Attachment and Detachment

“One of the chief obstacles to this perfection of selfless charity, is the selfish anxiety to get the most out of everything, to be a brilliant success in our own eyes and in the eyes of other men. We can only get rid of this anxiety by being content to miss something in almost everything we do. We cannot master everything, taste everything, understand everything, drain every experience to its last dregs. But if we have the courage to let almost everything else go, we will probably be able to retain the one thing necessary for us -whatever it may be. If we are too eager to have everything, we will almost certainly miss even the one thing we need.

Happiness consists in finding out precisely what the ‘one thing necessary’ may be, in our lives, and in gladly relinquishing all the rest. For then, by a divine paradox, we find that everything else is given us together with the one thing we needed. “

From No Man is an Island by Thomas Merton
(Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Publishers, New York, 1955) Page 130

Went to weekly appointment today. 4 hours round trip plus 5 hours in the clinic, mostly waiting. So feeling sort of wasted.

Kulimela is in full swing. Mobs of youths. I mostly get second hand reports as my family comes and goes from my house to the temple. Hope someone writes it up and shares with the world. I won’t. It seems to be quite a dynamic event.

Marken has figured out young ladies are quite impressed by a large scar and a story behind it that you gave part of your liver to your dying dad. When I mentioned to him he could minimize the scarring by applying vitamin E, he said, “Why would I want to do that?” They had used internal stitching and butterfly bandages to hold his incision together.

I had my 43 staples pulled out today. My incision was higher so apparently needed more to hold it together. I had the idea that I would go somewhere kids with lots of body piercings hang out and show my staples off. So out of touch I wouldn’t even know where to go though. What to speak of if I had the energy to do that I might go spend some time at the Kulimela. It’s all academic now. Goodbye, staples. Doctor said wait with the vitamin E until the scabs fall off. Not that there is much scabbing, surprisingly.