I spent my twenties, I recall, insane and finishing college. Not that the two have anything to do with one another, but you may draw your own conclusions. After that, there had been such a lack of my having done anything substantial with my life, I felt this desperate need to produce — somehow, it did not register that actually graduating college was any sort of accomplishment. But it was a good thing, I think; before the madness, I had spent 5 years getting stoned and whacking off; better that I saw less of my achievements than think grandly of little ones few and far between. And that lasted about 6 years, maybe 7.... And now — I have something like peace. A pace. Patience. I will get done what I will get done, and perhaps it will be something great. I don’t know what causes such a transition, from desperation to acceptance; perhaps it was God remembering a prayer from long ago, which I myself have forgotten, when I must have wished for repose I had never believed could be mine. “Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed.”
Anonymous
11:22pm thursday, 24th march
Congratulations on your hard fought victory.
Strawberry
1:06pm sunday, 27th march
I recently saw a photograph of a Celtic stone at the entry to a burial in Ireland. The stone had carvings on it of spirals, and the book with the picture interpreted these convoluted lines to be a depiction of a maze. I like that metaphore for life best because starting and stopping points of events seem to be more of a surface illusion. My life is an endless maze and phases are places where I walked straight and took no turn.
It is frightening to start to believe that thread of my life has had a direction. When I was younger I did not believe in destiny, I only believed in gain from hard work. Gradually I became aware of blessings entering my life. Of course the schizophrenic illness was a big curse, I saw things in the raw black and white of blessings and curses. But my mind wasted no experience. It took each event as it occured and either broke down or mended. Often before a mend could occure there had to be a break. If I look back I see big and small happenings as a juncture in a maze where I had a choice to either turn right or left. I made choices and could not dream of the consequences - like in a maze a person can only see the immediate direction a turn takes. Now I think that the paradox of fate is that if you do not believe that you have a destiny or purpose then in fact you have none. But the more you believe in fate the more you start seeing clues all around you that your life is guided and directed and that you are learning. The maze leads toward knowledge. Knowings that your spirit uses to attach itself to fate. For if you are a fool your soul wanders aimlessly......And I think the fool is vulnerable to attacks by agents of chaos (the devil). Back in the middle ages a fool was by definition someone who had lost their connection to God. Hundreds of years ago in Europe a mentally ill person was a fool, old science depended on religion in this way.
Anonymous
Strawberry