Continuous Change, Care, and Gratitude

BMT and I are preparing to return to our home in a devastated community in western North Carolina. On the one hand, I look forward to being home with all that is familiar, with water that is now officially safe for drinking and bathing, and with daily walks and conversations with neighbors on our mountain-forest-road clothed in autumnal colors and beauty. On the other hand, I will miss the convenience of services, new sights, and old relationships here where we have sheltered these past seven weeks.

Living in our home again will include the joys of being closer to our children and grandchildren for Christmas and our son’s fiftieth birthday celebration.

It will also mean that we will begin preparing for possible futures by letting go of many things in our house. It will be hard for me to part with any of my mother’s watercolor paintings, artifacts that I have collected around the world, books, papers, family photographs, and other precious items. If Helene had destroyed our home, this letting go would not be necessary.

In the parking lot of a nearby grocery store that was flooded and damaged, there is now a tent city of people whose homes were destroyed. Some bridges are still out. Some buildings and businesses are gone. Debris is in piles in many places. How depressing will it be to experience all of this? Can we possibly be of any help? I will attend some of the meetings of a new grassroots alliance that was formed after the hurricane. Will I be able to offer anything?

My wife still has chronic health issues. Will she be able to receive the care she needs back home?

I am taking physical therapy twice weekly to improve balance, flexibility, and strength. Nevertheless, I am feeling weak and tired a lot of the time. How many years will I be able to walk and take care of myself?

Will BMT and I experience other climate change events such as floods, fires, smoke, mega-storms, infrastructure damage, and food shortages? Will people respond with the same outpouring of care and support that they did after Helene?

With the results of the recent national election, will my country become inhospitable to certain people? What will happen to Social Security and Medicare? How will my pension hold up? Will quality healthcare be available? Will the US dollar maintain its value? How can we help care for the vulnerable and continue the struggle for social justice and ecological regeneration over the next seven generations?

There was only a two million vote difference between the two presidential candidates, with ninety million eligible voters not voting this year. What can be done to require everyone to vote?

How long will I be able to think and write and share with others? What might I do for others if that isn’t possible?

This week an international conference is taking place in Nepal, a country of the Buddha’s birthplace, the world’s highest mountains, a profound culture, and a beautiful people, and in which I have enjoyed visiting, speaking, and working several times over the past fifty-five years. What does it mean that I don’t desire to make long plane trips anymore? Could there be circumstances in the future that would motivate me to do so?

How can my presence in word and deed be helpful to others near and far? How can I cultivate peace and happiness in my heart as I accept challenges, changes, and new realities?

What about you? How are you experiencing the changing of change? How are you caring for yourself, family, friends, neighbors, and the vulnerable, nearby and around this beautiful planet? For what are you grateful?

Every morning, I remind myself that I am of the nature to grow old, to be sick, to die, to become separated from everyone and everything I love, and that my actions are the ground on which I stand. I also recall that I am of the nature to be at peace, to be happy, to be well, and to continue in oneness with everyone and all that I love.

I then take refuge in the awakened one, the teachings and practice of awakening, and the community of awakening. I continue by reminding myself of the realities of suffering, interbeing, and impermanence, and the call to compassionate action in each moment.

Gratitude for this mysterious life of awareness and action! Gratitude for the young, the yet to be born, and the movement of movements that will continue to transform mindsets, behaviors, cultures, and systems relieving suffering of all Earthlings and throughout this conscious cosmos.

Our son and grandkids will be here after Thanksgiving. I will then start packing the car for the trip home.

Happy day of giving thanks, to you and your family!

Here is a poem for you that I read on Thanksgiving a few years ago and that appears in my book Earthling Love: Living Poems:

THANKSGIVING: A POEM FOR OUR FAMILY

Gratitude for this day with family
Such warmth of fire, food, and heart
Grateful for each of you, here, now
and all ancestors who have moved on
Let us also be aware of our native
brothers and sisters who have lived
here for 10,000 years. We express
regret, and sadness at the great
harm our ancestors caused these
good people while taking their land
We vow to care for all people every
where, as our sisters and brothers
We are grateful for our nearby star
We are grateful for being Earthlings
We are grateful for life, and health,
and happiness, as we celebrate this
day, vowing to care for all people
everywhere, our brothers and sisters.
Our family is so fortunate. We have
so much. We have each other. We
have opportunities. Some people
have so little. Some have nothing.
Let us vow to care for all people
everywhere, our sisters and
brothers. So be it. Let us feast!