Page 15 - Contrast1993Fall

ke~t i~ touch, I here and she in DC. We talked on the phone
perIodIcally. I could tell that her death was coming, because
her voice was getting weaker, and she would become ex-
hausted. As time passed, our conversation would get shorter
and shorter; she was only able to talk for brief periods of time.

On the day that my life was changed, Brenda told me I was too
proud and needed to listen to what she had to say before it was
t?O late. Instead of putting up the usual defense, I listened. I
lIstened for the first time in my life. I think it was the tone of her
voice. I could hear the urgency of the message she saved for me.
Yes, I was too proud, and I knew I needed to change, for
something had to give. Why not pride? That's when I listened
and grasped the truth of the spider, the web, and me.

I could barely hear Brenda as she said in a voice that had the
tone of an eighty year old woman, "DeDe, you know a spider
sptns a web and people come and tear it down; yet, the next day
It'S up again. Each time we tear the web down, it's right back
up, because we have to kill the spider to get rid of the web." I
thought and wondered what this girl, no this woman of thirty-
three, who once couldn't grasp anything now dished out
wisdom like pitching horse shoes, was trying to tell me. Brenda
went on talking through coughing and hacking, trying to
express the central idea. The-web is the people, places, and
things that keep us tied to the addictive life-style that controls
the world of a self-destructive personality. However, one can
move to a new place, meet new people, and do different things,
but if she doesn't kill the spider with herself, the old ties of
people, places, and things will entangle her again and again.
I became quiet. Inside the silence of that moment, under-
standing and acceptance were flowing into me. The walls were
being taken off the maze that trapped me, and I was emerging.
I decided to talk to her later, not thinking or even aware that her
tomorrows were limited to today. She's dead now, and thanks
to her so is the spider in me. Thank-you, Brenda Holmes ...
If I had not listened with ears of humility, I would never have
known to kill the spider to get rid of the ties that bind.

THE BEGINNING

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