kethrai's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Way The way in...is the way out I'm not much of a mystic. I was brought up a little too hardheaded to commit myself to any one manner of faith, be it organized religion or lucky rabbits' feet. After the Catholic Church and I divorced (amicably, more or less, although I suppose they could get me on abandonment) I did not find any one organized religion or faith that seemed to answer most of what I needed it to. So I drifted--not too unusual for someone of my generation, I suppose. But there are things I believe in. Every time there is a news story about the space program--let alone a disaster like Columbia--there is a solid icy lump that stays in my chest for days. I tend to watch my feet when I'm walking, because I'm a klutz...but you don't go very far when you're only staring at your shoes. Sooner or later you must look up. When we cease to look up...well, that's the end of us. So when anything threatens the space program, when our grand space ships fail to fly or burn or people die and we show signs of just wanting to stare at our own shoes....then, I am afraid. I believe that we must, we MUST look up. I believe in small pleasures. Life can be terribly hard, even at times when outwardly everything is going for you. Some of the saddest, loneliest people I've ever met had good jobs and good homes and were dying inside because they were lacking something. They kept looking for the Big Something, and never stopped for the peanut M&M's. Maybe because mine is a life of relatively small pleasures...I believe in them. I believe in hospitality, dear NSR's. As you know. I'm not quite sure, even, how to quite codify my beliefs in hospitality. Hospitality means a multitude of things to me--the importance of being a Good Guest, in your own home, in the homes of people you know, in your country and on your planet. The duties of being a good guest include being kind, not embarrassing your host or damaging your host's property. It also involves not bringing shame or disarray into your host's home. I believe in being a Good Host--a good host to my family, my friends, my dependents, my countrymen and visitors to my home. Being a good host involves protecting the people within your borders. Not allowing folks to stir up trouble under your roof, and being careful of your visitors. Being evenhanded and fair to your guests. Offering the best of your home to your guests. Balancing the needs of your household with the needs of your guests. Being kind. Hospitality is sacred. I believe in hospitality. I believe in books. I cry at scenes of bookburning in movies. There ARE books that I refuse to have in my home, but it would never occur to me to destroy a copy of a book--I would sooner give it away. There are books I would not care to read--I don't agree with them and they make me angry--but it is important that they stay written, that they exist, if only for a better view to oppose them. Often we only define our light by the amount of shadows around it. I believe in books. I believe in children. I believe in them so much that I have chosen to not have them unless I felt ready to do so. It's not fair, otherwise. Children are all we've got, in the end, all I'll ever have or know--someone's children, even if not mine. It will be someone's child who takes my ashes to scatter into the sea. I believe in joy. I grow impatient with the codification of joy--it seems to not be chic to be joyful without reason. It seems to me a dreadful thing to chain joy to cause and effect, simply to what is done. There is a sun, there is grass, dancing exists in the world...there is joy. I believe in cats. When I was twenty-two and all alone in a tiny little apartment--my first--and waiting for a man to move and be with me who in the end, never did arrive--I knew I needed a friend. And a reason to get up in the morning. And 12 years later, Miro climbs up by my head every morning and purrs loudly enough to rattle my eyeballs in their sockets. and I have a reason to get up. I believe that certain shapes resonate so deeply into our DNA that they take on the strength of holy things when we consider them. Have you ever considered a spiral? I make them in my jewelry, I call them andromedas. After the spiral galaxy. Have you ever watched water drain? Seen pictures of the Andromeda galaxy? The thing about a spiral is the way in...is also the way out. That's become important to me over time... that to know when you come to the end, you can still exit the way you came in. There is no shame in going back. Or foward. Only in staying still. I believe that the sun will rise for all the rest of my days. I'm not much of a mystic, or a religious type. And I look at my handful of scattered beliefs here--and this isn't all of them, mind you, just what I could think of at the moment, and it often seems like they're not enough. That what I have is a handful of patches, with seams ripped and the wind whistling through. That if I could find an Answer, it would all be more clear, and whole. But we only get through time one minute, one moment, at a time. And for each minute and moment there is an answer, if not an Answer, and for that minute and moment, oftentimes that answer is all I need. 9:50 p.m. - 2003-02-11 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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