Adam Helps, and Heals

It has been 4 months since Adam won $20,000 in the writing contest. He immediately gave it away. He’s delighted by the idea of funding dreams, and has started “Community Camaraderie Cures” (CCC) to funnel money through. It was his dad’s idea to make it a non-profit, and the family attorney set it up.

Adam went through his old yearbooks and found old friends who had property they weren’t doing anything with. Once he shared the dream with them, those friends called other friends. A property attorney from the old crew drew up 100 year land leases and other generously termed contracts. Camilo is here doing natural building. Crews have already been dispatched to build healing villages across the country. It’s been an incredible few months.

Adam hasn’t touched alcohol since he poured his last drink down the drain 136 days ago. Part of the reason he’d been depressed was he’d been feeling underutilized. Now full of purpose, he feels no urge to drink. It hasn't been hard, and he isn't really counting the days. He started taking the lichen-based vitamin D his Uncle Tom gave him, too. That really helped.

Adam pulls his old blue diesel Mercedes into the gravel parking lot and stops in front of the sunflowers that greet the visitors. He gets out and slowly walks the meandering stone path toward the sanctuary to get a cup of chai. He sees Bea off in the distance working in the garden.

Bea and her herbal medicine friend Nicholas have been living on the same land here for the past three months now, supervising the building of this healing center Nicholas now runs. With the diet and other protocols he’s created for her, she has been thriving. She looks and feels younger. Not that he has felt her…

Adam doesn't normally go for older women, and Bea is just old enough that she could be his mother, but she isn't looking or acting like it these days. He's definitely attracted. He feels a little guilty for not feeling that way about her when she was in pain, though, but he can't help being attracted to her vitality now. They've been spending a lot of time together. Bea is the visionary of the project, and Adam helps it get resourced. Bea has a Master’s degree in Social Work, with a concentration in Non-profit and Public Management, so she's helping run everything, too.

Adam steps inside the cob sanctuary and ladles himself a glass mug of chai from a setup in the entrance way, then goes back out to sit in the garden. He has a meeting with Bea in a bit, but will wait for her to come to him.

He's been thinking it might be time to confess his feelings for her, too, but he doesn't want to make it more awkward than it has been not saying anything. He'd call a friend for advice on this, but Bea is the person he'd call.

Adam chooses a garden bench surrounded by blooming lavender plants, filled with bees. He watches them flit from bud to bud. One flies up to him and lands on his mug.

“Hi, Bee,” Adam says quietly to it while it cleans its legs. “Can I ask you some advice about that Bea, down there?” The bee looks at Adam, wiggles its butt, and flies away. “I guess not,” Adam says aloud.

“I guess not, what?” Bea asks Adam, wiping her hands on a towel hanging out of the back pocket of her overalls. Her hair is in a messy braid almost to the middle of her back. Her smile is friendly and warm, and Adam stands to greet her.

“Oh, nothing,” Adam says, “I was just talking with a bee that landed on my mug.”

“Ah, ok. Would you like to share a hug?” Bea asks Adam, smiling. “I am a mess, but not too dirty, I think.”

Adam moves in to hug her, forgetting, again, just how short she is. At 6’2”, he is nearly a foot taller, but their bodies nestle together nicely as they hug. The familiar “world dropping away” feeling envelops him, and they are floating through a non-dual reality, nothing but energy. It’s intoxicating.

He is suddenly back in his body, though, aware that he’s aroused. He pulls away, breaking the hug. He’s going to have to say something, but he doesn’t know how, or what. It’s the first time he’s wanted a drink in months. Secrets aren’t good for him, he realizes.

“Bea, there’s something we need to talk about before the meeting. Can we sit?”

“Sure, let me get myself a cup of tea, and clean up, and I’ll be back in a few,” Bea says, intrigued.

Adam looks over at the bees for guidance, and finds none. Then he remembers a quote Bea has hanging on her wall, about truth having legs — and thinks maybe the bee did have some guidance for him.

Bea returns a short while later holding a rustic ceramic mug she made herself. He notices her hair has been brushed and face cleaned. She is holding a little black notebook tucked under her arm, and a tray of cookies balanced on her palm, showing off her old waitressing skills. Adam is glad to see her shoulder is better, and her ankle too. He pulls the table next to him closer to her so she can set the stuff down.

“The $20,000 you donated to this kitchen project made these superfood cookies possible,” Bea says to Adam, holding the plate out to him. “Nickolas wants to know what you think of this batch. He’ll be out in a bit,” Bea says.

Adam laughs nervously and takes a cookie. Bea sits on the adjacent garden bench, balancing the notebook and pen on her thigh. She looks at him expectantly.

