essence of love – sound mind journal

Past tales -revisit “where our lives meet, there is always time”

I first took part in Becky’s timesquare with this post, where our lives meet, there is always time posted on 12-27-2018. Looking at the pictures and the poem I realize how time has passed almost without notice. The story and poem (about an old love between a farmer and his old wife) faded like the deliberate fading effect of the pictures which were originally taken in 2015 in a homestay in a third world country.

The 2018 post was included in Becky#timesquare.

Here is an original picture in colors.

taken on 2015-04-05 in a bridal suite in a homestay in Cambodia

Becky’s past tales (2021-10-14)

The magic briefcase adventure: a random reading of one day

“This is where it all begins. Everything starts here, today.”― David Nicholls, quote from One Day. He never knew how he could ever forget the day they first met and began a strange, out-of-this-world relationship. Looking back now, he realizes how true these words have been to them, “You can live your whole life not realizing that what you’re looking for is right in front of you. Whatever happens tomorrow, we had today; and I’ll always remember it.”― David Nicholls, quote from One Day

He is back now in his own realm (which the earthlings call, planet) and has settled to his light years of taking a break after his earth assignment, an assignment which he will always remember, not only because of its colossal responsibility of a century as a guardian for the four winds, a shield for earth against external invasion, but also for the last task to complete a book/report on “the essence of love” involving emotion and feelings, the energy that drive the earthlings to make irrational decisions and actions.

He has kept a copy of the report, mainly in excerpts as the full set of research paper is too lengthy and detailed with sadness involving him, a part which stuns even a being like him, who has been programed not to feel or be emotive in the earth’s way. Yes, he has been deeply hurt and nearly ruined. And it is all because of just one earthling woman who remains a stranger to him as even now he realizes he has never known her.

While back to his realm, he continues a very disciplined life and switches back to patrolling the earth as a circling light when it is his turn, which is an annual event. He remembers his last farewell words to the strange enigmatic woman, when she was still alive and young, “when you look up the midnight sky on every February 14, no matter which time zone you are, you will see a brilliant white light that lights u the whole sky for an instant, and you will know that it is me.”

After leaving the place he names Snowland, they no longer contact each other. He carried on his assignment for several more decades, until he was allowed to leave earth. He did not know or find out (if he wanted to, he could) where she was and whether she was still alive. Sometimes it is better not to know. As he listens to the earthling’s book “One Day” today, he is stirred to remember her. And his eyes are moist and he feels liquids running down his cheeks. Yes, he has tears. They had some good days together, during the months of locked down up that 8000 ft high mountain.

He never questioned her past. And that was his mistake. She tried to tell him, disguised as narrating the story of a friend, or a project she was writing, but he preferred to stay out of her personal life. He learned too late. He discovered too late that she was not what he thought she was. When she unleashed the force of human emotion based on misguided feelings, he was totally unprepared and did not know how to respond as a human would do. He had never learned how to. It was like a powerful tidal wave with the force equal to 8000 locomotives or 25 million horses pounding against an unwavering cold stone wall. At her uncontrollable raging he continued to think and analyze, “Why does she hate so much? Why do human hurt themselves with hatred?” He could see her pain, but he could not feel. He was merely a bystander in her world.

In short, he does not know human kind of love, or any emotion called love and hate at all. He really cannot fathom how a human can love and hate at the same time, to the point that they want to destroy in the name of love.

Ka,2021-05-04

sensitive silence: a poem.

The silence of the sea. Random music musing. War=Wall between two humans.*

“How lucky you are to live by the sea. What I like most about the sea is its silence. I’m talking about what is hidden. What can be perceived underneath. One must learn to listen to it.”

I want to say something but I just cannot vocalize because it is too sensitive to talk about. Silence is a great wall. Sometimes some music can break through the wall. If only more have ears to hear. Pure music is always without words, without singing. It is a form of silence. The sound of silence. Yet it tells stories that touch the heart. If only more will write the kind of music of yesteryears. Music that can break through walls and wars, time and space. But we each hear a different beat. So there is no condemnation for any differences if need be. We are designed to be different.

