Tucson painting by Felix Pasilis
"Adam"
written Saturday morning, 9/20/08, 8:40 AM
I had big booboo to my feeling two days ago. I can’t tell how much of it was due to the thing of it or the shock of it. It was so unexpected and from such unexpected direction. My feelings were so hurt that to my own shock I burst into tears. I was as vulnerable to my feelings as a child. This is so rare for me these days, because I have put so much effort into learning ways to hold on to my happiness thru thick and thin. I have developed so many techniques thru so many experiences, that normally they are instantly triggered when something which threatens my peace happens. If I get bad news on email, even if it is knock-out blow, at the same instant that I am reeling, I am scrambling to keep my balance. Usually I am going down and trying to get back up at the same time. This doesn’t protect me from everything, I am not invulnerable, but I always put up a good fight and eventually I get my balance back.
This thing which caused such hurt feelings two days ago is not a bad thing in its own right, it is not like bad news or something going wrong. It’s just about feelings. It’s the kind of experience a 4 year old girl could have in nursery school, if she got yelled at by the teacher. In fact everything about it is identical to experiences I did have at 4 years old, when you are so completely vulnerable and so innocent and have no idea the world can be mean to you. I am sure it was the shock which left me wide open this way. It was completely outside my experience, and in a place and in a way I never expected.
The shock happened two days ago, so I spent all that day being comforted by my Higher Self about it. And I woke up in good mood yesterday. But I really felt like I deserved a big treat. I deserved a big treat because I had had big booboo. So my Higher Self suggested before pool I go to Tuesday Morning and buy myself beautiful sheets.
Because I spend a lot of time lounging in bed in front of tv, and eat there and smoke cigarettes there and pet my dog there, and drink coffee and sodas there. No matter how careful I am, the sheet in that corner always picks up lots of stains. I think this is because of my new thing, liking to eat while lying in bed watching tv. In New York my tv was on kitchen table, so I could always have my meals in front of tv. But here in Tucson, my tv is set up so I lie in bed and watch it. So to eat and watch tv at same time I have to lie in bed and eat. At first I found this very awkward. I had never eaten while lying down before. It felt peculiar and it was awkward. But now I am more used to it and I like it. I just love to eat and watch tv at same time. When I saw that no matter how careful I tried to be, my sheets were picking up so many stains, I decided I would try to buy black sheets. I never found any. But when I was in Grocery Outlet about a month ago, they had a sheet set, which was a very very dark brown. It was only $20 so I bought it and put it right on my bed and thought “O this will make everything easier for me because I won’t have to worry about stains anymore.”
Which is true, no stains show, but the problem is I find the color ugly. Everytime I look at it, I can’t stand it because it is ugly. And even tho it is 100 per cent cotton it is a rough cotton. I had to take off the dark brown pillow case, it was too rough on my cheek, and replace it with a very soft very pretty one I had bought in middle of summer. I didn’t care that it was soft blue with some pretty pastel stripes and would pick up stains, I could not stand the other one by my face. But I still had the sheets on, and every day they were depressing me whenever I looked at them.
So finally last week I decided “to hell with stains, I am going to buy pretty sheets, I want to be happy.” But Tuesday Morning is out of the way. But yesterday when Bill got up he said “I am not walking Beanie this morning, instead I am going back to my painting, we will have to go to Billie’s pool instead.” And Billie’s pool is very close to Tuesday Morning, I knew I was going to get my pretty sheets.
And instant we got in truck to go swimming I informed him I wanted to go to Tuesday Morning first. He hit the ceiling. Usually when he hits the ceiling about an errand I want, I am so wishy-washy about it. “If you don’t want to do it, fine” I say. I give him 100 ways to get out of it. But this time it was different, I wanted those pretty sheets, I wanted that treat, and I knew I deserved it, I wasn’t wishy-washy at all. I just said when I got into the truck “I want to go to Tuesday Morning first to get pretty sheets, I can’t stand the ugly ones I have,” and then just waited for storm to subside while he hit the ceiling. I had never told him about my shock and my experience, I thought it could upset him, and why should 2 people be upset, I wanted to contain it to me.
He got over Tuesday Morning pretty fast tho. It was loud burst at first, but he got over it fast and like sudden thunderstorm. I had planned out in my mind what I wanted. I wanted the pretty sheet set. I wanted to buy 2 new towels, one for him and one for me for swimming. In winter you do need a towel after shower, and we only have two I bought at Tuesday Morning last month. Also I don’t like the aroma of the body wash I bought there last time. It is supposed to be flower scent and I just don’t like it. I saw the little bottles with fruit scent there last time and I decided I would buy that this time, a package with six little bottles of different fruit scent. I was very clear on what I wanted to buy there, because his sitting in hot parking lot, I didn’t want to be long. Plus I didn’t want to forget what I wanted, because as you can see getting him to go back there is not so easy.
I was hoping that wonderful woman who helped me find the towels last time, so big so luxurious so wonderful at such a great bargain, and those wonderful soft pillowcases, so pretty, so sweet on my cheek and at such amazing bargain, would be there to help me choose the sheets. But I didn’t see her and went over to the sheet section myself. I had decided this time I would choose a pretty pattern. But as I was looking at them she arrived, I recognized her.
