"If you find a heart
love is coming to you."
These words of inspiration and hope are all I remember of a friendly woman I met with only a few times, years ago.
My current job was as a tutor to an Indian girl at the high school. We got along well and I
enjoyed her as a quick and bright learner. Unaware that an issue in my life was gathering a darker kind of momentum, the day my student asked why had I been mean to her, I hadn't understood. By the following day, though, I found myself unable to leave my bed for work, and on the recommendation of my psychologist, I checked into the psychiatric wing of the city hospital.
In due time I was released with a recommendation to see a woman who thought she could help me. On our call, we had both caught the other's attention when she had asked, "Do you know you are obsessing?" and I had promptly answered, "Yes!"
I remember initially thinking that our first in-person appointment was ridiculous. I sat on a metal folding chair, waiting. She sat down on her metal folding chair, facing me with our knees touching. Then she began pounding on my thighs. Over and over! I watched, wondering, "What does this have to do with me?" In a loud voice, she then said, "You are out of your body! You are out of your body! You are . . .!" Seeing that I wasn't questioning her—although I didn't understand much—she appeared to gather her thoughts before she said anything else. It would be good for me, she said, to attend a meeting that was in the same building, but upstairs, and on the coming Tuesday night.
In the days following that time period, I had met a woman who had a message for me: "If you find a heart, love is coming to you." Miraculously, a heart did appear. I am without a sure memory of its form, yet I believe it was a stone, as I remember holding it. I do remember my immediate little smile, with the thought, "Love is coming." It would be at those weekly night meetings that it did arrive and eventually the man that I met there became my second husband.
Stephen passed away many years ago. The love that I share with the man in my life now requires that we live on two different continents for each of us to fulfill our life's purpose and offer our service to others. We've found new ways of maintaining closeness. On a recent walk, I chanced to look down and saw a perfectly shaped heart in the sidewalk cement. Startled—and immediately pleased—I stopped and just kept staring. Then a little smile grew until I felt my cheeks puffing out into a wide one—once again, amazed.
My realization is, "It may be a small happening in life from which deeply meaningful love is felt."
Postscript: With the blog completed, I chanced upon a single line in A Flower for God * that brought a wide smile again—confirmation!
"At Meherabad, I found heart-shaped stones"
* Prema Jasmine Camp, A Flower for God: A Memoir (Seattle, WA: Wilson Duke Press 2021), 259.