make room for others

I’m on a raft pushing myself slowly down the river.

I was pushing myself, but now there is someone else with a long wooden pole in his hand. He focuses on his task like the others here do.

Until now, I hadn’t taken the time to sit and float and really take in the the majestic limestone formations surrounding us. The water is flat and calm. Its gurgling is peaceful.

My emotions burble up to the surface. I don’t know if it’s my thankfulness to be here, or if it’s just that everything has brought me to tears lately.

My feet are tucked under me. I’m fighting so hard to take in the sights or manifest them that I nearly forget my purpose.

I am Here, I think. I am Listening.

Suddenly I’m seized with so much gratitude that this man is taking the time to row me so I can sight-see. Something in me breaks, and I muffle the deep cry I’m having so I don’t disturb the cat sleeping next to me.

I wipe away the tears with the backs of my hands. They return against my will. The kindness of strangers, or something else?

I am still crying. I feel held, somehow. It is what I ask for every day: to feel held and loved and safe. My emotions are also of relief — that this place is still here for me, in all its abundance and generosity, even despite my lumpily grinding and reaching for it, and my worry it will disappear.

The rower sits silently at the front of the raft, so I am not in his line of sight. I hope I am not disturbing him. I don’t want to talk to him — I want to allow him to have his own experience, the same way he’s allowing me mine.

If he speaks, I will listen to whatever he says, but asking him to seems too much. He has made room for me on his craft, and that there is room for me is a small miracle given my recent pettinesses and impatiences and drownings in the outer world.

Make room for others.

He does not speak it, but this is the idea his steady, humble presence suggests to me.

Make room for others.

I have to cover my eyes to contain my tears.