Is that what you weigh, Lady,
Deciding which way to go?
Left, right, up, down,
In a finite world which
Demands you choose
And suffer its lot.

Some say you broke the mold
And walls along the way,
But how can you break what
Isn’t even there?
Like a ghost,
You walked through them
Without muss to your curls
Or runs in your stockings,
And took the secret to your grave
Where it waits to be found again.

~In loving memory of my maternal grandmother, Alma Alberta Firebaugh Mishler

Remember that crush you couldn’t live without?  You thought you’d go mad if he/she didn’t pick up the phone.  How about that love interest in high school?  College?  At work?

I just saw their picture on Facebook.  Consider yourself lucky.

Better that you treasure the memory than dig up the past.  Time has not been kind to your former love, which may or may not please you… depending on your appetite for revenge.  In fact, time has steamrolled over the beauty you remember and left it squished on the road.  It’s inflated the stud of your memories to a Macy’s balloon, the cheerleader to a cow and sleek athlete to unrecognizable blob.  That once-unattainable perfection has been rendered by time and now, only the occasional bit rises to the oily black surface.

Yeah.  Like I said… lucky.

So stop living in the past.  There’s no point mooning over something that doesn’t exist, especially if you’ve been shortchanging your current companions.  They deserve more.  Hell, you deserve more. 

Did you ever stop to think that perhaps there was a good reason why you didn’t end up with Mr/Ms Right?  If they were all that and a Prada handbag, logic dictates that their behavior would reflect the same.

 Ah… but that’s not what happened, right?

If you’re like most folks, you got your ass handed to you… after it was smacked around, battered and kicked for several blocks.  And you know what’s really sad about that?  You still sighed over them.  You invented excuses for their behavior. You wanted so desperately to belong to their world that you bent over and offered up your ass for future kickings.  Thank you, sir.  May I have another?

Love is not an exclusive fraternity.  The keys to your happiness are not in the hands of some arbitrary moron… or love goddess.  They belong to you and only you.  The standards are set by you and not by an elusive wisp of memory. 

Instead of feeling wistful and disappointed, think of those emotional beatdowns as lessons in what not to do.  If life had allowed you to settle for less, your disappointment would be far greater than you could imagine.   

A friend once asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up.  Since I was at the time a headstrong young woman of 22, I replied, “a fireman!” with all the defensive sarcasm I could muster.  I was more than a little miffed that my companion was underwhelmed by my then-current incarnation.  What was I supposed to do to impress him, stand on my head and recite from Henry V? 

It wasn’t until years later that I understood the nature of the question.  Rather than a condemnation of what I was doing, it was curiosity to know why I was doing it.   What’s more, I learned that I was just as curious to discover the reason.  What the hell was I doing back then?  Did I have a plan or was I simply on automatic pilot?

Though I thought myself a rebel, upon reflection I realize that I was drifting along currents that I didn’t personally direct.   So was my friend, which was probably why he asked the question.  Did he know where he was going, or was he just reacting like me?  Maybe he recognized a fellow drifter and wanted to know if there was a way to escape the undertow.

Because that’s exactly what it was… a dangerous riptide unseen on the surface, but once in, nearly impossible to counter.

I didn’t know I was in it.  Nobody does.  We drift along thinking ourselves masters of our own lives until that life slowly comes to an end, and with its closure, comes the sudden realization that we’ve been captives instead.

Not so, you might object.  My life is my own.  Yet were crucial decisions made over the course of that life based solely in the moment, or were they driven by fear, need or ambition?  Did your actions follow from pure sense of self, or from dissatisfaction and desire to find that sense of self?

If you thought yourself lost or less than, you are not alone.  Everyone thinks that way when they’re caught in the undercurrent.  It will disorient you faster than anything imaginable.  It will drown your bearings and torpedo your will until there’s nothing left to do but flail and keep your head above water… if you can.  No amount of education, prestige, power or privilege will act as life preserver now.  All of that was amassed in reaction to your condition, not in spite of it.

The harder you struggle against the tide, the stronger it becomes.  Not because it is an overwhelming force, but because you believe that it is.  Your parents, friends, children, colleagues, countrymen or foes have only the power you choose to give them.  If you think yourself at the mercy of external factors, then it is so.  Beliefs, no matter how ridiculous or farfetched, create reality and as long as we believe control resides outside of ourselves, then we will be forever caught in its current.

And so I ask myself today, the first day of 2012, what do I want to be when I grow up?  Just another fish drowning with its school, or take a chance on something of my very own creation?   Hmmmm… I think I’ll roll the dice.

I’ve often wondered why forgiveness is such a rare commodity.  It’s a common tenet to nearly every known doctrine, yet it’s the least circulated coin of the realm. We deny it to others, thinking ourselves righteous or vengeful.  Yet, who really suffers when it’s withheld?

As I walked this morning, I tried to keep my mind off its task and into the strange puzzle-solving moving meditation it has become of late.  What is the nature of forgiveness?  Why is it necessary?  Who benefits?  With each step, I realized that two columns of my own life were tallying up some substantial numbers:  Stupid Acts Requiring Forgiveness, and People Waiting to be Forgiven.   Who was I to deny it when I had plenty of reason to ask for it?

