After reading my last post, my friend a podcast about sliding on ice (and falling through). In this podcast, a Denali Mountain climbing guide tells about bringing a sick client across an ice bridge with thousands of feet deep crevasses. At once point, the ice bridge breaks and his client falls in. By some miracle, he catches both of them and secures them. He finds his client dangling fifty feet down in the ice cold, dark whole. (I'm going to very badly paraphrase what happens next).
The guide yells down to his sick client, You must cut away your sled and back pack so the rope won't break.
The client looks up and says, But there are thousands of dollars worth of equipment and all my things. I don't want to let them go.
The guide says, It is your life. It's too heavy. It will drag you down. Cut them away so you can have a chance at survival. You can replace them, you can't replace your life.
He lists and cuts the sled and his pack off and they listen and listen and don't ever hear it hit.
I was packing up lunches for our ski day when I heard this part and I stopped mid mayo swipe. I felt like I was in that crevasse, being pulled in one direction towards the light and safety and in the other, towards the dark and cold and endless drop. It seemed like such an easy decision to immediately cut away the things that are dragging me down and climb out to the light.
And yet . . . there are precious, seemingly irreplaceable things in my packs. I wouldn't want to lose them.
Would I?
What would be worth cutting away to live?
All day and night and for the five days since, I have been thinking about this.
I've been going over what is in that sled hanging below me, dragging me towards darkness--the things I've been holding onto that seem so so important: The hurts that seems utterly justified and righteous to cling to; the time, private time, my time that seems justified and essential I protect; waiting until that sibling or friend or parent reaches out to me, I have done enough; my political or religious views that have created wedges between dear friends/family that seem so so essential; and about a thousand million other pounds of worries and fears and confusions that are weighing me down, slicing into the fraying rope holing me to the light.
As I was thinking about the things I am holding onto, I remembered a Christmas years and years ago that John and I spent in Tetonia, Idaho. We got into a silly, petty argument that escalated to a cold and non-talking stalemate where I went to bed early, furious and knowing I was absolutely right in rightness and his blindness.
I fell asleep and in my dream, a horrible nightmare really, Finnegan wandered out in the snowstorm that was blowing around the house. He fell into the deep snowdrifts and froze. I do not remember if he died or not, but I remember finding his cold blue lipped body and sobbing and all I wanted, the only other human in the world who could understand my sorrow and comfort me, was John.
I woke, tears streaming down my eyes, distraught. I jumped out of bed and first, checked on Finnegan who was, to my great relief, sleeping peacefully snuggled up with his sister. Once I kissed his cheeks about ten times, until he sleepily swatted me away, I went and found John. I pulled him into our room and hugged him and cried and cried and apologized for any and everything I had done. He looked at me, shocked (so sad--this says too much about my ability to hold grudges), and then pulled me close and frankly forgave me, unconditionally and comforted me while I told him about my dream. He laughed at the absurdity of it (but also, double and triple checked all the locks on the doors and the next day when Finn wanted to go sledding, stuck right by his side) and told me we were going to be ok.
In letting go of my anger and hurt, I saw John with my heart--not my hurts and frustrations--just the raw love I have for him. All the weight of the past was gone. I was free.
Remembering this story and how good and light I felt, made me long for that in my life right now.
I am holding on to waaaay too many things.
I am weighed down and I do not want that anymore. I think I live too much in the disappointments of the past and the worries of future. I want to come out of this crevasse and let go of all this stupid stuff that is dragging me down. No matter how important these things seem, they rarely are even worth a second thought. Living is what is important. And what kind of life is it if we live in fear and worry?
This year, starting this month, I am pulling out my sharpened mind, and cutting away all the junk. It's much harder than I thought, but each time I do, I feel like I am one foot closer to the light.
It's feels like a gift, even in all the CRAZY going on in the world, to know there is something, I can control--myself. And thought it seems small, it has given me courage and peace. I will continue to ask myself, What am I holding on to that is stopping me from living in the light?
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