The Transcendence of Essential Truth

I learned something today that I’d like to share. I was in the sauna and I reached that lightheaded moment that marks a point of ‘should return’. But there was an older guy across from me who looked like he could be a spokesperson for Quaker Oats (No disrespect intended by that. Oatmeal fuels champions), and he was doing fine. He came in before me and he was clearly going to outlast and outlive me but I wanted to put up an effort. So, I pledged to stay in for one more earbud song. What came up next was Larry Levan’s mix of Inner Life’s Make It Last Forever, and it was apparent that the universe was speaking directly into my ears. I may never experience a more profound synchronicity of lyric and feeling of lyric. This was perfect and just and right and it was going to truly feel like forever just as the chorus promised. And so it did. Several minutes in, through steam and blurry eyes, I could see that Quaker man was solid as the rock upon which his parents landed. He looked set. I was soft and sad and wavering. I checked to see how much time was left on the track and realized that this was a thirteen minute song, less than halfway over. I dug in, because the universe told me to and my death would be on its hands, not on my own.

 Infinitely stretched on and I checked repeatedly for an end date. Three minutes left. Two minutes. Less than one. And then with less than 40 seconds left, my ‘don’t die’ instincts sprang up and shoved the universe out of the way. I wobbled out the door, focused my scintillas of remaining energy on not stumbling into the pool and finding a wall to collapse against.  I laid with my head propped against it for longer than ‘Forever’ feeling the warm euphoria of rest. As sweat poured beneath me, I fell into a kind of meditative state. Deep breaths? Check. Immensely deep. Feel the weight of your body? Yes. I felt the weight of my current body and all the previous iterations of it. Uncluttered mind? Sure. I thought mostly of living and continuing to exist. I was glad to live and aware of the mechanics of it. Time seemed to stop or, at least, it became moot. Desire beyond breath, seemed moot as well. Life itself seemed suddenly clearer. When I opened my eyes, they were blurry, but after a time, they seemed clearer than before. The colors around me, seemed vivid. The sounds, more distinct. I felt a warm sense of being, just being, that brought an unconscious smile to my face.

Once my energy came back, I was more grateful for it. My steps felt purposeful and light. I walked to the locker room with a renewed sense of purpose. I thought of the surreal and moving visions that people have reported having in sweat lodges. I thought of how pilots who are forced to pass out to acclimate themselves to extreme g forces often have near death experiences and talk of reaching heaven. Could it be that I had experienced something profound? Was my third eye ever so briefly open, and had I somehow touched on something beyond me that could allow me to see things in a way that I hadn’t before? I closed eyes, that I wasn’t really using, lost as I was in my own thoughts. I said to myself, when you open them again, what will you see? When I looked there was only the wall across from me and a wastebasket. Nothing more. And the thought that sprung to my mind was:

I should take out the Trump when I get home before it begins to smell.

The lesson, I believe, is that trash is Trump and Trump is trash, both on our perceptible plane of existence and any that may exist beyond it.

For my Natasha and her Natasha.