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Tiny Buddha

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Over the years, I have become a less patient housekeeper, easily annoyed by trinkets and knickknacks that add nothing to my life but more work: remove trinkets from shelf, dust shelf, wipe trinkets, notice chips in trinket bases and grime in trinket cracks, fetch toothpicks and toothbrushes, deep-clean trinkets, place trinkets back on shelf, arrange, rearrange, check watch and cluck tongue when I see I wasted more than an hour of my life removing dirt from inanimate objects.

When I became a more diligent housekeeper, when I began dusting on a weekly basis, our trinkets transformed from sentimental, significant mementos into useless, meaningless crap that got in my way when I tried to clean. In the past year, we have purged kitsch from our home, and I am proud to say that our shelves and tables are now trinket-free.

Well, almost.

What remains on our shelf-tops are sources of light (candles and lamps), pieces of earth (smooth gray cobbles from rocky beaches), and a small, jiggle-bellied laughing Buddha from our pre-children life. The little Buddha is fashioned from black resin; a chalky green, like oxidized copper, etches the lines of his happy grin, his belly button, and the laugh lines that crinkle the corners of his eyes. My little Buddha fits in the palm of my hand, and when I look at him, he giggles: of all the objects I pitched on my path to happy housekeeping, of all the things I was able to detach from, I could not part with him, The Buddha, whose philosophy advocates non-attachment as a path to contentment.

My little green Buddha sits among smooth stones on the low wood shelf near my writing desk. He reminds me of another life, when my husband and I were young and newly married, when we lived in College Park, Maryland as DINKs (double income, no kids). On weekends we explored the Maryland, Virginia, and Delaware that lay outside of the D.C. Metro area: Annapolis, Sugarloaf mountain, the western shore of the Chesapeake, the eastern shore of the Chesapeake. We sailed, we hiked, we ate seafood in Annapolis, drank beer in Baltimore. And one weekend – a rainy weekend in winter, maybe even Valentine’s Day – we booked a room at a bed and breakfast in Rehoboth Beach. We traveled to a summer beach in winter.

I love summer beaches in winter.

At Rehoboth, we huddled against each other in a raw drizzle as we walked the empty boardwalk. The ice cream kiosk was shuttered, low clouds grayed the sky, and most of the shop windows were dark, even at midday on a Saturday. We paused to look out over the mist-shrouded beach. Wintry Atlantic waves crashed on tan sand, and wisps of my straight hair curled against my temples in the wet, salty air. I smiled against my husband’s shoulder. We had this all to ourselves.

When the cold worked its way through our coats and into our bones, we found a side street parallel to the main drag, where in addition to the neon Bud Light signs, we saw a cozy coffee shop, a sidewalk sandwich board with a chalk drawing of a steaming bowl of soup, and a few pottery and gift shops whose windows glowed like hearths. I saw crystals and tiny Buddha statues through one shiny pane, and the bell jangled on the door when we whooshed into the warmth from out in the cold. I fingered geodes and handmade straw brooms, flipped through incense boxes and nodded at the proprietress with her long silver hair and reading glasses that hung from her neck on a beaded chain. When I came to the glass shelf of Buddhas, the laughing ones with the fat bellies made me happy, as they always do. I picked up the one who looked like he was holding an umbrella, smiled at my husband and said, “I’m getting this one.” I held the little Buddha in my hand like a talisman.

Four years later, I think I suffered postpartum depression when we brought our infant home. Or perhaps it was post traumatic stress disorder. My life as a new mom, and our life as a new family, shocked me in its differentness from what had come before. Gone were our freedoms: freedom to travel unencumbered (diaper bags, toys, diapers, baby), freedom to sleep (10pm feeding, midnight feeding, 2am feeding), freedom to take romantic weekends away (single income, with kid). I felt trapped, without an outlet, stuck in this new life forever. I remember driving by a restaurant one night with our baby in the back seat. I looked into those warmly lit windows, saw couples smile at each other across a bottle of wine, heard cutlery clinking in my mind, and I burst into tears. “We’re never going to be able to do that again!” I wailed.

And the laughing Buddha laughed.

Over time, my depression transformed into delight as I let go my clinging to our old way of life. It helped that our infants did not remain infants forever, and that in a few short years, our babies have become responsible little people who sometimes stay home alone, who cook their own eggs and grilled cheese, and who surprise me into belly laughs that crinkle the laugh lines at the corners of my eyes. They hike and camp; they write comics and crack jokes; they snuggle and say, “I love you, Mom.”

My little Buddha has moved with us from state to state, home to home, shelf to shelf; he bore our children with us, watches as we raise them, hears us read books and tap keyboard keys and eat pizza while we watch TV. And no matter where he is, no matter what room or state or shelf, he sits relaxed and laughing. He reminds me of romantic rainy days both past and yet to come, and of the transformation of depression into delight, and of the deep, happy-soul laughter our children surprise out of me on a near daily basis.

Some things carry meaning that is worth dusting off every week. Some things are worth hanging on to.

This is my entry for the Weekly Writing Challenge: Object.

30 thoughts on “Tiny Buddha”

  3. Have been having the same thoughts about my many trinkets! Once again your words are good advice and a cosmic wink of approval. As I spring clean and purge, I shall attempt to keep only that which is dusting-worthy!

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  5. ~ Wow, it was such a happy piece. It made me smile esp. when you said this: They hike and camp; they write comics and crack jokes; they snuggle and say, “I love you, Mom.” I am not yet a mum and I kinda worry what kind of mum will I be in the future and that I might not do the things I used to do once I started my own family. Friends say I will just know when I get there and the mummy instinct will kick in. Hahaha, is that true? Anyway, thanks for sharing a piece of your experience. I was enlightened. 🙂 – Bliss, The Lurker’s List

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  9. There are those pieces that can conjure memory just from their presence and those tend to be the ones that follow us wherever we go. Unfortunately while we have some lovely pieces I am being stalked by and paint by the numbers Buddha that my mother-in-law gave us when we got married, despite my best efforts it has survived to haunt to this day.

    Thanks for sharing your story I really enjoyed it.

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    1. I read your piece on your husband’s Buddha and had to chuckle. I can’t help but smile when I see that Buddha grinning and holding up a rainbow. Not that I’d want it in my living room though.

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  10. Yes, we have to learn what is more important and meaningful in our life’s to keep it and to leave what is occupying with out any meaning or even annoying! love it great post.

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  11. This post brought a smile to my face. I am recently engaged to the woman of my dreams and we have already had so many moments like you finding your Buddha. Very great writing and smooth flow. Thank you for sharing this piece with me!

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  12. I love this! You’ve got me inspired to take up some of the writing challenges, even if I don’t post them on my blog. Your Buddha story is just wonderful, as are all of your writings. Such a gift!

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    1. Thank you Sara. You should absolutely take up the challenges when they inspire you! They always take me to unexpected places, which to me is one of the greatest pleasures of writing.

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    1. I have not read that, have you? I follow the @tinybuddha Twitter account that spawned it. I just read the blurb for the book – it looks like a great little book to keep around for those times when you have a small moment to fill, when you want to pick something up, read a couple hundred words, and then have something to contemplate for a little while.

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      1. My teenage daughter had it checked out from the library for a while. She read some of it to me. It seemed good. I think it’d make a great little gift.

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  15. I just fell in love with your tiny buddha! Lovely post 🙂 I could also really, really relate to the increasing impatience with knickknacks and dusting. I’ve been systematically de-cluttering our house too… only, all those available spaces have somehow been taken over by toys!

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