I approached this year gingerly having decided to abdicate all reigns of control and to steep myself in the practice of nonattachment. Okay, so I fell off the horse a couple of times (horse being the Russian metaphor rather than the American wagon). During my birthday period, I spent money on clothes and jewelry treating myself like a Queen on steroids. I broke down and purchased a few books. I even bought a song or two on iTunes pre my terrific gift card from a friend. And I cared. I cared whether this LaLa was still standing when my son grows old. I cared about other areas of my life that I have been vested in for so long. I admit it, I over-cared.
Now, the captain is about to let this ship steer itself, and run aground if need be, or sink all together if that is its fate. The strange part is that I don’t feel weakened by giving up control. I feel powerful like the Mississippi, jumping levees, carving out new basins, and simply not behaving appropriately for the masses. I feel timeless and awe inspiring.
I was walking this morning through City Park which was still glistening from the monumental rain we got yesterday as Mother Nature was trying to make up for the drought we have had here. I saw a heron, larger than life hunkered over on the naked tree looking more like Alfred Hitchcock in profile than a fowl friend of the lagoon below. Turtles were clinging to fallen logs in the water, smaller herons with their stark eyes stared at me from the underbrush, ducks and geese were galavanting with ibis chuking here and there in search of all those worms that have now come to the surface.
I ran into a fellow walker and we caught up on different areas of our life, I told him how I was feeling and he said, “That is brilliant. You are in a good place. Stay there.” Really? This is such a different feeling from the one that I have clung to for so long that it has dragged me down into the sea of mere mortals who are desperately trying to go about life in a world teeming with twists and turns.
Then I got it, it hit me like a bolt of lightning about the same time that Loca decided to go mad, psycho dog, over two dogs headed her way. I lifted her up with her choke collar and body blocked her against the bridge side and I thought to myself, “Self, you have lost your way. You were supposed to be practicing nonattachment. Oh but you failed. You gloriously failed. And now nonattachment has come to you. Because when you ask the universe to help you, it does. It doesn’t turn its back and say oh no, you can’t always get what you want. It provides you with what you ask.”
I walked home from the park. Loca’s leash shorter than Heidi’s as I held her close. A neighbor working with a gardener on her endless weeds (she has a garden much like mine, lush with vegetation, and thick with weeds) said hi, and I responded, wouldn’t it be lovely if the weeds didn’t come back? Ha, I said throwing my head back in my new careless manner. As if. She asked me about the guy doing the repairs to the house, and I said, he’s great, but costly. She said I admire you how you maintain that house. I looked at her and I said well get unused to it, because me and the LaLa are about to enter a decade long period of benign neglect.
One stress monkey leaped off of me and swam into the bayou.
I then thought about the other areas I have clung to for so long with deep seeded fear of losing and said in what remains of my California-esque dialect, “Mmm, bye bye.”
Two stress monkeys leaped off of me and caused my feet to somewhat rise off the sidewalk.
I looked at the Magnolia Bridge that is in so much need of repair and thought about the work that remains to be done to get it where it needs to be and I thought, it will happen, don’t sweat it.
Three stress monkeys leaped off of me and suddenly I was gliding home.
The R in Rachel that once stood firmly for Responsible is now being converted, quietly, diligently, and forever to signify Relinquish and what follows, well let’s just call it for now, nirvana.