"Like the study of science and art, accounts of historical events can be intrinsically fascinating. But they have a wider significance. I believe that people are better able to chart their life course and make life decisions when they know how others have dealt with pressures and dilemmas---historically, contemporaneously, and in works of art. And only equipped with such understanding can we participate knowledgeably in contemporary discussions (and decisions) about the culpability of various individuals and countries in the Second World War. Only with such understanding can we ponder the responsibilty of human beings everywhere to counter current efforts at genocide in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia to bring the perpetrators to justice." "...we humans are the kinds of animals who learn chiefly by observing others---what they value, what they spurn, how they conduct themselves from day to day, and especially, what they do when they believe that no one is looking." ----Howard Gardner, from The Disciplined Mind, published in 1999
As promised, here is a picture of my Buddha made from Potato Head parts. He is a 4-armed Chenrezig . I can't tell you how much I love having him on my kitchen windowsill along with the prisms that throw rainbows about the room.
Here is the little Jizo that I made for my personal Segaki this week. Jizo is often depicted as child-like, so I chose to use a miniature potato head. His gem is a crystal drop coated in dichroic glass. I've worn this pendant for 3-odd years now. I chose to use a set of measuring spoons to approximate Jizo's special ringed and clanking staff. It seemed appropriate. I like this little Jizo very much.
And Snowy made a pizza!
Hoping all good things to you, dear reader. It was good to visit with you all. I'll be a little bit busier in the next few weeks than usual. Remember that fortune from the fortune cookie? An opportunity is knocking. I'll be pursuing it. I don't really want to tell you about it until it becomes definite, dear reader. What I can tell you is that there is writing entailed in the pursuit. I do so thank you for helping me to practice! I'll talk with you soon. Pravs, I'm digging up a jam recipe just for you...
BG had a very good birthday. He did mention, however, that he would welcome a bathtub like the one that Francis had:
Me? This is what I wish for (though in my version the bacon is veggie, the cereal is whole grain and sugar-free, and the Potato Head is fashioned into a Buddha!)
But this music does play into my head often. It seems to fit. I hope these clips make you as happy as I am: welcome to my world, dear reader!
Dear reader, I've been distracted by assignments for grad school, and I've missed posting even once a week this past week. More importantly, I've missed visiting all of you. I'll be visiting soon, I promise!
Today is BG's birthday. It's exciting to see him mature and grow.
Next week is Halloween and trick-or-treat, as well as Segaki.
I was very much looking forward to the Segaki liturgy at the sangha that I sometimes attend. I don't get to the sangha often, as it is far away. For many reasons, this year, it seemed especially important to send things up in smoke before the Jizo in the little sangha garden.
This year, the sangha's liturgy is on the same night and the same hours as our township's Trick-or-Treat night.
So, as we go door-to-door in our neighborhood, LG will be a pirate.
I will practice the realization that I've probably attached myself to the desire to go to the sangha because I want to do in an external, physical way what I've probably already done in an internal, quiet way. I need to practice the realization that sometimes we humans don't have to show off, to act out.
Trick or treat.
For me, they are most potent hand-in-hand.
Have a great week, dear reader. Be well. I'll see you soon.
Today Cobalt's mother hurried up to me as she was dropping Cobalt off for school. She was flushed, excited. I don't often see her with this kind of smile, dear reader. She began to tell me how she had been doing a lot of reading. And that she had a plan for Cobalt. She wishes to cure Cobalt of autism.
Autism can be reversed, she said. I've seen it. Cobalt is doing very well here at school, I say. But Cobalt could be doing so much better, she says. She pats Cobalt on the head as she says this, in front of all our students who I've brought on this sunny day to greet their friend. Jenny McCarthy and Oprah have unwittingly caused more people to feel---well, a strange happiness that comes from promises of changing unhappiness: the kind one feels when it is felt that what you have just isn't good at all.
I think about Cerulean, who is, at last account, on the fifth classroom placement in four years. I wonder if Cerulean yet receives plankton, hyberbaric oxygen, crystal therapy, and the like. I think of Cerulean's family. Of how they would be over-the-moon happy---if Cerulean was at the same place that Cobalt is.
I thought yesterday about beginning a different meditation practice into my routine: the making of enso. One every day. After my encounter with Cobalt's mother, I think tomorrow is a good place to start. Namaste, dear reader. Namaste: Cobalt Naples Vermillion Thalo Blue Rosegold Madder Camouflage and Cerulean
Dear reader, 1939 US filmThe Wizard of Oz has been referenced in yesterday's post as well as today's. I've included the hyperlink, in the event that you would like to read more about the film.
One of the things that I do not enjoy about working with the students and families that I do is that I sometimes experience dependent-arising thoughts in some of the remarks made to those of us in the field of work. I have been trying to grow an attitude of gratitude for the opportunity to break the cycle of dependent-arising when these instances do happen. I know they will always happen. So far, this attitude I wish to grow is a seed I hold in my hand; sometimes, I think that I've sown it: yet, with a fresh remark, I find that it's still nestled in my hand.
For instance, our classroom is in an entirely different building in the district. A support staff team member who had first expressed delight at our coming (I can't wait to get my hands on them. I love those autistic kids) entered the room yesterday and expressed the desire to come and visit from time to time as, even though our students will keep their former support member (as planned by design), she still wished to visit because, well, that's my little quirk. I love kids with autism.
Kids with autism? Children are, and will always continue to be, children. Plain and simple. Autism? A part of the whole child. Please make no mistake: these children are not broken. The quirk, if one could call it that, and I do so here only to parallel the semantics---the "quirk" should be that you love kids.
