School

"Nothing ever goes away until it teaches us what we need to know." Pema Chodron

In my World Religions class, we just finished a unit on Hinduism. The ideas of karma and a continual cycle of birth, death, rebirth, and so on challenge my linear way of thinking. It is so unlike our Western ways, so unlike the Christianity that I am most familiar with.

I am 54 years old. Most of the time I don't think much about my age. I am blessed with excellent health. There is a lot going on in my life that keeps me very active, and requires that I continue to think in new ways. But the day I wrote the post "Where Did I Go Wrong?" I felt about 100 years old, although I have no idea what it feels like to actually be 100. A friend who saw me that day remarked how old I looked. The issue with my loved one is something that I have been dealing with one way or another my entire life. It haunts me, as the words of people who died long ago come back to me, as their faces go by. It is as if I need to learn something here that I am totally missing. The lesson is repeated over and over and over and over, but I just don't "get it." What am I missing? When will the light bulb go on over my head? When will I finally pass this course?

The lesson is a painful one, too. Very painful. You know how people who advocate corporal punishment for children say things like, "That's the only way she'll ever learn..." What is wrong with me? Can't I learn what I need to learn without having it beaten into me?

At this point I think I am not even interested in learning the lesson. I just desperately want this class to be over. I don't care about getting an "A" anymore. A "D-" would be fine, anything that is a passing grade would be fine, just so I can move on. That's my linear thinking coming into play again. I want to move ahead, move on, move forward.

But the circles keep spinning endlessly, to my immense frustration. This class never ends.

Susan

A Fine Specimen

She was a single mom in her 30's. She had lupus, as well as other medical issues. She worked part-time when she needed to be working full-time, but her health limited what she could do. She was hoping to get better, or at the very least to get a stay in the death sentence she had been given. She just wanted to live long enough to raise her daughter.

At the time, she and I both attended an evangelical Christian church that looked at healing this way. God could heal you if he wants, but maybe it's his will for you to be sick. So pray, read your Bible, attend services, try to convert others to the faith and leave it at that. Go ahead and ask God to heal you, but don't count on it. There was also a subtle message that perhaps your unconfessed sin was preventing God from healing you. She made the rounds in her desperation to be healed. She sought the help of a Pentecostal church that taught it was always God's will to heal and only your lack of faith kept that from happening. They put oil on her and they put hands on her, but she didn't get well. She went away from that experience feeling guilty that she didn't have enough faith. She even found a group of renegade Catholics who performed an exorcism, because her illness could have actually been demon possession. That experience left her feeling somewhat icky and violated. If I sound irreverent, it's because I am.

Since I couldn't change a thing in her life, I tried to distract her. I would make her laugh. I would tell her jokes. I am a smart aleck, and I think what people love about me is I will actually say what everyone else is thinking. One of the many times she landed in the hospital, I went to visit her later that same day. She looked like death and I had never seen her more discouraged. We visited for a while. She told me she had to give a urine specimen, and I looked at the bottle of apple juice on her dinner tray, and had sudden inspiration. I guess you can guess what we did. We thought it was the most hilarious prank. Her color got a little better after that and at least for that evening anyway, all did not seem lost.

Who knows why bad things happen to good people and good things happen to bad people and bad things happen to bad people and good things happen to good people? I think it doesn't even matter. Who knows why we are here in this time, in this place? I am no longer a person of faith, not in the organized religion sense of the word anyway. I know there is definitely a spiritual side to life and a spiritual side to me. And as for my friend? I do know I will never forget her. How could I? I think of her every time I drink apple juice.

Susan

Last Words

"In the last analysis, what we are communicates far more eloquently than anything we say or do." Stephen Covey

You sit in a memorial service for a loved one. The things she did with her life are enumerated. Where she went to school, her occupation, her devotion to her family, her involvement in the community, her hobbies, her benevolence with church and charity. Anecdotes are shared, always poignant and often funny, of things she said. You somehow smile through your tears. It's a concrete way to celebrate her life. You are thinking, "We'll never forget you!" but there's a panicky little thought that maybe she will slip away forever.

As if that could ever happen! As the years go by, you may forget what she did and you may not recall everything she said, but who she was made such an indelible impression on you that while she may be dead, she lives on in you. You wish that those children born after her death could have known her, but in a way they do. Everyone who knows you knows her, too. They never witnessed her deeds or heard her voice. Yet she touched you and you touch others and in that very important way she never dies.

Susan

Sanctuary

The year I was in fourth grade was a very tough one for me. I don't know what was happening in my mother's life during that year, but her cruel treatment of me seemed to peak.

My teacher that year was a young woman who was extraordinarily kind. She impacted me in such a positive way that more than forty years later I looked her up, found her address and sent her a letter telling her what she had meant to me. We reconnected, and the next time I visited my hometown, she and I had lunch together.

I was not the only one who was having a rough time in that 1967-68 school year. None of us children knew it, but our teacher was hurting, too. Her mom was diagnosed with breast cancer before school started that year. She was with us during the day, but spent as much time as possible in the evenings and on weekends with her mother. Her mom passed away that same school year, in the spring. She told me that in that classroom, we kids were precious to her because she could forget the pain of knowing her mother was dying and concentrate on us.

My abuse was not physical, so from the outside I didn't betray the pain I went through. She knew nothing of my nightmare and I knew nothing of hers, yet we found sanctuary together. It made me feel so good that someone who had helped me was also helped by me.

Who are those who have shown you love and kindness, just when you needed it most? And have you ever let them know just what that meant to you?

Susan

Delighted To Be Here

When I was 16, my 24-year-old cousin was diagnosed with a terminal illness and three weeks later he was dead. It was the first time in my life where I was touched by the death of a young person. I have attended many funerals since then, but that was by the far the most heart wrenching. His young wife losing her husband while they were still practically newlyweds. My aunt and uncle, just in their 40's themselves, saying good-bye to their only child.

I once worked for a woman who made no bones about the fact she hated her job. Often when she came in to work in the morning, if someone said hello and asked how she was, she would smile and answer, "Delighted to be here." She meant it with her tongue in cheek, and who among us has not been less than thrilled over a new work day? Same old, same old.

I woke up this morning! And since you are reading this, you must have done the same. There are some folks who are not so lucky. As for me, I am delighted to be here.

Susan