Anima

Yesterday, during meditation, I began to notice that I’m alive. Now, before you scoff, it was more I sort of sensed whatever it was, that spark of life within me, that is not in a fire hydrant or end table. That mystical, magical thing that happens only for us, that rides on our blood cells and sends messages to synapses and invents thought, hormones, and waste.

Anima, is what this is. The life property of us living things.

It wasn’t as if I sensed my soul in that sense of the meaning, but more, that simply I was aware that -hot dog!- this is being “alive.” I found this interesting, this unique "blessing," perhaps. To just notice that there is something in me, as in you, that is not in everything.

Later that day, I found out that a friend of mine overdosed on drugs, and died this weekend.

At the moment, it felt simply like shock, indignation, and anger. I am believer in a Higher Power, and an order to the Universe, or something like that – although my understanding and relationship to that power changes and evolves, like most relationships. However, this this felt abnormally cruel.

He was my age, 30ish. Tall, blue eyes, light hair. Handsome. I had a crush on him.

Granted it was a from-a-distance crush, because I knew the struggle he was having with staying sober for the year plus that I’ve known him.

When I got sober, I was told to buy something black – the men told to buy a suit – as we were going to be attending a lot of funerals. (That’s not “recovery”’s position on the matter; it’s just the half joke/half not of some people in it.)

When I was a few months sober, someone I’d been peripherally running around with being wild and crazy and ISN’T LIFE GREAT WHEN YOU’RE NOT PUKING AND BLACKING OUT ANYMORE?!, well, I found out that he’d walked off a cliff one night on purpose.

A girl I know died last year, and a lot of folks I know were affected by her death.

But, for me, this one has come the closest to home. I sat in the same room with this kid almost weekly for over a year. I heard his dry humor, and his despair, his attempts, his hope, and his … anima. I heard his life. We all did. And now, he’s dead.

My emotions of shock were sent in a sentence up to G-d: What The Fuck.

Sure, I do believe in the order of things, and that “things happen for a reason,” but I’ll tell you, believe that though I do and may, this happened to be a great way to shake that conviction. But moreso, I feel indignant and righteously angry and my firm belief in a kind Universe. I know it sounds antithetical, but really, I have no other choice.

I, like many people I know, have no other choice than but to believe in some cosmic goodness – to me it is a goodness. And, sure, I can choose not to believe. I can choose to say that this world is fucked, and aimless, and sometimes you win and sometimes you lose, and there’s no reason or order or lesson or anything. Cold, inanimate life.

But. I don’t believe that. And, really, it’s not because I must, it’s because I do. I simply do.

And, so then, how to “reconcile” at all the tragedy of the loss of a … how can you describe a person in a word?

I cannot reconcile the loss and my worldview. And often my worldview is replete with paradox, and for now, today, I will hold them both. I will be furious and mystified at the shortened life of my friend. And, I will continue to scrape the residue of that which covers my own anima – because I do also believe that whenever the light is turned on in one person, the whole world is lightened because of it.

And though I still don’t feel that this is now some cosmic balance of we now all get to improve ourselves and not take life for granted and all that bullshit, … well, what else can we do?

Dear Aaron, I'm sorry I didn't offer to lend you the two dollars you needed when you were on line behind me at the grocery store last week. I wish I had.