Over on my
day job blog, I wrote this article, and thought those of you who read my personal blog would enjoy it. xo
On heartbreak, small crimes, and Mother Earth.
I often say, live long enough, and life will happen.
And “life” is full of joy AND sorrow. We all
know that, of
course, but when LIFE is happening to us full force, and usually we
become aware of the extreme details of the present moment in times of
sorrow, danger and shock, we forget that THIS is a part of the gift of
life, too. This hurt. This pain. This sorrow. And that it is not
happening because we were bad or didn’t hold the perfect affirmation or
mantra the right way in our heads and hearts but because…
Life happens.
I got mugged once at gunpoint at a drive through ATM. I was totally
broke at the time. I was driving through at about 9 PM, at a bank where
the drive through ATM was maybe 100 feet from the curb. It was a Monday
evening in a busy part of Studio City, CA. There were people walking by.
I had about $10 in my checking account and had just given a massage and
had $100 cash to put IN to my bank account. I drove up, put in my card,
hit the PIN number, and then leaned over to grab the cash out my purse
when-
Knock, knock…
I felt something hard against my head.
A boy, or young man, in a ski mask, stood at my driver’s side, holding a gun to my head.
Knock, knock…
Another boy, or young man, stood to the right of my car and knocked on my window to let me know HE was there, too.
My heart stopped. Time slowed. I remember that I had clear, extremely
reasonable thoughts: “…if they try to get in the car, I will drive off
and risk getting shot, because THEN they will probably bring me to a
gang house and… the worst. If they just want money, they can have it, I
will just try to get out of this as quickly as possible.” I recall that a
couple walked by, not 75 feet from me, and either didn’t notice what
was happening or didn’t care. I believe they didn’t notice, because
eventually, someone would have dialed 911, right?
The boy at the ATM tried to get cash out but he couldn’t.
(There was no Cash to GET out! I didn’t even have $20 in there, remember?)
I was holding the Benjamin I had just earned in my hand. He took it, and asked,
“That all you got?”
I nodded.
“Gimme your phone,” he said.
His hands were shaking.
I gave him my phone.
“Get out of here,” he said. I drove off, and then my heart raced.
Later, the police were at my house, questioning me, fingerprinting
the car. I heard on their walkie talkies ANOTHER robbery at another ATM,
same exact format. Probably the same boys.
The cops were much angrier than I was. I found that nice, but weird.
They kept telling me they were gonna “get these guys” and that the guys
“would pay.” I understood that was the job of the police. I actually
spent a lot of time with them and learned about them. One was a veteran
of Afghanistan, from a long line of police in his family. The other
needed a job and this was one.
But I felt so bad for those boys, or men, who had not only mugged me
but threatened my life to get money. First of all, they were obviously
either a) on drugs (they were skinny and shaky) or b) new at crime (they
were skinny and therefore probably young and shaky) or c) joining a
gang (probably a shortened life there) or d) just really wild and dumb
kids on a crime spree. Their guns were real, although I don’t know if
they were loaded, and wouldn’t have wanted to find out…. or at least
their guns were VERY real looking. I am not an expert but I have gone
shooting several times, grew up around guns and hunters, and (now) am
romantically and life-partnered with a former Police Captain. So… it was
real enough.
But these dumb boys, they were targeting some broke massage therapist
slash actress (it was about two years before I started working with
12Listen,) they were at worst getting into drugs and crime and there is
no future in that, or at the other worst, just a$$holes.
I prayed for them. I prayed for them, for the police officers who
were probably just a few years older than the criminals who were
endangering themselves to stop crime, and then, I prayed for my bank
account. (I mean, I did. It’s the truth.) And I never went to an ATM
after dark again unless it was right in front, on the busy street, where
there were LOADS of people.
Why am I telling this story in a blog about heartbreak?
I don’t know, but it seems like the right context to share the next part of this blog.
Recently I have gone through a few heartbreaks again in life, less
painful than some I’ve encountered thus far in life. Not the worst, is
what I’m saying, but… it doesn’t make it any easier to go through.
Years ago, long before getting robbed, long before going to India,
but not THAT long before… when my heart would break, I would turn into a
dramatic mess. I would sob, and wail, and go for long walks in the
woods reciting very depressing 19th century poetry, and listen to a lot
of depressing music by songwriters who died young or committed suicide.
(poetry by Christina Rosetti and Arthur Rimbaud, music by Jeff Buckley
and Mama Cass and Elliott Smith.)
These days, I don’t deny my feelings, but I let it wash over me. I
still go for my walks and I look very closely at nature. I listen to the
wind in the trees. I touch the hard wood, feeling its roughness over my
soft skin. I give nature my sorrow and it returns new life force to me
in return. A shaman once told me that when we have emotions like sorrow
or anger, we should go to the earth, give it to the earth, because the
earth needs our humanity as much as it needs our carbon dioxide, that
it’s part of the symbiosis of our lives as natural beings.
I give the Earth my humanity, and it gives me in return a call from
the divine, from the holistic Earth-Divine-Cosmos continuum, from
Brother Sun and Sister Moon:
A whisper soft and low, but that yet I can hear, nay,
feel in the very core of my being, from my beating heart to the marrow of my bones:
“Yes, yes, my child, let the heart break, for it breaks open,
open to the blue firmament of sky, open to the laughter of children in a
distant place, open to the birds and the breeze and the orchestra of
life happening all around you.”
Don’t hide from your life.
Be here, here with me, here with you. Be here with your life and let the beauty of this world, inner and outer, shape your love.
You are here. Is is…. I am…. I am…. I AM.
