Dark Maria

Dark Maria 2

Maria had other plans.

Usually she'd be cleaning out her stables and tending to livestock. It was 7' clock in the morning and she liked punctuality. It's strange that you have to give up being forced to get up early to truly discover it's importance.

The wisdom classes were just spoiling everything for her and everyone else, and though she wouldn't be in a hurry to admit it, J was right. They wouldn't learn a thing by coming to the discussion group dressed in wine blouses and carrying important looking office pens.

Dr Sumoto wanted her to give the class a name, but she wasn't going to go that far.  The Dr. had good intentions and really thought he was going to help somehow, she had other reasons for allowing it to happen.

Meeting so many people so often made her . Since the sessions started officially, She made an effort to sometimes to find someone who  like her, was in the heat of the struggle, looking for real answers.
So far she found singers who wanted to sing to the holy spirit, poets who thought it was a missing phase in the spill out of their souls essence, women that wanted to cross their epiphany phase with spiritual guidance and crossfit bods who thought spirituality was the new church and wanted a taste of the enlightenment thing.

Dr Sumoto was a small man who stayed long hours at the center and earned so much money he spent on nothing at all. He owned very little and wrote monthly checks to his daughter who lived abroad and never visited home. The man was responsible for organising the sessions.
She suspected he was studying them too, as they listened to her, it he wouldn't disrespect her by sticking her up to do comedy and perhaps wanted to believe it would work.

Maria had a long and fulfilling past which she rarely ever told anyone about. Often a falling leaf or rolling waves reminded her of her days meditating in nature, pulled along by powerful forces unknown and unexpected, and dealing raw and dangerous with life. She walked away from all of it permanently, making sure to dust her feet on her way.
The sessions with the students were really all keeping her tired to it, and she already wrote to Dr Sumoto who, as usually, said he understood. The letters carried as much about why as tiles on hospital floors, but he'd just bow his head in the Japanese greeting of respect called *. The greeting was customary in Japanese culture as a mark of respect between friends and foe, but the doctor wasn't telegraphing anything behind the hooded, hands clapped pose.
She usually just waved him away, never bothering to bow in response, nor finding disrespect in her actions.

Despite her name, Maria never paid any attention to the Catholic church, not did she have any respect for "Maria", the symbol of honour in Catholicism. If she ever looked at it it would all be pretty poetry to her, and she would take it for what it's worth, and nothing more.
When she got into spirituality, she wasn't trying to be saved by another god, in comparison she'd seen and been part of fanciful shit, shit that made demons and blood magic and witchcraft rituals look like children's manuals. She want running away either.

Most people that pass through that door have something they want in mind. Usually a man has a near death experience and wants to be given the reins to his old life back, but, as usual, he's seen too much. Occasionally there'd be a Buddhist straggler come to appraise their knowledge of the way, a pastor on secret spy mission to convert all the sinners to Jesus or a super star historian trying to figure out the meaning to all of life's questions.
They all had one thing in common anyway. They came inside with big baggages that they securely chained to themselves, hugging and comforting them.
To even suggest the idea to them that the exact reason why they came was the thing that had to be destroyed was like telling a bulldog he can't eat steak.

What the hell do you mean?

Suggesting to a lot of Christians that Jesus was their captor not their saviour seemed almost aggressive, like you were asking for a fight, and often triggered a similar response in them. Their jaws lock up, their bodies stiffen, their minds close and they begin shooting defence triggers in the air.

She saw this kind of defense everywhere, and knew it's heart. It was the armour that they came to her classes with, like coming to a sunbathe clad in iron and chainmail.

She made an effort to finish breakfast, there was work to do outside. As she did she looked up and saw stars shooting in daylight. Such a magnificent display.
"Work to do", she muttered to herself, kicking the barn door with a little more energy than usual.