Two in a Pair

I was sitting in the courtyard at school, in the Northwest corner. I was smoking with a few friends, when I abruptly look at the ground over my left shoulder. Sitting on top of the dirt was an earring I had misplaced perhaps a month ago. I exclaimed, "Oh my God!" and picked it out of the dirt. I brushed the dirt off and marveled at my discovery. Since noticing it was missing, I was of the conviction that it was surely somewhere in my room. It never occurred to me that it might have been lost at school. Needless to say, I was surprised to see it in the courtyard. However, I am quite happy that the universe was kind enough to return it to me. My ears missed the earrings and the other earring missed its sister.

One Time, All Time, One Moment, This Moment

One time, I dropped acid that bathed me in light. I have no doubt about the visions that subsequently I was invited to have. My hand discovered its natural ability to reveal truth. My pen is my sword is my magic wand. Its fire is purple and green. Its air is orange and red. Its earth is brown and black. And its water is blue and gold. It embodies the irreversible rotation of the mandala of earth around the sun. A straight line is just a circle viewed from zero degrees. I see things, beautiful things, everywhere, and they only belong to me through the transitoriness of the succession of moments. There is nothing to fear because there is nothing to lose. My identity only exists through a shattered mirror, reflected in the pieces of other consciousnesses looking outward. Practice looking through the mirror inside one self. It is called clear light, and it is undifferentiated. The unity of one is the unity of all. I have siddhi, but I don't know how to use it. Oh, but I do. Through my pen. The pen that is held in a hand that begrudgingly rests. It is bursting with creative energy. It wants nothing more for ever than to be put to use. When my brain stops working at what to say and gives the hand freedom to say whatever the paper reveals, that is my pwer. My magical power of pen and ink to reveal what is already always present and ever obvious.

***

I spend too much time unsuccessfully telling my thoughts what to think. They don't decide what they do, they just do it. By attempting to ignore a thought, it only becomes all the more obvious. I'm listening to my thoughts and feelings and expressing them, and I feel incredibly calm, and content, and energetic. Sometimes the weight of cosmic responsibility collapses on me. I must turn that collapse into expansiveness. I am trying to, from within to without, the opposition of macro- and microcosms is increasingly meaningless from day to day. The transition from day to day has become increasingly arbitrary as I train my mind to be present in the singularity of momentariness. Words are just approximations of what feelings sound like. Art is just approximately what the experience of feeling and the feeling of experience look like. My mind has been shackled, but now my writing hand remembers how to be honest and channel all that dark energy into illuminating words, symbols on the paper. The last few years I forgot how to write for myself. I was writing with suspicion, and always the secrets and doubt remained, keeping the truth from myself for fear of discovery by others. It remained, pent up inside, piling up until there was no room left for new feelings. It's about time I cleared things out, internally and externally. Not being secure enough to even express myself in the one way that has always come most naturally... that would make anyone depressed. This feels amazing. I can quite literally feel pent up energy in my neck unknotting through the practice of writing these words. It is a warming, relaxing of tension around my ears where my skull meets my neck. It is an unusual sensation, but it feels good since the discomfort is just the tension draining out of my muscles. Now it is passing through my shoulders, unknotting the tangles between my shoulder blades. I never would have put together that not writing was cause the physical embodiment of my stress. I always assumed it was not exercising. But if I think about it metaphorically, I haven't been exercising my mind or my heart because I haven't been writing. I feel more balanced and relaxed in this moment than I have in years, and as I write this another knot of energy in my right shoulder unwinds itself and passes down my arm into my hand. I'm quite pleased to feel the tension in my back relaxing but I feel that it is happening slowly, and there is a lot of built up tension in there. About two years worth of pent up energy and emotional strain. Why do I always deny myself the pleasure of writing from my heart? In writing and art even pain becomes beautiful through creative expression. Pain is constructive, positive through its capacity to reveal beauty. That is the utility of art, to present ways of seeing beauty that are not always apparent. I had somehow narrowed my expressiveness to such a small portion of how I experience this reality that I forgot how real all those other feelings and experiences are. I am positive that I will sleep restfully tonight, and will dream easily. It is so much easier to just write what I'm thinking instead of thinking in circles about what I am thinking. Better to get all the thoughts out so there will be room for new ones to come in. I feel as thought a drain has finally been unclogged and I am no longer sitting in a tub of tepid, filthy water. All the unclean particles have been washed off, so I can drain and wash the tub so it will be clean for the next time I need to wash my brain out. All of these unexpressed thoughts have been obscuring my vision so much I could hardly distinguish what all the words on all the papers I wrote were supposed to mean. I'm saying what I mean now. My heart is in someone else's care. I am terrified by being out of control of it, and at the same time it is liberating to not have to mind it myself. I know it is safe; I just don't know how much attention, how much love is being shared with it. I sometimes feel that its caregiver resents his responsibility and neglects it, but that he also realizes its vulnerability, paying it enough tenderness so as not to inadvertently injure it. It's simply too vulnerable to be transported around. I suppose the place where my heart is right now is its true home, in the place and with the person that facilitated its coming into being, its reincarnation, when its wounds were filled with gold and closed with golden stitches, and forever watched over by my third eye, a wide-open sparkling green iris... and finally sealed with a reverse S, the mirror image of my Self. I can't bear to ask for it back, because it isn't worth the risk of harm. But I know he feels its beat. My magic is real to those who know how to recognize it, and I feel he does even when my thoughts doubt him. And I must ultimately obey my feelings, because they are true no matter how I might rationalize them. My heart is out of my hands, and I must obey them, obey his touch.