Here are just my rambling phrases being strung together in the name of a poem:

hear the music in your ear

sounding soft and clear

enduring endearing until you shed a tear

will not bend under tyrannical smear and tear

only the strong heart can bear

to the very end

if land does end

yet hope does not despair

hark ahoy a land

ocean’s heart’s prepared

blue beyond

for all anchoring wayfaring sons

not forlorn

surely you’ll hear

a horn

friends or foes

come what may

all sailor men must bear that day

with one heart they do not fear

nor ever by dismayed

fogs will clear

wars will end

at land’s end

for all

adieu

Ka, 2021-05-03

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

*le silence de la mer: Bach 8th. Prelude & Fugue – Le Silence De La Mer (2004) [https://youtu.be/-FZhYsfyeTg] (movie excerpts)

[https://youtu.be/UqYAGUc4EmY] BWV853 WTC 1-08 Prelude & Fugue in eb & d# Rosalyn Tureck 1953 mono

magic briefcase adventure: a conspiracy cover up

No one really knows what happened up that 8000 ft. high mountain of snow or the fact that the small people live up there deep inside the wood. When he was given the assignment as a guardian of the four wind for earth and transferred to this Snowland as the last part of his term of service, he though it would be another quiet and solitary assignment. How wrong he was as it turned out. It is not the land that is the matter. It is the people. Or rather, it is one individual earthling, a mystical woman whom he never got to know or understand. The small people in the wood are not the issue. They actually became good neighbor. But this one earthling woman suddenly appeared in the serenity and he was unable to solve her puzzle. It is not fair to blame her for the failure of his last assignment. It is just that human are too complex to fathom.

He first met the small people after he escaped from the lodge and walked deep into the wood. he did not expect to meet any creature because it was mid day and the sun was shinning bright onto the trees. It was a long and pleasant walk. Then he heard the sound of people rushing pass him. But he could not see them at first. The sound of running feet was real and clear. He stood and listened. The wood was still. Soft breeze was whispering through the branches. But the sound of running feet was on the ground and not up there. He squatted and looked at the ground intensely. At first he could not see them.

But soon he noticed the moving of dry twigs and leaves. When he looked closely he saw that they were not twigs and leaves. They were people camouflaged as dry twigs and leaves. it was like a migration because these small people were carrying lots of bundles/boxes that resembled luggages on their backs. They did not seem to notice his existence. They were bent intent to rush to their destination, marching like a troop of military ants.

He decided to walk with them and tried not to step on them. But soon he discovered that no matter how he walked they were able to detect his movement by instinct or an inbuilt secret radar detector. They knew how to avoid being stepped on while rushing forward without breaking ranks. He decided to run and noted that they moved at the speed of his running speed, incredibly effortlessly fast. While he followed them and ran forward towards an unknown destination, he marveled at their accuracy and discipline and wondered whether these people were robots.

After an hour of upward climbing they reached the “city of gods”, walls of bare red rocks standing precariously overlooking the steep valley on the other side of the wood, beyond which he could see golden mountains rising above the clouds in mid-sky, rolls and rolls of them, lining the blue beyond like a belt of shinny shimmering decorations inserted by a giant painter.

The small people halted and arranged themselves into rows on the flat plateau beneath the wall of rocks. Suddenly the rock opened and revealed an entrance of about his height. The rows of small people started moving into the entrance like flood water downhill, and soon he could not see them anymore. And he heard a voice coming from inside the entrance

“Are you coming in or not? We haven’t got all days! You, I mean you, the man from outer space!”

Yes, it meant him. There was no one there except him and he was the man from outer space. So he had reached a point with a choice between curiosity and duty. Should he continue this strange journey to another unknown world? Or should he decline and return to his four wind mission on earth at the Snowland?

He was trained to obey the One who sent him. “No, sir, I am not going inside. Thank you for your invitation, sir.”

