"Post" (Haste)

Bad things happen to all people, good or bad. The last few months have been pretty dreadful; people have died, died suddenly, unexpectedly; died slowly, after a long, declining fade; people have become ill, it seems as though there has been bad news on top of bad news until I find myself wondering fearfully when it will stop. And then I remind myself that all these things are part of life and they will not stop. Life will continue to be bitter just as it will continue to be sweet. Life is not fair. There is no rhyme nor reason behind far too much of the suffering, but there must be comfort in this: it is not personal;; it cannot be. The ego needs to acquiese, to still, to be at peace. The winter evenings are long and dark but the sun does rise every morning; the world spins on its axis; life goes on, we go on, we endure. And sometimes we don't. And that is a part of life too, one that is very hard to accept but has to be accepted. We have to see the beauty in the shadows; we have to not fear the dark.

Of course that's far easier said than done and I've spent the last several months in quite a dark place raging futilely against the seeming injustice of it all - why my friends, why my friends' friends, why my grandfather, why my world, why my life. Needs to stop. I'm getting there. On crisp, cold days like this one, when I can look out of the window as I type and see a clear, cold sky filled with a weak but persistent light, see the trees silhouetted against the skyline, see the last shocking scarlet flashes of the autumn leaves clinging on to the branches, hear the birds fluttering, chattering, even singing - it's just another winter. And winter is beautiful. We even had snow last week, briefly; I lay in P's bed and watched the flakes fall fatly past the window and settle on the tiled roofs of the tightly packed London houses, sugar-coating the dirt and the mossy damp with soft white frosting before fading and disappearing in faint wisps of steam back into the sky. I am trying very hard to arm myself with optimism, and to think Good Thoughts.