Dear Beloveds, Whoever You Are or Are Not

Sometimes I wonder if any new words will pop up in the apparent Miranda thingie candy apple brain. (Note the punctuation—not the “Miranda thingie’s” candy apple brain, as there is no Miranda who has one). It often feels like the song, "What do we do when there are no more words/we just sit in the park and sing with the birds." But writing is a habit; posting online feels like the letters I used to send home to family and friends.

The silent retreat is over, so finally I can get some peace and quiet around here. lol

Though it is literally quieter as the retreat-attendees were often making music. But beyond that, you realize how simply the human presence carries a whole language with it, even if unspoken. Body language, movements, grunts, and exclamations of pleasure or tears. And the internal dialogues that were unheard but almost visible on faces. Imagined as that story is. 

So while it was virtually wordless, it was not really silent at all, as the voice of life was singing in every human heart. Well, I suppose that sounds a bit romantic. Maybe it's more that simply seeing another human, even when there is no more projection about what they might be thinking or want, brings up a whole set of reactions. Just dancing or walking or sitting with another apparent human feels the same as engaging them in the most intricate verbal conversation. There is a language of the body, of emotion, and it's also felt with all that is, the birds and squirrels and trees, but the difference is they seem to have far less interest in the Miranda thingie than the humans.

Nancy Neithercut's poems are playing through the dining hall speakers, with some soft violin music in the background. I am writing on my laptop and snacking on some leftover peshwari naan Fiona made. Fiona jokes that now we can talk all we want, but have nothing to say. Most of the time, the only words spoken are Nancy’s, and sometimes the lyrics to songs. Sweet tears and impossible sighs.

When I read messages, it's realized that the number one question is always about what someone should do next, or maybe what they need to do now, etc. And when that is gone, well, it's just gone. The world is perfect just as it is, which is neither perfect nor imperfect at all. Every appearance is simply as it is, and the idea of altering it to improve it seems like someone saying we need to make the sun 7 percent brighter.

As it says in “Waiting for Godot,” there is "Nothing to Be Done." There never was, nor anyone to do it. This is what speakers say over and over, yet it's still imagined there is something to be done to see that there's nothing to be done. An absurd play indeed!

Fiona seems to be living here full-time now; like me she receives room and board and a small stipend. I am the "caretaker," she is apparently the "chef-in-residence" and also "maintenance supervisor." I love how the retreat owner makes up titles for us, but I suppose that is the way of it. Everyone has to be named a thing--- even a nonduality speaker is called a "nonduality speaker." It's not necessarily all that impressive on one's resumé , though....

Fiona says she told her family from the nearby village, who do the actual maintenance here as they've done for years, that she no longer has any future plans as she has no future. Since they are Buddhists, they were not upset. But her sister is somehow furious. Even though they always had intense sibling rivalry, she wants Fiona to become the world-class chef she always dreamed of being since she was a little girl. Fiona asks me how anyone can do or become anything. I tell Fiona that becoming a chef may still happen; awareness of not doing doesn’t mean things don’t appear to happen, it's only that the sense of anyone intentionally doing anything is no longer there. People somehow imagine if they see “this,” they will just sit down and stare off into space for the rest of their lives, as if "enlightenment" was catatonia. Some write me and wonder if they will end up a reclusive madwoman living in a remote woodlands or some such crazy thing.

But most humans that I know where this is seemingly seen--- whatever this is--- appear just like anyone else in the story of life. My friend Lynn teaches theatre to young people and interacts with her family, she just says there's no longer the stress of anyone feeling they are doing life or the sense that any of it has meaning. My friend Moira is involved in an intentional community, and others I speak to have very involved careers and family lives. It all goes on just as before...except it's no longer taken as any one's life in a world of actual things and beings. Call it a dream, a movie, it isn’t any thing at all, but seeing this actually does nothing. For no one. 

 “Nothing for No One.” How's that for a nondual ending?

Best regards,
yours truly (or not),
the Miranda Thingie💓