Bus ride

310 Marbles 
Hope is the feeling you have that the feeling you have isn’t permanent.  
Jean Kerr

   I took the bus home after work tonight.  I was so tired that I leaned against the window and uncomfortably tried to fall asleep with my head reverberating against the hard, cold surface of the window.  I knew I couldn’t relax completely and risk missing my stop, heading all the way over the bridge far away from my home, so I fell into a light sleep.  
   I woke up when we hit the hairpin turn a few blocks before my house.  Right in front of me was a woman, asleep and leaning against the man she loved.  They both looked so comfortable – he with his role as the stalwart one, she nestled securely in his arms.  Man, do I want one of those, not necessarily a man, but someone who has my back. 
   My running partner tells me that I send mixed signals: At one moment I’m independent and awesome, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound while distilling meaning from the universe; at the next moment I’m wanting to be the pedicured Principessa girl, admired and adored.  Yeah, so what?  Isn’t that normal? 
   I don’t think that just because that woman was leaned up against her man that she was feeble and needy in her waking hours.  But I have to wonder, when does the man get to fall asleep?

Eckhart Tolle wrote, “Wherever you are, be there totally. If you find your here and now intolerable and it makes you unhappy, you have three options: remove yourself from the situation, change it, or accept it totally.”  A breakup is a removal from the situation and my job over the next 310 Marbles is to accept where I am totally whilst changing the parts of my life that aren't working for me or my kids. Whereas the bus ride showed me that I still have hope for finding someone who has my back, in the meantime I also realize what David Hume so succinctly said,"He is happy whose circumstances suit his temper; but he is more excellent who can suit his temper to any circumstances."  What would it take for me to feel that my back is taken care of right now?