In The Garden The Door Is Always

Wrinkles Here And There Seem Unimportant Compared To The Gestalt Of The Whole Person I Have Become In This Past Year.

I Feel Like An Inadequate Machine, A Machine That Breaks Down At Crucial Moments, Grinds To A Dreadful Hault, 'won't Go,' Or, Even Worse, Explodes In Some Innocent Person's Face.

It Takes A Long Time For Words To Become Thought.

There Is No Doubt That Solitude Is A Challenge And To Maintain Balance Within It A Precarious Business. But I Must Not Forget That, For Me, Being With People Or Even With One Beloved Person For Any Length Of Time Without Solitude Is Even Worse. I Lose My Center. I Feel Dispersed, Scattered, In Pieces. I Must Have Time Alone In Which To Mull Over My Encounter, And To Extract Its Juice, Its Essence, To Understand What Has Really Happened To Me As A Consequence Of It.

Solitude Is My Element, And The Reason Is That Extreme Awareness Of Other People... Precludes Awareness Of One's Self So That After A While The Self No Longer Knows That It Exists.