He watched the entrance closed up. Then he turned and returned to the Snowland lodge where he continued his earth life, guarding the four wind, and putting up with a woman fellow lodger whom he could not understand, not to mention having to write a book about her!

He actually got to meet the small people again. But that is in another episode. (to continue)

Ka, 2021-04-13

Magic briefcase adventure: Does he celebrate birthday? Does it matter to her? Or anyone?

Does he celebrate earth birthday? The question suddenly appeared as he glanced at his social network message board. He has never really thought of such matter about himself. In fact he hardly think of himself. In a day’s time it will be another chronological birthday for him on earth. After seven decades, he can hardly recall how he first remembered a special day called birthday that his earth parents celebrated for him, just like any other kids. On that day they normally made him eat one whole boiled egg by himself. In those post-war years it was considered a luxury when the kid was only one out of a brood of seven. The question is from her, the earth acquaintance for a year in Snowland.

It is a surprise to him to read her sudden message, after nearly a year of silence. Does birthday really matter? Of course most parents like to recall that day when their kid came to earth, mostly crash landing with a loud cry of disappointment at the harshness of the external zone (tearing away from their hitherto comfort zone). That is the way he observes things, somewhat different from the earthlings.

She uses a strange new name. But he knows it is her. His social network message board is restricted to a few friends only and they normally do not message or comment anything. It is a silent and dusty board. It is kept there for a purpose which the outsiders do not know. He decides not to reply her strange question. What is the point in the question? They have not established any relation, not even an acquaintance contact. His mission in Snowland has failed.

He remembers last year. She made something for him and ate her portion separately in the living room. He ate his alone at the dining table. He cannot remember what it is now. What a strange birthday party of two eating something in silence in two separate rooms. It reminds him of war.

His earth parents went through a big war. They got married because of the war. The war destroyed his mom’s love, hope, and dream, that is, enrolling into the medical school like her fiancé did, but he was killed by a bomb while traveling north to the university. She had to flee the invaded country instead and ended up in a foreign land marrying another man, and had seven kids during and after the big war.

Why is he thinking of big war now? He is a guardian of the four wind on earth —an invisible shield against invasion by warlords from other planets and zones from other universes. He has failed to finish his report on earthling’s emotion, and is now serving his extended term in a different site (away from Snowland).

Perhaps he will eat a boiled egg tomorrow, to remember his own earth parents who have really shown him the essence of sacrificial love, by rationing their own food and making sure the children were fed well, particularly making each individual kid feel special on his birthday.

Ka, 2021-04-12

simply six minutes—magic briefcase adventure: first day in Snowland

Looking back he can still see her face. It is not a face that can conceal or even bother to conceal the heart. She is of indeterminable chronological age. She is not young. No, there is no wrinkle and she has done a lot on up-keeping her looks and her fitness too, tall, slim, and a strict keto disciple in terms of diet.

But it is the facial expression that reveals her heart. She tried to be civil. So she started with small talk like the weather, the flight, the lodging house sharing and so on. They were in the kitchen and had to decide who used which side. Seeing she was standing near to the dining and living area, he chose the far side which was near to the garage and tool house.

She suddenly said something about her (chronological age related condition) being a dry prune and it no longer mattered how she looked. It was a shocking statement to him. They were merely fellow lodgers. They were each assigned there on Snowland for separate missions which they did not disclose to each other. They merely shared the facilities of the accommodation.

When she blurted out that statement he watched her face. It was a mirror of her heart. A once beautiful face, now twisted into a shape which only revealed a deep, heavy, and even hostile, disguised sadness that was heart wrenching. It was far more than reading any sad mysteries of earthlings. How was he going to learn about the love and hate emotion of earthlings for his report? He dreaded from the first day of their encounter.

But this is his last work station and last chance to complete the remaining half of his century long assignment on earth so that he will receive his due award, a retirement back to his home planet/realm. While spending long hours in pondering on her expression, he wondered what has made a beautiful woman grow into such sadness. He has researched this subject in many fields of study. There are many possible factors and variables. Earth has acquired the technology that prevents a person growing old physically, through constant practices of up-keeping their body and mind. But there is something that they cannot up-keep, that is, their deteriorating emotion. And it shows on their faces, and affects their behavior. Often it can cause harm to themselves and others.

