nothing matters and what if?

i felt lousy yesterday.  and then a friend invited me out.  and i went and i felt better.  i still don't feel well or quite right- but not quite as paralyzed.  

i just finished a book.  that the daughter of a friend of mine wanted us both to read.  it had a happy ending. which i suppose the world  needs.  

i could use one, myself.  but you know, given my stubbornness and fear, i'm not sure i'm capable of creating as the characters in the story were capable of doing.  

and so i may just have to survive in this life.

which is far more than so many people in this world ever get even the chance to do.  by accidents of birth. don't be born in Syria, or the Democratic Republic of Congo, or Brazil ... or.... whereever-

do those people even matter in the bigger picture of things?  the world's a big blue marble when you see it from up high.  do they matter?  

do animals matter?  

do bugs?

creatures in the sea?  

it's so very hard to believe that i matter if those souls don't.   

so what does it matter?  why do we even try?  

all i know is i don't want to be who i was.  i want to be kind.  from here on out.  and do right things as much as i am capable of.  even tho- it may not matter one  single bit.  

does that matter?  

whistle and fish

 So, lots of times when I write, I start out with a title, but by the time I'm done, I find the title to be completely inappropriate for what the post turns out to be.  And then I go back and change it.  Well today, my thoughts are so jumbled that I couldn't even come up with a starting title.   So I've started with "untitled" as the title.  We'll see if when I'm done that ends up being the title after all.  

So how interconnected are we all? -- as humans, that is.  or maybe even broader, as creatures on this planet or in this universe.   Are all our differences and crimes between us evolving us towards some greater end? or is it all just random?  

my x was here.  the occasion was a get-together that I hosted for his nieces and nephews.  that was originally planned because my daughter was going to be home for a visit.  but when she was not able to come, i decided to go on with the gathering because my x has quite the "youth following" because he's ...well, he's different.  And I don't mean that in a mean way, but he's just not like most of the others in the world.  he's not ambitious.  he's not trying to accumulate wealth or power-  just trying to survive.  and it makes him sort of old-hippie wise.  the youth- they love that.  

at any rate.  there are many crimes between us that we've never really discussed before.  too hot to handle kinds of issues that seemed better left in the pandora's box kind of thing- even as we've been ever moving towards forgiveness and peace between us for some time now.  

this morning though- we (rather he) kinda went straight for the heart of the matter.  and the essential question ended up being - "do we come clean or would that be more hurtful and harmful to the people involved?"   and we even selfishly both spoke of that it might be harmful and hurtful to us.  

so then we started talking about souls.  do we all have souls?  when our souls leave our bodies, do they talk to each other?  is something guiding us?  but what is the point of the guidance then?  what is such a collective body of souls trying to achieve?   what are our individual souls' roles in all this?

he says he thinks that as we enter this world, we choose our miserable lives.  for some kind of reason.  and well, i get that, but i also don't get why anyone would ever choose miserableness.  "is it because if we don't keep striving for perspective and understanding- we'll go straight to hell?" I ask him.  and he says, "no, there's no hell."  

he tells me of what he thought was a near death experience he had once.  and how he was told he had to go back, and finish things.  that there was something left for him to do and accomplish.  so as much as he wanted to die- he came back.  

and personally, i think there was a reason why he came back.  and it seems like i know what that reason is.   but still, i think- "damn, this is one hell of a system set up if that is true-  that we are always having to be striving for some higher plane for ourselves? i mean, wth? who would want such a system, that we always have to be struggling.  for just that brief moment of time of understanding after we die and before we are born again.  what's the end purpose?  that we all come together (on earth as in heaven) one day?  

and we finally just said, "damn, we don't know."  but then he added, "i don't want to change anything."  meaning he doesn't want to upset the apple cart of the question that the conversation originally posed.  that he was fine with the role he'd been playing.  and that he wanted to continue in the role.  

at any rate, i'm both more peaceful after this conversation but also more disturbed.  more disturbed on several levels.  selfishly- on what's going to happen to me? he's coming out as a true good person in the end, and i'm essentially not.  but also in the cosmic sense?  i chose this?  this life?  these mistakes?  these crimes?  for some purpose?   what purpose?  

it's very hard to believe in a sort of god.  but you know?  it's also very hard not to.  

our conversation ended with a hug.  and him saying, "be good to yourself."  