Then of course came the hypothetical explanations, the theoretical overtures, the oh-so-proper wording that would elicit sympathy and skirt responsibility.  All mental exercises that if correctly executed would secure forgiveness and deliver me back into the fold.

So why hadn’t I done it?

I rounded the corner and the sun shone full on my face, and suddenly I understood the reason.  I wanted forgiveness to be granted like a star shining on me no matter what.  It shines day and night, without supplication or sacrifice and heedless to outcome.  It can’t be withheld or kept in a box.  It shines because that is what it is.

I immediately shelved the mind exercises and resolved to offer truce to those kept in limbo.  Maybe they, too, have been waiting for the star.

When I left the corruption of the city for the blue skies and cornfields of central Illinois, little did I know that I had just stepped through Stargate Carnality.

Imagine this:  You’re attending a wake.  The room is hushed, a battered Kleenex box is passed around and the grieving family stands in a somber receiving line.   A woman of indeterminate age enters and gravely pays her respects, shaking hands with each family member until she suddenly turns heel and leaves the room.  Her friend, a long-time confidante and member of the family, follows.  Knowing her aversion to occasions of this sort, he fully expects a sheepish excuse.  Instead she tells him that the handsome temptation in the receiving line was too much for her and wished to spare him the embarrassment of a funereal proposition.  Thinking himself the object of desire, he demurs and graciously offers to escort her out.  She accepts and once safely on his arm, expounds at length on the nature of her interest.  It seems that it was not he, but his son that inspired her ardor.

Of course, I didn’t believe his story.  Nobody gets picked up, or jilted, at a funeral.  It just isn’t done.

Unless you are a member of the secret underground of Illinoisan swingers who meet online on swapping sites and convene in large hotels along the interstates.

Again, I refused to believe it.  That’s the kind of behavior attributed to jaded city-dwellers and fictional characters in Letters to Penthouse.  Nobody has the kind of illicit, toe-curling rendezvous that makes good copy and everyone jealous.

Unless you are an active participant in said Midwestern sex underground.

I casually mentioned it to a young co-worker.  “This place is full of freaks,” said I, without a shred of judgment.  “And I thought Chicago was bad.

She just shrugged.  “Yeah, it is.” 

I tried to conceal my shock.  Not even twenty-one and she was completely nonplussed.  It made me wonder if I had crossed the threshold into Old Fartdom.

“Not much to do during the long winter.”

She had a point.  Cabin fever can make people do the craziest things.

I know what it is.  That thing you’ve been trying so hard to conceal.  That image that keeps floating to the center of your mind no matter how diligently you push it away.  That secret you carry around in your heart that prompts you to lie to your friends and family.  That constant inner reminder that there is one person on Earth who knows what you did.

Oh, yeah.  That one. 

It’s a biggie, isn’t it?  After all this time, you still find yourself recalling every detail, etching them into your mind lest they be forgotten sacrifice on the altar of your folly.  And what a mistake it was.  Every hour, every day that passes by since then feels like an eternity.  But all you’ve got is time, time to think about what you’ve done and what you failed to do.

Of course you tried to bury yourself under a mound of artificially generated concern for those whom you felt were wronged.  That’s the easiest way to seem engaged.  As long as you feign interest in the mind-numbing prattle of the zombies around you, they won’t slash you open and devour your entrails.

Because that’s what you really expect, don’t you?  To be drawn and quartered and publically humiliated for the error of your ways?  You sin, you pay.  It’s as simple as that.  And then spend the rest of your life in a guilt-driven haze, cleared only occasionally when you indulge in… you guessed it… your last weakness.

And it saps you of strength, doesn’t it?  You’d rather lie in bed, clinging to those last moments of a dream when you were entwined rather than face the day and its inevitability.  But you force yourself up and paste on a smile, or what passes for one, and carefully misdirect your audience until you can lock the office door and tune out the noise.

For that’s what your life has become:  a blur of nonsensical noise.  A constant clamoring for your attention and the systematic rejection of your deepest needs.  So you defend by emotional detachment and drift away into a solitary world of your own creation.  You lead a completely separate life though surrounded by others.

Lonely, isn’t it?  But you’re resigned to your fate.  You tried to break free once, but you misjudged opinion and it stung you.   It’s always dangerous to expect sympathy from those incapable of it.  And even worse when your entire self-worth is entrusted to them.

So it’s back to the secret life in your head, the one place where you can play with impunity. 

I forgot my ear buds, so I was forced to listen instead to the random conversations on the bus… most of which were dull and lulled me into the stupor that mass transit induces.  Living in a college town in the autumn means lots of discussions about beer and football.

And death apparently, if the exchange I overheard between two former lovers is any measure.  A young girl got on at Vine and University, laden with a heavy backpack and a smile.  It vanished when the young man seated in front of me jumped up, took her arm and tried to kiss her.  She wrenched the arm from his grasp and turned her head.  “Please don’t touch me,” she said.  “You have no right.”

He looked chastened and said nothing as he retreated back to his seat.  She sat down next to me and retrieved a book from her bag.  For several minutes a silence hung between them, as if much needed to be said, but neither was willing to break it.  The man looked over his shoulder more than a few times before finally heaving a sigh and telling her how much he’d missed her.

She never looked up from the book.  “You made your choice.  Now live with it.”

