Mental Housekeeping

Overcast.  A soft day.  Later it will be hot, sticky and uncomfortable but this early (7am) it's still a balmy tropical morning. 
     There's something wonderful about being alone for awhile.  Moving to my own rhythm, listening with an undistracted ear, moving through space without the gravitational pull of another person.  I love it.  I need it.  Not forever.  I want him home but the novelty is luxurious. 
     So what to do with this day?  Not eat is one thing.  I've learned to love cooking.  What I cook I eat.  Will be nice just to have liquids today.  Plant the Black Bean tree in the yard where the summer heat and drought killed a small tree I'd planted a few years ago (put a dripper on it too late).  Repot some other plants.  Take Balthazar out for a pick.  No work for him, just pick.  Work on my painting?  Read a book.  Do yoga.  Have another coffee. 
     Decided after my little scare of a few days ago that it was time to reassess what I was feeding my mind.  Every day, through various email subscriptions, I was reading about the horror in the world; the cruelty, the mindlessness, the greed and because that was my steady diet I was, in a way, perpetuating it.  There's the voyeuristic quality involved too - why people slow down at a car accident - which had me reading crap I shouldn't have.  I know how susceptible I am.  I know once the image is there I can never be rid of it.  Animals Australia sent me a membership kit with flyers depicting, with graphic photos, the barbaric treatment in factory farms.  Glanced at it, saw what it was and threw it away. 
     When I was 12 or so I saw an image of a starving kitten, dirty and abandoned on the street.  The image was from some animal welfare group.  I cried and cried and cried - and am tearing up now thinking of that long dead kitten.  I can't take it.  The wall is breached.  The filter faulty. 
      So yesterday I unsubscribed from those groups.  I kept Greenpeace, Animals Australia, IFAW and a couple of others but the worst ones (as far as my oversensitivity goes) are gone.  I then subscribed to planet affirmation and good news stories. 
     I do believe we hide our Godlights under the delusion of matter.  Our corporeal form comes, we think, with a license to behave like barbarians.  Because we can affect matter, I suppose.  It's more accessible than our Godlight or at least more easily perceived.   We shove matter and it moves.  Suddenly we have the illusion of power.  The power of life and death, the power to cause pain, the power to accrue 'stuff'.  But it's an illusion.  But such an illusion!   Yet the illusion is maintained with lies.  I know the cruelty in the world is also an illusion - but it's one I can do without.  Call me a coward.  It's true.  I am a coward.  This small corner of the world I can protect - to a point.  So I do.  I love what is mine to love and  for the rest of it, drape the world in imaginary skeins of kindness.