Laughing At The Sky

Posted by tiff in meditation retreat, Momsanity, Uncategorized | 6 comments

I bet Buddha talked with spiders. I do! I bet, sitting under the Bodhi tree all by himself, he talked to lots of things. At least, I hope he did, because I found myself reaching out and talking to everything while I was at the meditation retreat. Not talking as in using actual words, because I was very careful to maintain noble silence, but more like mentally communicating.

There was a brief respite in the middle of the 10 days of meditation, in between the first 4 days of mentally wrestling with myself and anapana meditation and the last 5 days of mentally wrestling with myself and ‘strong determination’ meditation. They told us every day what day we were on, but other than that I was in a state of timelessness. There were only 3 things I did there: eat, sleep, meditate. Without anything else to worry about, it was easy to slip into a very unfocused state of being.

One morning, while out for my usual stroll after 3 hours of meditating and an hour of eating oatmeal, I noticed that the fog blanketing the ground had frozen and made crystal necklaces out of all the spiderwebs in the meadow. I noticed this because ever since my dance party with myself, I felt much more inwardly calm and aware. Much more present in the moment.

I sat on a bench, watching the crystal necklaces turn into dewdrop prisms as the sun came up. This was one of the only days that we saw the sun, and the warmth felt amazing. In fact, more than amazing. Without my mind wandering into the past or future, I felt everything acutely in the present…more than I ever had in my life. The sun felt sublime. The hundreds of glittering spiderwebs looked divine. The more I focused on noticing these little gifts, and how they made me feel different sensations in my body, the more I noticed other little things.

I noticed the call of the birds on the wind. Not just ‘bird calls’, but how each warble belonged to each individual bird. I heard the scurry of little animals hiding in the meadow. I listened to frogs hop around in a pond. Feeling the sun on my face, I wanted to feel more of the warmth on my body so I opened my meditation blanket and spread it out on the bench so I could lay down.

While laying down and basking in the sun, I wondered what I’d feel if I looked at the dew filled meadow upside down, so I scooted my body over and reclined so my lower body was supported by the bench and my upper body was waterfalling towards the ground. My eyes were at ground level, and while checking out the meadow I looked over at the bench leg and noticed a little spider crawling up.

Spiders and I don’t really vibe well, so I had a little moment of panic. My first response was to flick it away, but I’d promised not to harm or hurt another creature, so I just watched it. It slowly, slowly made its way up the bench. It was small, about the size of the tip of my pinky, so it really took a lot of effort. The more I watched its slow climb, the more I respected it.

“You’re a really determined spider.” I thought. “I bet you’re pretty handsome, as far as spiders go. I bet I’d think you were cute if I were a lady spider!” I pictured myself as a tiny spider, going out on a tiny spider date, navigating through the world that was now jumbo sized.

“Hey spider. If you ever make it up to the top, you’re welcome to share my blanket with me. I don’t usually share my space with spiders, but this is different somehow. I feel connected, you know? Is that crazy? Probably, I mean, you don’t even know I’m here, or human, or not a tree. But here we are, sharing this tiny little space in the middle of this great big universe, and I’d be honored to spend a little more time with you if you manage to make it up that far.”

I left the spider to continue on his spider way and shifted my still upside down focus to a fat slow caterpillar burrowing through the thick grass. It also was a determined little fella. I sat back upright, keeping my gaze on this newest development. It was yellow and black, with the hairy spikes that make caterpillars so amazingly chubby and cute.

I started wondering if caterpillars make any noise as they caterpillar through grass.

I looked around. Looked up at the sky. Looked down at my blanket. Thought for a second.

“Well, there’s only one way to find out if you make any noise, little caterpillar. So here I go.”

I got down on my hands and knees.

I bent over so that my ear was half an inch above it.

I became very still, and focused very hard to see if I could hear any caterpillar noises.

It didn’t take long before I heard it. A soft little ‘crunch crunch crunch’ and ‘swoosh swoosh swoosh’ of a tiny caterpillar body pushing it’s way through each individual piece of grass.

This sound made me delirously happy. It’s like I’d landed at the North Pole after a hard expedition. It’s very rare, as an adult, that we make a totally new discovery, or think a totally new thought. But finding out that caterpillars do make noise was one of those new things. Also one of those new things: the caterpillar had a crown of dew drops strung across her sweet little caterpillar head. And also?! She had another very small spider on her back. I wondered what THAT spider had on its back, and what was on the back of THAT microscopic thing. I sat back on my heels and laughed at the sky. “What a glorious world we live in, eh frogs? And spiders! And birds! And caterpillars!”

I sat back on the bench and felt the sun on my face again. I got lost in the sensation of it, in that moment it was all I knew and felt and thought about. Until I looked down at the bench and saw my spider friend, who had made it to the top. I skooched over and literally patted the spot beside me on the meditation blanket.

“The invitation still stands, you cute little spider you! Come sit a while!”

Damn if that little spider didn’t spider on over and chill beside me. We sat and vibed together, sending peace and love to the universe. At least, I did. I’m not sure what spider was doing.

Eventually, it spidered away and I was alone again.

Alone and happy.

More than that.

Alone and content. Something I rarely am. Content. Not wanting for anything, wishing for more, or unhappy with what I had. In that moment, I was filled up with everything I could ever need.

It was beautiful.

The meditation gong sounded, so I gathered up my meditation blanket and shuffled slowly back to the meditation hall.

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