Ah, something worth listening to, thought I.  I put on a pair of dark sunglasses and feigned a nap to better observe them.  I felt like that spy in the house of love.

“Won’t you even look at me?” he pleaded.

“No,” she said firmly.  “I won’t fall for that again.”

He searched her face, but she refused to meet his gaze.  He looked ashamed.  “Will you ever forgive me?”

“There’s nothing to forgive,” she said, looking up at last.  I noticed that she kept her eyes averted from his.  “What you did to me, you’ve done your whole life.  I’m just one of many missed opportunities.”

With that, he turned around and faced forward.  The girl returned to her reading and I, thankfully, got off at my usual stop several blocks later. 

I couldn’t help but imagine the circumstances that had flung the young couple together, or those that had divided them.  This wasn’t the florid exchange between overwrought teenagers, but a thoughtful one that showed more wisdom than one expects from college kids.

I saw a few people dressed in costume and remembered that it was Día de los Muertos.  I chuckled to myself.  It seemed fitting that death and forgiveness were the highlights of my bus ride.  Whether it’s the end of life or just the end of the road, no one can move forward without permission.   To forgive is not to forget, but rather the refusal to carry another’s burden.

It was the big tree that caught my eye.  Sitting in the middle of nowhere, easy to spot on the flat prairie, but in full leaf like an invitation.

So I accepted.

I turned off the county road and drove the rutted lane to the top of the rise, turned off the engine and surveyed my domain:  Corn on the left, soybeans on the right and a huge sky above them both.

I sat down, resting against the trunk and looked up into the green canopy.  How many others had done the same?  Or did they pass it by, hurrying down the road without a second thought.

It was during this reverie that I heard it for the first time.  Funny how I hadn’t noticed it before.  Humming.  And it seemed to be coming from the tree.

I jumped, thinking a beehive nearby, but closer inspection revealed none.  I circled the tree more slowly, alert to any change in the sound’s strange timbre and found myself reaching toward old graffiti cut into the bark:

                                                “H.D.   1887”

No sooner had my finger traced the last number when the ground gave way and I dropped into a brick-lined tunnel that angled downward and shot me a good 500 yards from where I had stood.  I rolled to a stop in front of a wooden door, painted red like a barn.

Maybe I should have turned around and crawled back through the tunnel.  Maybe I should have asked myself how I could see the color of the door without any ambient light.  Maybe I should have wondered why anyone would build such a structure.  I should have done any of these, but I didn’t.  I just couldn’t resist taking a peek behind the door.

So I looked.

Clearly I wasn’t devoured by monsters because I lived to tell my tale.  But what I saw… and what I did once I stepped across the threshold, I’m not at liberty to discuss.  What I can tell you is this:  If you drive the isolated stretch on County Road 9 and spot the lone tree, ignore its invitation.

She winds her hands in his hair, long argent strands curling around her fingers .  The smell of tobacco and mint drifts from his lips.  What are you thinking about, he asks.  Don’t you know?   Strange how the sea cannot fathom the heart.

“CUT!!”  The director threw the script to the floor.  “What kind of dreck is this?” he bellowed.  “Get me the screenwriter!” 

His assistant scuttled to the door, making frantic motions with his arm until a slumped shouldered woman with tired eyes appeared and lowered it to his side.

“You called for me, Chief?”  She shuffled across the soundstage and pulled a battered laptop from her satchel.

“You call this passion?” he said, kicking the script her way.  “How can I make the audience pant when you don’t give me any heat?  Jesse!!” 

The assistant crept out from behind him.  “Gimme one of your Vicodin; I got a migraine”.  He swiped the pill from the assistant’s trembling hand, and washed it down with the last dregs of coffee in his mug. 

“Listen up, people, we got 6 hours to pull this together or we don’t make deadline!  And you two…” he said, glaring at the actors on the set bed, “at least try to look like you’re interested.  You’re actors for chrissakes…”

The writer raised the lid and began typing…

She rakes her fingers through his hair, long silken hanks that brush her face and curtain them off from the rest of the world.  She inhales deeply before looking into his eyes, searching for meaning within still tidal pools.  What are you thinking about, he whispers.  How much I love you.

“CUT!!!  No, no, NO!!  Not rom-com cornball bullshit!”

Again the script flew through the air and the hapless assistant scuttled to find the writer.  “If I had a bigger budget, I could have hired someone with talent, who knows what I want!  But, noooo… I’m stuck with a literature geek from Hyde Park! JESSE!!”

Jesse sprinted to his side. “Get on the phone and track down that writer from Vivid.”

“But, sir,” squeaked Jesse, iPhone in hand, “he writes porn.”  

“I don’t care if he’s a goddamn porn writer, at least he can write heat!!” The director leaned back into his chair and mumbled under his breath. “… two SAG nominations and now this… If that woman doesn’t torpedo my career, I don’t know what will.”

The writer stepped forward from the group standing paralyzed off-set.  They watched silently as she padded up to the director and opened her computer. 

“You sent for me, Chief?”

He turned with some effort to face her.   “Did I or did I not tell you that this is not a film for women?” asked he through clenched teeth.  “I don’t care about the psyche of this character, or any like her.  This is a man’s film.  It’s not even important that she thinks at all, only that she’s ready to go.  Got it?”

