I'm Not Good At This

I'm not good at this.

And suddenly nothing I ever said or cared about or practiced really matters to me at all.

I don't do the things I'm supposed to. I don't drink enough water and I know it. I haven't gotten enough exercise. I'm behind on papers. I eat anything. Meat included. I cannot snap my fingers and be happy. It's not easy. I don't know why I ever made it sound like it is. I'm bitter at the sound of my own advice.

I don't make salads. I cannot meditate. I gave up reading books because I forget the words in front of me in a matter or minutes. I have not opened my emails in days. I miss phone calls and don't return them. My sink is full of dishes. My suitcase is still empty and Friday is just seconds away.
I don't do the things I'm supposed to.

The things I'm supposed to do.

What is it that I'm supposed to do?

I need to be there. And yet I am here.
To get there I must board a plane. I must pack. I must close bank accounts and exchange money. I must say goodbye and wish people well. I must figure out what is next.

I need to do these things. Now.

But I don't.

I just don't do them.

I cry. I think about you a lot. I write. I think about friends here. I watch them pack. I watch them leave. Disappear. I smile with them. We share food. We have some wine. We laugh. It feels good. For a few moments. My mind goes back to you. To other places. To that time you held my hand in church and rubbed my fingers to make them long and skinny. That was years ago.  I haven't gone to church since 2006 or something. We all had dinner last night as the group of Asian Peace Builders got ready to head to the Philippines.  Such a warm group of people. So many big smiles and beautiful eyes. I like to imagine where they will be tomorrow. And next year and 10 years from now. We relive memories of classes together. Of my dogs wandering down the school halls. We hug and smile. I'm okay for a bit. More than okay. I'm happy. Proud. Loved. My mind travels back to you. You're telling me you don't want to make the salami pie but you are rolling the dough. You tell me you don't remember how many eggs but you are cracking them. We watch the video I recorded of you later and you love it. You smile and laugh at yourself. You watch it a few times. You curse a lot.

Is it true you won't be there anymore? You won't do this? You won't come to my house? I won't wait by the door to let you in as you pull up in your white Chrysler? You won't wear your gold jewelry? You won't complain about the coffee? Who will I sit with at Christmas? Who will sleep in my childhood bed? Who will be my Grandma?

I come home.
I said home. I mean my place in Costa Rica. My little room overlooking a big green yard. The windmills to the left. The sunsets to the right.
I come home.
But I don't pack.

I take a few things off the walls. I'm supposed to do this.
Things I drew in the past few months. Quotes I like. Photos of places I imagine myself in the future.
I cry a little bit more. There's a photo of you in every room.
I don't care about these things.
Not right now. Will I care soon? When will that be?
Have you ever lost interest in a dream?

I don't dream. Not in the past couple of weeks. I see sunsets. But they're just colors.
I want better things for the world. For the people suffering. For the injustices. But, honestly, I stopped trying to believe I can help. I cannot imagine how to do so. Will I remember, one day? Will I know, sometime soon, what it is that I was placed on this planet to do?

I lay in my hammock. A lot.
Sometimes, this is what it feels like I'm supposed to do.

I see the same things I have been watching since August of last year.

Yellow breasted birds that land on the power line in front of my balcony and occasionally glance in my direction before flying off over the pool or the mountain or landing in front of another person in another place.

A little nest perched in the guayaba tree is finally fully of tiny beaks and I watch them poke up and down and I watch their mother come by with little wormy gifts.

There's a big iguana that rattles the tin roof in my neighbor's house, which makes the dogs go crazy. Three of them now. But one's just visiting. Trying to find a new home for the other two. It hurts. I don't want to leave them. They know it, too. They're extra cuddly today.

The clouds are coming in. It will rain soon.

The day is almost over. I could have sworn I just woke up.