Delhi Meats

I arrived in Delhi last night around 9pm, but by the time I went through the Swine Flu Health Check, Immigration, Baggage Claim, and Customs, it was almost 10pm. Outside of Customs I was met by a representative from Sea and Sky Travel, the company the college has employed as our "travel liason", who led me to a cab and sent me on my way because he had to wait for the last of our group to arrive at the airport shortly following me. When I got outside, the first thing I noticed was the dust. The second thing was the full moon. Not only was it a full moon, but it was also the Dalai Lama's birthday. Auspicious timing for an arrival, to say the least.

When I arrived at the Hans Plaza Hotel in central Delhi, the incompetent concierge had no record of a reservation under my name, so the taxi driver had to call the agent from Sea and Sky to talk to the hotel and finally I was given a room key after about 15 minutes of frustration and confusion. Owing to the excitement of being in a profoundly unfamiliar environment and the 9 and a half hour time difference, I was unable to sleep right away, and so waited until my roommate arrived around 1am. After we settled in and contacted our respective relatives to inform them of our safe arrival, we visited the 24hr hotel cafe for what would be a relatively timely dinner were we in New York, but considering it was 3am in India, seemed to be a curiosity to our waiters.

We returned to our room mentally drained, but physically unaccustomed to the time difference. I was unable to sleep until after sunrise, at 5:30am. My roommate awoke around 6am and proceeded, perhaps out of restlessness, to get ready for the day. By 6:30 the sounds of her moving around the room woke me from a bizarre dream (which are one of the common side effects of the anti-malarial I am taking) and was unable to fall back asleep. I watched BBC World News after showering and dressing while waiting until it was time to meet my teachers and fellow classmates at 9:30 for breakfast and orientation. By 12:30 we dispersed for a few minutes to freshen up before attending a group lunch at the United Coffee House. The food was outstanding, perfectly spiced and served with the best naan I think I have ever eaten. After lunch, generously paid for by the college, the five of us were split into two groups and each given the name of a different nearby destination which was written on a piece of paper in Hindi. Our task was to find a stranger and get directions to the designated location and record the sights, sounds, smells, and overall atmosphere of the place.

My partner and I got directions from several strangers then walked the 25 minutes or so to what turned out to be an enormous Sikh temple, Gurdwara Bangla Sahib, the largest Sikh temple in Delhi. First, we had to check our shoes outside the temple walls, then step into a shallow pool of water at the entrance to wash our feet. We walked barefoot around the perimeter of a huge pool where devotees were bathing, which was set in the middle of an even larger courtyard, paved with a black and white marble mosaics, red woven rugs drenched in water running the length of each side and intersecting at perpindicular angles. The enclosure was walled in by open-air corridors where some worshippers sat in groups, some lay sleeping in the shade, and others walked about. Then we went inside the temple, which was up a flight of marble stairs.

Inside there were small groups of people prostrating in front of a room with large glass windows revealing what appeared to be some kind of shrine covered in brightly colored embroidered cloths, and touching the doorway with their hands and foreheads as a means of obtaining blessings. We went upstairs and walked around a balcony overlooking the main room where more small groups of people were scattered around on a bright red and orange patterned carpeted floor around a platform mounted by several seated musicians. They were singing what we assumed to be prayers, seated on cushions around another altar draped in heavy embroidered cloths, the whole space marked off by a golden railing. We walked around inside for a little while longer, taking photos and observing the worshipers, then trickled outside with the crowds, and walked around a large flagpole draped in orange fabric where people once again were touching with their fingertips and foreheads. Finally, after walking around the fourth side of the pool, we sat for a period in the shade of the open-air corridor. After a few minutes, a teeny little India woman wearing a white sari and a kind smile approached me and started speaking to me in Hindi. I hadn't the vaguest idea what she was saying, so I just kept saying, "I don't understand", "I only speak English", and shake my head and shrugging my shoulders in what I could only assume was the international sign for, "I don't understand". Eventually she wandered off, and my companion and I laughed off our confusion and decided it was probably time to go.

