Intimacy Is The Willingness To Open Ourselves...
Anadi and I are just back from walk number two… I haven’t felt like running today, as my body still feels a bit shaken up and fragile; but getting out and walking, and moving, and being on the land has helped me heal some more…
We went to the gym to stretch first; that felt good too, to open me up, unravel some more of the impact… As we left for our walk, we were stopped by a man with dread locks and not many teeth, a joint, half smoked, was hanging from the edge of his mouth…
‘What have you done to your leg’ he asked; I told him and then he said to me that bush medicine is the best; that there is no need to take any pills and that the cure for my cuts is fresh Aloe; I said I still had some in the fridge – ‘and’ he carried on ‘after rubbing Aloe in, you must put rum and salt into them…!’
‘I reckon he’s right’ Anadi said as we walked on; I agreed… ‘And’, Anadi continued ‘his joint did smell lovely…!’
Tonight we walked on the beach, because just as we were heading off to walk a loop on the quiet road; a woman called out to us ‘Where are you going…?’ We told her and she said ‘No, No don’t go there after dark; it is too bushy; too many bushes, and you never know; stay here where it is clear and open…’
We took her advice…
‘It would be mad not to after we’ve been warned’ Anadi said ‘And to think this time last week we were in the middle of the wilderness with our dog’ I replied!
This morning we walked up to the very top of Pigeon island. It is almost a year exactly since we got married in the little gazebo in the middle of the park.
The route to the very top is rocky and stony and steep.
I wasn’t sure I felt up to a rocky, stony, steep! My right knee that took the brunt of the fall is a bit sore and stiff; but as I took another step and another, I found it was happy to bend; the path opened in front of me and before I knew it we were at the top…
While we were sitting there a couple appeared; they were taking photos of one another and so I offered to take one of them together…
‘Thank you,’ the woman said and then ‘This is the first time I’ve got to the top, I always stop down there' - she pointed down the path... 'But today I’ve done it’!
She was elated, the joy of her achievement shone out of her; and she was bursting to share it…
As we walk through Gros Islet, the people want to connect, to say 'hello'; to stop and talk and ask questions… To share and relate and find out; to give advice and offer suggestions; to connect…
Sharing ourselves with one another, experiencing intimacy is the biggest gift we can give…
I remember reading that the Dalai Lama said that in Tibet they are not as focused on romantic love and the concept of ‘the one’ as we are here...
‘The Dalai Lama’s model of intimacy is based on a willingness to open ourselves to many others, to family, friends, and even strangers, forming genuine and deep bonds based on our common humanity.’
