i am too healthy

my nine year old niece agnes says this, after her mom says she is glad the kids are healthy. too healthy. her two little words strike a deep chord within me. i say, with simple curiosity, what do you mean by that? agnes says, hmmmm. i say, when i was little, i would wish that i would be sick, just sick enough to not go to school. as a matter of fact, the best seven days of my childhood were in the hospital. it was a serious ear infection which the doctor said it looked like poisoning from centipede bites. it wasn't a surprise to anyone since the family slept on a damp, rough concrete floor over a leaking corrugated roof. we cohabited with cockroaches, rodents and centipedes. as far as i am concerned, the pains are nothing compared to the luxurious comforts of sleeping in a clean bed. and my own bed, no less. i didn't have a proper bed, let alone my own bed, until my twenties. that's another story. anyway from my eye as a nine year old, hospital is heaven. i don't have to go to school. i can read the adventures of monkey king and other chinese immortals all day long. grandma makes little clay pots of rice and chicken for me. there are milk and cookies at night. so yes, i was really frustrated that i was so healthy that i didn't get sick more often.

the hand of benevolence gently puts him down

hwubby says, as soon as i realize the taxi is going to slam right into me i am just filled with this sense, to let go, do not resist. so he goes limb. two thousand tons of moving steel hit his right. like a rag doll he is thrown into the night new york city air, dents the hood, cracks the windshield before spinning into the icy cold air and dropping onto the freezing ground on his left. i am not making light of all the broken ribs, clavicle, multiple pelvic fractures, and so on and so forth. in the ensuing days and nights he keeps seeing the car ram into him. o, yes, he stays conscious the whole time. they put him on morphine and he still goes through spasms which, on a pain scale of one to ten, are off the charts. having said all that, he is very, very lucky, in the words of the attending trauma physician in bellevue. mr bernstein, he says, you are very very lucky. indeed. they find no spinal injury, brain damage, no surgery necessary. everything is healable. if that is not grace, i don't know what is. the hand of benevolence holds him up and gently puts him down.

i don't meditate and torah study to gain benefits and yet...

i don't go to torah study because i want to get benefits in anyway from anybody. i simply love the sweetness of torah. i don't do spiritual study groups regularly because i want somebody to do something for me. i just enjoy the holy company of fellow yogis who love immersing in the lights of the scriptures. i couldn't have schemed or engineered or fantasized the scope and breadth of good fortunes that have been falling into my lap one after another at super-duper speed.

first case in point. i'm in bellevue trauma ward after a sleepless night. i'm allowed to stay there twenty-four hours, but not to sleep. i put together two chairs, doze off, feel someone tapping my shoulder. it's the night nurse whispering, my supervisor says you can't sleep here. the chinese in me who is scared of authority jolts me up. i'm in that enforced state of sleeplessness for goodness how long when someone says, are you suk wah? i say, yes. the person says, there's a call for you at the nurse station. my heart jumps and skips. i blankly say into the phone, hull-ooo? a guy's voice says from the other end of the line, suk wah, this is so-and-so. my mind stays blank. i could not recognize this name. after an awkward pause, he begins to speak. i cannot make any meaning out of the words until these two. torah study. suddenly i remember like seeing the sun popping above the horizon. yes. i know who he is. he sometimes goes to torah study in the rabbi's house. we rarely speak to each other except greeting each other shabbat shalom. i blurt out, yes, yes, ben-ji. this is the name i know him by. he goes straight to the point. suk wah, i know you need a place to stay, you can stay in my apartment. just like that. no questions asked. no conditions. a couple of weeks later i find out what transpires. judy, the point contact person in the shul, emails the entire shul population about my need to find a place to stay in the city. ben-ji's boyfriend, steve, gets it while in an airport somewhere in the world. he knows this apartment fits my needs. the trick is there is another person staying there but about to leave. so there's only a tiny window of time to get me the key to the apartment. meanwhile judy, under my strict instruction, would not give out my cell to anyone. so steve, whom i sometimes like to joke around with, says, call bellevue. as it turns out, i have a two bedroom garden level apartment all to myself. i can have a meditation room. i can chant facing a snow-covered garden. i can take a bus from around the corner and get off at the entrance to bellevue. to top it off, it's a beautifully done place. elegantly simple. chic with a lot of character.

second case in point. at the last minute i need a ride on a monday afternoon to drop off an envelope to the lawyer in new york. the first name that pops up is claire. she is my spiritual study buddy. i know she is off on mondays because we have to periodically adjust our weekly study schedule. i call her. she just comes. again. no question asked.

my guru says, again and again, to the effect, get the relationship with your inner self right and everything will be all right. well, it's more than all right. it's infinitely more spectacular than i could have imagined. but then, all this and all this are not why i meditate, chant and study and do the practices. it's because i love it. i can't stop doing them.

breaks my heart to see him in such pain

i thought i have a good handle on 'attachment.' until i see hwubby in such pains. a burp sets off a screaming spasm. or it can come on just like that, involuntarily. the doctor asks him, on the scale of one to ten, what is this pain? hwubby says, nine at least. so he's been put on morphine. and that creates another kind of pain. constipation. before this happened hwubby has at least one bowel movement a day. so it breaks my heart to see him suddenly screaming in pain and i can do nothing about it.

so it is i count my great good fortune to be able to stay in a lovely, serene apartment near bellevue. i have the two bedroom apartment all to myself. now i even have a meditation room. i go into meditation today with a burning question. how am i going to walk through the eight inch of snow in l l bean shoes? but i am not worried. somehow i know the answer is within. and sure it is. soon into meditation i receive it. wrap plastic bags around feet. and so i do. i secure it midway below knee with rubber band. it works beautifully. thank you, inner self. now off i go into the famous new york snow.

hwubby in bellevue hospital

it could have been so much worse. hwubby was hit by a taxi in new york city. he was thrown into the air, dented the hood, cracked the windshield before hitting ground. pretty beat up. his attending physician in bellevue hospital says, broken ribs are the worst pain. and hwubby has a bunch of them, besides a broken clavicle, cracked pelvis, lung bruises and liver lacerations. o, yes, a broken pinkie too. but he is very, very lucky. no surgery is necessary. yes, there are bruises but none on his face. he's going through phenomenal physical pains but his mind is clear. in fact he was conscious the whole time these two thousand tons of accelerating steel hit him.

this happened last friday night. now, four days later i find myself gazing into a magical world created by a night of snow as i stand in the living room of this garden level apartment in chelsea. i just come out of a sweet meditation. it's warm quiet all around me and within me. how can i not feel safe, supported and cared for when there have been abundant loving help streaming in everywhere through everyone that i cross path with. as my guru says again, all this is grace, all this is grace, all this is grace.

i couldn't have created a better set up to cultivate what i want to cultivate. patience. and so i feel grateful and tranquil, deeply tranquil.