That is why he has been assigned this task of studying their emotion, particularly the kind of emotion called love that can drive all other aspects in life.

The first day of encounter signified that his challenge would be tough. He tried to stay neutral and adopt the stance of a researcher. He posited that with time he would adapt to her pattern and be able to complete his report. He neglected one pertinent aspect, how did she see him that first encounter? What was her perspective and impression of him? What does he mirror?

Much later, towards the end of their separate assignments, she suddenly blurted out, “I have never liked you, even from the first day.” He did not know then whether she was telling the truth or she was just trying to convince herself that she has never invested her feeling for him. But he knows now. (to continue)

Ka, 2021-04-03

simply six minutes—the magic briefcase adventure: Does love make one a fool or do only fools fall in love?

Love and hate are two sides of the same coin. How little does he know this will be the lesson he has to learn on his last mission. Guarding of the Four Wind on earth is only 50% of his mission. The other 50% is to study the most influential power source on earth and submit a full investigation report on completion of his four wind assignment. Because he is beyond earth time he is not subject to the chronological aging process on earth. His term on earth is a century and he has already served 70 earth years. He has been assigned to the other stations of the four wind. This snowland station is his last assignment. He is an elite “engineer” in earth term and the hardware (technical) part of his assignment is no issue to him. On the other hand, the “software” part is a real puzzle which he has little remaining time to crack.

What is exactly the most powerful power source on earth? Based on his last seven decades of interactions with earthlings, he knows, and has completed the bulk of the report, mostly in theory and concept. But now he is stuck. He has to do the practical empirical evidential based part of the report, and he has to find a live object to study and actually interact with first hand.

When he was transferred to this Snowland station he knew this would be his last chance. He has failed three times previously. This time he cannot afford to fail. Failure is just too costly to bear. Briefly, he will be compelled to extend his assignment contract for another century in another planet or realm. And he is looking for a retirement back to his home planet/realm.

Outwardly there is everything good about him for the last assignment: tall, slim, fit, smart, a chiseled facial look, deep-set eyes of a color that is most pleasant and acceptable to most earthlings, a default expression of a highly intelligent and elegant being. He has been trained to know many languages and cultures. People are naturally drawn to him because he is genuinely kind and selfless with the backdrop of the apparent show of good tase and a cut above others. He has been programmed to look thirties. No, he is not an AI robot or a clone. He was born to a normal earthling couple and had a normal childhood. His only difference from earthling is that his entire nurturing, education, and training were all done by a more advanced source beyond earth from his original realm. And he is in constant communication with them.

His remaining task is to find an earth woman and study what love is. Yes, ironically, love and hate are the most powerful influence on earth. This is the main obstacle for completing his report. He is not required to fall in love but he must find out what true love means and why it turns to hate with unimaginable destructive power. His report is aptly named: “The essence of love”. Why focus on love and not hate? Because, alas, the two words are interchangeable on earth.

This is what he finds out on the Snowland, his final station. (to continue)

Ka, 2021-03-31

simply six minutes—the magic briefcase adventure: “I don’t want to be a tree, I want to be its meaning.”

As he now remembers Snowland and the mystical woman he met up there at 8000ft altitude, he remembers how the trees have impacted him, as he tries to associate her with something they both can relate to without feeling bound. Both of them value independence and privacy above all else, even their strange unique relationship. The have found a few common interests, or rather, safe and indifferent topics to talk about casually. And trees is a safe topic, aside from coffee, deer, and snow.

When he first arrives the trees are green. Within a month the snow comes suddenly. He is shocked. All his past assignments were in the tropics. Snow is a novelty. In his homeland in outer-space, there is no snow or season. They live beyond earth time. While on earth he has always been the guardian of the South Wind which control station is located in an evergreen island in the tropics. This new assignment up the 8000 ft of a mountain in the West (or near West) is entirely different from what he has accustomed himself.

