My marriage to the Buddha

Dream:
I'm among a group of American tourists in some exotic, mountainous country. We're observing some local people who have prostatrated themselves in front of an ancient shrine, where a headless statue of Buddha sits among the ruins. Common legend holds that for some especially devoted followers, Buddha restores the head to the statue by inhabiting it. The tourists are moving on, but I can't go with them. In a gesture completely out of character, I throw myself to the ground and stretch out my arms before me, my palms together in namaste. A girlfriend tries to draw me back to the tour, but I refuse to move, to speak, to acknowledge her at all. I am intently praying, somewhat surprised to find myself doing so, but passionately given over to it. My friend whispers--you must have loved him in a past life, and disappears.

There are some ugly American tourists in a bath behind me, hoping sheepishly for the Buddha to come to life. He will not come for them. An indian man, about 15, steps in front of me. We are standing in front of the pool where the Americans squat. We are not in the water. We are divided from the others. I step to the side. A wall moves back and squeezes the pool into a rectangle, then a box, then into nothingness at all.

The scene changes. Local women with long dark hair and brightly colored saris join me on the ground, our hands outstretched in supplication. We are like flowers scattered across the hillside. 

The Buddha comes to life. Among all the women, it is me he looks at, me for whom he has awakened. He reaches out his arms to me, and I rise and go to his side. We have found one another again. I am my beloveds and my beloved is mine; he feedeth among the lilies. We are together briefly, and then he must turn to the daily business of caring for his people. There are lines of supplicants, and dignitaries, and diplomats. Among them the representatives of Abraham Lincoln have come. It seems the Americans are planning some kind of invasion, or colonizing movement. Between them and the Buddha, who retreats sometimes to the tallest and loneliest plateau in the mountain range, where he reads a few carefully chosen books of philosophy, shuffle the women with the long dark hair. Each of these bureaucrats would give her life for the Buddha, each of them has a personal relationship with him. He loves them, but is not intimate with any of them. He tells me that I am the one he has been waiting for. I am his beloved and my beloved is mine. But the women who minister to him and for him do not believe that this is true. They interfere between us, they refuse to let me advance up the mountain, through the many different plateaus of increasing importance and intimacy. The ministers have turned Buddha's open lap into an elaborate court. They want to protect him.

A toy plane, with Buddha's household on it, zooms by, catching me up. Or I catch hold of it and go careening above the heads of the guests at the party, who are holding their breaths in fear. I am not afraid. Carried impossibly by the tiny plane, I tear around under the enormous, red, ceiling of the tent, or giant hanger, that houses all of us. Elated--my childhood fantasy of flying has finally come to life--I laugh uproariously. Not hysterically, but happily, full-belliedly, mirthfully. I see the humor in every situation, in all the petty worries of human life, the immense joyfullness that defeats despair. The central truth of existence is mirthfulness, joy, laughter.

I return to the Buddha's court, and throw myself beneath the Banyan tree where he usually manifests himself. "He is not here," one of his ministers tells me. She is irritated, clearing up the mess from a recent appearance. There is debris on the ground, ribbons and long swaths of colorful cloth sweeping among the branches of the tree. He has just departed. "But I must see him. It is urgent. There is danger!" I have news of an encroaching enemy, which share with the minister in the hope that she'll let me past the gate. But she rudely pushes me away, "Now I will be the bearer of this news. The Buddha will reward me and never know that you were here at all." I am desperate, I plead. The ministers herd me away from the tree, away from my beloved, towards the edge of the plateau, a cliff that falls miles down to the ocean. I know that I can fly, and leap out...plummet, and then, miraculously, level out and lift. My body arcs through the air, finding the current, pulling up and up, nosing into the wind, rising. I head up the mountain, above the amazed and angry ministers, and find my way to the eagle's nest that the Buddha can reach, his most private refuge where he reads and mediates. I have proven that I am his coequal, his beloved, as he is mine. He manifests and embraces me, and I know perfect bliss.

We move down to the level where he communicates with his ministers, and tells them that I am his partner, and that they must accept me. They complain, and then adjust. Time passes.

He disappears. Suddenly, without a word. He is simply gone. Is this a test? Terrible things begin to happen--tornadoes of bolders begin to whirl up the mountain, and the ground erupts, spitting rocks. All the angry forces that the Buddha has kept in check unleash. The people are frightened. Where has he gone? What will we do? I must act. I must believe in my own power. I must try. I hold out my hand against the tornado, willing it to settle, and, amazingly, it does! I halt the rocks sputtering out of the earth. When the winds rise up again, I calm them. I quiet the waves. I have always had this power within me, but have never believed in myself enough to feel it.

