"TO OUR READERS. The New Yorker this week devotes its entire editorial space to an article on the almost complete obliteration of a city by one atomic bomb, and what happened to the people of that city [...]"
John Hersey's Hiroshima begins:
"At exactly fifteen minutes past eight in the morning on August 6, 1945, Japanese time, at the moment when the atomic bomb flashed above Hiroshima, Miss Toshiko Sasaki, a clerk in the personnel department of the East Asia Tin Works, had just sat down at her place in the plant office and was turning her head to speak to the girl at the next desk."
This was in my inbox today from the Writer's Almanac. Today is a memorial service as well for a dear friend, a yogini named Katy who has passed and left her physical, linear time and space with us on earth . I have spent much of the past few weeks contemplating the realm of random vs intentional experiences in my life, Thus I have not blogged much lately. I feel as if I am in some submerged diving expedition and amidst the very confusing place my mind has entered recently, a death of a friend. A friend who is a mother like me, like me a yogini, like me an explorer of sorts, like me, someone who prefers giving rather than taking.So , i ask more about the randomness of human suffering, the very fine line between what seems to us intentional, yet is so random and in any moment in time ,there seems like there is a singular solution when the possibilities may be infinite. What moves one beyond the entrapments of finding only one solution when there can and are so many possibilities that exist.
I return now to finish this entry after being at the memorial service of my dear friend,Katy who has passed. Many beautiful words and sentiments were shared about the very full and vibrant life of a valiant woman who experienced great suffering but also vast joyfulness which she open heartedly and generously shared.
The afermath musings today for me after losing my friend come after tears, anger, regret , acceptance and forgiveness. I come to these simple conclusions:
Life is so very brief,
Time passes so very quickly,
Suffering is random,ubiquitous and senseless,
We have much daily work to do in reaching out to the living,
Take no person, no kind word , kind action for granted,
A kind word to a friend in need can and does save a life,
Take no gift of kindness , however random or specific for granted,
Appreciate the abundant wonder and beauty that is always within us and around us, if we only choose to see ,
Never feign love or affection as we can not live ,breath or grow without it,it is what sustains, connects us and makes us human....
Namaste
Dearest Emma,
ReplyDeleteYou speak truly about the randomness of suffering and the preciousness of life. Last night I watched an episode on Opera about a little 7-year old girl suffering with severe schizophrenia. I had no idea children could suffer from this most horrible of mental diseases--I thought only one developed it at least until 17 or 18.
This little girl and her two parents were interviewed on Oprah--they live in California. Essentially, all of the severe sufferings that an adult goes through with schizophrenia this little girl must undergo. She is bombarded with hallucinations and "imaginary friends" telling her to hurt herself and others every second of her life--from the time she wakes up in the morning until she goes to sleep. She has even tried to kill herself--and she's only 7!!
She has a baby brother, who she has tried to attack several times and the only way for her parents to ensure her and her brother's safety is to raise them in separate apartments. So basically the family is never together. The parents are on a tight schedule and one raises one child in one apartment and the other in the other next door and then they switch--and they do this every day of their lives.
Well in the interview the parents spoke of how painful this was for them and how they themselves have gone through depression because of it. The father confessed that at one time during all of this he considered suicide and had begun to swallow a bottle of his anti-depression medication. He was 1/4 way through the bottle when he stopped himself--he could not leave his children and his wife alone he said. He could not be that selfish. He also could not even go to the hospital to get his stomach pumped because he could not leave his wife alone with both kids at one time--so he had to force himself to stay awake and just walk off the effects of the drugs.
I was moved by this episode. These parents showed what it means to truly be parents. They admitted that it was a uphill struggle every day of their lives just to keep their child alive and healthy but it was obvious that this wasn't something they even had to think about.
They are parents and by definition this is their job. I admire their strength, honesty, and courage just to get up every morning and I also admire their little girl who is plagued with a kind of suffering I cannot even imagine.
amen sistah
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