Three

The Room

Imagine my surprise finding you in a classroom. The faces, like mine, hanging on your every word. You are speaking slowly. I can see because I am watching your lips. Your fingers curl around a chalk stick, and go twirling along the blank green board, leaving a soft snowy spray of dust that softly drifts through my see through shadow.
I look at their faces and see that, with some of them anyway, you’ve turned on a light.
I can feel your voice shake the door, and rattle the floor. I see your passion but I also see…only some of it is heartfelt. I catch a gleam in your eye. A numbness, a slow disappointment creeping into your movements. You found children eating ice creams, and they ignored you when you called their names. Someone else is drawing on the wall. Is this not what you thought you’d find in another country? What did you imagine? I watch you scowl…I see you slow down and gather yourself up in a little ball. I see you look deep and hard into nothing, asking, What am I doing? What am I doing here, with my life?

You know I was studying to be a teacher when I met your father. And I always thought you had a way with children. And a way with people, when you wanted to, when you cared enough to slow yourself down enough to look, and listen, and be helpful. It made me smile watching you with them. It made me wonder; when on Earth will you have children of your own? I am sorry I won’t be here for that, and for all those other things. Will you move on to those important steps in one’s life? Marriage, children, a decent job. A house and a car don’t matter, but I suppose it is a start. When will you get started? When will you involve yourself in a real life? My son, when?
I suppose, that’s a little rich coming from me. I’m sorry. I haven’t set the best example. But I know you know what you need to do. I think what you lack…is courage and fortitude. You’re going to have to come up with that stuff from scratch. It’s not something you inherit, it’s just a decision you make.
And trust. You don’t trust the world, and why should you? You should because you’re a part of this world, and you’re living as though you’re apart of this world.

I have been watching you more and more in this faraway place that feels like an island. I have been losing sleep, losing time. I am sleepwalking on Earth, just as you seem to be.
Yes, I notice between all the laughter and all the fun…I notice sadness, an emptiness that haunts every step. I can see how you resist the quiet desperation. How you push against a gnawing despair. Some people tell small lies so they feel better about themselves. Others drink? What do you do?

You seem to have vivid dreams day and night, and sometimes, often, I see you drawing on the board, sometimes on a paper, sometimes with colored pencils on a big white poster. What is happening to the artist? Are you crushing him?
You have the weariness of an old man between bouts of hyperactivity. You sweep into the class and get everyone onto your rollercoaster, and you swoop and you swing, and then you leave the class with a flourish, papers floating down to the ground like leaves behind a lot of bluster. I can see that once you found this meaningful, but now you do not. I wonder: Where will you go now, in search of meaning. Where can you go from here?

You know very well that this great emptiness in your life is of your own making. Just as it was in mine. You have to spend time with your ancient soul, listening to what it has to say, about what it wants, about its idea of meaning. It is a very ancient spirit, that is within you, and you need to be still. Be very still and listen very carefully. You know this.
And there is another thing. You have to have relationships…but the most important one is the one with yourself. You are often running, but is it away from something, or towards something else? Do you ever run for the love of it? Do you ever enjoy the state of being that running is? Just the simple movement, the being out there. You seem to have your sights always set on the next unattainable or faraway target. No. Slow down and stop and just connect to this moment. This is all you have, right now.

Happiness is about having a goal, having relationships, and then all those smaller things that give us pleasure. Ice in a glass, a red hat, a pair of glasses, a nice meal when we’re hungry. Someone giving us a compliment or a small gift, or sharing a special moment.
Happiness is also beyond all of these. It’s being happy with what you have, who you are, with everything that exists. Happiness is breaking that desire, that sense of continuous wanting. Happiness is peace. Being fulfilled without needing anything for that fulfillment. Happiness is being happy. Happiness is being, not having, and not always doing. Not busyness. Connectedness. Flowing. Focused and alert and calm and inner rest. Happiness is breathing the free air, and marveling at the purity and beauty and brilliance in silvery clear water. Happiness is having that water flow into you, and radiating its mercury brilliance through your pores, your eyes, your smile. Happiness should not have reasons or weather or situations. It should simply be what it is. The currency of life. Each individual heartbeat, each breath, each sunrise. Each upward glance toward the vault of Heaven. Each wisp of cloud trailing across the nuclear fire. Each silver glow off the chalky moon. It’s our thoughts that get in the way of the sheer pleasure of pouring our lives across the Earth. Even if our lives become wretched and desperate, there is still happiness in small things. The shade under a tree. A nights rest. The bread that crushes between milk white teeth. The stars that shine forever above us, and the sun that rises through the blue hope beyond.

You make eye contact with these children, and I know you feel the connection. You feel a spark of happiness. But can you hold on to it? Can you stay in this moment, and not get sucked into your own manufactured misery?
I know I couldn’t. There are not many who can.

I’m standing beside you as you open a book in the teacher’s room. Sweat is pouring down your back.
You have a frown on your face.
If I were you I’d close the book and eat some of the fruit you have in the refrigerator. Concentrate on that.
I can see you’re trying to escape in this book you’re reading. Every time you have a break, the book opens.
I put my silver hand on your neck. I whisper in your ear: “Neeeeee keeee.”
You don’t look up. You look down, but I stand beside you nonetheless, watching. The echoes float around you. I see them. You ignore them. It feels like an eternity.