I’m in a Michigan forest.  I’m thinking about all the burdens I carry around.  I decide to make a stone out of each one and carry their heaviness in a backpack.  I empty gear out of my pack.  I take a five-pound rock, and stuff it in.  This one’s my romance.  Another one: I have no kids.  More big stones.  They stand for my family, all the needy people in my life.  My job, that sucks the lifeblood out of me.  The burden of walking a spiritual path.  That trail’s uncompromising.  That I left a law career burning in cinders.  Health problems.  And did I forget to mention the ultimate futility of existence?  Oh cold, cruel world!  They wouldn’t be giving Jesus the headlines unless he carried around that cross. Maybe I’ll get some media coverage, too, if I stumble around with mine.

It occurs to me that these burdens I obsess over getting rid of are my life. My family. My friends. My clients. My job. I slip on the backpack and walk around.  Soon, I no longer feel the weight.

We search for others whose wounds correspond to our own, mirror images of seeming deformity.  Each of us connects to another and then another like the jigsaws in an immense, dancing puzzle.  And we connect at the places where we’re wounded, where our burdens join.  Each wounded other bears a gift for me, and I for them.  And the wounds heal when and where they meet. I put down my rucksack of stones.  I didn’t feel the same without it.

© 2022 by Michael C. Just

Mike’s novel, The Dirt: The Journey of a Mystic Cowboy, is available in softcover or eBook formats through Amazon.

You can purchase the book through this website. Or go straight to amazon at https://www.amazon.com/s?k=the+dirt+journey+of+a+mystic+cowboy&crid=1S40Q4BXSUWJ6&sprefix=the+dirt%3A+journey+of+a+m%2Caps%2C180&ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_23

Mike’s other titles, including The Crippy, The Mind Altar, and Canyon Calls, are available through this website or through Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B002

Four of his short stories have recently been published online:

Lies, Ltd. has been published by The Mystery Tribune @ Lies, Ltd.: Literary Short Fiction by Michael C. Just (mysterytribune.com)

The Obligate Carnivore has been published by the Scarlet Leaf Review @ Category: MICHAEL JUST – SCARLET LEAF REVIEW

I See You, Too has been published by the 96th of October @ I See You, Too – 96th of October

Offload, a short story about a man who can heal any disease, is now live and can be read at The Worlds Within at Offload – The Worlds Within