Little Black Book

I felt the same way they did. Looking for the answers to the same problems, but I was not traveling to three countries in three months or hiking the Pacific Crest Trail to find answers. I had a family to care for and a job that made it possible. So what about the rest of us that feel lost or stuck without time off to adventure away?

Probably not the best train of thought on a morning dog walk. Wanting something new to think about I turned a different corner. I didn't know who lived there but the gingerbread house had some donation boxes out front with “free” written on them. Just a week ago I had put two boxes in the driveway of basement junk for neighbors, but no one wanted the old tools. I looked in the second box stacked on top of a broken dresser. Lucas pulled to the end of his leash to sniff a telephone pole while I saw old shoes and books in the box. I brushed the dust away to read the titles on the spines but they were blank. I pulled a black one out, next to the red. The elastic band that held it closed was broken, no big deal. The corners were rounded and it looked empty as I flipped through off-white lined pages. It stuck for a moment in the middle pages from the bookmark ribbon. It was old but not used. Lucas had enough of the telephone pole and pulled to get to the next tree on the street. I didn’t know what I would use it for but it was a great find.

Back home to fix the dishwasher and write lesson plans for the week. The day felt heavy and over as I hung up the dog leash, wiped off the black book with a dish towel and tossed it on the table. My mind raced with the usual--How am I going to get everything done? I wish there was time to do something else. I turned to go up the stairs and heard something drop on the floor. I looked back. I guess I tossed the book too hard to the edge of the table and it fell off. It was open on the floor to the bookmarked page with writing. Why didn’t I see that before? I wouldn’t have taken it if it was used. It said in the middle of the page--

“Love in your mind produces love in your life. This is the meaning of Heaven. Fear in your mind produces fear in your life. This is the meaning of hell” --Marianne Williamson.

It was beautifully handwritten and I had no idea where it came from but I let it sink in. Love, I didn’t feel in that moment. Days being hellish, I knew that, and fear was behind most of my thoughts. If I don’t get the lesson plans done I’m afraid they will know I’m not a good teacher. If I don’t fix the dishwasher I won’t have the money for a repairman. I’m not a good mom or a good wife. I will die and never accomplish anything meaningful to make me happy. All the fear in my mind was hell and no one else had the same fears, or they hid it better.

I took a deep breath and tried to find love around me. Love was the birds outside at the bird feeder. Love was tired Lucas curled up in his bed sleeping. Love was the morning sun on the wood floor. My shoulders relaxed and I let go of my to-do list and my fears with it. I was not in hell anymore. I was still holding the book and without thinking why turned the page. More writing in the middle of the next page said--

“Doing one thing at a time means to be total in what you do, to give it your complete attention. This is surrendered action--empowered action.”--Eckhart Tolle

No idea where this is coming from but I can go with this too. Do one thing at a time. Watch the videos about dishwasher repair. Try each option, run out of options and order a new drain pump. Write 5th grade lesson plans. Take a break. My work load did not change but something was better. I went downstairs wondering what the book would say. Before thinking could get in the way I opened the book to a random page. It said--

“And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places.”--Roald Dahl

The words and the magic I could not explain stayed with me as I went back upstairs to more lesson plans and then take laundry to the basement. Did the black book have anything else? I opened it again trying to not think or care. The page was blank. I flipped the pages and they were all blank. I opened the cover and saw the initials M.M. in the middle. Whatever magic had happened was gone and M.M. did not mean anything to me.

The book left me feeling odd. Did I really see those words? I put it back in the donation box in front of the gingerbread house on my evening dog walk.

Everyone would be home soon and it would be hell again but everything had changed. Could it stay changed? Yesterday’s junk mail was on the table. A letter from a probate genealogist had to be a scam but I saw the name Mary Major. A name I knew but not heard in decades. My father had a daughter before he met my mother. She was 19 years older than me but we never met. My dad had left my mom after I was born. She passed away with no will and I was her next of kin. I just inherited $20,000 from M.M.