May 30 2007
Peace and the Road To Atlantis
Continuing my story on my vacation in Cape Town, South Africa.
[May 2 - May 4, 2007]
I didn’t have a care in the world.
Isn’t that the core of what a vacation should do?
Some may forget their cares in a carefully scheduled 10-countries-in-10 days tour of Europe.
Some may find hiking through a rainforest their escape.
Some may want to stay home and garden.
What it all comes down to is letting go.
For me, letting go is having no expectations and allowing life to unfold. I feel connected, at peace, stilled.
Laverne and Shirley had to work and all I had to do was hang out at their home.
I ran on the beach.
I played fetch with Nebe.
I wrote.
One afternoon, Shirley took me to her office in Malmesbury so I could see more of the area. I wrote in an empty office while she worked. It was quiet. I felt at peace.
On the way back home, she took a route through the town of Atlantis. The road through Atlantis was evocative as it sounds - a seemingly endless corridor of sun-gilded eucalyptus - a road only seen in dreams.
The scent in the air was more earthbound. Oddly familiar. It reminded me of cooking and I asked Shirley, “What is that smell? It’s like…burnt toast.”
Shirley sniffed delicately and thought about it a moment. “Oh. Bokomo has a Weet-Bix factory here.”
Breakfast cereal and beauty: Sustenance for the body, sustenance for the soul.
Runs on the beach.
Playing fetch with a dog.
Writing with passion.
Being aware of the beauty all around me.
Surrounded by love.
Sustenance for my soul.
I was saying “Yes” to life.
I’m saying Yes right now.
I have been going through a difficult time but I know that I will feel joy again. Each day I affirm all that is good in my life and I have been having more moments of peace.
Yesterday Laverne told me that a friend of hers had committed suicide. It’s sad to realize that the moody, angry and sensitive man I had met almost 10 years ago had too much pain to go on living.
If you’re in pain, believe in life, reach out and allow it to hold you. Reach out to others and ask to be held. We all need to be eased now and then.
“If you’re in pain, believe in life, reach out and allow it to hold you. Reach out to others and ask to be held. We all need to be eased now and then.”
Wonderfully said and very true.