“Got it, Chief.”  

The director dismissed her with a wave and called for a twenty minute break.  The set was immediately abandoned as cast and crew fled outside to smoke and worry.   The writer sat quietly in the silence, recollecting her memories and tapping them onto the keyboard…

She twines her fingers through his hair, still damp from the shower.  He’ll need another one before she sends him home, damper still with sweat and longing.    What are you thinking about, he growls. There’s an off-shore storm roiling in his eyes.  How much I want you.

“Cut!  Print!”  The director’s shoulders sagged, but there was a trace of smile across his thin lips.  “There!” he said contentedly.   “Now was that so hard to do?

The writer shrugged and closed her computer.  Harder than you’ll ever know.

When last I spoke to her, she was planning a ski trip with her new boyfriend, a 20 year-old college student that she had met at a store-front art gallery.  I wasn’t all that surprised when she called this morning at 2am, begging me to meet her at an all-night diner.

“If I knew then what I know now, I wouldn’t have bothered,” she sobbed, burying her head in the crook of her arm.  She looked up suddenly with swollen red eyes.  “And if you tell anyone and I mean anyone you saw me like this, I’ll deny everything!”

 “So what happened?” I asked, partially guessing the truth.  If I knew Suzanne, it probably involved love gone wrong.

 “He left me for his wife.”

“He’s married?  I didn’t think he lived in Kentucky.”

“Not Josh, you idiot, his father.” 

“You got involved with the son AND the father?”  This was new holy ground, even for her.

“Not at the same time, Kimmy,” she whimpered.  “ Peter just sort of happened.”

 “Peter?  His name is Peter?  Why not Dick?” 

“If you only knew how he made me feel…”  She looked off into the distance, eyes suddenly unfocused.  “I felt alive for the first time in my life.” 

“You said that about his son, remember?” 

“No, no,” she said, eyes refocusing.  “He was just a kid, an amusement to fill my lonely days.”  She heaved a sigh and crumpled into the seat. “And now my loneliness has no bounds.”

I rolled my eyes.  As a businesswoman, she really missed her calling.  She would have been better off on the stage.  “Don’t you think you’re overdramatizing the matter, Suzanne?  He’ll be forgotten in a week.”

“You’ve never been supportive of me,” she snapped, drawing herself up. “I’m pouring out my heart and you dismiss me!”

“If that’s the case,” I said dryly,  ”why am I sitting in Denny’s at 3 o’clock in the morning?  I could be at home, dreaming about George Clooney.” 

“I should have called one of my real friends,” she muttered.  “They’d understand my pain.” 

“You don’t have any other friends, Suzi. They all got tired of the late-night emergencies.”

“ … someone with real heart, who knows the wretchedness of my being….”

“If you don’t stop right now, you and your wretched self will be sitting alone.”

 She shifted back on topic without taking a breath.  “…he told me that he loved me… that he wanted to have kids with me…” 

“Kids?!  Are you kidding me?  You’re 52!” 

“I should’ve had my eggs harvested before I switched over to Cobra,” she said, wandering off again. “They don’t cover fertility treatments.” 

“Yeah, I can see you as a mom.”

“Oh, can you?” she asked breathlessly.

 “The first time the kid pukes on your Coach bag, you’ll be handing him off to a nanny like a football.”

She frowned.  “I planned on being a hands-on mom.  I’d never hire help.” 

“How could you?  You already have a stylist, personal trainer and chef on payroll.” 

“But, now… now, it’s over!” she wailed, “and he’s gone back to that cow.” 

“Perhaps it’s best,” I said. “No doubt the entire family will need counseling after you plowed your way through them.”

“She doesn’t even love him, Kimmy!  She sleeps on the sofa with the dog.”

“Maybe he snores?” 

“She smokes like a chimney and has an ass like a Mack truck,” she sneered, lighting up a Winston. “At least I go to the gym…”   

“But what about Josh, the snowboarder?”  I asked, digging for the real story.  “I don’t suppose he warmed to the idea of you banging his father.” 

“What?”  She seemed distracted. “Oh, him.  You’re right, I should blame that little twirp!  I wouldn’t have even looked at Peter if it hadn’t been Joshie’s doing.”

“He hooked you up?”  This really was sordid.

“No, he just had too many Jager shots that night and passed out.  I went downstairs and there he was… Peter all alone and desperate for company.”

“So while your teenage boyfriend was sleeping off the booze, you seduced his father?” 

“Seduce?  Kimmy, why do you have to cheapen everything?  It was love…” 

“Wait a minute, let me get a visual here… the kid’s asleep, you’re canoodling with his father and the wife, where was she?”

“In New York with their terrier.”  She sighed again.   “Everything was perfect:  the moon, the snow, the bearskin rug in front of the fire…” 

“…the alienation of affection…”

“Before I knew it, we were pledging undying love.” 

“Was that before or after his wife came back?” 

“It wasn’t like that,” she said indignantly.  “Well, not exactly like that …”   

“What was it like… exactly?” 

She squirmed a bit. “Well, Joshie must have seen us because he called his mother  and she had her fat ass on a red-eye within an hour.”  She frowned and stubbed out her cigarette.  “You just can’t trust young people nowadays…”

Stop pounding on the wall, damn it!  I’ll get out of here when I’m good and ready.  Besides, I paid for this room and I’ll do what I want in it.

