DEATH, HOPELESSNESS and Mr. McKean

Charlie McKean died this morning after a prolonged illness.


 He was in his nineties, surrounded by his family, his friends, all knowing the end was coming. He was as prepared as an ex-Marine, an ex-Mayor of Gardner, a relative-by-marriage, and my father's best friend, could be. (We all got our Christmas cards, sent by his wife, Theresa, even as he was in the hospital this last time around. God bless you, Theresa. God be ready for you, Charlie.)


I have been pondering "death" a lot, since coming back from California. I saw it up front, more often than I care to remember, when I was living there. I was always working with a "high risk" population--a younger crowd whose untimely passings were often wrought with violence, horror and much tragedy. And then, there was the entire AIDS tsunami, beginning to hit shore even as I stepped off the plane at LAX, in September of 1978. (Not that I hadn't grown up with death...we had a huge web of great aunts, uncles, grandparents and step grandparents. Many cousins and regular uncles and aunties also died, in my childhood. Irish wakes and funerals were something I was born into and  dreaded.) To know that the three hundred teens I worked with, as a street counselor, in Hollywood, have all passed, has haunted me, to this day. Yes, I have walked in the shadow of the Reaper.


Now, living with it in this house, watching my parents' friends and the parents OF my friends die, knowing the inevitable way I, too, will leave 88 Maple Street, has caused me to become more committed to studying a Buddhist approach to death. (My Catholic prayers  hold some comfort and connection, but the Church, itself, has passed by.) So, what do I read, meditate upon, consider and write about, this afternoon, upon hearing of Mr. McKean's passage?


Let me quote one of my Teachers, Pema Chodron, in her work, WHEN THINGS FALL APART: "When we talk about hopelessness and death, we're talking about facing the facts. No escapism. We may still have addictions of all kinds, but we cease to believe in them as gateways to happiness. So many times we've indulged the short-term pleasure of addiction. We've done it so many times that we know grasping at this hope is a source of misery that makes short-term pleasure a long-term hell.
             "Giving up hope is encouragement to stick with yourself, to make friends with yourself, to return to the bare bones, no matter what's going on. Fear of death is the background of the whole thing. It's why we feel restless, why we panic, why there's anxiety. But if we totally experience hopelessness, giving up all hope of alternatives to the present moment, we can have a joyful relationship with our lives, an honest, direct relationship, one that no longer ignores the reality of impermanence and death." 
                                             (Chodron, 1997)


Impermanence.
That's so hard for me--for us all. Belief in hopelessness--not depression about, but BELIEF in it--that there is nothing "better" to hope for; to be present, fully, in the reality around  us--remembering to always strive to do and be our kindest, most compassionate, awake-self while doing so--and to experience exactly what is happening. All the terror; the pain; the tragedy--to breathe it in and to send out compassion and mindfulness into the maelstrom. To accept that this, too, shall pass.(Every wise book re-iterates this message, have you noticed?)


Buddhist teaching isn't about "non-theism" vs "theism".  Even Chodron writes that the difference between theism and non-theism is not about whether one believes in God. It is about believing that there is some great Babysitter that will see us and appreciate us if we just do the right things, say the right things, and give up our responsibilities to something outside ourselves. Non-theism, she tells us, is about "relaxing with the ambiguity and uncertainty of the present moment without reaching for anything to protect us".


 ( I guess she means reaching for something/someone to protect us from the fear, the loss, the emotional pain of the death of the loved one.) I guess she means to sit tight; don't push it away; open to it; breathe it in; feel it; examine it; breathe out compassion to those left behind--including ourselves...not so easy.


Learning that I could still respect "God" and relax with my gut-feeling that there is A Universal Creator, while also following a philosophy that points to taking responsibility for my own actions, minute by minute, (and then, conversely, makes me aware that I cannot hold on to the results of those actions), has blown me away, several times. It has also made me aware that I have no excuses; continuing this practice, this study, this life, is absolutely something I have to do. I must act from mindfulness in every moment; act from compassion and kindness in every situation; but also, not beat myself up if I fail.


 Acknowledge. Confess. Refrain. Let go. Breathe. Always.


In this light, I send my prayers, energy and love to Mr. McKean's family and friends. I feel their loss and their sorrow.(I see it in the eyes of my parents--especially my Dad.) I know this is a marker for both of my parents in their own struggle with impermanence. This affects my entire familia in so many ways.


You were a good man, a welcoming neighbor, a great friend, Charlie. Find your way to the Light and Peace.


(May I be as brave.)


Namaste.     

IF YOU CAN PRACTICE, EVEN WHEN...

"if you can practice, even when distracted, you are well trained." 
                                                                              Lojong training slogan for today.


Yesterday: Mom goes into bathroom. Mom comes out hysterical. "The toilet's broken, again!"
She rushes downstairs, screaming, to my walker-bound father, who is watching an early football game on the t.v.


(It is the day after Christmas. For two weeks, there have been countless guests in and out of our house; some relatives; some friends; some staying for longer than a few hours. All have used the fifty-year old toilet we grew up with--the only toilet in this large house.)


