Swanwick Star Issue No. 4 (2011)

Thanksgiving Gathering

The Thanksgiving gathering had a gracious atmosphere with Elena there to greet the guests with a table full of snacks, delicacies, and tempting teas while Dr. JK Siddoo’s piano fugues played in the background. It was a wonderfully light and airy room at the Vancouver Public Library with an unusual view of downtown. We were a small group of ten.

…And, then, K started to remind us with his stream of consciousness lecture how we are responsible for the deplorable state of the world and that when there is the self, there is no love. It was quite a shocking statement that stunned the mind into silence.

Strangely, it had Russian subtitles and, luckily, a few Russian speakers arrived who were able to benefit from them. How nice it is to hear a language spoken with such sensuality and conviction! It is so unlike the tentative and timid way in which we speak English.

At the end, we were given slips of paper and pencils to write down our thoughts and, after a period of silence, we went around the circle asking each person to share them with us.

The here and now is all that matters; living life in the present; the death of individualconsciousness; living with passion; the body is a jail which the soul must transcend, were some of the comments we explored in the ensuing discussion.

Then, came the final question, what is love and what does one want from it if anything? And, I was put in mind of a neighbourhood cat, Puss-in-boots, who had died recently. What an extraordinary creature who had lived with such attention and given me so much of it!…not through flattery, or, by giving me some kind of false importance, but just her total, unadulterated Attention. And, as I thought of it, perhaps, there had not even been the feeling we were two separate entities…