Jesus, you never get privacy anywhere, do you?  I wouldn’t have had to move into this hole if I found it at home, now would I?  Yeah, well, what’s waiting there, except more questions and faces hounding me. I can’t get anything done while they’re staring and asking stupid things.  Why can’t everyone just leave me alone?

And that goes double for you, whoever you are behind that wall!  If I hear you banging one more time, I’ll punch through myself and teach you a lesson.  Can’t you see that genius is at work?  Morons.  They wouldn’t know art if it slapped them in the face. 

Doesn’t matter.  I’ll just stay here with my friends and we’ll convene with the gods until I fall asleep with the needle in my arm and when I wake up, everything will be changed and I won’t have to explain where I’ve been and who I’ve been with.  And I’ll float on a white cloud of euphoria that will take me to places I’ve only dreamt about and my arrival will signal a new dimension of expression which will be hailed as revolutionary and daring and all the kids will want to emulate me and download my stuff and I’ll become as famous and wealthy as I’ve imagined.  Only it’s real and not just a notion that lies untapped at the bottom of my potential.

Because I’m not just latent talent waiting undiscovered and unappreciated.  When I speak, the angels weep and beg me to continue.  And why should I stop?  I have every right to stand up and say what I feel, even though most of it I buried a long time ago.  I got my pride, you know.  And people depend on me, and I can’t let them down…

What are you talking about?  I’m not running away, I’m running toward.  Running toward that thing which gives me reason to live.  That perfect tone, that unmatched harmonic which only I can hear and bring to the toneless.  This isn’t escapism, you hayseed, this is ART!  And it’s the only reason I exist, to act as channel and funnel its brilliance into crude medium where even the blind can see.  So, don’t bother me with your mundane requests and hysterical demands, because I know what I’m doing.  I can control myself.  The only intervention I require is that of public laud.

And they will come.  Droves and droves of adoring people, throwing their money and themselves at my feet, calling out my name in the collective voice of thousands and I’ll know that I’ve achieved what I’ve planned in this dreary little room.  I’ll be vindicated at last and set upon Mount Olympus while the rest of you scratch your heads.

So, stop nagging and get out! And take all the rest of your small-mindedness with you.  I’m being called to a higher purpose and will commune using whatever vehicle I find and won’t be hampered by the needs of the body.  It’s nothing compared to the glories which I see in my head.

I didn’t think I had that many in mine.  I was wrong.

You know what I mean… all those persons who are bad news, activities that sap your strength, thought patterns that are destructive.  How many in your garden?

I’ve spent years trying to whittle off mental and physical baggage, sometimes successfully.  Other times, not.  And even though I thought I was being fairly diligent about the process, the cosmos must believe differently because my garden is choked with weeds.

Let’s be honest.  I know what to do; I’ve just been reluctant to do it because for one, I’m lazy and for two,  I can’t make a decision.  What if I need one of them later?  Will they resent being yanked from my yard?  If I pull the wrong one, what then?

In addition, there’s something disturbing about a pristine garden.  It doesn’t look like the rest.  Someone’s bound to take notice and sound the alarm, and before you know it, you’re surrounded by a hostile mob demanding explanation why you’ve chosen to be different.  Weeds are good, you’re told, let ‘em grow like we do and you’ll fit right in.

But what if you don’t fit in?

What if you don’t want what everyone else claims to have, but can’t produce?  Isn’t there something more than short-term gratification and long-term regret?

I was once told a long time ago that the road to self-awareness is a lonely one.  It has to be because the individual is the only one who can travel it.   We delay our departure because so many things/weeds get in the way until we’re just too tired to start.  So we invest in the next generation, hoping they’ll have the courage to go where we could not.  The only problem is that, as humans, we learn by example.  If you’re wondering why young people are fat, complacent, and somewhat unwilling to fledge, we have only to look at ourselves.

I don’t want to suffocate under the weight of weeds which my inaction allowed to proliferate.  So today, while the moon is New, I’m putting on my kneepads and gloves, and will hoe until my garden is free and I can breathe once more.

I saw the devil the other day and it did not look like popular depiction.  Instead, it wore the scariest face of all… that of an ordinary person.

Not being high up the spiritual food chain, I never expected a personal visit.  I mean, why would the Trickster be interested in my life?  I don’t have dominion over anything but myself, and am hardly the kind of person to lead the righteous into battle, so imagine my surprise when the placid matron in front of me suddenly morphed into the Lord of the Flies.

She didn’t look particularly evil -aside from the usual middle-aged vanity-, and her intelligence seemed only average at best.  Yet as she turned to leave, her eyes flashed a sickly yellow and her sword found its mark.  Its blade was only sharp words, but they cut deep and I found myself spinning helplessly in an eddy of self-doubt.

I tried to disguise the pain by plastering on a benign look, but she knew it was false, and even smiled as she left the room.  I tried not to think about fangs, but her shiny porcelain veneers covered more than uneven canines.  I didn’t realize until later, after I had sorted through my anger and discarded the theory that she was just another bitchy female, that I had been ambushed by Old Scratch.