I told her how happy she had made me last time, that everything she chose for me had made me so happy, and I explained about wanting new sheets now, and why. I told her the whole story. And she instantly put her hands on two sheet sets which she thought were the best value. One was an attractive blue with brocade looking design on it, so it wasn’t just one blue, I liked it. And the other seemed to be tan. I so wanted to get away from brown after my bad experience, and brown is not my color anyway, blue is. I am a blue girl, not a brown girl. But she said “this one is the same price as the blue one and it is 500 thread count, the other is 450.” And it’s true the original price was much higher than the blue set, altho the prices at Tuesday Morning were the same. It was clear this was the one she recommended for me. “Because it’s a better value?” I said. “Yes” she said “500 thread count.” Whatever that means. So I bought the one she suggested, I trust her.
When we got to pool parking lot Bill went right off to swim, but I wanted to organize my stuff. I put the two towels I bought behind seat because they are for emergency for swimming if our towels are wet from rain in winter. I put the box of body wash with my swim stuff because that is for shower after swimming. And I put the sheet set placed to take into house when I got home. And then when I was all ready to go swimming myself, I saw Adam arrive for his swim on his bicycle in bare feet.
“How are you?” he said. “Great” I said, which meant a lot to me to say. I had been so upset the day before ‘bout the booboo to my feelings, but when I had woke up next morning, feeling OK again, I had read Gloria’s “Letter from God.” Where God had stressed how important it is to be happy because happiness is contagious (like measles) and you want to spread happiness wherever you go. I really wanted to carry out God’s request, to bring happiness to others by being happy myself. So I felt good about saying “great” when Adam said “how are you?”
Adam said his kitty cat went to Heaven yesterday. He said it came out of nowhere, one minute she was fine, then she was so sick, then she went to Heaven. I don’t know how many cats Adam has, he said “one of my kitty cats.” Of course I knew all about that booboo, my summer had started off with booboo about Lulu. My heart went right out to Adam. He said “the only thing which heals the hurt is time.” I said “that’s true, we went thru it with our dog Lulu in July, the hurt lasted a month, by the second month I was OK, this is the shortest I have ever been able to get it down to.”
For me it is absolute conviction that everyone and all animals live forever, so Lulu is perfectly happy, perfectly alive, perfectly enjoying herself in Heaven now. I forget that not everyone sees it that way. What was interesting was Adam feeling and reasoning his way to it, as we stood on sidewalk in front of pool. He was still astraddle his bicycle, with his bare feet.
He said “I think it is the same for animals as it is for people. We have physical body and astral body and soul body and all the way up, and at highest level is our spirit body always trying to help us and guide us.” Adam was explaining why he thinks we live forever and so do our animals. But he got so interested in his explanation to me, explaining how it all works, that he said once when he was on wrestling team in high school, the practice was so grueling and so exhausting, that when he got home and lied down, he actually started to have an out of body experience. “Instantly I hit the panic button” he said. “It scared me but I did see how you could be out of your body, I experienced it, but I hit the panic button right away to stop it.” I said “we all believe our own experience and you experienced we are more than our body.”
Adam was explaining to me about consciousness. I had already read all this way back when I was first learning stuff, so I knew it all already, but I found it very interesting that Adam was such a good explainer of it. I never could explain it that well. I don’t think I could explain it at all. When he started explaining about consciousness, and how consciousness exists on so many levels, all the way up, I actually saw it before my eyes. I could see how they are all going on at same time. And it all depends where we put our focus. Like a building with 100 floors, but spending our time on second floor. Hahaha but we could take elevator to 100th floor. Our consciousness does go all the way up.
Then when Adam finished telling me the story of what happened after wrestling practice when he was in high school and how he hit the panic button, he interrupted his conversation to say “I better take my swim or my mom will worry about me.”
Like many in Tucson, like my friend Jim who took complete care of his bedridden 99 year old mother till she went to Heaven this past winter, Adam too cares for his very aged bedridden mother at home. But Adam has a problem Jim never had. Which is if Adam does not arrive back home instant the time he says he will be home, his mom panics and calls the police.
Obviously she has a problem. Adam is a 45 year old man, 45 year old men do not get kidnapped on way home from swim pool which is only 4 blocks from their house. It has imposed a lot of limitations on Adam’s going out. For instance he is passionate about UFOs, and Bill said there is monthly MUFON meeting at Wilmot library on 2nd Saturday of every month about UFOs. But Adam cannot be gone that long, his mom would call the cops.
But you have to hand it to Adam. He can’t go anywhere because his mom calls the cops. His beloved kittycat went to Heaven yesterday. And yet his wondrous curiosity, interest, passion for life, love of understanding and explaining, and happy buoyant spirit was all over his face yesterday afternoon. Adam’s happiness was contagious to me.... He is the one who healed up my booboo totally and completely, as we stood on hot sidewalk in front of pool yesterday. And I did have lovely swim....
