TheBanyanTree: Losing Perspective

[Maria Gibson]

It's desperately bleak outside.  Cold and damp, gray and overcast.  This 
is January and I shouldn't be disappointed, it is what it usually is.  
Weather matching heart is a little closer to home than one may be 
comfortable with making it that much harder to hide.  Still, I don't 
feel depressed, I feel almost in limbo.  Waiting for nameless life 
changing events; dreading them, hoping for them.  Nameless simply 
because I refuse to name them.  And now let them go to focus on other 
things.

I am so happy to have Jack, soft and cuddly kitten, in my life.  His is 
unconditional love at its most selfish.  I recognize his 'love' for me 
as selfish, if it is indeed love.  Can a cat have love for another 
creature?  He comes to me for his own pleasure.  He sits on my lap 
drooling when I scratch him exactly as he likes it, for his own 
pleasure.  He does not one damn thing he doesn't want to do, he does it 
all for his own gain and he is unashamed.  I could be Jack the freakin' 
Ripper and if I treated the cat just right, he'd love me.  He doesn't 
know my bank account, my day job or realize it when I am a super-duper 
fuck up.  And.  Wouldn't care even if he knew as long as I continued 
treating him as I do.  I am impressed and galled.  I often feel as 
selfish as this cat acts which would probably make a novel if I sat to 
write it out.  I certainly love him but I'm not sure I'd continue to 
love him if he became an awful member of this community.  It would take 
a lot but I'm sure he could do things to change my feelings for him.  
This is human love.  For all of our pronouncements and proclamations, 
I'm not sure that true unconditional love exists for larger brains and 
reasoning minds.  I believe that we are all capable of doing something 
horrible enough to no longer be loved and that we could experience the 
extinguishing of our love's flame if the circumstances became bad 
enough.  But human love at its finest isn't selfish.  It isn't given for 
the sole purpose of what is gotten in return and even, many times, is 
given freely during times of great testing for love's capacity.  Some 
love is as selfish as it gets.  Taking it, basking in it, giving it.  
Nothing but pain as a gain to be had.  Is it really better to have loved 
and lost than not to have loved at all?  Is there any good that can come 
from allowing love that cannot flourish?   Can love be purposefully 
allowed or disallowed or is it totally without guidance?  What is this 
elusive emotion that rules stealthily, sneaking up without regard?  Who 
could answer these questions and do I really want them answered?

As I sit in pajamas on the third day of a new year and think with good, 
strong coffee in hand, knowing that tomorrow I have to go back to work, 
I am steeped in philosophical thought. 


Maria