Weather

I didn’t mind covid that much. I mean, I didn’t like it when I got it. It always seemed to me like a really weird disease. Not natural at all. I can well believe that he gets escape from some laboratory we scientists were experimenting.

But there were some things I liked about it. It actually gave me an excuse for not going out. I rarely go out anyway, but covid gave me an excuse for not going out at all.

It’s the same with the rain. For two days now the rain has been pouring down. I hear it hammering on the side of my caravan, I hear rivulets running in the gutters. I haven’t gone out at all. Not even to the town to buy groceries.

I don’t even know if I’m flooded in or not. I haven’t been down to the river to look. Four years ago, the river came up over the bridge, and we were flooded in for ten days. It was okay. We survived. You could even see some interesting, good effects of it.

For instance, some people in the community who were usually not highly regarded, suddenly became very highly regarded because they had all old bush skills which were useful in our flooded in environment.

For instance, some guy rigged up a temporary bridge made of bamboo across the river. You couldn’t drive across it of course, but you could crawl.

Another guy rigged up some kind of wire thing across the river whereby we could get cans of raw milk from the farmer across the river. So, these old-timers had their moment of glory, their moment in the sun, while the rain was pouring down.

Anyway, I felt very happy for the last two days at home in my caravan all the time with the rain pouring down and it impossible for me to go anywhere. How much I enjoyed it. It fitted in exactly with how I am experiencing old age.

It is a well-known phenomenon in old age, that we old people tend to withdraw. Our world becomes smaller and smaller. The world withdraws from us, and we withdraw from the world. Now, this can be viewed as a negative thing, but…

I will quickly tell you the story of my old age. I guess we are starting to age from the moment of conception, but I first began to notice old age when I was in my 40s, and my once razor-sharp memory was no longer so sharp, and I was starting to have those senior moments. You know, you walk into a room, and you think, I know there was some reason that I came into this room, but I can’t for the life of me think what it was.

But old age really began to bite me when I was in my 70s. This Euro was ushered in by some serious illnesses. I got cancer, I had heart attacks. And the whole experience seems to be all about lots. Loss of teeth, loss of hair, loss of beauty, loss of sex appeal, loss of health, loss of income earning capacity, loss of hearing, loss of sight, loss of friends through death or their moving away, loss of memory, loss of intelligence, and so on.

This was depressing. I knew as a Subud member I should not be depressed. I should rise above everything. My spirit should be stronger than my body or my circumstances. I should be sitting on the chair, the chair of old age should not be sitting on me. But I could not help it, I hankered for my old life when I had all these things I was losing.

Then I read a story about Bapak which gave me hope. In this story, an ambassador from a foreign country comes the Bapak and complains about old age. How his mind no longer functions and so on, but Bapak says, your problem is that all your life you have been driving a Toyota, but now God wants to give you a Cadillac, but you don’t want to get out of the Toyota.

Instantly, I recognised the truth of the story. I knew exactly what was meant by the Toyota. This car I had been driving all my life which was always giving me problems. The Cadillac meant a much better state graced by God. But what was this Cadillac, not as a symbol, but as an actual lived experience.

Well, it’s taken a long time, but I have begun to experience driving around in my Cadillac. It happened quite suddenly, quite recently, only about two months ago, some dreadful cloak of gloom and depression I’d been wearing all my life fell off me. And. I feel very peaceful. The peace that passeth all understanding.

And I feel very accepting. I accept my situation and myself. I don’t worry so much anymore. I am not ambitious. I enjoy life. I can sit for hours just looking in wonder at the clouds. Well, I could go on, but that should give you a taste.

And I very much like staying at home. Even a year ago I sometimes feel terribly lonely because I live by myself and whole days might go in which I did not speak to another soul.

But I no longer feel lonely. I feel completely self-sufficient. Of course, I enjoy when I go out and spend time with people, but most of the time I’m very happy at home. Home is the place you know. Home is the place which is imbued with your presence, your spirit. It’s where you feel comfortable. It fits your contours. I like being home, especially with the rain pouring down. I have everything I need here.

We had two days of rain and then on the morning of the third day the rain stopped, and it was a beautiful sunny autumnal morning. It was one of those mornings in which the world seems to be born anew.

I especially associate this feeling with the island of Bali which I have visited many time. Maybe it’s because in the Bali there is such a sacred feeling in the air. There are mornings in Bali when you are up on a mountaintop, looking across terraced rice fields towards the dawn, and you hear the sounds of roosters crowing and villages coming to life, and the sun is burning through the mist and you really feel the world has been washed clean and born anew.

And sometimes, I get the same feeling up here.

By Harris Smart