At first I was alarmed.  Presbyterian horrors flooded my mind:  Fire!  Brimstone!  Pitchforks to the heinie!  I was gagging with terror.  The theoretical clash of Good versus Evil was making real contact with my own life and it almost paralyzed me with fear.

Almost.

What if the Adversary had actually done me a favor?

I realized that I had a chink in my armor.  I was still holding onto ideas that, if challenged, could trigger fear and doubt.   And what were those ideas anyway… self-importance?  Achievement?  Could I truly be damaged by another person’s poor opinion and careless words? Only if I think acknowledgement confirms my merit.

What’s more is that I discovered a chink in the Fiend’s armor, too.  No matter how many millions he terrorizes, he will never be satisfied because he is as entangled in the Original Error as any of us.  If it’s true that Lucifer was cast down because he wanted to be like God, then his punishment was due to misperception and not ambition.   You cannot covet what you already have.  If God created everything, then everything is of God and cannot be separated from Her.  Acts of cruelty and violence upon another become self-inflicted wounds that fester and cannot be cured from without.

Why do we allow ourselves to be held hostage by the blatant rudeness and self-advancement of others?  Are we afraid of offending them?  Have we become a nation of those who observe social order and those who don’t?

These phenomena are not limited to the surly 20-something bagging your groceries, or the snotty 30-something who can’t be bothered with responsibility if it interferes with her plans for the evening.  Consider our elected officials, corporate honchos, celebrities… all of whom have no internal conflict with elbowing their way to the front of the line.  Did Goldman Sachs wring their hands with humilation before extending them for a handout?  No.  They paid their directors fat bonuses with the windfall.   Are the Bickersons in Congress fighting about solutions to our national debt, or are they fighting for pack position?  If you think they’re working for you, think again.  The only thing driving these self-seekers is self.

Shouldn’t we organize a revolt and throw out all the miserable parasites?  Sure, but what explanation will you offer the constituents who voted them in, or the stockholders who are dependent on the actions of the board?  Yeah, nobody likes BP drilling in the Gulf, Exxon puking crude across Montana and AIG reneging on their federal bailout… but nothing is actually done about it.  Congress offers a rebuke and lawsuits are filed, but we all know the end to that particular story.  Litigation will continue for years and those immediately effected will lose their homes, businesses and lives in the interim.  It’s just collateral damage, but within acceptable limits for those who don’t really care what happens provided their agenda are met.

Just like that bully on the playground.  You remember him, don’t you?  The savage who stole money and doled out black eyes for fun?  Everyone tiptoed around him for fear of being the next target, or became toadies to get a piece of the action.  As much as he was loathed, he was useful to some.  He was the hammer that broke the nuts and took the best -but not all-  for himself.  The rest was divided among those who feared association with him as much as losing the benefits rendered by such association.  As long as their hands were not used to punch your face and swipe your wallet, they could plead innocence to the crime and still enjoy its perks.

Which is why nothing is done in Congress or in court to curb the behavior of monolithic bullies:  Someone is benefitting from their actions.  Maybe that someone is your neighbor, co-worker or Facebook friend… someone who publicly condemns the savagery yet is privately dependent upon it.  Stock porfolios, 401ks, retirement funds, business investments and Social Security benefits all depend upon the bits gleaned from the nutshells.  Could that someone be you?

He wasn’t a saint, but I adored him anyway.  From my earliest memories of him carrying me on his arm, to his last day on life support when that arm fell slack and he slipped away, he was my Dad and champion.

It was a struggle in the early years, but something always appeared when needed.  Dad worked a full-time job while putting himself through undergraduate and law school, and still managed to provide enough to allow my mother to stay at home to care for three children.  We didn’t have much, but I didn’t know it.  Our home was tidy, with a large garden and fruit trees in the backyard.  Dad built life-size playhouses in the yard and took us camping in the summer.   I can still taste the strawberries that grew in the sandy soil.

Because he worked odd shifts I didn’t see him much, save the early mornings when I’d get up just to watch him shave and eat Cheerios together at the formica kitchen table.  He never spoke to me as if I was a child.  Instead, he would tell me about history, or philosophy, or possibilities of the future.  I never thought they were abstract concepts.  Dreams were real because my dad made them so by utterance.

More than home, education and stability, he unlocked my mind during those formative years and gave me its key:  the belief that anything is possible.  Goals met, visions realized, problems solved, ideas created… there are no limits, only limited beliefs.

Maybe he fostered an over-imaginative daughter, but even in my darkest hours I have never lost hope or faith.  Dad taught me, whether by lesson or model, that they are indestructible virtues and if sincerely embraced, will take the believer to places yet to be imagined.  Not just successes within this world, but to the infinite number beyond.