and damn, i think he's on a higher plane than me already.  that's what he got out of all the crimes i inflicted on him.  and he deserves that.  he truly does.  even as he admitted clearly several times that he was no angel to me either.  

but i guess, what i got from this conversation is that he personally forgives me. and well, i guess, for some time now- i've forgiven him as well.  

whistle and fish, i guess-  "you forgive us, we'll forgive you, we'll all forgive each other til we both turn blue.  Then we'll whistle and go fishing in heaven."  

what's it all about?

 i'm always kind of  amused fascinated by those christian (and to be fair, other religious leanings)  people who are ok with a "fuckaroundandfindout" god.  You know- the ones who are sure you are going to hell someday.  and sure that there is a hell.  You know the ones-  the ones who live their best pharisee lives  each and everyday.  and i guess it's not that they are exactly ok with it, but more they are convinced that this just is the way life (and death) is.  

and i realized that there is a branch of them who sincerely believe that JeSUS saved us from all that.  But that the sticking point is that you have to say you BELIEVE and then further, act like you BELIEVE before you get that assurance of being saved.   And i have always been fascinated amused by little kids adults  who wonder, "What if you confess on your deathbed when it's too late to do anything about anything you did wrong?"   Is that an accepted "save" or will it just be a desperate plea made in desperation at a desperate time?  And those are the ones who will warn you, plead with you, beg on their knees with you to repent before it's TOO LATE!   Lots of those people put up billboards.  

I always thought catholicism had such a good idea in that of confessions.  right up until i learned that the priest would charge you with fixing what you could of the mess you made.  and then i wasn't so on board with it.  and anyway, it seems to me like the ultimate act of selfishness to only make those atonements because you are afraid of going to hell.  Not because you want to be better and good.  But because you don't want to burn, be tortured, or tormented for eternity.  

i believe what I'm saying is that it seems to me that the major religions are fundamentally flawed in this way.    And why I do rather like the Jewish idea that when you're dead, you're just dead.  Seems to me that you might then just want to do right because it's the right thing to do.  and that if you can't- well, then that makes you human, just like the rest of us.  

But i also realize that for a lot of people the thought of death just being the end is completely unthinkable.  unfathomable.  intolerable.  That you'd never see your beloved grandpa or dad or husband or child who preceded you in death again is just too much to take.   i get that.  and that would be an argument for living right-  so that you'd get to see them again.  and that not getting to see them again would be your version of hell.  And oh, how i want that heaven for my mother.  

But I'm not even sure i want it for myself.  Because quite honestly, i'm afraid to look some of those people in the eyes.  for shame.  

I have a friend who fully believes that there is an indescribably joyous afterlife.  She says she's had a near-death experience.  and so, she knows it.   But I ask her both overtly and covertly all the time-  but what happens to the bad people?  does she have any word on them and how they are faring?  Inquiring minds want to know.  

she has no answer.  she only knows what she knows. and no more.  And i can see her wanting to know- "what exactly have you done to worry so?"   But she's too polite.  Either that or she thinks that whatever I've done can't really be as bad as all that- that i'm just scared.   

my friend that died recently- his wife believes he's been reincarnated as a baby buffalo.  i find that kind of sad.  because he's a penned-up, never free to roam baby buffalo.  who will grow up to be a penned up, never free to roam adult buffalo.  and what's the fun in that?  What's to look forward to for the rest of your days?  you 3 squares of buffalo kibble?  the same four walls of fence?  until ya die again?  but at least you're safe, right?  And that's where my friend's wife wants him for now.  right there where he's safe and penned up and gets 3 squares until he dies so that when she dies, she can join  him somewhere.  

Is this discomfort in my stomach cancer or is it shame and worry all balled up?  Which came first? Who's on first?  And does anyone ever make it home safe?  

This is my mind as of 1:14 this afternoon.  and i'm dreading going out with friends tonight because i know that as good as they are, they cannot make this stomachache go away.  and it's really above and beyond the call of their duty.  

Vonnegut said the reason we are here is just to fart around.  i wish i had his faith.  

