Companions

soulvessel posted this poem today.



The way is full of genuine sacrifice.
The thickets blocking your path are anything
that keeps you from that, any fear that you may be broken
into bits like a glass bottle.

This road demands courage and stamina, yet it's full of
footprints!
Who are these companions?
They are rungs in your ladder. Use them!
With company you quicken your ascent.
You may be happy enough going along, but with others
you'll get farther, and faster.

Someone who goes cheerfully by himself to the customs
house to pay his traveler's tax will go even more
lightheartedly when friends are with him.

Every prophet sought out companions.
A wall standing alone is useless, but put three or four walls
together, and they'll support a roof and keep grain dry
and safe.

When ink joins with a pen, then the blank paper can say
something.
Rushes and reeds must be woven to be useful as a mat. If
they weren't interlaced; the wind would blow them away.

Like that, God paired up creatures, and gave them
friendship.


~ Rumi


With gratitude for all my dear companions on the way. . .

Wednesday?

It was a three day weekend, and today is Wednesday.
So why have I spent all day thinking it was -- or should be -- Friday??

*sigh*

On the upside, evidently my daughter was all excited about leaving for camp this morning. I had been a little worried she would get cold feet at the last minute, but that didn't happen.

My boss is indebted to me big time for driving to her place not once but twice today.
She doesn't ask things like that very often -- and to be honest, I was much happier driving on a sunny day with my iPod plugged into my car stereo than I would have been sitting at my desk -- but she felt bad about it. Put it in my good karma account with her.

I'm reading a surprisingly good book called Harem. Ordinarily I do not expect much of books with that title (and there are many) -- but this one, a novel, reads like one of Angela Carter's fairy tales: fantastic, erotic, vivid, a bit scary. It's becoming harder and harder for me to find novels I genuinely enjoy, so this is cause for rejoicing.

When I got home I changed into jammie bottoms and my green-and-white-plaid-used-to-belong-to-This-Guy shirt, but I'm considering changing back into Out In Public clothes, and then going to the Berkshire for a drink and bread-with-oil-and-basil and reading more of my book, then coming back to (finally) watch A History of Violence. (Viggo!!)

I'm in a paradoxical place right now: seeing my daughter's cell phone on the dining room table and her pillow on my bed, I feel a pang of awareness her absence. Then there's the part of me that is simply reveling in the awareness that I will have my house -- and my life -- to myself for the next 48 hours.

Tomorrow night: orientation at The Wet Spot!
Which I'm sure will be worthy of a post afterward. . . . or I shall be very disappointed.