turn so much that no one can really call anything "good" or "bad". Things just... are. We are the ones who attach labels to events and people and things and we screw ourselves up that way... by not letting things merely "be"... Things just are.
Real helpful, right?
Because what things are are April, and April is the cruelest month... because she melted the cold of ignorance and revealed what was really in the water the whole time... because she's the bearer of uncomfortable news... but, at least someone told you.
Perhaps May will tell me how to not care so much about April.
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