The Dead

[pjthompson]

Random quote of the day:


"The dead are the invisible ones, but not the absent ones."

—Victor Hugo


Over the weekend I was going through a number of old files, old journal entries, rummaging around in there to see if I could get back in touch with something I've lost track of the last few years. Why do I write? Why do I want to write?

This quote reminds me of something I found from December 1996, something I started to write in the voice of a character in preparation for a story. But it turned into something else, about my friend, Stephan, who died in February of that year. So I stuck it in the private e-journal I kept at the time, and never did write that story. I have millions of little bits like this that should go into stories, but never get there. I have to get them out of myself. I'd probably implode if I didn't write them somewhere.



There has to be a place in the Universe which takes all this longing seriously, which takes it in and transforms it into something real. We should all be able to get there, but we can't. We sit here on this side of the glass and watch as all of the things we long for walk by us and past us. What was God thinking when he created longing? What did he mean us to learn from it? I admit I can't see it.

I have a friend who died, but before he did, he said, "All longing is essentially a desire to return to God, not to be separated from Him any more, to be in the presence of his love. Everything else we long for is just a shadow of that deeper longing."

Except he said it more profoundly. I've blotted out the words, or dramatized them, or something. I haven't gotten them quite right. Maybe what he said was, "All life is suffering, and we are suffering because we are separated from God and longing for Him. When we are reunited with God, we will never long for anything ever again."

Or maybe he didn't say that either. Maybe I'm just imagining it. Maybe I'm just longing to hear him again, wishing he had given me some profound statement before he died. Buddha said that, didn't he? He was rather Buddha-like when he died, my friend Stephan, stripped away of all pretense until the light of Heaven shone beneath his sallow skin. I suppose I'm longing to be reunited with Stephan, not God. Or maybe they're the same thing.

(And if Stephan wasn't already dead, he would have laughed himself to death over that one.)

He probably is, anyway.

Comments

[athenais.livejournal.com]

I'm still barely head above water with longing for my cat who passed away three months ago. I wish I thought we were reunited with loved ones after death. That would still this longing.

[pjthompson]

It's the only comfort I know. I wish I could lend you some.

[wldhrsjen3.livejournal.com]

Thanks for adding me as a friend.

I think about longing a lot too. My grandmother passed away two years ago... I was very close to her and we shared a passion for books. I always wished she could have lived long enough to see me get published. The day after she died, I remember crying -- I kept thinking that she'd never get to see my book in a store and that I wouldn't be able to make her proud. And then - as clearly as if she stood beside me - I heard her say, "But I *am* proud of you." And now I wonder -- was it her spirit or soul or what have you, or was it just my own imagination conjuring some whisper of comfort?

I think about longing for goals too... those dreams that make your heart burn with desire, those hopes that vibrate in your very bones. Why do some achieve success so easily, while others have to fight for every step gained? I suppose there are lessons in it for each of us, but sometimes they're hard to see.

[pjthompson]

There was a time in my life when I had become so agnostic I was just a breath away from atheist. I stopped believing that there was anything more than this world. I remember declaring that to myself.

It was as if the Universe took it up as a challenge because it began to present me with many experiential counter-arguments, experiences that reminded me that I was more than a mind and a body. These experiences changed me and how I perceived the world.

I'm not particularly religious, and I'm enough of a materialist to realize they may indeed be something I am generating, I don't believe they are--but I also don't need any more than that, I don't need that confirmation. Because these things bring me joy, and a sense that I am part of a larger continuum, a realm of spirit as well as flesh. And in your heart of hearts, you knew your grandmother was proud of you. The Universe reminded you of that when you needed to hear it most.

As to the success thing, it's one of life's great mysteries, I think. Kind of like the concepts of grace and suffering.

[lizziebelle.livejournal.com]

Sometimes it feels like life *is* longing. Perhaps it is aspiration in disguise.

[pjthompson]

Maybe. I thought after I'd posted this that longing is probably responsible for most of humankind's achievement. Longing is a form of dreaming, after all.

[kmkibble75.livejournal.com]

Your quote file is an amazing thing...

[pjthompson]

I love the synchronicities it sometimes pulls out of the hat. I love the chains of thought it sometimes inspires.

[kmkibble75.livejournal.com]

The thought chains are definitely a good thing. So you get credit, too. ;-)

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

I loved this post.

[pjthompson]

Thank you!