my cousin’s husband said
I wouldn’t want to be around the kind of people who play paintball
which silenced me as I suppose he meant to as I stared at him thinking that since I was telling him that I had taken my son to play paintball as a celebration of my son getting a 4.0 in sixth grade and we were framing it as a celebration rather than a reward so that low grades would not generate in turn a punishment and I was trying to tell my cousin’s husband about the third round of paintball and I was the only woman there and definitely the only mother there and by then the sharpshooters in camouflage had asked why I was there and I had explained upon which one said “you are a good mom” and so in the third round when my son said that he wanted to be on the opposite team as his mother the guys giggled and we were on opposite teams and I am good at hiding in the woods but was having a bit of trouble with trajectory so everyone on his team was shot but him and everyone on my team was shot but me and I was trying to shoot my son with a paintball in a desultory sort of way since he was peppering the tree I was crouched behind when he ran out of ammo and we walked back to the safe area me with the gun held over my head saying “moms rule” and the sharpshooters in camo said we are going to shoot you next time and they certainly did
and I didn’t say any of that to my cousin’s husband
because I am one of the kind of people who play paintball and so is my son and I realized abruptly when my cousin’s husband said that that I really want to love everyone and so I still send love to my cousin’s husband but honestly I have trouble being around people who divide the world into us and them and didn’t Jesus and buddha and Muhammed all say essentially that god is love and Rumi says that the universe is the Beloved and so everyone is Beloved and we are all part of the one and there is no division and if god is love then there can be no hell
and I don’t really visit that cousin any more
and I still wonder why people want us and them and why people talk about that kind of people and I try to work with every kind of people that comes into my clinic that’s why I became a doctor really because I wanted to understand people and understand love and forgive things that happened when I was very little and thought that really, the big people were insane and loving but not trustworthy and obviously this is a fail in the end because I truly don’t understand how anyone could ever make assumptions about anyone else and ever say that they wouldn’t want to be around
the kind of people