The kitchen door slams as our teenage son, Mateo, storms off in a huff. He's in a hurry to get to school, and is wordlessly reprimanding me, letting me know that I'm not moving fast enough, and thereby falling short as his taxi driver. It's not even 6:30am, but for some reason he's decided he needs to leave for swim team practice a few minutes early today. I ought to know better, but now his impatience is making me feel out of sorts, too.
ANOTHER TIME
Standing at the door, car keys in hand, I take a deep breath and find myself remembering back to the time sixteen years ago, when the birth of our son was the answer to a deeply-held prayer for Zet and me. At that point, she and I been together for twenty years, and had been trying to have a baby for part of that time. It's a long, winding story, and I'll spare you the details here, but suffice it to say that we were both astonished and overjoyed when the phone rang and a kindly stranger asked if we were still interested in adopting a baby.
Somehow Zet's mother's next door neighbor's sister knew a lawyer whose paralegal assistant knew a woman whose cousin was pregnant and seeking adoptive parents. In case you got lost in that last sentence, that's probably because it lists the seven degrees of separation between us and Mateo's birth mother.
ANOTHER PLACE
Three months after that life-changing phone call, we were truly blessed to be present in the delivery room to witness his birth. I'll never forget the sight of that full head of black hair and his right hand emerging simultaneously, those impossibly long, thin fingers outstretched and flexing, as if reaching out for something that was invisible to the rest of us, but that he was clearly longing to grasp. Now, sixteen years later, I find myself reflecting back on the sight of that outstretched hand, and how symbolic it is of the way that Mateo often seems to be reaching for something that neither he nor anyone else can quite see, much less understand or articulate.
Most of the time he is very gentle and sweet-natured, so it can be truly mystifying and heart-wrenching to watch him work himself up into an agitated state over some project or personal relationship, or see him march out the door in a hurry to do something or go somewhere.
ANOTHER STORY
Clearly, this is one of those times, so I slip into the driver's seat with a sigh, determined to remember that this moment, too, is a gift. During the ten-minute drive to school, feeling the weight of the silence hanging in the air between us in the car, my mind drifts back to an old Buddhist folktale about a young man named Basho who was hungry for knowledge and eager for enlightenment. Feeling constricted in his search for awareness by the constraints of daily life at home, he decided to leave his familiar surroundings and travel to a far-off land to study with a famous Zen teacher. After travelling for many days, he paused to rest in the shade beside a stream, where he encountered a kindly old man with whom he struck up a conversation. When the elder asked the youth where he was headed, Basho spoke of his search for a teacher to show him the path to enlightenment.
The stranger looked deeply into Basho's eyes and said, "Rather than seeking a mere teacher, you might be better off looking for the Buddha." "But where can I find him?" the young man asked. "When you return home," he was told, "you'll find a person wrapped in an old blanket, with unkempt hair and wearing shoes on the wrong feet. That person is the Buddha."
Basho immediately jumped up and headed back the way he came, travelling night and day with a hopeful heart. It was well past midnight when he finally arrived home, knocked at the familiar door and called out a greeting. Startled awake from a deep sleep, his mother hastily grabbed an old blanket and drew it over her bedclothes, and without stopping to brush her hair or notice that she had put her shoes on backwards, went to the door to greet her son - who took one look at her, and was instantly enlightened.
ANOTHER CHANCE
I wish I could report that I was instantly enlightened by remembering this story, or that I found some warm, wonderful way to thaw the chilly space between my son and me during our ride to school today, but that's not the case. Instead, I'll be satisfied by remembering once again why we chose to name him "Mateo" - which comes from the Hebrew name meaning "gift from God." Because he truly was, and is, precisely that. Just because the gift doesn't always feel good or seem logical, doesn't mean that I'm any less grateful. Or that the lessons he has to teach me are any less important. At least, that's my story, and I'm doing my best to remember it.
With gratitude and blessings,
Rudi