When the snow comes it is sudden and all encompassing. When he returns from an outside assignment he is caught in camera by her standing on the top of the stairs of the sundeck. The deck is steeped in at least 12 inches of snow. The trees are his background. He still has that photo. Green trees with snow all over their branches and trunks. He looks stunned. What a sight!

But it is not so much the sight of the green trees covered with brilliantly white snow that puzzles him. It is the meaning of those trees. Sometimes he compares himself with a tree to the earthling. A living and thriving being with its branches all pointing towards the sky, the location of the light source and life sustenance. Like the earth writer Orhan Pamuk once wrote, “I don’t want to be a tree, I want to be its meaning.” He wants to be a meaning of things. Being a meaning is different from being a physical existence.

He wants to be a meaning for existence. How to communicate this to her, an earthling? They are there together and yet not together, each existing each own meaning. He has had many acquaintances in his many decades of living on earth. But none is like this acquaintance on the high mountain. She is not a local. She comes from the oceanic continent. Is she on a secret assignment like his, guarding the earth? She never talks about it and he is not expected to ask. She does not ask him his too.

So he puts his mind on the trees. They are his great and faithful companions. They tell him a lot of things through the sound of the wind as he takes long walks on the paths meandering through the snowy woodland. But they never talk about their meaning on earth, not the kind he hopes they will reveal. He knows the textbook stuff of course. He imagines there is more —the unwritten ones, the often chuckling and sometimes sighing thoughts deeply embedded in the ancient tree trunks. He has never found out.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Here is a hauntingly beautiful song for memory sake

I will remember you, will you remember me? I’m so tired but I can’t sleep Standin’ on the edge of something much to deep It’s funny how we feel so much but we cannot say a word We are screaming inside, but we can’t be heard I’m so afraid to love you But more afraid to lose Clinging to a past that doesn’t let me choose Once there was a darkness Deep and endless night You gave me everything you had, oh you gave me life

[https://youtu.be/nSz16ngdsG0]

simply six minutes—the magic briefcase adventure: colors, details, irony

When he first arrives on this magic mountain he doesn’t think about love. His goal is to guard the four winds at this height of 8000 ft. He is one of the four guardians assigned to earth from another realm, which earthlings call planet. How little do the earthlings know the difference between a physical planet and a spiritual realm. He comes from a realm and not a planet. But it’s ok if they insist of describing a zone where they cannot figure out in their physical mind and have to use what they can explain away another existence with their limited language.

Today is another snow day on this mountain which he calls Snowland. It has become so common yet unpredictable that he is contented with the snow coming and going outside his abode which he now shares with an earth woman of indeterminable chronological age. Earthlings are particular about their ages, not that it matters to him. He always knows their true age when he meets them. True age means a spiritual age originally programmed in each seed that is planted the moment a baby is conceived. There is a clock that ticks silently inside the formation, a beginning and an end. it is designed to last much longer than an average earthling thinks they have. It is recorded in an old book, at least 120 years an average man can live. The earth is designed that way to be loved and cared for and in turned nurtures and sustains each man for that length of time.

Yes, the man from another realm knows this because he has been through a course on the affection, attention, interest and compassion he must have on the earthlings before he is finally considered ready to be assigned here. He knows and sees and appreciates the beauty and yet mystery of this land, including the snow and all, even the earthling woman who happens to be here in the same mountain house on a totally unrelated assignment. They never talk about their assignments or whether they are in the same camp, or not.

After an initial struggle with sharing all the common amenities except each separate room cum workplace, he has settled to getting used to this kind of life. Why this arrangement on earth? He cannot see any relevance at all. Nor will his superior back in his own realm give him any clue. So he just has to adapt and adjust with the existence of another living being.

