at the moment, i am SO tired and unmotivated.  i suppose it doesn't seem so, but this whole family thing, and my impotence before it, has really gotten me down.

***

what i said about friends earlier, what i MEANT was this: for me, the truest expression, what allows me to get to the heart of things (or at least, MY heart) involves peeling away and forgetting all expectations people have, all the superficial pictures people have of me, and just saying/doing the truth.  oftentimes i am so smothered by all of this that even I don't know what that truth is until i go through this process.

i believe that the truest art is only found in this process, when one communicates with the silence and the darkness, when one "speaks" with what does not respond, and with what cannot be seen, and with what cannot be conceived.  this conversation, which always occurs in the deepest isolation within oneself, is a conversation with god.

in the end, when you shoulder your burden in life, and you just "do it," there's nothing to be said about it...

***

i recall something (vaguely) that charlotte joko beck once said with regards to suffering.  she tried to say it by referring to the etymology of the word "suffer," and although i can no longer reconstruct that etymology, there have been moments when i definitely understood what she meant.  in "suffering," there is the image of a tremendous burden that one must bear, and in that image is contained all the reluctance and hesitation and pathos that makes suffering a thing to be avoided at all costs.  but there is a moment (if one can find it) when a decision is made, and one becomes "one" with suffering, and then suddenly, it isn't such a big deal, because you ARE it, you're no longer thinking about it.

...well, i wouldn't say that it isn't a big deal, but what i mean, and what i think beck meant, was that in adopting it, in becoming one with it, you are no longer standing outside of your situation judging it; you are it, inescapably it, and that's alright.

escape.  es-cap-e (quoting dory from finding nemo).  it's a paradox, but most of the battle of life involves not escaping it.  the rest is (relatively speaking) easy.  or, rather, for the rest, it doesn't matter if it's easy or hard, because it's you.

***

it's what i have to do.  it's what will happen anyway.

***

thank you, grandmother, and shodo, and everyone (whom i imagine looks out for me; and even if they don't, well, it gives me someone to thank when i am feeling grateful for scraps of understanding)...