Buddha Heaven
Last night I got the boys into bed, kissed them good night and told them Ernie would be up soon to kiss them as well. I curled up in bed to read….I’m recovering from the flu but still not quite there. It was quiet for a long time…Ernie didn’t come up and I began to hope that Owen had just fallen asleep as he’s not feeling perfect yet either. Next thing you know though…..pad, pad, pad across our creaky wooden floors and there stood a tired Owen. He told me he couldn’t sleep and that Dad hadn’t come up and he really wanted to sleep with us, etc., etc. I weighed how much work it would be to get him back into bed and asleep versus how irritating it would be to have him sleep with us. Laziness won out and I told him to crawl into bed with me. He did, after a quick redistribution of plushes to Leo (I let him sleep with us sometimes but I draw the line at a million plushes) and he lay there quietly. I was facing away from him, toward the bedside light when I heard him quietly say, “I wish those Buddhas hadn’t come.” Owen has always referred to Rinpoche and the Buddhist monks that visited Judi as ‘the Buddhas.” I peered over my shoulder at him and said, “What?” He looked up me sadly and said, “I wish those Buddhas hadn’t come and helped Aunt Judi move on……move on away from us.” Oh damn…..I turned off my Kindle and my light and turned around and held him in my arms. I struggled to come up with something. “They didn’t move her away from us honey. Remember how Judi told you she would be in your heart forever----always with you?” He nodded. “Well, they just helped her to move on to where she should be----kind of like Buddhist heaven.” Forgive me all Buddhists who read this but you do the best you can do….especially with a small sad child. “Judi is always here with us honey....she's always right here in our hearts.”
He nodded thoughtfully and said, “I guess when you get to heaven you see the golden gates and there are probably a couple of guards.” Then he must have rethought the idea of armed security outside heaven so he said, “Well, maybe they’re just guys. Yeah, and when you get inside there’s probably an angel sitting there…..with a snack. You know, something to eat and maybe a soda too. “yeah,” he nodded, “a soda. And then they tell you where to go in heaven.” I guess at this point he’s figuring a hall to Buddhist heaven, a hall to Christian heaven, etc. Then he added, “and probably on Fridays they have a big party and the legends come.” I just nodded because….well, no words were forthcoming to say the least. “And Grandpa and Grandma would get to see Judi. They’d be so happy. And Harlan too---he could come from Kitty Heaven.” I said that sounded pretty wonderful and he relaxed and drifted off to sleep.
Man I love that boy.