The Diamond of Today
Sunday, October 5th, 2008Today, as I was sitting on the train, reading a journal, I happened to look up and find myself looking directly and deeply into the eyes of a man facing me from a row away. It was a long moment of warmth and it filled my whole body, like there was a sun inside me, and it started to shine and warm me from the inside. I could not stop smiling and looked around a bit stupidly. The man also seemed to be unusually awake. I was quite shocked about my reaction, as my whole body seemed really large and warm- it was a very beautiful shock. And I realized that I did not have to have sex with this man and I did not have to exchange phone numbers nor do anything else that I didn’t feel like.
Realizing this was a relief from previous occasions when I would not even dare allow myself to look so openly into a stranger’s (especially a man’s) eyes, because of possible “dangers”.
As the train came to a stop, I told him how beautiful it was to just look into each other’s eyes and he replied, with a big smile, “ciao.” I then left (Actually, I flew!) because suddenly I did not know what to do. When I went up the stairs, I heard a voice behind me: “ciao, buona giornata.” I guess it was him, but I did not turn around- I was so shy about what happened and how much it touched me. This is my diamond of the day.
-Stephanie B.
On Saturday, Artur (my husband) and I headed off to visit his family (brother, Celso; sister-in-law, Steph; niece; nephew; and sister, Idilia.) Now, I have a confession to make: I usually dread these visits. I usually fail to implement the brilliant suggestion Ariel & Shya make about doing things as if they were your own idea. Instead, I usually sit in their living room, or in their garden, and make small talk while I count the minutes until we can leave. For, while I love Idilia very much and am very close to her, the rest of the family I have just never connected with at all. I’ve given myself many reasons for this, reasons that mostly allow the responsibility to fall outside of myself! : we’re so different, we have nothing in common, they’re not interested in me, I’m not interested in them, we don’t care about the same things, they’re boring, they just talk small talk, there is no chance to get deeper with them - no chance to make a real connection… So, every time I would go, while holding tightly to my judgments, my heart closed to any other possibility of what it might be like to be with them. Well, the weekend started out with me still like this, and, as we set off to drive south, Artur and I started bickering a bit, and I realised it was because I was resisting the situation and blaming him for it. So I stopped, right then, apologised, and made a commitment to myself to embrace the trip, the people and choose to actually have fun!