At the threshold to the temple we washed our feet again, traded our little tin coin in for our shoes, and once we had them on got in a tuktuk, a little three wheel motorized rickshaw which looks as precarious as it feels. We rode it back to the hotel for 50 rupees (about $1) and had the pleasure of being pestered by beggars at every red light. We just ignored them until they either went away or the light changed, whichever happened first, and neither of which ever happened fast enough.

After about an hour's rest, the whole group met for masala tea( which is probably the most delicious drink I have ever had) in the hotel cafe to reveal the mystery locations we discovered and our experiences and reactions to them, followed by a dinner of South India dosas at the Banana Leaf. The sun set while we were at dinner, and as we rounded the corner onto Barakhamba road, a huge, low-hanging yellow full moon appeared in the dusty sky and escorted us back to the hotel.

I am presently back in my hotel, enjoying some black tea with milk before assing out for the night. I will hopefully be able to sleep through most of the night, considering I haven't really slept since my last night in New York, not counting the ambien-induced spell of unconsciousness I had on the flight here.

Tomorrow we are taking a tour all morning of Old Delhi followed by another "special project" involving the locating of a mystery landmark.

Respite

While I was Indianapolis I was fortunate enough to come to several conclusions about the present situation of my life, and the dissatisfactions I have been struggling with for the past year.

First, that I need to live in a more natural setting. I need trees, big skies, water, and quiet so that I can think and feel clearly. I need these things for spiritual fulfillment. This lead me to my second conclusion: that I need to leave New York once I graduate. I have been chronically unhappy for the past year, and until I returned to Indianapolis, I couldn't figure out why. I changed my concentration, I moved around a few times, I struggled for a meaningful relationship, I took psychedelics and traveled through the stars... all to no avail. My depression and loneliness persisted. But after a few days at home, my mind had quieted and my spirit had calmed, and suddenly I could hear my thoughts and feel my feelings. The source of my unhappiness had nothing to do with the circumstances of my life in New York, but directly to do with the fact that I live in New York. The sense of uprootedness and alienation I felt was a consequence not of my inability to connect with others, but rather of the general disconnectedness inherent to living in this city. Alienation from others, from nature, and from myself had plagued me for months and months, and I convinced myself I was responsible. But being surrounded by trees, calm and quiet, seeing large skies with breathtaking clouds, I finally understood what was missing from my life New York could never grant me.

My third conclusion had indirectly to do with the others. After accepting the previous two facts, suddenly an opportunity presented itself. I ran into a man who I had not seen since we were children. Our siblings had been friends as long as we could remember, but time and circumstance had kept us out of each others lives for thirteen years. On New Year's Eve we reconnected, and spent the next four days savoring each others company while we had the chance. Never had a man looked at me in such a way. Never had a man's touched ignited such a powerful fire beneath my skin. Never had a man's kiss weakened me so much. Never had a man held me so close and spoken freely of his feelings to me. On the fourth day we had to say goodbye because I was leaving Indianapolis for New York. Never had I been so reluctant to go, so loathe to return to New York. We made assurances to keep in touch, whispered how we would miss one another, savored our final kisses and the warmth of each others eyes. And then I was gone.

Of course, we made no commitments to each other. Such a thing would be unfair to ask of either of us. Still, I can say the experience was valuable for one very important reason. In all of my failed romantic endeavors, I had always wondered what it would feel like to be treated the way I deserved... with adoration, respect, curiosity, and mutuality. As a being rather than an object. And I can safely say I now know that feeling, the ease and comfort that accompanies it. Over and over again I have wasted my time rationalizing my hesitations and ignoring my better judgment for the mere sake of attention and affection. And I was always left feeling foolish and undesired. No longer do I feel it necessary to spend my time always questioning a man's intentions, questioning my own interest in him, questioning always questioning, is this what it's supposed to be like? No. It's not.

So maybe our connection was real enough that it can endure the distance of our separation. There is a very real chance he will visit me here in Brooklyn in the spring. However, if it proves to have been a fleeting thing, as amazing as it was, I am still left with the fact of what we had. And I am willing to wait until I meet another man who stares at me with the same warmth and gentleness, whose gaze alone makes my stomach flip, whose touch electrifies my skin, whose kiss turns me to rubber, whose eyes meet mine and are not afraid or withholding. A man who is not afraid of his feelings, who has courage and confidence. I have received one of the most valuable lessons of my life, which will not soon leave me.



Lastly, I came to a conclusion after I returned to New York which follows from my decision to leave the city after graduation. I have reconnected with my desire to spend my life surrounded by books. I have long had an intuitive attraction to antique books and aged texts. I have long said that all I need to be happy are books, good company, and nature. So, I am getting serious about the idea of becoming a literary archivists. I have not done any research yet, but inevitably I would have to get a masters in library science. Yes, that's right. I am almost entirely certain that I will become a librarian. For the first time in my life I can foresee a future with a career, and it does not terrify me. And I can pursue it practically anywhere. The relief is intoxicating.