I walked this morning. Up to one of my favorite trees. A maze of branches and roots and vines and leaves and weeds and nests and soil and bugs. Dirty things that all of a sudden I like more than the pretty ones. A mess of a tree. Not knowing where one thing starts and another ends. I climb it. I rub its rough bark with the palm of my hands. With my fingertips. I hold on to thin vines that I think will be weak, but they are strong. I stand on branches. I look up. Sometimes, you can learn so much from just watching. From trusting. From trying. From not being afraid. From getting dirty. My mind travels back to the Magnolia tree that used to be in the front yard of my house in New York. My older sister and I are climbing it. She falls off. The tree dies one year. No more bright pink and white flowers. My Dad cuts it down. It's just a stump now. Grandma is riding a big wheel down our front hill in the blue, red, yellow sweater that she always wears. We're all laughing.

I'm back in my hammock. Thinking about you. Watching the tiny bird beaks. Listening to neighbors talk in the distance. Writing. This feels like what I'm supposed to do.

Who makes these things? The rules of life.
What is it that I'm not good at?

Order. Routine. Numbness.
Balance. Acceptance. Non-attachment.
Discipline. Dedication. Duty.

How does one get good at such things?

Practice. everyday.

And then it is lost. In an instant.

For we are always trying to get somewhere.
Do more. Have more. Be more.

An illusion of the mind.

All we have is this very moment.

Am I wasting it? As I sit here. Un-packed. Un-bathed. Un-anything.

I can't feel right now.
I see it all. The birds. The tiny beaks. The playing dogs. The beautiful skies.
And I don't feel that sense of admiration. Inspiration. Beauty. Bliss. That which I used to know.
What is it that I'm supposed to do?
Because I can't remember. And I can't feel it.

Not until the next wave of chest-shaking cries come along.
Emanating from the gaping hole in my chest when I feel that you have stopped breathing.

Exactly one week ago today I came from the airport and into your room.
And you held me.
And you, too, cried in a chest-shaking way.
And you told me you loved me. With your eyes closed. An empty stomach. A dry mouth.
A pain that would have been too much for anyone else to bare.
But you kept fighting.

I'm not good at this.

It just takes time.
It's what everyone says.
It's what I know myself.

Time.
It's hardly ever a friend.



__________________________

Don't call this world adorable, or useful, that's not it.
It's frisky, and a theatre for more than fair winds.
The eyelash of lightening is neither good nor evil.
The struck tree burns like a pillar of gold.

But the blue rain sinks, straight to the white feet of the trees
whose mouths are open.
Doesn't the wind, turning circles, invent the dance?
Haven't the flowers moved, slowly, across Asia, then Europe,
until at last, now they shine
in your own yard?

Don't call this world an explanation,
or even an education.

When the Sufi poet whirled, was he looking
outward, to the mountains so solidly there
in a white-capped ring, or was he looking

to the center of everything: the seed, the eggs, the idea
that was also there,
beautiful as a thumb
curved and touching the finger, tenderly,
little love-ring,

as he whirled,
oh jug of breath,
in the garden of dust?

-Rumi

I Can Feel You Leaving

I can feel you leaving.
I can feel it because I left my house without my rings on today. My bracelets were there and I heard them clanging against each other as I walked, but when I fidgeted my fingers, like I usually do, they were bare. And I felt naked.

I can feel you leaving.
I can feel it because the sweet orchestra music today was both serene and somber. Too somber. And as I sat there trying to keep it serene, with my eyes welling up, the rest of the room faded and the blank stares of unfamiliar faces around me hurt.  A lot. And I wanted to pick up my bag and walk out, but I wasn't sure where I would go. And I was scared.

I can feel you leaving.
I can feel it because I can't remember how to cook. I don't taste when it's too salty. I don't remember to lower the flame. I don't care about the presentation. I eat without thinking. Without chewing. Without tasting. My stomach doesn't know if it's empty. Or full.

