Fuck You, Buddha

In Buddhist philosophy, there's a concept of pain vs. suffering.  Pain is mandatory as we travel through life, suffering is optional.  Suffering, the Buddhists say, is caused by our clinging and aversion to certain events.  We are hit by the first arrow of bad news, or disease, or loss, and that causes pain.  But the second arrow is what we do to ourselves as a result of our minds being so utterly attached to whatever it is that's been affected.  If we can detach ourselves from those things, then we will be without suffering.

Fuck that.

Today I am feeling very attached.  Even though all evidence is telling me that I have ducked the mortality bullet, this time, I am still very profoundly rattled by how close it's come.  And I'm very profoundly aware that this bullet can come out of nowhere, at any time, for no reason at all, whatsoever.  I could be riding my new life-affirming bike, my breast still full of cancer, and get walloped by a car.  I could be in the hospital after the car walloping and an earthquake could rumble through.  I could survive the earthquake, stagger out onto the street, slip on a banana peel, and crack my head open.  I could crawl, bleeding, back into the hospital, holding the pieces of my head together, and be given penicillin and have an allergic reaction.

You get my point.

It can come at any time.  And my gift, and curse, these days is being acutely and painfully aware of that fact.

And so I suffer.  Because I AM attached.  I fucking AM attached to my children.  I fucking AM attached to my husband.  I'm attached to the spring air, and the clouds in the sky, and my weekends at Descanso.  I'm attached to the very loud music I blast in my car these days, screaming and singing at the top of my lungs.  Aqualung, Garbage, loud, angry, bass line fuck you music.  I'm attached to my crazy dysfunctional job with its impossible workload and totally great cool smart earnest supportive co-workers.  I'm attached to my mother, trying to hold it together at 91, trying to wrap her head around what's happening to me, as she's trying to wrap her head around her own mortality.  I'm attached to food and how good it tastes.  I'm attached to Wes Anderson films and want to see all of them, all the time, forever.  I'm attached to martial arts and the feeling of whacking a bamboo stick against another bamboo stick with hard staccato blows.  I'm attached to the smell of a backstage, so attached that the thought of never again touching a hemp rope or pushing in the shutter of a leko almost makes me lose my mind.  I'm attached to every one of my friends, my glorious idiosyncratic funny smart literate sassy laughing cooking friends.  I'm attached to my goofball dog and my bitch of a cat.  I'm fucking attached to all of it, including my actual very own BODY PARTS, Buddha.  And THAT is why I'm suffering, and THAT is why I say fuck you.

I hate this.  It's all well and good to say oh yes, death is just another plane and we'll just vibrate on a different frequency.  Absolutely.  That could all be true.  But what about those KIDS of mine?  To never see them again with these eyes?  To never be told that my bike has been stolen, or they found the Maylasian plane, hijacked by the Somali actor as a reality show stunt after his taste of Hollywood -- hahahahahah April Fools! -- or to watch another Buffy episode with either of them, or talk about movies or art or bikes or martial arts or theatre or great plans for the future or how to deal with college?  Like, REALLY?  To never do that again?

Or to never take a yoga class taught by Roger again, or watch for red whiskered bulbuls in the trees on our street, or sit in back eating salmon from our absolutely rocking BBQ, while the water feature competes with the freeway for decibel levels, and my chaotic but beautiful hillside tries to keep making sense of the way I planted it, talking deep into the evening about life and people and philosphy and how to get the kitchen remodeled.

To never do that again?

FUCK YEAH, I'm attached. 

So yeah, absolutely, Buddha.  I say fuck you, because you're right.  All this attachment is causing me to suffer.  It's causing me great joy as well, as I sip every moment of life gratefully.  But, it's causing me to suffer.

Which is why I am writing this blog.  Because it sucks to love it all so much.