He agrees with his favorite earth writer, Orhan Pamuk that he just has to open his eyes wide and actually see this world by attending to its colors, details and irony. The two strangers appear to share common interests in a number of things, such as, hot coffee, reading, genre of music, one painting in the common dinning place, and creatures that come out in the snow. The irony is that they do not talk to each other about such personal stuff.

There seems a commonly self-imposed code: do not get personal because that will be too close.

2021-03-20

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~a quote

“The beauty and mystery of this world only emerges through affection, attention, interest and compassion . . . open your eyes wide and actually see this world by attending to its colors, details and irony.”― Orhan Pamuk (from his book “My Name Is Red”).

simply six minutes —the magic briefcase adventure: silent painting

“Painting is the silence of thought and the music of sight.”― Orhan Pamuk, My name is Red. To the man from a distant planet, a higher realm than earth, snow falling is like painting. A gigantic hand is brushing over the land and everything else in the Snowland with white paint. Not surprising. Because the invisible hand is so huge, earthlings think that the snow just comes by itself without any deliberate action of anyone. But he knows it differently.

Where he lives they are more advanced and know a lot more stuff compared to the earthlings. For example, the thing called love. He is looking at the snow falling and the building up of the thick white blanket out there below his window sill. Why does he think of love suddenly?

Because he suddenly thinks of the music of sight. They both like music. She and he. Jazz and classical. She does not talk about her likes and dislikes at all. They are mere acquaintances stuck up there on this snowy mountain of 8000 ft. above sea level. Talking about music or painting means getting close. And they want to avoid it.

One day she listens to him singing in the bathroom at random. When he emerges she says, “you seem in a good mood, singing.”

Another day she reminds him of manner. He has taken a painting from the common dinning place and hang it in his room. He has put back another picture on the empty space. But it happens that she only likes the one he has taken.

So he apologizes and puts the original picture back to its original place behind where she sits when she does her zoom meetings. She wants that picture to be in her background. So does he. He moves it to his room for the same purpose!

Amazing how much common interests they do share without talking about them. In a way it is like watching the snow being painted outside accompanied by inaudible yet beautiful music performed up there in the great beyond. The silence of thought and the music of sight beautifully being presented to the two of them, alone in a big house.

The sharing of the color of the snowland, the serene silence in the house except for the occasional jazz played softly in separate rooms, and the unspoken understanding that each has his or her own space, and a common picture in a common room, and many other small things, all create a feeling of calm affiliation. He somehow thinks it is related to an unselfish thing called love.

2021-03-19

Simply Six Minutes: Magic Briefcase Adventure six (about silent love and pain)

“How much can we ever know about the love and pain in another heart?” (Orhan Pamuk) He gave her a poem on her birthday, Rudyard Kipling’s “the power of a dog”. And she burst into tears while reading it and seeing a portrait of her dog that passed on prior to their strange meeting, the first time, on the snow mountain. He merely sat quietly and waited for her to compose herself. She never asks him why he decided to give her such a gift. After all they hardly know each other.

After that she drinks up her coffee and returns to her room. They never talk about that fateful morning when they sat down across the coffee table and she read the poem in tears.

The snow does not give notice. It just comes and goes on that mountain. The sound of the wind and the arrival of the lone young buck one day breaks the monotony of the lodge. The buck is limping. He is very young and has one single tiny budding antler. Has he encountered an accident? Why is he limping? She asks, not expecting any answer and he remains silent.

The wind sometimes howls at night, when he stays up all night to complete his earth assignment. He hears how they wind talk to the trees and the trees answer back through their branches and their leaves. They only talk after midnight when the wind visits his window trees. Sometimes they talk all night as he operates the four wind shield to protect earth.

One day she decides to name the buck Blessed. And they never saw him again after that.

She remains silent when they note that Blessed doesn’t turn up anymore. He sees sadness in her eyes. He knows she must have loved and felt pain in her heart. But they do not talk about heart issues. After all, they hardly know each other. He is merely writing a six minutes story about a strange kind of love.

https://christinebialczak.com/2020/12/15/simply-6-minutes-welcome-to-the-challenge-12-15-2020/