Adam looks at her, sighs, and puts the cookie down. He can’t eat right now. He reaches over to take Bea’s hand, and knocks the notebook and pen to the ground. They both bend down to get it, and bump heads. Not too hard, fortunately, but it was sobering.

Adam stands, putting the pen and notebook on the table. He paces circles between the chairs. His sneakers make fractal patterns in the dirt. He looks at his shoes, while Bea squints to focus on his face, looking for understanding in what she is witnessing. Adam lets her look through him the way she does. He's nervous, but he doesn’t try to hide it. She is empathic. Pretending there’s nothing wrong when there is implies to her that what she is feeling is coming from inside of her, when it isn’t. At this moment, she knows she is fine, and he isn’t, but will be, and isn’t ready to talk about it yet. And he has learned that even if he doesn’t have words, and doesn’t want to talk about it, it's ok to be seen by her. It’s like being in one of her psychedelic hugs, but without the security of the hug itself. He’s just energy hanging out in space, nothing grounding him, naked energy — letting himself be seen by her. It takes some getting used to, but she is kind and gentle, and honors boundaries, and never uses any of it against him. Adam calls this unconditional love. Bea calls it true intimacy. And he’s never had it with anyone before like this.

Bea stands and stretches, turning to smell the lavender and watch the bees, feeling the anxiety radiating from Adam. She smiles at the bees and finds all the places in her that feel anxious, seeing what is mirrored — and witnesses it. She lets it cultivate compassion, takes a few deep breaths of lavender, and sits back down. Adam paces another circle, then sits on the dirt at her feet.

He looks at her, letting everything he wanted to say and everything that was keeping him from saying it drop away. “I feel like I’m tripping when I’m around you, Bea. It’s intoxicating,” Adam says.

Bea sits on the ground across from him, a little off center, not quite squaring shoulders. She waits for him to continue.

“I see now that I was projecting, or something, or looking in a mirror, or whatever you’d say about it, but I was going to tell you I’d fallen in love with you. And I am, I do, love you — but I think I was trying to make it something romantic, when it was just intimate. I say “just” but it’s the deepest kind of intimacy I’ve ever known. I didn’t say anything as it was unfolding, because I didn’t know what to say, but I did my best not to block it from you. I didn’t want to make things awkward,” Adam says quickly. Bea doesn’t try to interrupt. “Did I make it awkward?” Adam asks.

“No, you didn’t make it awkward, Adam. You’re fine. I appreciate you telling me, and trusting me, and not blocking it from me,” Bea says. “This, here does not feel like a romantic connection to me, no, but I think you are attractive and lovely and I'm flattered! Truth be told, I haven’t been with anyone since the Philosophy Professor. It’s pretty rare for me to have a connection like I had with him, and you'd know if I felt that with you. I’m happy enough self-partnering until I feel it again — you are a dear friend to me, though, and I enjoy our hugs!”

They sit in silence for a while, taking it all in. She is still integrating that whole experience with the Philosophy Professor. She knows she isn’t ready for another sexual relationship until it feels as natural as being with him did, even when she was still dealing with all of that body pain. He’s the first person her body wanted to say yes to in such a long time, and she felt so...matched. But she went into the dynamic thinking she was “too much,” still having trauma responses to compensate for it, not being as fully authentic as she thought she was. She thought she was having authentic communication when she wasn’t, and projected stuff. It was a mess. Self-delusion is hard to see, and she’s still working through some of it. All of this stuff is easier to see when your nose isn’t in the way, she thinks.

Pulling them out of their stillness, Nickolas approaches with 4 cups of soup. Camilo walks up a minute later from the garden, wiping his hands on a towel tucked in his back pocket. Bea and Adam dust themselves off and help rearrange the garden furniture into a circle.

“Time for the planning meeting?” Nicholas asks. “I made soup.”

“Am I late?” Camilo asks.

“Everything is in perfect flow,” Bea says. “Perfect timing.”

Everyone takes a cup of soup. Bea dusts off the little black notebook and pen, and puts them back on her knee. She looks over at Adam to see how this has all impacted him, and finds him smiling at the group.

“I’m so grateful for all of you,” Adam says. “A few months ago I couldn’t get out of bed, and drank about it, a lot. Today drinking just isn’t on my mind very much. Thank you for helping me find a reason to get out of bed. Thank you for all of this.”

“Thank YOU,” Camilo says. “Without you none of this would have happened, Adam. Each of us was an ingredient in the soup that is this place. Individually we couldn’t do much. Together, this is very nourishing.”

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