The Storms of Life

Jim's deep backyard ends at a stream that makes a right-angle turn. So you could say that his backyard is bounded by a burbling brook on 2 sides.

That sedate creek became a raging river last Sunday during Hurricane Irene. When Jim left for church, the brook was turbulent; when he returned, a flash flood had spread over his football-field-sized backyard and into his garage. He was able to close the back door of the garage against the water that was pouring in.

Then he watched as a 15-foot-long brush pile that he'd been adding downed sticks and weeds to for 5 years, floated, turned slightly, and jammed into the back of his garage, effectively forming a beaver dam barrier that was held in place by the force of the water.

In our meditation practice, we eventually learn that the debris of our thoughts are floating down the river of consciousness.

Then, sometime, when we are flooded by the waters of emotion, our mindfulness is strong enough, and we have enough faith that mindfulness can protect us. We decide we can tolerate the turbulent emotion for 1 minute or 10 minutes, and so we watch the flood.

An emotion has 2 parts--body sensations (often unpleasant) and a thought (very slippery). We decide to observe just one of these.

We watch body sensations--the tension, the tightness--or we watch the bumpy, smooth, rough, short, or shallow breath.

If our mindfulness is strong, we watch thoughts go by like downed trees in a swollen river. That thought, which seemed so strong and sturdy and true, actually comes into view, floats by us rapidly, and disappears. Gone.

The next thought rushes by, again gathering all our attention and even our belief in it, then it too is gone.

Mindfulness is our ally during the storms of life.

Hurricane Irene

Hurricane Irene has come and gone. It rained for 20 hours, beginning and ending with a couple of hours of mist.

I was kayaking on the Connecticut River looking for migrating nighthawks (none) for an hour before the rain started on Saturday evening. The confluence of the West River and the Connecticut was extremely low, with the put-in place being a slender, shallow channel through mud flats.

All the boats had disappeared from their docks. During the last heavy rains, 3 years ago, all the boats and docks floated down to the dam, 10 miles downriver.

By noon on Sunday, the rivers were over their banks and the barren docks were breaking up and floating away one by one. Streams were also out of their banks and flooding the floodplains. Woe to people who had homes or businesses in low-lying areas.

The treetops waved wildly for about 10 minutes, and i thought my eastern casement windows (closed but not locked) might rip off their hinges and fly away.

The electricity went out, as we knew it would, but for only 3 hours.

Rain and winds sweep through our lives. Two weeks ago, a writing friend learned she had liver cancer. She died a few days later.

At noon yesterday, the rivers looked more solid than liquid, with trees, branches, debris, and docks floating away.

Our earth-ly bodies also float away, down the river of life.

A raindrop dies into a puddle, into a trickle, into a stream.

We die, the ego dies, into the ocean of impersonal space that surrounds us.