"You should have let the kids buy a new toilet, like they wanted to do, Jim! You are so stubborn!" Bev's yelling comes clearly into my consciousness, through my closed door, up the stairwell even as she continues her tirade.


(I, too, have used this toilet, often. I, too, have contributed to this broken handle. I, too, have offered to help pay for a new toilet, several times. I, too, am frustrated by the increasing "control" issues these aging parentals exert on anything around them--especially the lives of their children AND mundane, household issues. I understand the "why", but it does not lessen the manic impact. Now, Jim, who remains seated in his special recliner most of his waking hours, because his balance is off, and his arthritic back, spine and legs don't want to hold him up, anymore, struggles to stand, find his walker, and come UP the stairs. HE WILL FIX THE TOILET!)


"It's the damned handle, again. The plumber told me that if it breaks one more time we will have to buy a new one! " Bev is still screaming. She follows behind Dad, up the stairs, bumping into him and causing him to begin to respond, angrily, back at her.


(As all of us who have rented apartments know, the chain on the inner lever of the toilet tank often comes loose or rusts off, etc. and must be replaced. No big deal. This happens at least once a month at our home, because Jim "gerry-rigs" from the most absurd bits and pieces of his "junk metal collection" down cellar. Whereas a simple chain link would suffice, and could be easily bought at the local hardware store (or Wal-Mart...) for coins, he insists on going through every piece of scrap metal he has hoarded and sorted, and chooses a ball chain.


This is the single worst choice to try to wrap a paperclip or piece of wire around and re-attach to the lever, inside the tank. His hands are palsied; he won't put on his reading glasses to see up close, and can't get the wire wrapped between the miniscule balls that make up the chain; when we stand behind him, so he won't lose his balance between the front of the toilet and the sliding glass doors of the shower, he gets furious. When he asks for one of us to hold the flashlight over the tank, he bangs his head, innumerable times, against it, as he crookedly straightens up, and then lets loose with gusts of internal flatulence--whether on purpose or by accident, one can't be sure. Finally, between Bev screaming that he will kill himself ,and his yelling at me because I am trying to do what he cannot (winding the wire between the little balls on the chain and then threading the wire through the miniscule holes on the lever), I get angry. I tell him he is a "Crabby old man and if he doesn't want my help then he can do it alone...period."


I leave him, standing over the tank, bent and swearing. Bev stomps into her own room, cursing too. Jim, ever obstinate, and now, with "a job to do", grunts and mutters and continues to work, alone. In my bedroom, I try to go back to reading, but am listening for his yelp and thud. I am also waiting for the sound of broken glass shower doors, or a broken porcelain toilet bowl...


When my brother and niece arrive, by sheer chance, five minutes later, he will allow ONLY my brother to assist him. They remain in the toilet for another hour, because Dad demands overseeing the operation with the chain--and my brother is dealing with his own eye issues. (It is the myopic leading the Cyclops...)


Another sister arrives with the dog. Dad yells at her, because she comes upstairs and begins reminding him of the fact that we wanted to buy them another toilet and he ordered us not to--bad timing on her part. She, too, is banished from the bath.  Mom, sister, niece, dog and I go downstairs, all of us alert that an ER visit may be imminent--for either Kev or Dad. A 911 ambulance may need to be summoned, as it has been, often, in the last year, precisely because of these kinds of silly situations where no control can be given up on either side.


Screaming is the first response--usually initiated by a hysterical mother insuring she is "the warning system"--and the utmost urgency is given to whatever mundane appliance breakdown or common chore immediacy has been deigned "CRITICAL" by either parent. This applies to snow removal; trash take-out and removal; dishwashers; dryers; flooding basements from snow-melt or rainstorm; toilets; bathroom drains, etc. Whatever small tempest arises, it becomes a Tsunami, with untold layers of melodrama.)


When Kevin finally attaches the chain to the lever, and talks Dad back downstairs, Brenda and Mer and the dog distract  Beverly with holiday gossip and on-going weekend plans. I can retreat to my books and writing.


However, now I am upset; still stinging from the sharp words and early screaming, when all I was trying to do was allow Dad the fantasy of his being able to fix the toilet, alone, while "assisting".(He did not speak to my brother that way.) What if my brother had not shown up at that moment? Dad would not allow me to work on the toilet and would not leave the bathroom until it was fixed. He would not allow Bev to call the plumber.


Dad doesn't 'get' that when he endangers himself in these situations, thinking he's solving a problem and damned anyone who tells him not to do it, he also engages everyone, every single one of us, in the drama. He doesn't care if he hits his head again, or has another seizure, or becomes stroked out, or dead.


"Bury me in the backyard" is his ongoing joke. However, it isn't easy as that. It isn't clean and clear cut. It's hospital trips every day, twice a day, with Bev, and multi phone calls to all the rest of the family, and doctor interventions, and rehab and driving and arguing about driving and who went the most to visit and who stayed the longest and who can miss work to get them up and back and who is the best child and the guilt of never doing enough and doing it right or correctly or with perfect attitude. It is a lifetime of being raised to believe "we are not enough"--inside, or outside, ourselves.


