[A Meeting for One]
Destination reached. The random beach chairs were unfolded in a circle around the ancient-looking willow tree next to the pond positioned in the center of the park. Noah found a few pebbles the size of abnormally large lighters that he found useful in pinning the Forgiveness Meeting Pamphlets to each seat.
He couldn’t stop thinking about the coincidence:
I had 13 dollars.
I used ten of that and got 13 random beach chairs…
And the rest was given to Yang to make pamphlets.
Which he made 13 of.
Noah had no idea he would get 13 chairs or that Yang would make exactly 13 pamphlets. And he most certainly did not know exactly 13 large pebbles would be right where he needed them on the windiest day of the spring season. 13… Why 13? Yet he was no believer in coincidence…there was no such thing in his vocabulary. He was filled with a sense of Hope. A calm peace rushed through him instantaneously.
Lord.
Give me strength.
Be my personal armor against sin and impure thoughts.
He felt good. Really good. He knew he was doing the right thing. Attempting to actually do the first step in ‘a book’ by attending Forgiveness Meetings required a physical commitment.
It also required the ability to face one’s fears, head on.
This was scary; and again Noah was rendered immobile for several minutes. Opening ‘a book’ and curling up with his mighty little dog under the willow tree, all he could bring himself to do was read and reread the first section.
That was it. A strong feeling of flight duking it out with his urge to fight through his fear took place internally.
Then. Almost in an instant. Something clicked in his brain and he understood!
This book is about action, about change…It is not just for observation like most other books shelved all over the world!
It was indeed this thought, this singular thought, that appeared to be paralyzing him.
Noah was told over and over and over again that life was what it was and he needed to live it the way he was told to or he would shame his family and end up in a place called hell. Shame? Hell? Deep down, none of this made any sense at all to Noah. The world he grew up in wasn’t even close to being perfect…heck! Half the time it wasn’t even tolerable!
So. There he was, back against the trunk of that ol’ willow tree; daydreaming’ about the way the world could be if everyone just made little adjustments. ‘Little’ adjustments he knew first hand were excruciatingly hard to make. Time began to pass quite slowly.
Noah stood up, dusted himself off and decided to start. Choosing the faded blue beach chair closest to the pond. It had one of its flat rubber bars that was supposed to give ‘seat support’ missing. Noah had to readjust his rear-end repeatedly so as not to slip through onto the soggy wet grass. Noah thought through the whole scenario:
If someone falls through this chair,
I’d never hear the end of it and not one person
Would stay for another meeting again.
So Noah took that chair and suffered the consequences. He sat at that meeting for a while. By himself. On a broken, faded beach chair. In a circle with 12 other beach chairs around a tree…An excited dog tied to the willow tree, barking loudly at the birds up above…Getting up to fix the circle here and there when the wind ripped through, knocking down a few of the chairs once-in-a-while; Noah thought to himself: I forgive myself for not attending church today. And then he thought:
Now’s as good a time to start the meeting as any.
I am deciding to start with myself.
I have some forgiveness
I need to give and to receive…
I don’t need other people to start the dialogue in my mind.
As long as I’m not talking out loud to myself no one will
Think I’m crazy… Hopefully 😉
Whether or not that was sound logic, it was good enough for Noah.
He began by coming up a list of the top five things he wanted to address at this first Forgiveness Meeting:
One. I would like to forgive myself for worrying so much about what other people think of me.
Two. Maybe forgive myself for living my life for other people…mainly Mother.
Noah took a deep breath and continued his meeting within his own head:
Three. Forgive my parents; they know not what they’ve done.
Four. Forgive myself for being so blinded by my ignorance and fears.
And…
Five. Forgive myself…forgive myself for not having it all figured out by now.
This horrible feeling came over him. He was a failure.
Into The Mystic, Ash 