“In the Holy Relationship, it's understood that we all have unhealed places, and that healing is the purpose of our being with another person. We don't hide our weaknesses, but rather we understand that the relationship is a context for healing through mutual forgiveness.”
― Marianne Williamson

 I am doing a lot of reading and soul searching about love these days.  I have glimpsed this before at different times in my life. I am currently comparing the difference between giving all you have in codependency.....hoping to heal or improve another because of a belief in the other's inadequacy (which oftentimes mirrors an unseen inadequacy of one's own self), or giving all you have because you know that all you have is boundless, unconditional,  and ultimately, enough, because you find your own self to be enough. In unconditional love the boundless love, once found in self, would echo and bounce back from every other being until self was no more and only love remained.  At least I think it would be that way: a perfect paradox. I am not anywhere close to this: mostly confused and far from where I wish to be.  Therein, I think lies the rub......I will never be enough until I am enough, and so others will never be enough until I am enough.

If I can forgive myself, then I will be forgiven by myself and I will free the others I hold in the bondage of judgement.  So be it.

Tonight a fine, fresh mist blanketed Norman and when I arrived home from work, the breeze stroked my cheek and the mist kissed my lips.  A restless longing stirred within me. I dressed warmly and went into the dusk. I ended up at the Norman Mardi Gras Parade.

As twilight became dark, the wind became insistent, pinching my cheeks and biting my lips. I didn’t care. A wild energy filled me with a sense of expectancy.

I stood to watch the parade alone. I made no effort to gather candy or necklaces.  I simply observed.

Then the space around me was filled by a group of young revelers. A young man in a plastic fire hat saw I had no necklaces and placed some around my neck as he breathed beer into my face.   After that, I belonged.  We gathered necklaces and candy and bestowed them on one another. We sang “We all live in a Yellow Submarine……” at the top of our lungs. We danced to the rhythm of the Jazz in June Jazz Band.  We twisted to “Let’s Twist Again” blasting from the Octopus Float. The man with the fireman’s hat turned and hugged me. “Bye!” he yelled. They left as suddenly as they'd arrived.

On the way back to my car, I gave all my necklaces to a woman with a little girl.  “You don’t want them?” she said, obviously puzzled.

“No, I’m going home.” I smiled.  So I did, strangely comforted.