It is Dad sitting up in a hospital bed, with tubes and machines and nurses surrounding him, and a slack johnny and his white and blue and mottled Irish skin exposed in ways we don't need to see, grinning, like he's on vacation. (Maybe he is.)


I get it.
Hourly.
The control and power these people have exerted on their families, and in their communities, is waning. (Even their beloved Catholic Church has shut its doors, thanks to the Bishop, when they need the support, most.) So, they retaliate, in their way. They cling, even if they fight, to each other. They cling, even as they spout horrible things, and later insist,"Well, you should know, we don't really mean it, you're too sensitive", etc.

This tempest in- an- eight- room- teapot burns my spirit and boils my soul--especially because-- I lose it, too.


When this is pointed out to me, often, by a sibling: "I thought you were so Buddhist--so peace-loving! Hah!",  it is particularly painful.  It is true. I have lost it. Even as I try to work out issues of self and self-deceit; of impatience (still) and harshness and anger.


The mirror up to the face, and the snide comments in the midst of vulnerability one is already feeling guilty about, is almost too much.


Then, I realize: this is one of those "ghosts". 


This is the "don". The thing that wakes you up. The thing that keeps you mindful.
Admit. Confess. Refrain. (Begin again.)


Forgive everyone, including yourself.

Realize: you have much to attend to.
Then, "let it be".
 Sit down.
Breathe in.
 Breathe out.
Thank the protectors and the ghosts for pointing out these places in need of investigation, still, inside you.
Breathe and let them go.
Sit and let them rise.
Do not push them down.
Do not obsess about your failure.
Let them visit for as long as they need to.
See them, understand them for what they are.
Let them be.


The parents will continue to put themselves at risk. The siblings will continue to show up, and to help where they can, and to criticize when they can't. The nieces will avoid all confrontations and fall back to their I-Phones. Everyone will do what they have always done and what they feel compelled to do.


Mindfulness is realizing: you are in this alone.


Mindfulness is realizing: you have a choice.          

FEEDING THE GHOSTS

Another "dangerous time of year"...Solstice and Christ's Birth and sometimes the high holy days of other cultures, too...so many sensuous memories...so many regrets and failed hopes and sadness, ...all coming at us as the light moves into darkness. Even if it is a dream, it is a bit of a scary dream, isn't it?




In a long Buddhist slogan-teaching-phrase--there is a multi-pronged approach to overcoming resistance. I'm not going to break it down, here, because I've only begun to wrestle with it in my own life. However, one tiny part has jumped out from the text and moved onto my lap. It is about "feeding the ghosts".




It suggest that, like the holy man, Milarepa, in the old days, whose cave was filled with demons, it is only when we befriend the frightening ones and invite them to stay as long as they desire, do they, in fact, disappear. Fastest way to clear out the ghosts is to actually put out a tasty bite for them to gnosh--a bit of cake.(Real cake.) Along with an incantation: take this cake and make yourself at home, because you are truly welcomed. You show me what I'm most likely to avoid. You wake me up, even when I don't want to be awoken. For that, I am grateful. Manga!




I suppose, as I study this new set of tools, I will come upon more subtle ways to deal with my obstacles and resistance. However, in this particular season,(especially as I find myself a grown woman with a past, confined to a childhood bedroom surrounded by a dying present, faced with an unknown future,and few who actually know me, deeply, or even care to), the ghosts rise up in a multitude, invading both waking thoughts and dreams. (Ghosts of Christmas past; Ghosts of Christmas future?)  They all look and sound the same: mostly in the guise of lost lovers and friends; people once so intimate that their passing out of everyday time seemed an impossibility--and yet--they are gone; disappeared; untrackable. Only returning as these whispering memories and unfinished tales.  (Brrrrr.)




So now, I am going out for cake. I will begin to put it out, everyday. (Just tiny ones.) Just bites.(Ring Ding Juniors? Hostess cupcakes?) All with the incantation attached: for my Ghosts; may you actually come by; may you make yourself comfortable and known, finally; up front and visible. Even if I'm intimidated, I am thankful for your visitation.




Amen.  

BABYSTEPS

The first step, the "babystep", in the seven "steps" of mind training, is the basic preliminaries. The actual sitting one's butt down; slowing everything down; breathing, gently; mindfully.  Allowing whatever is going to arise from the muddy bottom of consciousness to float to the surface. See it; own it; examine it; know it is only a memory. A dream thing. Touch it lightly and then: let it go.




Identify these "dreams" as memories; as thinking; as constructs of the mind. Nothing really is real. All dharma is a dream: even the dreams are dreams! (Wowza!!!) Don't let that knock you off your cushion--just breathe in the thought: "Thinking."  Then, breathe out the thought: "Letting go."


A light touch of a feather on  your breath--an image Pema Chodron, Buddhist nun/scholar, offers--works quite beautifully.




No big deal.
If it feels like a Big Deal, breathe it in. Examine it. Welcome it. Breathe it out as "memory" and let it go. No judgment on how  you did or where you will next progress to...no bullying of self (or others). No comparisons. No black dots to denote failure and no gold stars, either.
No big deal. Seriously.



Just sitting. Just breathing. Just compassion for everything--including Oneself.


Namaste.