Looking Within

I recently ran across a post on facebook that really captured my heart.  It was written in German, and I meant to translate it when I had time to post for my friends.  However, I've lost the post and can't find it.  So I will do my best to retell the story in my own words, as it echoes in my own heart.

In the beginning, when the Earth was made and shaped by hands greater and kinder than our own, the gods sat down to discuss the final, most important, aspect of humankind:  Where to put Wisdom.

One god said, "Let's put it on the top of the highest mountain." 

The other gods disagreed.  "It's too dangerous to acquire there by humans physically unfit to make the trek, and too easily knocked off the peak, never to be found by a single one."

Another god said, "Let's put Wisdom at the bottom of the deepest ocean."

Again, the others disagreed.  "It's too easily found there.  Humans will find it before they are ready to understand and assimilate it with love and peace."

After a moment's silence, the quietest god spoke up.  "Let's put Wisdom deep within the soul of each human.  When each is spiritually aware and ready for understanding, they will look within and find it in the depths of their hearts."

The gods all nodded in agreement.  To find Wisdom requires spiritual awareness and quietude.  Quiet your mind, still your heart, and when your intentions are pure, you will find it there, waiting to bless you and those around you with its light and warmth.

To all my friends who have shown their support

The constant support of friends is deeply touching and brings (more) tears to my eyes. My gratitude to all of you is heartfelt and boundless.

I wish I could say that Alex is the only sorrow that catches up with me. It's really a little of everything from the abuses of my ex-husband--now two years past--to frustration over my life and hopeless job and financial situation, to loneliness and unrequited love, to body issues, to school, to Alex... Even the house renovation with its lack of privacy and all the minutiae that go with it.  It's just all caught up to me.

I count my blessings every day, and I'm grateful that, bottom line, I'm lucky I've got a rent-free roof over my head and a family whose support has gotten me through the worst decade of my life (albeit 5,000 miles remotely). But I'm ready for the struggle to be over, now, because climbing out of the muck and mire is as exhausting as plugging through it, and I'm so very tired.

I'm feeling better today, though still emotionally overburdoned. I don't mind when others learn the story about the loss of my son, Alex--or anything else, really--through the grapevine.  In fact, I'm sick to death of explaining to anyone what happened with my son, and I avoid having to do so as much as possible. It's better when people know, but it's easier to not have to explain that my son doesn't live with me and then answer the plethora of questions that inevitably follow. I live with his absence every single day, and reliving his loss through each retelling is another scratching away of the scab of a huge wound that wants desperately to heal.

When I periodically post my pain on facebook, in whichever form that's prevalent at the time, it's not an attention-seeking effort. It's done from the need to express the pain and rid myself of it. The need to get it out becomes greater than the fear that others will think I'm looking for attention.

Thank you, again. My appreciation is greater than I can express. Truly.  Much Love, Joy, and Laughter to all of you!

Cadaver Day

09:30--It's cadaver day in Anatomy Lab.  Our first one, sprung on us with no warning!  Our new prof and two assistants just wheeled in three stainless steel cadaver tanks, and opened them wide.  The smell is phenomenally strong.  I can hardly bear it.  Blech.

12:35--The smell was worse than the sight of the bodies, which in itself was a little…  well, very disconcerting.  There were three cadavers, 1 female, 2 male, each in its own tank.  They were not completely submerged in preservative.  Rather, they lay in a shallow pool of it with towels draped over the body.  The towels absorb the preservative and distribute it across the ventral half of the body. 

The cadavers were not fresh--they seemed to be quite well-aged.  One male seemed to have been so long in service that his skin and linings and innards had turned dark brown.  The female seemed to be the freshest, with bits and globs of flesh still scattered here and there on the lip of the tank, across the towels, and on the blunt probes.  The other male was somewhere in between.

The two males had had their brains removed. Their heads had been sectioned midsagittally so we could see inside the oral and nasal cavities, as well as inside the empty cranium.  One male and the female still had intact eyeballs, though the male's were deflated somewhat, and the female's were still, erm, round and plump.  All had their tongues.  Not all had their teeth.  All were bodies of elderly persons.

Picking up a probe at the female cadaver, I was compelled to wipe it on the towel because I couldn't get past the fact that there were bits of greyish-pink human flesh sticking to it.  I wondered if anyone else in my group noticed the globs.  Three of my lab mates had their hands right in the cadavers, reflecting flaps of skin and touching the various muscles that we were studying today.  I was curious, but I couldn't quite bring myself to touch those bodies.  It was a little overwhelming in my mind, the smell was unbelievable, and I was, frankly, too grossed out.  Everything seemed like very pliable leather.

It was very difficult to wrap my mind around the fact that we were looking at dead human beings, once alive and breathing, now stinking and preserved in a foul, poisonous fluid for students to poke and prod.  The next time I renew my driver's license, I may reconsider my option to donate my body and parts.  Let my body, such as it is, maintain its dignity of form in death.