Yet my faith falters. I doubt myself, I pity myself. My ability to fly comes and goes. Sometimes I can lift only a few inches off the ground, and then can move only slowly. I can't seem to steer. Other times I careen straight up above the skyscrapers, and flit about like a swallow, or a bat.

Why I write

It's hard to explain why I no longer keep a journal. I used to. Writing daily used to be the activity that kept me sane. Do I not write because I can't face myself? Possibly.

I read a review of Susan Sontag's recently published journals. It wasn't very nice. The reviewer complained, it seems to me, because Sontag used the form to do what most people do in their journal: record their feelings, their emotional responses to events or thoughts that take place. He searched in vain for polished prose, complex sociological analyses, political commentary, and found the record of the heart's movements. This disappointed him. What a jerk.

I don't keep this diary to count the number of men I've slept with, or to pronounce wittily on public phenomena, or to explore philosophical issues, or whatever it is that Mr. Reviewer looked for and could not find in Sontag's journal. I write here because it helps me to express. It's vital to my sanity. And if i worry about how intelligent or sophisticated or stylistically correct I'm going to appear to some future reader, if I write for any reader at all, then I tend to fail to achieve what it is that I want to achieve when i write--which is mostly to express, to let out, to think through, to relieve my mind and heart of its burdens.

Writing here, in this public blog (which no one ever reads, which no one is likely to read) then seems rather wrong. It's not technically personal, hidden, private enough a venue to serve the function for which I'm theoretically writing. But I have to admit that I've never only written for myself. It's no so much that I want or need to be read and praised (what every writer truly longs for, obviously, is praise) but more to reach out, to communicate. To find myself and to find others with whom to communicate. Readers of the future, perhaps.

What makes a writer write? A need to get it out, to craft, to express--to get out of the head and onto paper what presses to be released, that which irritates until it is out. But also to figure out what it is that is inside, what needs to come out. To be seen, by the self, the writer, who shapes, molds, prods, teases, but also by the reader, who receives, acknowledges, and reshapes. Reading is never passive. But who is my reader?

Who do I imagine you are, dear reader, dear lovely, sweet, sugar-candied reader, you who have taken the time to read, to pay attention, to acknowledge my words. Fit, though few, you get me. I also fear you, of course. I fear your disdain, contempt, dislike. I long not for your love but rather your understanding, your generous sympathy. And also for your response. I want to communicate, to move you to reach out to me.

I write from a position of profound loneliness, isolation. I write to know that I am not alone. That what I experience, feel, say, formulate, make up, has some kind of reality and in its realness has meaning. To hear the sound of my own voice? Not so much. But more to see the evidence of my own being, and to have the opportunity to think about what I am thinking, to reflect, to consider, to evaluate and reevaluate. To make conscious what largely goes unconscious, unspoken, unheard, and unremembered. To see the mark of my wake in the water and to chart its direction in relation to the sea and landscape.

What prompts writing is often pain. The pain is always the same: I miss him, my son. I am always mourning the loss of time with him. It's worse, strangely enough, after we speak on the phone. Easier when we videochat. The voice alone, over the phone line, underscores the distance between us, the time lost. I don't want to write about it. And yet I want there to be a record of how much I have missed him, how terrible it has been to have been separated from him for so long. I want the record to be here. I can't bear to record it. It bores me, for one. It is always the same. There is never anything new to say. It hurts. It hurts. It hurts. He hurts. I hurt.

Love and fear

It has been a wonderful summer, very free and open in so many ways. I haven't had to work so very hard==in fact I've taken a total vacation from work for the entire summer--and I haven't been encumbered by any romantic relationships, good or bad. The whole thing with J, as you know, was very distracting, but not ultimately a solid thing that I could rely on. We're not in the same place, emotionally. He's not ready for intimacy and commitment, and I really need comittment, Also, while he's a lovely person, very good and very decent, our educational background is so diverse, and our sense of the universe so different (he's a very conservative Protestant, very Republican, and I'm a Buddhist/nonconformist, very suspicious of the current administration), I don't think we could ever have made it work even if he had been interested.

