PRELUDE This is the opening, the threshold of learning, the giving back and the receiving All in one grateful ear. Let it begin now, the opening of words. This is here. This is now. Let this space be. I have given it so. Now. JAL, 4-7-99

 
(Visit with "the space within", after learning Cynthia's twins won't make it)  
 

What to do with this? Isn't this the beginning of every hurt? The dead, dull realizing? Ever, always, loss pulling at one like an undertow. There is no placing this pain. It will sit where it wants. And so it does. And I do. I sit here of my choosing and have let the black thing fly. It lands here, in my heart, like a setting weight that must be recognized. It is not the first time, won't be the last time this presence makes itself known. I can't push it away. It must gradually dissolve in the rain of so many tears. I give it space for that. Space it will take, with or without the giving. But I'll not kick at it, the foreign thing sitting there, angry at its existence. I didn't ask it to come. It didn't ask to come. It's just here, arisen of fate beyond touching. Ai-i-i-i-i-i-h! I'll not add to the weight by hating it. I'll say this thing here, for as long as it needs. And it needs. And I need. And sometimes that's just the way of the world.

 
If you think things could be different, well, these things aren't ruled by thinking.