Retreat #6: Eternal I
I walk up to the gazebo. Standing alone on the hill, feeling the wind in my hair and the sun on my face, the bite of winter in the air, I feel very alone—a feeling that seems to be a frequent visitor these days. The loneliness has a nebulous quality to it: I can’t pinpoint its cause. Being in the presence of other people doesn’t alleviate it; in fact, being around others seems to stir it up.
The cold gusts on the hilltop cause me to think of funerals, of relatives’ funerals in the past, where there was always wind at the graveside. I think of my parents, knowing that their days on earth are numbered. In one instant, all of that coalesces into the knowledge that no matter how many people are in my life, no matter how many people I love, no matter how many lives I touch, I am ultimately alone. I’ve known this intellectually for a long time; today the knowing moves from my head to my heart. It becomes something that I know with my body.
I look up and see the mountains in the sunlight. Time folds in on itself and I experience myself as an ancient, yet timeless, “I”. It’s hundreds of years earlier, and the essential “I” within me stands on this very spot, staring at sunlight reflecting off glaciers. “I” observe the sun sink behind the mountains, see a thin curtain descend over the world, feel the air and light and temperature change moment by moment. “I” am in a different body—shorter, thicker, male. My lifestyle is unfamiliar to the current me. But the unbounded “I” that has lived in every human who ever lived and which will inhabit every human yet to be born—that “I” was/is/will be here, experiencing the drop of daylight into nighttime. Is that why I feel such a primal stirring within me at dusk? Is that why the brief melancholy, the transient yearning for “home”? I’ve been here before. I recognize it. Now, in a different body with different memories and the experiences of this era, I am here once more, watching twilight settle over the mountains.
I put my binoculars to my eyes. The sight of massive, snow-covered mountains looming close causes me to catch my breath. My eyes tear up. I know that although I’m always alone, I’m never abandoned. The mountains call me back to the transcendent “I”, which never, ever leaves me. I feel loved. I feel whole, and I am happy as I come down off the hilltop. It is enough to walk this earth…
Frost slicks the boards of the deck; I tread carefully the few steps to the door. I pause before pulling the door open. The mountains rise silhouetted against an indigo sky. A coyote howls. My eyes scan the deepening sky and an amazing thing happens. A pinhole opens, a tiny light appears. The opening grows, stretches, and Venus steps through, taking up her reign for another night.