Journal Entry 11.5.23

I have been thinking about my father, here, in the heat of the village. I am thinking about his foibles and all his justification for his foibles rather then simply being an honest and vulnerable, an imperfect human being. It takes a lot of humility to see and know your weakness, your mistakes, your fears, your preferences, your need to protect your most delicate and fragile parts of yourself. But the payoffs for that depth of honesty and vulnerability are so great.

Today, someone in the village walked into the house, calling out. I thought it was my son, in the bathroom washing his clothes. I was startled, fresh out of the bath, lying in my room, damp with nothing on but a sarong. But a person walking into my house meant something, so I walked out to greet the sound. My neighbor here had a plastic bag he handed me with the word “sada”. I greeted him in return and opened the bag. It was at least two handfuls of fish, tiny carp. They were fresh as could be and so I exclaimed, thanking him, and asked if he had caught them in the stream between our houses. He had. He told me he would return tomorrow and left.

I don’t feel I have done anything to deserve such open hearted kindness, but I must have, somehow. Otherwise, why else would a relative stranger fish for carp and hand deliver them in time for my dinner? I must have done something to have connected with him in that way, and since there is nothing grand that I did, it must have simply been because we are both allowing ourselves to share our humanness.