The "Perfect" Cure --- Days 10/26 & 27

Walk: 1. Presidio  2. Hood

Distance: 1. 4.4 miles, yoga  2. 4.2 miles, yoga

So, Ciwt was going to take a trip to the place where she grew up.  But today she canceled it.  Lots of real world reasons, mostly related to the fact that it really is too soon to travel for many of us unless it is a necessity. At least to take a longish plane trip.  For openers (and closers actually), the state she was going to has a no mask policy while Ciwt's state is still masking, social distancing etc., and Ciwt feels safest with that for now.  

Seems a rational, sensible decision, but, because it concerns the place of her childhood, not going is confusing.  By doing what feels safest and most comfortable (and sane) to her, is she being a good enough friend?, community member?, citizen of the world? human being?  It is fraught - home - and Ciwt struggles to finally, finally not get confused by it, nail it down, get over it. And she found a poem today that seems helpful.

THE CURE

Albert Huffstickler

We think we get over things.

We don’t get over things.

Or say, we get over the measles

but not a broken heart.

We need to make that distinction.

The things that become part of our experience

never become less a part of our experience.

How can I say it?

The way to “get over” a life is to die.

Short of that, you move with it,

let the pain be pain,

not in the hope that it will vanish

but in the faith that it will fit in,

find its place in the shape of things

and be then not any less pain but true to form.

Because anything natural has an inherent shape

and will flow towards it.

And a life is as natural as a leaf.

That’s what we’re looking for:

not the end of a thing but the shape of it.

Wisdom is seeing the shape of your life

without obliterating (getting over) a single

instant of it.