Halil Baba nodded kindly and said, “When children do something bad, they cry and say they’re sorry and promise their parents they’ll never do it again. And their parents see their good heart and intentions. So they kiss them and love them and forgive them—even knowing that they’ll likely do that very thing again!”
We all laughed and Halil Baba continued, “Well, with Allah it is the same. Allah is our parent. We are all his children. And every time we sincerely say we are sorry and promise we won’t do something again, Allah sees our remorse and good heart and loves us and is happy—even knowing that we’ll likely do that very thing again!”
Then he told us a parable, which is how Sufis teach, through stories and fables from their oral tradition.
“There is a vast, deep ocean,” he said. “And on that ocean there is a tiny island. And on that island there is a parrot sitting in a tree. And on the beak of the parrot there is a tiny speck of dirt.
“Can you see that?” Halil Baba asked, his brown eyes shining. “Well, that tiny speck of dirt is our sins. But the vast, deep ocean is Allah’s compassion.”
I felt my heart open—to the day, to myself, to compassion.
Then I smiled at John.
He smiled back at me.
And we both knew, most likely, I’d do that very thing again.
Come, come, whoever you are . . .
Come, even if you have broken your vows
A hundred times,
Come, come again, come.
—RUMI
MY MOTHER-IN-LAW’S BEDROOM
John’s mum, Dorothy Wilcockson, always lived simply. She grew up poor in rural England and left school for work at age fourteen. By the time I met her, she was a widow in her eighties and had enough money from her pension to live a nice life. Mum shared a home with her elder son, Dave, by the creek in Dorking, Surrey.
Yet despite her savings, Mum lived as simply as ever. She kept their home clean and unadorned and only bought what she truly needed. On our yearly visit, there was good food to eat, but just enough—nothing extra, no waste.
She didn’t waste words either. Each day of our visits, we’d sit together in the living room and Mum would ask us how we were feeling and how our grandchildren were and then settle down to knit scarves—“For the old people,” she’d say and then laugh, because they, in their seventies, were far younger than she. While she knitted, Dave read the horse-race results in the paper, John communicated with his computer, and I played my guitar. Now and then, someone would say something about what they were reading, or comment on the changing light outside, or Mum would say, “That’s pretty, dear,” about the music.
It was a routine that seemed foreign to me—raised in a Jewish home on the East Coast where you had to speak loud and fast to be heard—but I grew to love it. There was an acceptance and warmth in the silence we shared. Its peacefulness soothed me. Then, at 4, Mum would always ask, “Would you like some tea?” Later, we’d cook dinner, play Scrabble, and go to bed.
John and I would stay in the large and airy blue room: light blue walls, white bedspread with blue flowers, and sheer white curtains. I thought of Mum’s room as the lilac room because when I’d peek in, I’d get a feeling of lilac. Perhaps it was the walls or her bedspread . . . I just knew I saw lilac.
I never entered her room until after she died. It was such a little room, such a small space she took for herself, that it felt invasive to enter it when she was there. But after she died, I wanted to see it, to know her better in any way I could.
I walked into the room with reverence, and that seemed right, not only because she had died, but because it looked like a young girl’s bedroom to dream in or a nun’s room for prayer. The furnishings were sparse: a small bed with a wooden nightstand, one chest of drawers, and a little dressing table with a mirror. Only a few objects were on the table: a hairbrush, some face cream, a photo of her with her children, and two picture postcards we had sent from Colorado. The purple curtains were homemade, the ruffled bedspread was white with blue and lilac flowers, and the wallpaper was a pale mauve-pink.
Everything was perfectly neat and clean and had a purpose. Nothing extra, no waste. Just a simplicity and sweetness that made her room feel almost holy. Like Mum, it inspired me and said, Here’s another way to live.
MIRACLES TO SHARE
I was reading a book with a great title, Stand Like Mountain, Flow Like Water, by Brian Luke Seaward, and something he wrote struck me. After revealing that he’d had several mystical experiences in his life but felt guarded about sharing them since few people do, he said, “I imagine that if, indeed, we did share these on a regular basis, we might be living in a much different world. Perhaps a better world.”
Now I believe, as Seaward does, that many, if not all of us, have experienced the miraculous sometime in our lives. Not just the ever-present miracles of creation, but something specific to our own life story. We might not have called it a miracle; we might have said, What an amazing coincidence, or, Thank God that happened. But maybe, just maybe, it was a miracle.
Seaward said we should speak about our miracles, perhaps so others can be open to their miracles or feel hope when hope is what they need. Yet sometimes it feels strange to reveal them, not just because people may roll their eyes, but because they feel like special gifts, personal and sacred, not to be talked about lightly. Still, I have two miracles I feel ready to share, maybe because they’re
