Revising Loneliness

The homeless man I pass by everyday is missing.

His area is in a new state of disarray and the brick wall is burnt.

I am full of sadness.

I am regretful that I avoided him recently.

I hope that tomorrow, I see him, and that all my worries are laughable, but right now my stomach is knotted. I don’t know why. I realize that in a strange way I care about him, but I am also seriously frightened by him. These feelings are in conflict with one another.

I took this photo to remember the difficult feeling, then walked down to the subway station, sat down, and opened up my book.

“To lead a life that goes beyond pettiness and prejudice and always wanting to make sure that everything turns out on our own terms, to lead a more passionate, full, and delightful life than that, we must realize that we can endure a lot of pain and pleasure for the sake of finding out who we are and what this world is, how we tick and how our world ticks, how the whole thing just is.” – Pema Chodron

I am thankful for Saturday.