today is a brilliant, crisp, and wholly beauteous day. there is a slight chill in the air, indication of change and inclement weather. my neck tells me it will rain on sunday, for Rinpoche’s teaching. hrm.
this last week has been to consider the changes and shifts that have occurred from september to now… and to boggle slightly. i can hardly say i’m a different person, but i am certainly a much more balanced one. that, in itself, is a shock and surprise.
i have a sense of thankfulness for what has, until now, been seen only as a snarled, matted mess. for all i have said i am thankful, it has not been until this week that the truth of thankfulness has been more than a breeze over the top of my head.
i am, truly, deeply, sincerely, wholly, humbly, and completely thankful for having encountered h and m. they are, in very large part, responsible for every inch of the progress made from august until now.
while it remains there are some decidedly wrong aversions in place with relation to both of them, while it remains that i am still struggling with very real disgust, disdain, and to some degree, hatred for each of them… i continue to chip away at it with these lessons, brought by them.
there is still a small part of me that is angered beyond all ability to reason at the insult and wrongfulness of the malicious accusations they have made.
there is still that part of me that is disgusted and that hates them both to my core for their slinking around behind veils, spreading untruths as if truths, speaking poisonous words with arrogant certainty, as if ever they knew me, as if ever they tried.
there is still that part of me that wonders how they could possibly utter such things, think such things, and still consider themselves other than precisely that which they accuse.
there is part of me that wonders at such selective sight. such blindness. such choices.
of course, i temper it all with turning it inward and admitting where such things still live here, and would as easily leap forward. and i seek its shattering by such reminders and admittances… chasing the screaming id down long hallways of memory and moments… not allowing it to rest, not allowing it to duck into convenient corners, not allowing it to hide.
and there is, even in the presence of all that negativity that remains, that part of me that sits ‘above it all’, detached and empty, and looks at it and smiles and cries and sighs.
smiles for the good things i always knew of both of them.
cries for the ways each of us have been so very foolish and selfish.
sighs for the truth that is impermanence and the regret that some things simply have no potential for being repaired because none of us are capable of choosing any more skillfully than we have… not even me anymore.
but it is good to be able to say these things and have no ‘reaction’ to them. it is relief and surprise and thankfulness to simply be able to speak them and just let them all be as they are.
the ripples have passed. there are no more stones being dropped, thrown, slung… and thus, the waters return to what they should always have been… placid… peaceful… evenness.
i was talking with ‘the fella’ last night about it all. such tenderness he gives to me. he was upset and angry that he had not been there to shelter me, protect me, defend me, set himself between me and those who hurt me.
i understood all the things that spoke to, and the silken strand that binds us is a cherished thing that draws so sweetly close that it is hard to describe.
as we talked, i told him of all of this, how this series of encounters were things that opened new doors for me… taught me in ways i might never have managed otherwise… and while yes, there was extensive suffering in it, that it was all self-inflicted… for all i still blame them in places. and that regardless the pain of it, regardless the insult and offense to ego and pride, it remains that without every moment of it, he and i could not possibly have this moment, this tender, precious, intimate moment.
and for this truth, all things past are forgiven, transmuted, and made silk. even as the sharp edges of it linger in back corridors of memory. the workers are bustling here… paddles of mindfulness and the trademark stubbornness that has so often been set upon others turned in this moment upon myself… so many briars already spun to soft thread… and more will be so.
for all i do not and will never again turn to either of them, it remains i fully intend to find the way to full care and compassion for them. distant by necessity and in the name of peace… no more than memory, ever… but teachers until such time as the lessons are fully learned.
i am thankful. no tightened lip, no clenched jaw, no gritted teeth… the slap of the paddles drive them further away in every moment… and, free of the attachments… coming to grips that will eventually release the aversions… it is possible finally to be thankful as is proper.