We were moving, and I didn’t want to leave. We left, and I didn’t want to move. We’d arrived - and all I wanted was to go back.
I am not a Buddhist, but I am familiar enough with Buddhism to recognize one of its principal precepts: that everything is subject to change and that suffering and discontentment are the result of attachment to circumstances and things which, by their nature, are impermanent.
Indeed.
All throughout this journey of packing and storing, moving and arriving and ultimately, unpacking…there was a single item I professed to care about. One thing that, if damaged or lost, I would somehow feel as though a piece of me was also broken and dispossessed. And maybe, because of this move I was so reluctant to make, I already felt a little damaged, a little broken….a little lost.
The truth is, I was attached to a thing - a painting. A huge piece of artwork that I’d carried with me throughout Kathmandu during an amazing trip to Nepal and Tibet back in 2002. Every centimeter of the fragile canvas was covered in superbly detailed (often in miniscule scale) color including delicate gold filigree. It was an oversized scroll — a "thangka" lovingly and painstakingly stroked by two Tibetan monks, depicting a life cycle…an extraordinary expression of the birth and rebirth of the Buddha. The irony hit me only after my encounter with the woman at the frame shop.
But I’m getting ahead of myself.
So as was bound to happen, this one thing I valued, this one thing to which I’d allowed myself to become attached - this was the one thing that was damaged in the move. The glass within the frame, shattered and broken.
Metaphorically speaking, I could relate.
Realistically speaking, I was irate.
I tore up the driveway on the day of the Big Move, right after I got the call informing me that a very large item, a piece of artwork, had been damaged in transit. I jumped out of the car and raced inside the house, pushing my way past the movers as they continued unloading our stuff (which is how I regarded the rest of our belongings….just….stuff), arriving in time to see a third party snapping photos of my beloved “thangka” lying on the floor of the basement, shards of glass everywhere.
Suddenly everything was quiet…and in the silence of that room in the middle of a house in the center of the States, my mind raced back to those monks in the Thamel District of Kathmandhu…how we’d talked to them and carefully chosen this piece, how we’d conscientiously avoided transacting in Tibet because the occupying Chinese strangulate everything there from commerce to artistic expression. How that painting had once threatened a visiting priest, how I’d been misjudged for establishing its domain on our living room wall…how for me, it represented one of the last major trips I’d taken in my many journeys fueled by curiosity and an open mind craving new experiences and a desire to connect with people the world over.
Seeing some stranger hovering over it as it lay prone on the floor…my reaction wasn’t limited to just the visceral; I had an immediate physical sensation similar to that of a body blow. I fell to my knees and passed my hands over the painting…just how damaged was it? Could it be fixed?
It could be fixed.
Several weeks later, I was single-handedly and single-mindedly dragging the painting through the house, out the garage (sliding it on top of some leftover cardboard from a remnant box), and gingerly and of course ever so carefully, hoisting it into the back of the CRV. I covered it with a blanket and drove at an obnoxiously slow pace all the way down the street to the nearest frame shop which luckily, was only 3 miles away.
When I got to the parking lot of the frame shop, I was all business. Trying to wrangle that thing out of the back of the car was out of the question; I knew I’d need the assistance of at least one employee just to maneuver it out of my vehicle and into the store. With that in mind, I decided to first park the car and then advise the store personnel that I needed help. As I walked through the parking lot, a Lexus pulled up right next to me, forcing me to stop in my tracks. Irritated, I looked down into the window of the car and saw an elderly woman in the passenger side. She was of tiny stature, her long grey hair pulled back in a bun at the nape of her neck. She was dressed in an Indian sari. For a second I forgot where I was as I reached out to open the car door and offer the woman my hand. She turned to the younger female driving the car (her daughter?) and said something to her, then turned back to the car door which I’d since opened - as though I was a chauffeur waiting for my client to emerge from a stretch limo.
“Would you like some help?”, I asked her. She smiled and said thank you, yes she would like help out of the car. Her enunciation was soft but clear, “Please….yes. Help me.”
I grasped her arm and gently pulled her up and out of the car. We walked slowly toward the store entrance. It was cold and drizzly that day, and I was wearing jeans, jacket, and closed-toe shoes. By contrast, my elderly companion was wearing only the lightweight, gauzy material of her not-very-weatherproof sari. I pulled her closer and leaned into her, propelling us both through the doorway and into the dry protection of the store. Once inside, I attempted to direct her to a bench and asked her if she’d like to take a seat while she waited for her daughter. She smiled and shook her head, pointing to the carts. She wanted a cart. We walked over to the carts and I pulled one out for her. Knowing her daughter was parking the car and would be catching up momentarily, I asked my impromptu companion if she’d be alright to wait for a second or two, and she smiled at me, nodding in the affirmative….yes, she’d be alright. And as she turned to thank me, she paused for what was almost an imperceptible second before taking my hand and squeezing it gently. Holding it for an equally imperceptible second more, she then did something so remarkable and unexpected, I smile now just to think of it again — she raised my hand to her mouth and kissed it, saying “Thank you…thank you”.
So then, there I was, recently arrived in the Breadbasket of America (at a Michael’s Craft Store no less), heavy of heart, bearing the burden of that shattered painting, my broken “attachment” — an attachment as much circumstantial as material…and I was just kind of momentarily stunned. Stunned out of my funk, in fact. The only thing that came to me was to say “thank you” back to her as I turned away, leaving her to watch me, both of us smiling. And I realized I felt…excited. Happy. Almost joyous. Like a burst of adrenalin to the soul.
I thought about this strange connection - this genuine touch between two people…a kind of unexpected intimacy not normally associated with an encounter between two unknowns - though no less authentic for the lack of acquaintance. I thought about that fleeting touch - how it was so brief and so…light. It was unusual, yes — but it didn’t feel awkward. It felt…sweet. Poignant, even. It made my day, and I would say, it even made the damaged painting all the more worth the while. I’d gone from feeling upset about the need to repair it, to feeling especially fortunate - for the same exact reason.
As silly as it may sound, something changed for me that day, it really did. Something inside. I felt the tides shifting toward the positive. When I walked out of the shop, the sun was peeking out from behind the clouds.
I smiled all the way home.
