I went through a letter box of mine, trying to clear space in a metaphysical sense. There are some unnecessary things one hangs onto, but others that help make us who we are. I guess the thing is to let go of what is no longer serving your higher self at the time.I found a beautiful card or two from my mother, sweet letters and cards from my kids and one from one son to another, too sweet to do anything besides cherish, of two boys, one small and one big, holding hands. It was to the older one from the younger. They must have been sixteen and the other turning twenty-three, a birthday card.
There were letters to and from myself and Baba Hari Daas, an enlightened Indian master in northern California. I found just some friendly letters from people I never got to know so well.
Most amusing were the romantic entanglement letters. Example: me: 'Perhaps you should be looking for another place to stay while I'm here doing this gig in California. Still, I am hoping we can go to Charleston and take your car, etc... Sorry to sound so businesslike.' This is not an exact quote of course.
Response: 'So, you just do whatever you want to assert your independence...?' At the time this may have partly been true, but it was my place after all. This was correspondence I did not keep, lifetime drama.
And then there was one from a guy I thought I really loved. Although the relationship was pretty toxic, the card was too sweet to throw away. I only say thought, because I am not sure what true love really is anymore. So often it is so unhealthy, and you think you are madly in love with someone, so much codependence, neediness, obsession, addiction, but seldom any real balance or anything truly functional. Still, you have to believe that something good came of it somehow. At least I do.
Funny how the years go by, the relationships with people we have had. I realize it is all attachment, but someday maybe I will write some memoirs and can use the past. My life has to come to some resolve before this can ever occur. People ask me sometimes if I will ever write a book about my life. I suppose that is my answer.
The good news is that I can even laugh at myself, my old self, even my new self sometimes. I am grateful for all of it, the bad as well I suppose. The important thing is knowing my kids loved me, and I guess still do, and even my mother loved me I guess, and maybe even still does.
