How to Get into Heaven Easily?

L-O-V-E. It seems to me loving someone, and being loved, should be enough. An all-consuming puppy dog love like I had at age 15 with my fiery Panamanian auburn-haired buxom beauty on a California beach? No, that lasted only a few summer months. In love with Mary? My stocking-donning good Catholic girl when we went necking in the Hopewell woods in her late '60s burgundy Corvair? No, I felt obligated to return her love and deep affections because of her willingness to do almost anything for me at age 19, when I had no clue what I wanted or where I was headed. Especially not capable of sacrificing my ego and wants to some or all of hers. No, that wasn't love, just its appearance. And the many flirtations with girls in between were mutually meaningless, except with a blonde knock-out named Kathy.

I was 17, she 21, married to an Army private overseas in Vietnam, which did not phase me in the least. Even their two-year-old son was not a deterrent from my advances one day at our apartment complex pool where she was sunning herself and he at home with Grandmom, where they both lived, just a few buildings away from my Dad's and mine abode. Oh how I wish sometimes I could remember my opening pick-up line with her! But, as i found out later when she broke my heart, it didn't matter. She needed to have a male figure with or around her at all times, and I happened to be young, handsome, tan, and glib - open and sincere in my wanting to know more about her - telling secrets which she never confided of hers. And when she threw herself at me and pushed for intercourse on my Dad's living room carpet it literally scared the Bejesus out of me and I pushed her off. Never to see her again, except once. A week later I saw her in a cherry midnight blue '55 Chevy with a man driving, her appearing to be in a black dress with her hair up, obviously out on a date to a fancy Garden Grove restaurant, or perhaps to L.A.

That was a crush on my part and I kicked myself for months for not acceding to her desires that nite, but inwardly I knew there was no permanence to be had - not for me to push aside the obvious child and husband. Southern California in those days, with thousands of beautiful swim-suited babes to choose from, was a dream for a horny youth - if that was your "thing." But my escapade with Kathy taught me that it simply wasn't me, no matter how lustily I acted.

Then Dad put me on a greyhound bus at my request 'cause I wanted to come back home to Jersey to my real family. So I started Ewing High School in April 1967. And it was there, in Mr. Mulligan's Art class that I met a petite, energetic redhead named Janet, with freckles and button nose, and twinkling piercing brown eyes. In my mind and memory we first connected when she approached me in class, as I struggled while molding my clay wrestlers and said something like, "Hey, that's cool. Are you a wrestler too?" And that was it. The beginning of our dating, subsequent Baha'i marriage in June 1971, first child Jesse Kalim born in August 1977, and evanescent daughter Kate following in June 1981. Years of parenting following her educational lead as a professional teacher, until their high school then college graduations; a little over ten more years for each of us working, and here we are retired, lounging in front of our virtual onscreen fireplace watching Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune together guessing the answers. 

And "Love will keep us together" as Captain and Tennille sang in 1975, and the even more meaningful line "Look in my heart and let love keep us together," worked for us. It certainly doesn't hurt one's chances at true love when you have a good heart. 

To philosophize the myriad levels of human love many people may start with a physical or mental attraction, but spirit - with the soul as its source - soon overtakes flesh and seems to outweigh the mere mortal considerations. And isn't spirit composed of atoms, just like the body? The cells and neurons of the brain hardwired to "love" our mate's physical, mental and spiritual aspirations and exchanges? And to codify those onto our memory faculty? How bright and cheerful our memories can be of a less-than-perfect spouse, especially after marrying and raising kids, working, retiring and finally dying - one of us first? 

I feel love may be a fluke, but can definitely be attained, as well as the path to true bliss in the next world - together.

Best, Rod
Copyright 2014 

Surviving Bipolar Disorder in the modern age . . . a journey of Hope for the afflicted.
My poetic memoir Episodes available at www.amazon.com/episodes-rodney-richards/dp/0615914705/   

 

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