A moment at the gym.
The guy in front of me answers his cell phone.
His voice is very loud. I can hear everything he says. He’s talking about finishing a deal of some kind, and it’s definitely work-ish-related.
“We need to get them to the table as soon as possible….blah blah blah…”
My eyes burrow into the back of his head.
Will. You. Be. Quiet.
What a disturbing, inconsiderate man.
He hangs up.
*Finally*
I can go back to my reading of the Tao Te Ching while pouring with sweat.
Two minutes pass.
Another man comes down the aisle-way behind me VACUUMING.
SOAB, doesn’t anyone know how to hush up around here?!!
He is actually vacuuming around the wheels of the machine I am riding.
Seriously?
My eyes bore into the page.
But somehow, at the very same time (that’s the amazing part) another place within is basically entirely undisturbed.
Rolling Stones are playing “I Miss You” on the gym speakers.
Who would I be without this thought that everything needs to be quiet?
Including my own mind?
I close my eyes.
I hear feet plopping on a running treadmill, to the beat of the song. I feel air from a nearby fan blowing gently across my right forearm. I feel the fabulous pounding of my heart, steady, happy. I hear these thoughts come and go. I hear a squeak from a machine needing WD40.
I open my eyes.
I see rain pattering in a puddle on the black asphalt through the window, and yellow lines someone painted “NO”….”LANE”.
I see a gray car wish windshield wipers going, turning right while facing my direction. I see cars 100 yards away moving back and forth along an arterial, navy blue, light blue, red, brown. Woman’s white coat in square shapes. Red stop sign. Green trees, unmoving, always in the same place just past the Jiffy Lube. Gray speckled carpet. Round speckled speaker in the ceiling.
Who am I without these thoughts?
What is it that needs to have everything get quiet?
Who actually needs to shut up?
I could say “I do”.
I could move into thoughts about what I need to do, where I should be, how I shouldn’t condemn what is around me, and how I need more practice.
But then….
….even that thought splashes down into the earth and fades away.
No improvement necessary.
Who wants the improvement?
Who demands something different?
What else is here, besides the noise outside and inside?
Right there on the bike, I stretch both arms out wide as wide can be and feel ecstasy of the space all around this body, and how far it extends.
In my mind I see an image of the green wicked witch of the west riding her bike in the middle of a Kansas tornado, cackling with glee in Dorothy’s dream.
Hear the music?
Everything pulsing in this magnificence of a moment on earth in apparently the Pacific Northwest, inside a gym, watching repetitive movement everywhere. Legs pumping, clock hand sweeping, other legs running, light shining through a window, rain pattering, music playing, heat generating, up and down, in and out, dark and light, hearing and silence.
Nothing wrong with this brain doing its thinking, joining in on the clamor and orchestra of the moment.
He should not be quiet. It should not be quiet. They should not be quiet. I should not be quiet.
But something holds it all.
Something is already quiet.
Glory, glory.
Oh, without thinking something needs to be done, or something is missing, or something is too big and loud…..
….I just noticed the sound of “shhhhhhh”.
Hear it?
Much love,
Grace
P.S. Grace at the gym: puppetji.