Black Cat *Mixed Dao*

The black cat was elegant, graceful, and seemed to glide across the earth. The goal was to get a warm, soothing glass of milk. Some meat to chew on, and some kindness from those who would be able to give it.

How often was he chased away by a broom, or kicked around by the mean people of society. So often has pain followed him, so often has a person led him in just to hurt him, how could he trust anyone.

Living in the cold night, sleeping on the hard miserable earth. Finding leaves to sleep upon, but offering no cushioning against the harsh earth. Climbing trees to escape danger, or hiding and only prowling the night.

The night seems safest to him, the darkness giving him stealth. Black on black making him seem invisible upon the world. Those that do see in his world are not trusted, first they have to prove their intentions are pure and just.

My kindred spirit, my brother of nature, we share so many similarities. I am not sure I really want to trust anyone again with my heart? I stay far away from the broom stick. I wonder if there is a kind soul out there that I can trust, that will feed me out of kindness of their heart. Not pity, no sympathy, but out of kindness. I wonder when I will find the warm comfortable bed to lie in?

I don't think I am ready to go back to the world just yet. It has rejected me so many times, and I have rejected it so many times as well. Listening to my music, and I can't remember their faces, the eye colors, or much of anything else. I see their pages and just an emptiness remains. No pain, no sadness, the wish or feeling that I will die without them has gone like the black fur at night.

Disassociated from me in this reality, detached from my life. Looking back just one day ago, I realize that many more things have been detached from me, from my mind, from my life.

Upon being complimented on my decorating skills, it did nothing inside me. No sudden jolt of a feeling. I decorate just to avoid seeing bare walls, seeing an emptiness, it seems incorrect if something is not on a wall.

Upon seeing my best friend from high school, there was no feeling of comradeship, no anger, no nothing. I suppose maybe it is not time to leave this state of Flux, I suppose I am comfortable in this area. It is where I can not get hurt, betrayed, or destroyed.

I don't remember her curves, I don't remember her voice, at times I don't remember being married for a time. The person is special to me, all of them were, but nothing but a fading memory exists, a hazy memory at best.

The conversation turned toward my Ex-wife when we met. Name calling came as soon as the conversation turned that way. To me though she is a person that made a choice. So it hurt or what I thought was hurt me. Still her choice may lead to another persons happiness.

There are reasons thing occur the way they do. The river that flows south, should never be forced to flow north. People make decisions based on the moment, then later if the decisions were found out to be incorrect they fear to admit it, they push on, they fight through it.

But how can any decision be incorrect? If things were meant to be then how can one really see it as a poor decision. Why should anything really affect us in a positive manner, or negative?

My ballads from Kamelot make me tear up, but not in sadness. The songs are beautiful, they fit in my reality so nicely, so flawlessly. The black cat in me searches for a hand that is pure kindness, pure wisdom, and pure love. Just like a black cat though the people chase it away, abuse the stray, and tries to kill the cat.

Death though only provides a doorway to rebirth. Death of a lifestyle provides an opening to a new one. The life I knew is over, death came swift and silent however, the new light seems to be an older light. The study of the sages, the writings, the detachment from all things that caused conflict in my life. How do you do the things that once caused such conflict, without having the same conflict? Detached, and remove the core thing that caused the conflict, remove the emotion the thought behind the conflict. Without the thought and emotion how can one truly encounter conflict?

You know I have seen in the last couple of days a new thing start to occur in me. I have not been studying the sages, nor going to Tai Chi, but my hands seem to enjoy resting by my stomach within each other with the palms facing up. They seem very relaxed in this state. It is a nice feeling, I can't explain it, it is not emotional but it is a soothing type of feeling.

Yet still the garden is present in my mind, still the growing of life and harvesting of food is present in my mind. The idea of leaving the socialized world yearns from within me. Tis not the time yet, before I leave I must handle the loose ends in this style of life. Hence the reason I have not just packed up, dropped the rope here, and started walking to that garden.