There are many more, but here are a few:

1. I’m alive
2. I have a roof over my head
3. There is food in the pantry and in the refrigerator
4. I’m blessed with amazingly good health
5. There was a soft breeze blowing through the window this morning
6. My car is paid off
7. I have no credit card debt
8. My house is soon to be sold
9. I have a job
10. I have a job I like
11. I have a job I like that pays me well
12. I can ride my bike to work
13. Just started a new year-long learning project
14. Have another waiting the wings after I finish #13
15. After 34 years of waiting, we finally got together
16. There are a dozen red roses on my table
17. We have dinner reservations tonight at 7
18. My mother is my hero and role model
19. When I look out my window, I see beautiful trees and green grasses blowing with the wind
20. I have a perfect little cubbyhole office made for reflection, practice and writing
21. I have the best cousins in the world and the most awesome family
22. My college years were insanely fun
23. I survived to tell about #22
24. I stood in the middle of Stonehenge
25. I put myself through college
26. My sprained ankle healed in record time, a full 3 weeks ahead of schedule
27. I’ve burned a few, but most of my bridges are still standing
28. My stepfather is the kindest of men
29. Grandma crocheted an afghan for my 18th birthday and told me to wrap up tight whenever I needed her love.  I still do.
30. My father, though 10 years gone, still watches over me.
31. I saw Mother Theresa walking down the concourse at O’Hare Airport
32. I felt a cool Himalayan breeze under my hand when I touched a rare Tibetan thangka
33. I saw a UFO
34. I wasn’t abducted by #33
35. My cat Tinkerbelle gave me 14 happy years of companionship and taught me much about selfless love
36. I have few regrets
37. I can stand on my head
38. I have visited some magical places
39. I can talk to my best friends about anything
40. Even the most painful experiences can yield the sweetest discoveries
41. I live in a peaceful corner of the world
42. I can read, vote and make my voice heard
43. My lungs function
44. My heart beats
45. My brain, on occasion, functions
46. The older I become, the happier I get.
47. Was saved by divine intervention more than a few times
48. Learned the hard way, but the truth finally sank in
49. I’m so grateful for all the wonderful people in my path, prickly or not
50. Get to take long walks again
51. I cherish every moment
52. My tax refund arrived today!

Would you give up everything now to be rewarded later?  What if the sacrifice required hardship… or worse?  Would you still be willing to walk the walk, or would you -like most- just talk it and hope for the best?

I’m not certain what inflicts the greater damage to earth and nations:  religious zeal or corporate greed.  Both are blind to consequence.  Are the fanatics who lure men and women to their deaths in the name of righteousness any better than anonymous board members who employ men and women to plunder resources for gain?   Isn’t it all just a struggle for mandate?

Who’s on top, who’s below… it’s conflict without solution, like a never-ending game of King of the Mountain with a succession of kings either fighting to reach the pinnacle or fighting those who wish to unseat him.  And except for inflaming rivalry and anger, nothing is really accomplished.  The winner guards what he cannot keep and the others vie for it.  A completely futile exercise…

… but one that remain irresistible to those who haven’t yet graduated from competitive reality.  As long as there is someone to dominate, compare or belittle, there is little time for reflection upon right action.  It’s hard to put away selfish desires and operate from a place of compassion, especially when there’s no tangible incentive and nobody else is doing it.  It’s easier just to clobber your neighbor than help him.

But what if that has become tiresome and you yearn for something greater?  Has pushing and shoving through life yielded the happiness you seek?  Or are you still looking, hoping it can be found and reconciled to the habits you’re unwilling to break?

Nearly all religious and spiritual traditions have simplicity at their cores, a voluntary relinquishment of attachments to worldly life.  How that is ultimately achieved varies with doctrine, but all require surrender… not of self, but of those misperceptions that comprise self.

Picture this:  You’re at home or work, toiling away at some mundane task, when a strange mendicant approaches and urges you to abandon everything -home, work, family, mortgage- and to follow.  You scoff at the notion until a second glance affords you a look into infinity and you wonder why this odd person would ask such a thing, or why he/she glows with a palpable radiance.  You are confused, struggling between what is expected and what is possible, but you cannot shake off what you have briefly glimpsed.  Nor can you explain the serenity that creeps over you like a blanket, shutting out all the anxieties that dogged you previously.

“Follow me and others will follow you,” says your strange guest.

Now you have a choice:  Push through the fear that you’ve lost your mind and consider the offer… or dismiss the whole thing as the rambling of a complete nutcase.   Consider those who put their faith in someone like Harold Camping and gave up everything to spread his doomsday message.  Were they wrong to believe?

Our minds like finite ideas:  dates of apocalypse, numbers of people saved, estimates of the condemned,  bragging rights.  What we seem to shrink from is the notion that there are no finite concepts.  There are no divisions of race, color, creed, gender, ability, language, custom, or nation.  Nor are we separate from birds in the air or the rocks on the ground.  Indeed we are all just molecular particles swirling in space.  The only boundaries that exist are the ones in our minds.  And as long as we insist upon forcing this mental template upon the whole of creation, we will struggle.

For the struggle is not with neighbors, the boss or the government.  It is our own refusal to see everyone and everything as ourself.  Would you be a fisher of men and embrace all that you see regardless of the protests of your mind, or will you seek the temporary safety of exclusion?

… is not Kathy Bates wielding a sledgehammer.  Or the lady sleeping in a cardboard box under Wacker Drive.  Or the woman living in purdah in some God-forsaken corner of the world.   She’s the one right next to you.

You know who I mean.  That woman who pushes herself beyond all human endurance and then snaps… usually in your face and about something that is completely non-contextual.  The one at the gym that does more reps and kills herself on the stepper, and then screams in your face because you took her locker by mistake.  The one that attends more soccer games, Scout meetings, PTA pow-wows and ballet classes than anyone alive and explodes when she can’t find a parking space next to the door at Trader Joe’s.  The one working 40 hours a week while attending night school that you find sobbing in a corner of the ladies room.  Yeah… her.