Feet, don't fail me now.

 so i was talking with my x.  and yeah.  i've had some really good conversations with my x of late.  and while there are still reasons why he's my x, i also realize that i underestimated him in so many ways.  and i treated him badly.   not that he didn't treat me badly too.  but quite honestly, i may have started it.  

anyway, we were discussing an issue, and i said something to the effect that while  the past always matters, that there were just things that i felt incapable of doing anything about, and that i couldn't go back and change them.  just i would  go back and change them if i could.  and that the only thing i can think to do from here on out is be as "kind" a person as i possibly could be.  to not be out for myself.  or be judgmental.  from here on out.  

and so, being a veteran of AA and NA and all that, albeit a very eclectic veteran (meaning he took what he needed, left the rest, and added what helped) he says to me, "you know, you more or less just cited the serenity prayer.  change what you can, leave the rest. that's wisdom" 

and  huh. well, yeah.  i guess i did.  in my seeking of calmness and serenity for myself.  although, it does still disturb me that there is something that i possibly could change or own up to, but refuse to because the cost would be too high.  for me.  and possibly for others.  

and if i'll pay for that someday in another realm, well, sigh, i guess i will.   as you know- i don't know.  

But that is how i'm proceeding, for now.  

time after time

 So I got pretty deep  talking on here the other night.  day.  or whatever time it was.  i am on vacation time now finally, and i can't really say i know what time it is.  or was when i was writing.  and i'm just too lazy to go back and look if there was a time stamp.  because it doesn't matter. not really.  it was what was on my mind at the time whatever the time was.  

time is relative. I believe that is what Einstein said.  the rate of time slows down the more you're moving. something like that.  that i don't really understand.  not really.  

time is relative.  People will tell you.  But i think they are mostly talking about the perception of time.  most people are not Einstein.  most people are not physicists. and they are not talking about physics.  

what am i talking about here and now?  if you're reading this, you may well be wondering.  or maybe you don't care.  i don't know.  

and i don't actually know the point of what i'm writing right now either.  except to say that i feel much better than i did the other night when i was writing.  quite honestly, i was feeling rather sick.  better than i had for a week or so.  but still feeling pretty sick both at heart and physically.  

anyway. i feel better.  the thought of whether there's heaven or hell is not pressing on me.  yeah- i still admit that i have been a terrible person.  and that if there would be a hell, i'd surely deserve to go there.  and that if this is hell, i surely deserve to be here.  but i don't know why- it's not scaring me tonight.

it is funny tho, that right now the twilight zone episode that came on after the old perry mason (which i love for reasons unknown except to me) is about a plane moving too fast than is physically possible. and on it's way to breaking physical barriers as we know them.   and the stewardesses (not flight attendants- this show is old) are discussing Valhalla- the great hall in Norse mythology where heroes slain in battle are received.  or alternately- a place of honor, glory or happiness.  That's how it's understood now.  but you know, i think the Valkyries in the past were demons that would pick up the dead like vultures.   And Valhalla was the battlefield where these Norns would decide the fates of men.   I don't really know.  I've never seen the opera and do not know all that much about Norse mythology.   

and now the flight crew and the head stewardess see dinosaurs roaming where NYC should be.  oh wait, now they are attempting to reverse their time travel and scaring the passengers.  but success!  they made it.   everyone lives.  except they didn't.  they haven't made it their modern day.  but they are going to land anyway.  in 1939.  Lake Success.  the world's fair.  

so they will try again.  

but first, they are letting the passengers in on it.  and telling them to pray. and asking them to be calm.  and rod serling comments that if we hear the engines, we should send up a flare or something cuz it's just Global 33 trying to get home.  

time is relative.  and funny.   so is life.  i'll be calm.  while Norns decide my fate.  (-:  but i'm still not sure if i can pray.  if i have any right to.   or if it makes any difference.  

on earth as in heaven

 If ever there were a two week time period that interrupted and almost shattered my pondering about if there is a god, it was these last two.  

i mean the slaughter of babies.  and all the other innocents.  and on top of that some personal issues with people i love. the death of a friend.  the anniversary of the death of someone who i never deserved to call a friend.   

 i don't believe in Job-ish tests of faith and all that, and i also reject the idea of hell, perhaps because i know i deserve to end up there.  but damn.. these two weeks were tough on my old bones.  

and it all reduced me to a collapsed mess there for a bit.  and truth be told, i'm not quite ok yet.  just mildly better.  

and i have thought a lot about the role of prayer in some people's lives.  and that while it helps many, it also can be used as a meaningless phrase - as in "thoughts and prayers."  

and it got me thinking about the 23rd psalm and the lord's prayer.  which if you're white and of the age i am were surely memorized and droned out  meaninglessly at every sunday service your parents ever took you to.  

and they stick in your head still.  but now you wonder what they mean.   

