Turtle in the Road

On my way home from work last night, I saw a turtle cross the road. He was just reaching the other side when I passed him. For whatever reason, this amazing feat -- that the turtle had actually lived after crossing such a busy street -- made me want to cry. I cry a lot, so that's not all that impressive...but there was something so touching about his success.

As a creative writing student at Goucher, I was trained to look very carefully at the details in life. Too often we are in our own head and rushing from one place to another, that we forget to witness the details of our own lives. There are metaphors everywhere. And perhaps they don't mean anything...but I prefer to believe that they do.

As a Buddhist student, I have been trained to contemplate the conditioned circumstance of every detail. I have learned to see how every instance, thought, feeling, event arises somewhere so far back that it's true origin becomes untraceable. It's better known as the Butterfly Effect. Google it.

These two ways of training my mind have become intertwined, and so I notice the details of life and I see how they are no coincidence. Everything is relevant, and this is why I choose to believe that the metaphors that lay themselves out so honestly in our lives are not to be ignored, but honored.

There is a story about a raft in Buddhism. The teachers, books, koans, lessons of Buddhism are represented by this raft that carries you across the river. They are necessary in order to understand and fully realize enlightenment. Often times, people will be inclined to hold on to their raft, strap it to their back, and carry the burden of it for the rest of their lives. But the truth and lesson in the story is this: the teachings of Buddhism, the books, the sayings, the stories, are all just material to help you get to the other side. These material things are not enlightenment themselves. Striving to get to the other side of the river, I have listened to the teachings, I have built my raft, and I am still using it. But when reaching the other side, I must remember to let go.

I witnessed this turtle make it to the other side yesterday, with nothing but its will and a hard shell on its back. Many days I wish I had the perseverance and hard shell of this turtle, because we are all just trying to make it to the other side. More often than not, life comes at us, barrelling down the road, distracted, rushed, thoughtless, it hits us hard, and we suffer. Sometimes life creates such high waves in the water that it laps at our raft, shakes us from side to side, we struggle to stay on the raft. Sometimes it is lost to the ocean.

Yesterday was one of those days where life came at me, and all I wanted to do was lie there in the road and give up and jump off my raft. But a good nights rest does wonders for the spirit, and today I feel like putting the hard shell on my back and crossing the road.