I ran into her last night.  She waylaid me as I walked from my car to the door of the studio, madder than a hornet and ready to do battle.  Or at least her beastly (and much bigger) companion was, a hulking resentful mess of a woman who was clearly drafted by her to act as back-up.  Without much explanation, she launched a raging verbal assault, complete with finger-pointing and lots of name-calling.  The reason for her meltdown?  I turned off a fan.

Yep, I admit it.  I switched off a fan.  Guess that makes me quite the villainess, right?  And I suppose it would… provided it was ventilating priceless artifacts or cooling giant servers.

It wasn’t.  In fact, the only thing it was cooling down were my students who were shivering in the drafty classroom.  So I turned it off, little suspecting the firestorm to come.

But it came like the wind, bearing down on me in the shape of a fireplug with an extremely bad temper and a spittle problem.  It gathered in the corners of her mouth like tiny wads of cotton and I tried not to stare, fixing a blank look of interested concern on my face.  I wasn’t, of course, because she was completely deranged and refused me rebuttal, but I feigned it, wondering when she’d run out of ammo and finally shut up.

It dragged on and on.  I never knew there were so many variations on a theme.  How many ways can you say You inconvenienced me therefore you should die?  Even She-Hulk, the hired muscle, threw in her two cents with a couple of artless insults.  I had hoped for something more creative.

In fact, the entire event was a letdown. A huge waste of time, words and energy.. and for what?  Hurt feelings?  One-upmanship?  Petty triumph?  This miserable woman blew a fuse because she couldn’t get she wanted:  priority in all things.  Despite knowing that it would cause discomfort to others, she switched on a fan to cool herself and became enraged when her desire was subordinated (by me) to the needs of the group.

Yes, she was angry; that was apparent as she screamed at me in the parking lot.  And yet, the location of her tantrum told me more about her true feelings than the venom she spewed.  She was ashamed of herself.

Why else would she take pains to conceal her temper?  If she had a valid argument, it would withstand public scrutiny.  Instead she chose to act as a coward and ambush me in private.

And she was fearful.  If not, there would be no need for the hired thug.

And most importantly, she needed to vent to somebody that she trusted.  Venting is ugly, unfeminine and harsh.  No woman wants to be seen or remembered in that light.  But I’ve seen her without her flesh mask and I now know what she truly is.  Explosive knowledge of that kind can only be entrusted to the non-judgmental.

So in a crazy, mixed-up roundabout way, she was reaching out and revealing to me that which she dare not in public. Does she need or want my forgiveness?  It doesn’t matter.  She has it nonetheless.

It’s become so unfashionable to discuss faith that unless it’s brought up at a religious service, it usually implies the speaker is either a fanatic or a boor.  No one wants to hear personal revelation.  Anecdotal stories involving the supernatural are the stuff of snooze fests because they tend to be predictable:  Lost soul finds way and becomes insufferable.  Nobody doubts the authenticity of the transformation; only the new convert’s ability to demonstrate the same compassion that lead to it.

But grace manifests everyday, and it can leave one wanting to shout from the rooftops.  I know, because it happened to me.

No, I did not become a reborn Christian.  Nor did I feel compelled to shove my experience down the necks of my listeners.  In fact, I didn’t really tell anyone because I didn’t need confirmation that something extraordinary had occured.  I was living it and it filled my heart with joy. 

Never in my fifty-odd years did I think that I’d have a second chance with my mother, a woman whom made my life a painful, guilt-ridden anger trip. My earliest recollections were of wanting to get away from her, her rages, her petty manipulations and her all-powerful energy that suffocated me.  I appealed to my father, my ally against her, but he would not divide himself from her.  I was alone for years, the sole holdout pegged as either uncooperative, ungrateful or competitive.

My father’s early death only intensified the silent feud.  We went through the motions and properly discharged our social roles, but with a contempt so tangible despite the smiles that I’m certain it oppressed all who had the misfortune to witness it.  Decades of therapy, practice, and introspection brought no peace, so I gave up all hope for a reconciliation.  I wanted so desperately to have a mother, a real one, but resigned myself to my fate.  Not everyone has the luxury of a loving parent.

Over the years, I heard countless explanations for it:  Karmic destiny, ego battling ego,  jealousy, competition for my father’s favor, resentment, vanity.   Any one could have been plausible.  But as time passed, I lost interest in finding its origin and just allowed things to be.

And that’s when Grace intervened.

Circumstances flung us together for a short but intense period and during that time, something changed.  Were we older and wiser?  Did Fate smile upon us and grant us a reprieve?  Had God decided we quarreled enough?  Or did we finally let down our guards and confess we needed each other?  All I know is that when we parted, I felt like I was leaving the nest to fledge for the very first time.  I wept and so did she.

Maybe it was an atypical gestation, but I had the amazing luck to be born again… this time to a woman that I know with all my heart and soul loves me.  I can see her clearly at last, with all her beauty and strength, and I am so deeply grateful for the gift that I, too, want to sing from the rooftops:  So happy to have another chance and so humbled that it was given.