I will confess to being a really stupid little kid.  I always connected the two lines in the 23rd psalm:  "The lord is my shepherd and I shall not want together so that it read to me like "The lord is my shepherd that I do not want."   WHAT?  "You're not supposed to want god?  Then why am I sitting here in sunday school? i could be out swinging or riding my bike or building a snowman or something fun. wth?"  And I pondered and pondered over that for the longest time.  Until I learned the alternate meaning of "want" and also a rudimentary understanding of commas.  Silly kid.  

And of course then I had the later (still not right) understanding that if I put my trust in the lord that I would not want for anything.  it was all so magical.  thinking like that.  the idea that even if you had hard things in your life, that all would be ok.  you would not be deserted.  you would eventually have what you needed to survive.  to be happy.  to be well.  

and then of course, i grew up.  and i turned into a terrible human being.  i lied. i cheated.  i hurt people.  not thinking about how awful i was.  just thinking of me.  

but then- there was this moment where i thought i had redemption and forgiveness for all that.  everything was just as i dreamed it could be for me.  and so right.  

and then i lost all that. some because i was so insecure about it.  and some- well because...  and don't you think for a moment that i haven't struggled with how i didn't deserve that in the first place.   and how it served me right that i lost that.  and that it was my own damn fault for being so fucking stupid., thick, and insecure.   and as you know-  i lost god all together.  

but as in the last post, recently, i had come to ponder-  how are there flowers?  and how are there good people?  and how are there bird songs?   and how the fuck did i miss all that?

but back to the last two weeks-   and the trouble our world, our country is in.  and my hatred of republicans.  and struggling with forgiveness so that i don't become hateful as they are.  and this got me thinking about what a perfect world would be.

that i could go back and not repeat the same sins that keep my stomach in knots because i know that i can never be forgiven for them because i cannot confess them and atone for them.  or make them right.  

and that i could give everyone a sense of peace.  and that there wouldn't be shootings and wars and ignorance and hunger or love of money and power. or broken hearts.  and that we'd share in all the good things there are on earth.  

and then it hits me.  that lord's prayer.  "thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven."   

and is that our purpose in life?  to make earth like heaven?  and if so-  at this point- all i can do is do what i can.  and hope to hell that i don't burn in hell (that honestly, i'm still afraid of even while my brain tells me it's stupid to think there is one and even dumber to think that a god who loves you would ever allow anyone (even Hitler) to suffer in such a way) for what i'm not able to make right.  

and well, maybe what hell really is - is knowing that you'll never be in heaven.  where there is love and laughter and forgiveness and sweetness.  

and all i can think to do at this point is to pretend that nothing in the past ever happened.  and live from this point trying to make earth like heaven as much as i am capable of.  try to understand people.  try to forgive people.  try to be kind.  try to see the beauty amongst all the ugly.  try to laugh.  try to appreciate fully- the friends and family that i never deserved.  try to love my enemies.  try to not have my first thoughts go ugly or mean or sarcastic.  try to put others before myself.  try to work for justice and equality. and can i sound like a lame beauty pageant contestant for a minute? try to work for peace on earth.... 

these musing to be continued... some day.  

Mybewilderedbest redux

So, I used to have another blog. That I ditched when I realized it was just exposing the hot mess that was going on in my brain at the time.   Or something like that.  But I honestly cannot even remember the email or the passwords or anything that I used to get into it.  My brain has completely blocked it.  Perhaps that's a blessing.   Somethings are meant to be forgotten.  And some things in it are lies now.  Although in my head, at the time, they seemed true.  

At any rate, I apparently started this blog too- way back, and well, I don't even remember doing that.  I discovered that tonight when I decided that I needed to write/process, and I thought, "Well hey, I'll just start a new blog."  So I went to the bloggy place, and this popped up.  And well, no reason to start a new one, I guess.  

I either haven't needed to write or haven't had the will to for a very, very long time. I can't really decide which.  Just like I couldn't listen to music for so long.  Or haven't shed a single tear.  Not because I didn't want to, but just because I couldn't.

