Boston 1/06

Rainy mild weather, blustery wind, rattling the windows and spattering rain across the panes. One of those days where it feels like Hyampom--quiet, settled in, no desires.

Every year a month or so before the retreat, the retreat begins to manifest itself. I have been missing my life in Hyampom, but suddenly that life descends on me in Boston with it's peacefulness, the acceptance of what is, the awareness of weather and some acknowledgment that we are not in control, but part of a large system and a network of life which awareness sees through our eyes and is astonished.

I also have been feeling old here, realizing the limits of limb and brain cell. When I walk around at home, I don't expect adventure so much as I feel reverberating with every step, layers of the past, and with it, the mind set, the emotions of another time. The past is deep now, and my view of events shifts and rearranges itself so that the shame I felt at four is held with tenderness. The pain of adolescence is not just about me, but the gropings of a young life hiding from itself. The fear which was hidden and denied finally is seen clearly beyond the thin veil of bravado, of risk, of thrust and parry.

I forgive myself.