Life Pokes

I used to think that life "remembers" you most when you are in your darkest hour. It is paradoxical that when I felt most alone, that too was the time when I felt most convincingly God's presence and grace.

I hesitate to even call it "God's" presence. I don't know what and who God is, and I might be better described as an agnostic rather than a believer. In fact, I have an aversion against "believing" and "beliefs." Lurking within a belief is the possibility that it might not be true. But people believe it anyway. I know rather than believe that God exists, and I don't dare defile that knowing by attributing all sorts of names, myths and concoctions of the human mind to God. I don't know Him, Her or It; what I know is that God is beyond names and labels, beyond human understanding anyway. So it's useless talking about it.

Hmmm...did that just happen? I wasn't even going to talk about God and there I went. Oh well.

So, back to what I was saying, about life remembering you even when you feel most obscure. I've been cooped in the house, watching over the kids, making their...er, helping to make their projects, cleaning, cooking (more like reheating), doing freelance writing on and off (more off than on), and yes, gardening! I cleaned up part of our garden last Saturday, got rid of the many dead plants and moved around some of the living ones. I also took out some seeds (marygold and something else, maybe zinnia?) and put them in some nice, newly cleaned pots. I do hope they sprout one day soon. Now my right palm is really itchy and I suspect I might have gotten some fungi from all that soil handling.

What I'm trying to say in my very roundabout way is that I have been cocooned in my own world, away from people except for my kids. No social life, no talking to other adults, no going out except to buy groceries. And so far, I like it. I enjoy the solitude and the relative quiet. (With three kids, there is always some noise and commotion at home.)

Then my brother emails me to remind me that Ramadhan is just around the corner. I actually needed no reminding, since I've been occupied lately with thoughts of how to observe Ramadhan. I haven't fasted in many years, although I've wanted to. Now I feel it's time for me to do exactly that. I have been feeling the urge to enter into a more spiritual life, to renew my "faith" (for lack of a better word), and to find deeper expression for my gratitude. I have been very lucky, very blessed. I feel compelled to do something to give back, if not by actual deeds of service, then through deeper prayer and devotion.

Now life is poking me, as if to shout, yes, yes, do that! I am alone and cocooned from the rest of the world... but I am never alone. I always feel the Presence, and now it is taking me by the hand, affirming, guiding, loving, and just being there.