I can feel you leaving.
Because I cried today. In public. And I didn't care. I did. But I didn't. I kept crying even though I pretended I was starting to feel better.
And I yelled. And I hit. Because I wanted to make the pain that was beating me up inside get out.

I can feel you leaving.
Because I am not here myself.
I watch myself from afar. Sometimes close by. I stand in front of myself. I watch my lips move. I hear myself say the words. And I hate the sound of my voice. I hate how silly I sound. I tell myself to stop talking. Or, I choose the "right" words to say. in advance.  in preparation.
It's not me. I know it's not. I watch myself from the other side of my face and I know it's not me because the words are not coming from within they are coming from a contrived place that I have tried so hard to climb out of.
And it's you. Leaving me. Lost.
I'm lost without you.




Or maybe I'm wrong. Maybe it's not that you're leaving me. Maybe I'm trying too hard to hold on to the wrong things. Maybe I'm clinging and grasping and squeezing and forcing things. And I'm suffocating you.

Maybe you are trying to tell me it's okay. Maybe you want me to know that you are ready.

Maybe it's just me. This is you. This is me. You're there. This is your time. This is my time. And I'm not ready for either.

In my mind I have made it beautiful and easy and perfect and sweet. And that's not how it was ever meant to me. It's not possible. And I thought that if I tried hard enough I could make it that way. But I can't.

So. It's not you leaving me.
That's not what I feel.

What I feel is pain. Hurt. Sorrow. Sadness. Anger. Frustration. Love.
Love.
Love.
Love.

The immensity of your love is killing me.

It's not leaving.
It's permeating my every cell.
And I just. Can't. Contain myself.

And I need the hugs. The kisses. The hand holds. The rubs. The grabs.
Even though they make me cry.
I need them because they help release the love that is overflowing in me.
From you.
They help me share it with the world.
Because it is too much for me.

I can feel you.
Loving me.

I Don't Know How To Let You Go

Last night I cried.

I had the most beautiful day. I woke up with the rising ball of fire that heats my room every morning and warms me into the sweet melodies of the song birds. With 2 pups at my heels I walked down to my neighbors' house and milked some cows with a few of my best friends...friends from around the world, who I've known for nine months, but that I've been with for eternity. Friends who pretty soon will wrap their arms around me and smile and look at me and say "goodbye for now" or "adios" or "hasta luego" or "take care" or "see you soon" or some other words that we know are just words that maybe don't mean anything or maybe they do, but only the years will tell.

"Your material body is not you," I have to tell myself. And while it is true, I know I just say it because I have already become attached.

Later in the day, I picked up my graduation gown with my girlfriends. We laughed as we told stories about our time here. I could feel my wide-toothed smile. Inside, it burned.

Then we hiked through a farm that sits behind the natural reserve by our campus. A local farmer taught us about medicinal plants. Native fruits. The hundreds of species of bananas. We climbed over a water hole. We drove his old jeep. We ate some star fruit. We reveled in how ridiculous this place is. A little heaven on Earth that I will never forget. The most sacred of souls from around the world stork-dropped into a blessed little rural community on the mountainside, where all the neighbors smile and say buenos dias. Where pain and hardship, discrimination and social classes, surely exist - but where community prevails. Where desperate, or confused, or bitter hearts burn forests, but where others plant life. Where the tree roots are long and thick and windy and the branches reach up and wide. Where there are more colors than holds a crayon box and more things to see than you look for.

Our farmer friend tells us about a beautiful green bird. How she taps the wasp nest. And then comes her mate and he taps it, too, and then flies away. And there they go taking turns to feed on the wasps until eventually they are all scared away. And there the mama bird goes and lays her nest in the old wasp nest and life is regenerated.

I am still smiling when I get home. Thinking of my beautiful day in both gratitude and gloat.

And the message tone of my phone sounds and I pick it up and press a button and light the screen. And the skin on face goes from taut to heavy and I can feel it hanging down around my eyes and my cheek bones and the sides of my mouth. My heart plummets onto my cold, dirty floor and the phone is a brick too heavy for my hand to hold. And I don't want to read it, but it's too late.