So why am I sitting here now?  Well, it's been a rough week.  And I cried this morning. Partly because I was sad, and partly because I was touched by some sweet people.   And because I've started listening to music again. And well, because I just felt  the need to.  And because I could.  Not the ironically, way2frantic need like I had with that other blog, but just a sane, processing need.  

One of my friends died this week.  After living a year and a half with a brain tumor.  And well, it's a sad event in your life when one of your friends dies after living a year and a half with a brain tumor.  And I am sad for his wife and his sons, and well, for any of us who knew him.  We lost a light in our lives. He had such wit and humor.  And it's a loss to lose that.  He was such a smart guy.  Not an really educated one, but sooo, sooo smart.  He confessed to me about 6 months before he died that he knew he wasn't educated and he wished he'd been steered  to go to college and could have afforded it but that didn't happen. And he said (his words) that he was nobody, but he was damn sure proud that he'd  worked hard, and made a good living and sent his sons to college. One is now an engineer and the other a banker.  And I told him, he damn well should be proud of that, but that he was never a nobody, that he was one of my favorite people in the world, and that his intelligence always came through, even without education.  Both he and his wife, who had a similar background as far as going to college went, are/were two of the smartest people I've ever met.  But while she is all fire, he was all calm like earth.   I also remember that one time he was relating a story about how his parents didn't seem to ever get that he had an allergy to down feathers, and he suffered from feather pillows.  But of course, he told the story in an amusing fashion.  And I responded something to the effect that this was the funniest sad story I'd ever heard, and damn, his parents were jerks.  And he quietly smiled and said, "It was the best they could do."   And don't think I haven't carried that little phrase around in my head for years and years now.  When trying to forgive.   

I have very strong thoughts about forgiveness.  I don't believe the bullshit about you should - for you not the other guy. stuff.   I maintain that sometimes, you can't forgive because you simply can't.  And people shouldn't be all "It will be so freeing and good for you."  Because you can't do what you can't do. 

That said, I have been graced with forgiveness by someone who I never had the right to ever think forgiveness was possible from.  And that's a sweet, sweet gift.  And I thank him for it.

People struggle in this world.  I know someone who is struggling right now.  And well, I know she will be alright.  But I hate that she struggles.  Seems super unfair that some people have to struggle like that.  For no good reason.  And it makes me question, "Why?"  

I've been all over the question of "Is there a God, and what is he good for?"  I've gone from a church going kid who just went because you were supposed to.  To a young adult who went to church because it was the only place, she ever heard anything intelligent discussed. (My family is Presbyterian.  Presbyterians believe in having highly educated, intelligent people in their pulpits. People who were not afraid of questions and doubt)  to church being a nice place to take your family to a fairly strong believer in the world back when and then to a complete atheist in reaction to disappointment and heartbreak in my life.   

And that's where I've sat for a long time.  For quite a long time.  Except for then there's flowers.  And why?   And then there's dogs who run up to greet you when you're sitting on your porch trying to process the week.  And why?   And you have friends who quietly put their hands on your back when you tell them that you're sad about something.  And why?  And you learn that someone that you thought was hopeless turns out to do things that are so incredibly forgiving and sweet and has become such a fine human being, and you go from wishing you'd never met him to being so grateful that you did. And why?

I mean, how can a random, non God world ever create such things?  That's what I can't figure out.  

And well, I still hate.  I hate republicans.  I hate that people struggle.  I hate that I've made unforgivable mistakes that I can't take back. I hate that people hurt in any way.   And damn, why would a god let there be such hate as in the world? 

And well I don't know.  I just don't.  But then today, my daughter sent me a link to an interview with Michael Stipe.  And at the end of it, the interviewer says, "It seems like you need to discover things by accident. You work, and make mistakes, and then you look at the mistakes and you think, That was good."    Stipe's reply: "That's where God lives."  

And well, he was referring to his art (which incidentally, I just mis-typed as "heart.")   But I read it much bigger than that.  In that in all our human failings and mistakes and sins-  that is where God lives.  

And now I'm thinking- as a human-  "It's the best I can do."  

RIP Gary.  Love to you, Junie.  It will be ok.  And in the words of our now patron saint- "Love when you can, cry when you have to, Be who you must...."   I'll await your arrival whenever it's right for you.