But I have been spending a lot of time with my friend M, who is a feminist lawyer, very smart, who is married to a J, a playwright, whom I got to know a few years ago in a tennis class. I love her and her children--J is out of town for a month, directing a play--and her brother, T, who is a pilot.

In fact, my dear, I have fallen in love.

Okay, I know this sounds mad. It makes no sense to me. But the very first time that I ever met T, I fell for him. He takes yoga with our class, every now and then. And he is so handsome, so charming, so funny, so silly, so good with children, so loving, so amazingly talented and responsible. Yes, of course, I'm idealizing him. I've known about him for a long time--for over a year, but I also knew that he was going through a divorce, and that he needed time to recover. So I waited. I had this inkling, maybe just a fantasy, that he was the one for me. So I left him alone. But then, when I finally met him, after more than a year had passed, I found out from a mutual friend that he had a girlfriend! And I was so distraught, so devastated, I couldn't speak for hours. I couldn't talk to anyone, couldn't eat, had to go for a long walk. Ridiculous. I know. So I tried to put him out of my mind, to give up the dream. But I was so smitten. And am.

Never have I kissed a man with this kind of perfect compatibility, this kind of total love and surrender of myself. Never has anyone given himself to me so totally. I"m so afraid. I've had passionate encounters before--not quite this wonderful, but similar. And every time, I've been dropped, or abandoned, or I have left. It is terrifying. There I have said it. I am terrified.

But I am also very hopeful. He is such a good person, such an upstanding honorable man. I have so much respect for him. I know he'll do the right thing--I know he will break if off with her. But he hasn't done it yet. Am I a complete idiot? I have all this trust in him. I believe he will be good to me. Will he lose respect for me because I trust him so much? I can't believe he will. I am scared.

So, I'm sorry. I've been hanging out with the family, M and T and the M's kids. We've been biking and swimming. We've made dinner together in their wonderful kitchen. We've corralled in their living room watching movies. T and I have fallen asleep on the couch with our arms around each other. We spent last night together kissing the entire night through.

Okay. So I'm probably insane. Do you think so? I'm doubting myself. I think I'll be worried, on pins and needles, I guess, until I know that he has severed the relationship with her. I have to be patient. I know he'll do it. I don't want to push him. I'm trying to remain conscious--to say to myself, "it's like this: fear, fear, fear, anxiety, and hope, hope, hope, joy, joy, joy, and fear, fear, fear..." Trying to chart the weather system.

It's good spiritual training, I suppose. This morning, in yoga, I realized that I was very preoccupied, very "taken," occupied, by these thoughts and feelings, this longing for T, this hope for love, this joy, this excitement, this fear of abandonment, of screwing things up, of losing, again, of being alone." And I asked myself, what will help me? How do I find peace in this turbulence of emotions? What can I hold onto? God? But I don't know where God is, or what God is, if there is a God at all. I wanted there to be a god, a spiritual presence greater than everything, the sum of all being, pure goodness and love, a refuge. It is a fantasy, an ancient fantasy that our ancestors invented and passed on, through myriad variations, to us. But is there something holy and golden and true within us all, even so? Is there something alive, something that I could sail by, a beacon, a lighthouse, a steady point. Faith. Have faith in goodness, in love, in wisdom, in honor, in faithfulness itself.

Weeping

But I actually fell apart in yoga. I mean, I went to the bathroom to blow my nose and then started to weep. I don't know why it had to happen just then, and there, but I was just suddenly overwhelmed by grief, and the pain of being so far away from him, and for so long. It's always worse on this side of a visit, especially be he obviously suffers too. The whole situation is generally good for him, but there are really hard bits. It should be easier.

Anyway, beautiful Joan, who is in her early 70s, came in and hugged me. She told me that two of her sons had died, and that she understood. "You just love them so much," she said. Then she started to cry, and told me that life was hard, and that that is why she's a Buddhist, and that she was strong and so was I. So I managed to get back out on the floor and to do sun salutations, feeling comforted that she was nearby. I felt just a little bit as though Mom was there in the room, too. But when I looked around, I saw that Joan had gone, and felt awful because I thought I had spoiled her yoga practice. If I hadn't been crying in the bathroom, she wouldn't have thought about her sons, and she wouldn't have started to cry... So of course I couldn't go on with the class, either. I will write her a note.

