The Details of Nothingness

I like the title of this essay, as it says so much in so little space. Nothingness takes up a great deal of my time. And the details….You and I both know what they are. First off, there is the mirror, a thing made for taking care of details. It keeps showing me what needs to be done before I leave the house. That involves face stuff and hair stuff. Whew. Gotta have a cup of coffee to contemplate the details of this rapidly disappearing nothingness.

It’s winter, so I have to venture into the realm of what to put on. Ah, yes, the fleece top for sure. The old black pants and my newish sneakers. Now it is time to sit in silence and enjoy the real nothingness.

So I sat in a shaft of winter sunlight all dressed up with nowhere to go and lots of details all around me. I closed my eyes to keep from seeing them, because some involved dust! Now I could venture into my quietude and whoops! A thought involving a detail just hit me. Something about running out of milk. Another pesky detail to bother me. Then the phone rang. It was a junk call, but I had to get up and push the right phone button to block it calling again.

Back in the nothingness, I realize now what the problem is. Are you ready for this one? Because it’s a doozy. Details are part of the nothingness and I can just ignore them. Tomorrow I will stay in my robe all day and not get up to dress or even answer the phone. Buddha would be proud of me. Buddha in a robe and slippers wallowing in the ignored details of nothingness. Oops! Someone is at the door. It’s a good thing it is not tomorrow because then I wouldn’t be dressed or make a decision to get up and answer it.

But it’s just someone wanting to cut a tree down for me. And I don’t want the tree cut down. I retreat to my corner of nothingness again and let the details wash over me. Someone told me that I can go online and hear people talk about nothingness all day long. I will have to do that one of these days. Surely they know more than I do about details and nothingness.

I want someone young and handsome and charismatic to enlighten me. That’s the nice thing about being online; you don’t have to get dressed or comb your hair to listen to enlightened people blather on. Oops! “Blather” is not a non- dual word. It is “an experience.”

Well, I gotta go and sit amongst the details. Imagining them pile up behind my closed eyelids. I can imagine being on the evening news, “Spiritual student sitting in her chair minding her own business is involved in a billion-detail accident involving getting dressed, answering the door and who knows what else. Details at eleven. Details, it’s always the details.

Vicki Woodyard