1982

In hindsight, 1982 was the most significant year of my life. During that year, really awful things took place and really wonderful things. The awful turned into the wonderful and eventually, the wonderful turned into the awful. It was how I started looking at life that way.

To start the year I rekindled a relationship with someone who had physically abused me every six months. A year earlier, I had left him but he continued to pursue me until I relented and went back. He gave me Hep B. Ten days in a hospital. Ten weeks on disability. An argument that turned physical.

A visit to the Emergency Room, informing the EMS crew “I’ve got Hepatitis!” Once released I moved out. That really was the end. I moved back to my parental home. A different form of hell but a refuge nonetheless. I vowed to get back to my loose-living life. Another STD.  Really awful.

I remembered meeting someone in a bar on the East Side of Manhattan. When I told him I lived in NJ he said, “You remind me of someone I know from NJ. Maybe you know him.” He told me his name. I did know him. And 4 years later, he died of AIDs. The STD and the memory told me I had to change.

I met John at the Pride Parade 6/27/82. Within weeks I was in love. He had a lover. I knew better. And yet. Really wonderful.

Years earlier, I had gone to a psychic who told me, at the end of the session, “you know, you’re psychic.” I understood. She asked if I wanted to join a group to increase my psychic ability. I declined. A year later another psychic made the same statement and the same offer. I declined.

I spoke to a friend about needing to make a change and he suggested I go see his astrologer. He read me like a book and made the same statement and offer. I accepted. It was time and I was ready. He told me to be sure to wear a T-shirt (I was walking NY streets shirtless in those days).

On a Tuesday evening, I went to a hotel in NYC and met Ellen in a meeting room. Her students were all around us but for a moment, it was only she and I. “You are very protected.” Understatement. “You are very strong.” Same. Everyone went into another room and sat in rows of chairs.

Ellen stood in the front of the room and spoke. I couldn’t quite follow what she was saying. I went back every week and got a headache each time. During the third week she spoke about “Karmic debts and Karmic credits.” I was an accountant so this I understood. No more headaches.

Soon I was scheduled to meet with her privately. She gave me a small booklet of things she’d written, Divine Principles at Work. I read it several times. I still review it from time to time. It contains some of the simplest, clearest and yet complicated statements.

“Do not like. Do not dislike.” It’s still my goal in life. I get closer but not quite close enough.

In December, I moved into a building in NJ where several of her students lived. We gathered on Saturday nights and talked about our weeks and on Sunday evenings for another lesson from Ellen. And I met with her privately once each month.

I got a kitten. She lived in the basement. I went to get her but she wouldn’t let me pick her up. “Well, you’ll have to follow me, then.” Between the basement and my apartment (2nd floor walk up) I lost her. I searched for her but did not find her.

I went into my apartment and a little bit later heard a LOUD meow. I opened my apartment door and there she was at the top of the stairs. “Well come on in.” And she did. She inspected the apartment, including the closet, jumped onto the sofa and went to sleep. I went to get cat supplies.

She slept on my face and that’s when I remembered I was allergic to cats. So I did not let her sleep with me. The second morning, when I opened the bedroom door, she came toward me and I said “Yazzoo” which became her name. A friend told me that was very close to a Middle Eastern word for hello.

I started college at night, at first 3 courses over a summer semester and then two courses in the fall and spring. I got a promotion at work. And eventually another.

I talked with John several times per week, at his job. He said he didn’t have a phone at home. We didn’t see each other. One reason (of his) or another or another or another. Finally, at a private meeting Ellen asked, “How’s John?” As if she didn’t know how or that I was hoping to avoid the subject.

If I really try, I can hear her. She wasn’t yelling, exactly, but what she was saying was penetrating and it was like a parent berating me for a bad grade. The next day I officially ended the relationship that he had ended without telling me. Really awful.

I could not possibly overexaggerate how I grieved for that relationship. I started crying when the alarm went off. When I sat up in bed. When I stood up. While I peed. While I fed the cat. In the shower. Getting dressed. Just before leaving the apartment. Loud sobbing. Really really awful.

One year. And then I stuffed the pain (not recommended) and moved on.

So the awful events of early 1982 led to love and a Teacher and heartache and a cat and a complete change in who I was. But in another sense, it just helped me be who I’d always been. And when I think of the awful not awful year, I think

“Do not like. Do not dislike.”

And I try.