And I cry.

And I cry because I'm selfish.

Because I want more time. Because you are a person who makes me laugh and smile and feel at ease. Because I never had anyone like you in my life before. Because you give me something different. I cannot explain what it is, but when I see you and when you look at me, I feel OK. And when you pick up my hand, I like the soft, gentle touch of your skin on mine and I think I finally know what love is.

And when I come to sit on your lap, you lift your arms and you let me. And you don't tell me how heavy I am until your knees are aching and you push me off, cursing.

And when you yell at me or tell me the coffee is bitter or that I'm "so big" or to "shut up" I smile more because you are honest and real in an "I-don't-give-a-shit" kind of way that is somehow, someway still sweet, and loving.

And when I lay my head on your shoulder you pet my head like I'm a baby and I don't feel embarrassed.

And sometimes you drink beer with me. And sometimes you tell me stories about the old men that you used to live with.

And you always say "hi sweetie" when I call or when you see me.

And you always eat everything on your plate even though you don't like sea food and are particular about your cookies and you're not hungry anyways.

I cry because I am so very selfish. Because I want there to be more moments. I want you to be there when I get home. I want you to make salami pies with me. I want you to tell me stories about your childhood. And I even want to hear the story about when you first drove a car and when my Dad got high with your boss, even though I have heard them a thousand times already. And I want to see you stand proud in front of your white Chrysler or brag about your golf record or arm wrestle me or wash the dishes or sleep in my childhood bed and wake up at 10am and say you always wake up early.

I want you to be there at my wedding. I want you to dance with me. I want you to be proud of me.

I want to have a Grandma.

I want to have you.

And I am selfish. Because you are 95 and you have given me so much already and I want more.

And I'm sad.

Because I have never seen you weak. You are 95 and I have never seen you weak. Not one day in my life. Not when we have lost family members, not when we have struggled time and time again watching our loved ones, young and old, fight disease. Not when you have fought it yourself for the past 2 years.

I don't know what it means to see you give up.

And I'm angry.

Because the clock says you are 95 but your mind is still brilliant and your soul is still young and your heart still loves and your body is still healthy and strong and its just this one f*cking thing that is ruining everything. And you don't deserve it. And I don't want you to have pain. And I don't want it to be like this.

And I'm scared.

Because I have never seen you in all white.
Because you wear beautiful clothes and gold jewelry and red lipstick.

Because I have never seen you in a bed in the daytime hours.
You like to walk around and go to town with me and pet Sam and stand in the pool and play Rummy Kub.

Because you don't like doctors. You take care of yourself.

Because you don't like to be sad, or tired, or alone or helpless. You don't like our pity.
You are strong and beautiful and funny and active.

I'm scared.

Because I never imagined this day would come. And you can call me stupid and you can think what you want, but it's too hard to imagine something that you have never even come close to seeing as a reality. And you can think "oh but she's 95" but you don't know her. I'm scared because I thought somehow this day would never come. Or, maybe I thought somehow I would be prepared when it did.

I'm scared and I'm angry and I'm sad and I'm selfish.

Because last summer you played bad mitten with me.
And last week you said you wouldn't come down to visit me in Costa Rica because "you didn't know where the hell that is".

And last night I didn't know where you were.

And I don't know how to find you or keep you or let you go.


--------------------------------------
On June 12 my Grandma will turn 95 years old. She has been fighting cancer for the past two years, diagnosed with a tumor shortly after she lost one of her grand-daughter-in-laws to cancer and helped her great-grandson fight his cancer and my sister fight hers.

After two years of being at home in her son's house, staying healthy and active, my family says it may be too hard on her now.

Please keep her in your thoughts and prayers.

And if you have any photos or stories or memories that you would like to share with me, please send them to posa.jaime@gmail.com.