Breathing

Taking a few minutes to pause this morning opens me up to an end-of-the year reflection. The winter solstice has passed and the sun rises a hardly discernible part of a minute earlier as the weeks pass. Everything changes… one thing that can be guaranteed… nothing stays the same. Oh yes, I live in the same house I lived in yesterday but experience has taught me that there is no assurance that this roof will be here tomorrow. I do pay the rent and keep up with my bills. Being responsible for these gives me a little security but the next few seconds can change everything.

            I remember, at the beginning of a year a long time ago, the security of a government job, and art studio downtown, a wife and a daughter to come home to, and we always had a few dollars in the bank to insure a certain amount of the normal comforts. But, by the Holiday Season of that year, I nothing left of any of it but an empty apartment and a bar tab I couldn’t pay. It wasn’t the Merriest Christmas for me that year.

            The next year was full of optimism, as I celebrated New Years at a tenth floor apartment in the Santa Monica Shores with some very dear friends. There was champagne, caviar, and a new lover in my arms as we toasted the New Year. That year held out the promise of a very good one for me: the world was my oyster. Ahh, but how things change! That year turned out to be the worst… absolutely worst... worse than the year before... the worst year of my life.

You just never know. Opportunities missed, doors close, doors open… it is a game played by planning on the hunches… intuitions… I caution myself… be ready for changes...nothing remains the same… Good fortune, bad luck… everything passes… the best laid plans… circumstances… Then when everything changes and passes and nothing remains of any of it… Nothing but the silence remains and in that desolation of spirit I find blissful peace. Beyond surviving the worst of it I become ready for the best of it. After all, there is no other place to go. I haven't had a bad years... really bad year... no matter what happened... since I came to this realization... I am grateful for my last breath... I breathe in now... I exhale... then my next breath... the rest is frosting on the cake.

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