This article is about the humble bathtub drain.
Mine is broken.
There's a little chain that connects the knob at the front of the bathtub and the drainplug that goes in the drain. My drainplug (or whatever it's called) no longer works by turning the knob. If you want to take a bath, you have to put the drainplug in manually and then take it out manually.
And I've needed to take a lot of baths lately, since I hurt my left leg. I'm using a cane these days for awhile.
Anyway, I'm sitting in the bathtub. And I'm done; the drainplug needs to come out so the water can drain.
The only thing is, when the drainplug goes down far enough to seal the drain, it's flush with the surface of the tub, so it's not that easy to get it out again.
And I didn't bring a screwdriver or whatever with me to help, so I have to get the drainplug out with my fingernails. And it's not going well.
I've got two fingernails on either side of the drainplug (no, this is not a comedy piece), and I'm trying to pull it up. And it's not coming. I try different angles, different fingernails. It's not coming up.
Finally, using two fingernails, I just exert this steady upward pressure on the drainplug.
And then I noticed something very interesting.
The drainplug moves very, very slightly, almost unnoticeably, just enough so that a tiny sleuce of water going down can be heard.
But that tiny bit makes all the difference, because then a slight easing of the downward pressure is created, causing a little more water to go down. That in turn eases the downward pressure on the drainplug even, even more water goes down, and suddenly, boom!—the drainplug comes out.
But I remembered that moment when I was exerting steady pressure and nothing seemed to be happening, nothing at all. But that led to this tiny event, almost imperceptible, and then that tiny event led to a slightly larger event, and so on to the end-result.
I think our love, our compassion, our effect on the world, or whatever, may work this way.
Sometimes in life we're exerting this steady pressure in a certain direction, let's say to become more loving, or to try to make a difference, or to become more conscious, etc.
And we can't notice any difference. We have setbacks, this and that; nothing seems to be happening.
But that may be an illusion. That steady leaning we're doing to be loving, conscious, or whatever can be creating almost imperceptible movements, which can perhaps lead to more substantial movements down the line.
Because we don't know. The tiniest movement can affect the larger picture in ways that we may not be able to see or even comprehend.
And yet it was your steady leaning, your steady intention, that steady cultivation of your garden of love, that made all the difference, sweetheart.
—jim sloman, 4/27/01
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