Flash Floods and Hugs
A different weekend, altogether. This one
involved religion, hot penning and no drink.
The type of thing the counsellor recommended, in fact, when I mentioned
to her that I had seen an advertisement in the newspaper for Healing Weekends,
so to speak, for the divorced, the separated and the widowed. I rang the
organization and it sounded good. So off I went.
Check in time at the Retreat Centre was 5 pm
Friday. Bed at eleven pm, up for 8 am
breakfast each day. I slung my case into
my single ensuite bedroom, unpacked the travel kettle, the herbal tea, chocolate
and fruit, bottled mineral water. So far so good.
First event; the organizers introduced themselves
individually. Then half an hour of “getting to know you” games. We were broken
up into small groups of three and assigned a mentor. Given notebooks and pens.
In our small group, three of us, all women and a male mentor. We began the first
session of discussion, and then it was off to our rooms to write whatever came
into our minds. This was to be the
pattern for the weekend. Talks given to
the larger group, then breaking into our foursomes for further talk, then race
to the rooms to pour out tears and words. There were group ceremonies, a
religious service on Sunday morning. After that, a healing service. So many
tears flowed over the weekend, I thought we would all be washed out of the Centre, down the grounds to the river and out to sea... Over the weekend I wrote and wrote and wrote,
cried and cried and cried. In the small
chapel where the closing ceremony was held, the air was so heavy with sorrow
and anguish that I felt it lying across my shoulders and bowing down my head like a blanket. When the hugging took place, I was enfolded in
the arms of lovely men and nearly came unhinged altogether.
I don’t feel much different, if at all. I don’t
feel any major shift, any major Zen. I’ve
learned that there are many people going through changes they hoped would never
happen to them, never envisaged happening to them. But that’s life, isn’t it. I didn’t experience any eureka moments. I met
good people, very good people. I learned a lot. Hell, we even had some fun,
what with the jokes and poems and dancing on the last night.
Goodbyes and hugs on Sunday afternoon. Back to
reality. I can’t say that much has changed. Back at home in my own bedroom, I re-read my
scribblings. Then shredded the anger, the hurt, and the fear. Hoped that this intense
weekend will somehow start something in me that has not yet been apparent; a feeling
that I am doing the right thing, and that the future holds the promise of a new
beginning.
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