Dear Shangri-La,
I had a thing I was saving for you. A thing about the beauty and perfection of a stone. It meant that the stone was the symbol for all things made by processes of the world. By extrapolation, it meant we (you, me, the stone) were all beautiful and perfect, not because we thought we were, but because processes had made us so. Made it so.
All that is what I think it meant, anyway, because like I said, I lost it. I thought there was a slip of paper marking it. It's in Siddhartha, by Herman Hesse; so if you really want to, you can go searching for it. I decided that it's importance was better served through my telling than my searching.
But, I don't feel all that confident about that, and it might be just another miss. The book's world is very complete, very livable, while you are there, anyway. But once you leave it, you notice some fraying, or maybe I have frayed? It's a pretty parable, but don't you already have a drawer full? I do, and I am trying harder than ever to internalize the messages, the directions, the instructions, and the good advice of so many compelling and enchanting voices.
In any case, read this instead, if you are looking to read a thing: Thick, by Tressie McMillan Cottom, because it will rock your tiny boat in a fabulous sea.