I'm okay. Really. Just a stormy weather system today, as my favorite Buddhist teacher would say. I'll be okay. I have some errands and chores to do today. THe Jeep is leaking oil, and has to go back to the shop. I have to go get a TB test so that I can volunteer for Hospice. It's a huge pain. When I come back I hope to have the energy to paint a little. Maybe get out some of this anguish on the canvas.

Missing him

August 1:

B announced, within 30 seconds of getting into my car, that he had plans for the weekend and was not leaving. So, there went the camping trip I had planned.

I was so tired, and even in pain, that I welcomed the idea of "camping" at a hotel. B and I checked in, went across the street for pankcakes, and then huddled together on one of the beds, checking out the facebook profiles of B's friends and listening to music he likes --even some that he's composed. Then we watched the end of Borat and a documentary about the 1967 anti-war demonstration at the U of Wisconsin. It was fun.

August 2:
As I was driving back tonight, feeling really terrible and sad about how awful it was that I was driving away from B, when every part of my body wanted to turn around and return to him, in whatever possible way, I was thinking about how, when you grown in your heart, as it were, for a child, when your heart becomes inextricably bonded to someone, you just don't factor in having to be separated from them for months at a time. Or having to see them on such limited schedules. The heart rebels against this impossible and unnatural situation, and then it gets sick.

August 3:
I haven't spoken to a single person today. I didn't unpack the car until well after 6 pm. Only then did I bring in the sleeping bags, the tent, the air mattresses---unopened, unused. I hung the rain jacket I bought for him back in the closet. I put my clothes away, started a load of laundry. I thought about the clean sheets and new carpet I had put in his bedroom, but didn't go up to look at them. In the fridge, I saw the corn tortillas that I got to make a special dinner; the bag of semi-sweet chocolate pieces. I rearranged the magnets and photos on the doors. Before I left, two days ago, I had gotten used to being here alone. Today and tonight the house feels empty, too big, and barren.

At 3 pm, instead of mowing the severely overgrown lawn, or washing the dishes, or unpacking the car, I watched a DVD while eating a big bowl of leftover pesto pasta, a bag of popcorn, some sugared almonds and a piece of chocolate. I also drank half a bottle of red wine and fell asleep on the couch before the fim ended. I woke up feeling ill, bloated and gassy. I forced myself to finish my chores.

Then I took a long walk around the neighborhood. There were couples and parents and children circling the reservoir, a big crowd of people lingering at the fountain. A tall man in shorts, slightly hunchbacked and bow-legged with arthritis, walked ahead of me, toward his car with his round-shouldered wife. I envied them their togetherness and wondered if I would ever have a partner. The old thought, that I will always be alone, came into my head. I drove it out again with an attempt to make contact, somehow through space and time, with that someone--there must be someone--who will love me someday. I cried a little. Then I walked back to my lonely house.

Lassitude

I'm not a very productive person.

Today, for example, I got up dutifully for yoga at 7.30, then worked out on the treadmill. I took some packages to the post office, came home, and took a long nap. At 3 or so I got up, dallied about in my studio for a few minutes, and then decided that I was too terrible a painter even to begin. I didn't have the heart for it. I could have done something more productive, I suppose. LIke the dishes. But instead I sat on my couch with watermelon and cookies and watched the end of "All About Eve." Great Bette Davis film. When it was over, I thought about going to the climbing gym, but had too little energy for that. So I did the dishes, set up my stereo (which I've been meaning to do for about a month), sprayed Febreeze all over the old carpet that I got from my dad's house, which smells of old dog piss in the summer months, and finally settled down to shoppingfor camping gear online. Very dull. At least I'm not getting all dressed up and heading out to a bar. I used to do that, in darker times, when my self-esteem was lower. Now I just accept my lassitude, my sadness and loneliness, and try to cope.

It's not much of a life. At least I'm making some lovely women friends. I have a big crush on a guy in my climbing group, but it really doesn't make any sense. He's not at all educated, hardly reads, and has told me very clearly that he won't get involved with any woman until his daughter is out of high school--two years or more from now. He flirts terribly, and I'm very drawn to him for some reason. I don't know why, exactly. My girlfriend, Elliot, tells me to get over it. I'm working on it. He doesn't even kiss that well. And yet I love to kiss him, and to be held by him. Mysterious, sexual attraction. Who can explain it? Not I.

Am at least not drinking quite as much as in the past. It's too hard to get up for yoga when I'm hungover. Sitting here on my back porch, writing, listening to jazz sad standards.

Going back to the couch now to watch another movie.

I think of her