I believe in the unseen. In the subtle changes of the world, the hidden workings of god in whispers.
I believe that at fifteen, I was cursed. From the foot of the Himalayan mountains. We imprint ourselves in the things, the objects, the cloths that cover our bodies, the beautiful ornaments that serve us daily. They imbibe our energy like thirsty earth, absorbing. He knew that. He knew that when he took a scarf when I wasn’t watching, a scarf that was a gift from my mother and that I remember so clearly: blue, floral, full of my skin, my smell, of me. A scarf that I cherished. It happens often with the things we are so blindly attached to – they somehow always disappear, or leave, or die in some form or another. That same night he told me that I will see him in my dreams. He told me to keep my palm facing up, expectant, and god, or Someone, will put a dream inside my palm during sleep. Keep your palm up in receiving. So I did. I wanted a dream from god. I wanted love. He knew that.
He also knew that my heart did not want to open to him, never, no matter how much he pled and made promises of family and a love like in stories, movies. His heart filled with rage.
My scarf travelled somewhere deep into the Nepalese mountains, in a small village where he was from, a village where people knew the workings of the unseen, knew how to talk to the fire and the earth, to the waters surrounding them, they knew how to ask and receive. My scarf now imbibed with distorted prayers of loneliness and an acute lack of love. I didn’t know then.
Yet, every time I experienced heartbreak, more loss, guests uninvited inside my body, heaviness, loneliness loneliness, I always remember that scarf. The mountains. That man.
10 years later I spiralled down to the same exact place with the conviction to release this, too. I arrived to the place parallel to the one then. With the faith that no dark thing can survive for too long. That nothing that serves evil, power, darkness, could ever survive us facing it. Looking into evil eyes, despite the fear of the dark, despite the crushing tiredness, naming him. Naming what happened. Making stories out of scars and curses. This is what was done – I know it with my blood and beating heart.
Perhaps, this curse saved me. I was saved from caging myself in half loves and a life half lived. I had to turn to god when sinking too low, to turn to the only place of unconditional loving: inside.
And perhaps the attempt of others to harm us is in fact a blessing.
He thought this small girl wouldn’t even fathom what he’s done. How will she know about the dark things, about the power of mountains and words spoken? But I did, yet I opened my palms, I opened my palm knowingly to receive.
Knowingly, I open again, here, this time to drop another’s dream and plant the seeds of my own. No longer dreaming another’s dream.
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