Читать книгу Living A Loved Life - Dawna Markova PhD - Страница 11

What Was the Promise Life Made to the World the Moment You Were Born?

Grandma raises my open palm to her lips. I look at the little lines carved into the skin around them, wondering if they are there because she has spent so many moments of her life kissing things. She looks into my brown-green eyes with her brown-green eyes and whispers in a secret voice, “Did you know that there is a river of blood that runs right beneath your skin?”

My jaw drops open like a baby bird waiting for something delicious to fall in. I shake my head.

“Not only that,” she continues, “but there are special gifts and prayers for you from all those who came before that are being carried in that river.”

I know what prayers are because she told me she prayed for people whenever she made bread, but gifts floating in a bloody river? What does she mean?

“All of your grandparents and their grandparents and their grandparents before them dreamt that someday there would be one such as you: one who was free, well-fed, and smart because she could go to school and learn many wonderful things. They left their wisdom floating downstream in that river, the things Life had taught them. All of that is in your blood.”

My mind unfolds its wings and lifts off my bones as I imagine those old people wrapping prayers and presents in bright boxes that float now in the red bloody river under my skin.

She places tiny flower petal kisses on the tips of my fingers, and then whispers, “And here there is something else even more special. No one else who has ever lived has marks like these, and no one else ever will. They prove you are unique, one-of-a kind, a miracle!” She pauses long enough for me to absorb what she’s saying and then continues in a powdery voice, “Some people call them fingerprints, but truly they are promise prints. The moment you were born, Life made a Promise to the world. It left these marks at the very end of your fingers to help you remember to reach out and find what that promise is and make it real.”

The next question falls out of my mouth all by itself. “So what is my Promise, Grandma? Tell me, tell me.”

This time she kisses the tip of her own index finger, and then places it on the center of my forehead. “I can’t tell you that, my darling. No one can. It’s a great and wonderful mystery that you have to discover for yourself.”

“But how will I do that, Grandma, and how will I know if I find the real Promise? And does everybody have a Promise, and—”

Her finger floats to my lips as she responds, “Those are wonderful questions, Ketzaleh (little kitten). You’ll have to search for that Promise many, many years, asking big, wide questions. Life will reveal it to you by giving you clues and bringing many wise people into your world. Those people will tell stories that will help you feel more alive. Pay attention the way you do to riddles, because they can lead you forward.”

We’re standing in her kitchen next to the window where sunshine pours in on a table covered with shiny red oilcloth. Her gnarled fingers turn an oversized glass bowl upside down, and a mound of newly risen golden bread dough plops out. She slaps it down hard and says, “This is what the world does to you sometimes. It slaps you into shape, pushes you around, stretches you. This can make the talents you bring even stronger, Ketzaleh. The yeast in the dough is like the Promise that wants those talents to rise and reach out to others.” As her fingers knead the dough firmly, she insists, “You must not give up. Keep searching for that Promise and for people that will help it rise again. There are forces and choices that flatten life and those that grow and inspire it.”

I can’t wait another minute, so I ask, “Grandma, will the wise people tell me what my Promise is? Do I have to make bread every Friday like you do to find it?”

She wipes her hands on the apron and covers the bowl with a yellow checked dishtowel. As I push it back into the sunny spot, she says, “My Promise is like the bread, Ketzaleh. I sit with people helping them be born. I do what I can to help the Life Force, the yeast, rise and take form. Your Promise is more like the bowl. That’s all I can tell you now.”

“My Promise is like a bowl?”

“Yes, like a bowl that will shatter when challenged. You need to learn how to mend the Bowl of Life so it is stronger than before to realize the Promise inside you.”

The questions in my mind push out of my lips. “One more question, Grandma, just one. I’m sorry to keep asking, but I have to know—what happens after I find the Promise and keep it, then what?”

She turns to me, holding each of my cheeks in her warm palms and looking with infinite patience into the mirrors of my eyes. “You never have to apologize for your questions, dear one. Risk reaching for them, risk following them. As for what happens after you live out the Promise, well, by then, you’ll be an old wise woman. Your prayers, your dreams, your gifts will flow beyond you into the River of Life so it can touch whoever comes after you.”