You might think that I am referencing our newest quirky friend when I referenced the Wicked Witch of the West in the title. Don't be too certain of that, dear reader. It may very well be me, dependent-arising.
So I'll think instead about the young, enthusiastic women who came into our classroom yesterday morning instead: our students leave the room for specials, such as music and art, and these ladies are the general education teachers with whom our students will work for these things. They wanted to know what they could do to help our students; they wanted to know things such as their birthdays and the spellings of their names, so that our students would be included in their rooms in tangible ways: names on the birthday charts, name tags on desks. A gentle reminder to their classmates in that room: I'm coming, I'll see you soon. And for that, I am grateful.
Gratitude? I'm finding, dear reader, that it can be found---even though we may have to shift our focus elsewhere---or perhaps, not even focus elsewhere; but rather, relinquish that focus to a gaze: allowing us to take in more than we had previously, allowing ourselves to be surprised at the goodness that we may find. I love a good surprise, don't you?
Our blogging friend Pelicano asked in an earlier post comment about my avatar here on Blogger. It is a still from what is most likely my favorite film from the master, Hayao Miyazaki: Spirited Away. The image that I've chosen is one of Sen/Chihiro, the protagonist, and a character named No Face seated together. For me, they are two sides of the same coin, one that spins close to my heart. So, dear Pel, dear readers: if you've not seen the film, I would highly recommend it. Here's the trailer as it appeared in Japan, followed by the scene in which my avatar image appears. If you've seen the film, then you know exactly what a potent image it is. Miyazaki is the master indeed. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QORyMLG9CyA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bOJE_F9yL0
Make puri, she exhorted; just enjoy the making and the eating, and then tell us all about it. Of course, I was delighted by Anita's invitation, and resolved to make the puri within the time frame that Anita had proscribed.
To make a long story short, I awoke this morning, the last day of the party, without having made the puris. I was feeling tired, a little deflated, a little out-of-sorts, and honestly didn't know if I would be able to make them.
I made a pot of rose tea, and added rosewater to my cup for that Extra Something. I sat in my grandmother's rocking chair, she who always was so much of the kitchen, offering the work of her hands from her kitchen at any occasion; for her, just being with you was as good as a party . As I drained my cup, the warm coral-pink cloud of rose from the last swallow of hot tea permeated my very skull, and infused into my very self, it seemed---warm, pink, vital: waking my senses and getting me out of the chair.
And so I began in the kitchen. I cleaned collards, and then put them in a crock to cook slowly in a pot liquor of smoked almond broth. As Little Guy sliced hot dogs with a Chinese cleaver, I made the puri dough following Anita's recipe, with only a small change: substituting some of the salty smoked almond broth for the salted water originally asked for.
LG went back to his playing as I added tomato paste to the sliced hot dogs in the pot, and cooked the mixture to a lovely reddish-brown. To this, two cans of bacon and brown sugar baked beans were added, and the pot left to simmer.
Though I had made pita breads countless times, and felt at ease with rolling out those breads while cooking them, I felt less at ease with cooking the puris as I rolled them. I decided to make all the rounds first, placing them on a big platter and covered with a towel, and then I would fry them.
As I rolled out the breads, I felt comforted by the crick-crick, crick-crick sound of my ring on the round pin. I felt happy as the dough stretched and turned, as the pin rolled around.
When the first circle of dough went into the hot oil, it bubbled happily and seemed to burst with joy, and I laughed out loud.
Come here, LG, I said, look at this!
Naah, well...okay, he said. Okay, all right, let me get my stool.
LG, perched on his stool, stood at the stove by my side as I splashed the top of that first puri with oil, and then flipped it. He watched with much exclamation as it continued to balloon and as I carefully brought it out from the oil to drain on kitchen paper. We both admired its beautiful, happy golden, glistening roundness. It was too lovely for words.
The next thing that I know, dear reader, LG has completely taken over the stove: he is using tongs to pick up a circle of dough to slip it into the oil; he is using a kitchen spoon to carefully splash oil on the top of the circle; he is checking the bottom, and flipping---his puris are puffing, and we are both wooping and clapping as if we were both tiny children.
I had no choice, dear reader, but to watch him and set the table in between puris.
So with vegetarian baked beans in hand, I joined my family at the table, to eat the collards that I had prepared, the beans and franks that LG and I had made together, and the puris that LG had cooked, for all intents and purposes, mostly by himself, with some salty gherkins on the side. This is the best dinner ever, LG said, happily and solemnly, all at once.
My grandfather had an expression whenever he was in the midst of eating something the he very much relished: there ain't going to be no rind.
So it was at our table today, as we toasted Anita and all those at the party.
From the moment that the rose cloud of tea awoke my senses to the moment the dinner was finished, I was so mindful of not only metta, embodied in the kindness of the kitchen, the kindness of the invitation and the gathering, but of ksanika, also known as point instant theory. This is a way of thinking about time, of the passing of time, and of the value of the moment: each moment is here and then never again; our lives' moments, the stories of these moments, are so very much as a movie, a flip-book---miss a frame, the story is changed, and perhaps even makes no sense at the time. What one needs to remember, though, is just to keep watching. The world is a beautiful place, a magical place, and in the kitchen today, I felt as if I were dancing with it.
I thought of the party, and imagined the individual frames, the moving pictures that were making up the story of a party, the story of a gracious hostess, and equally gracious guests.
I may not be able to see the rest of the pictures, but I felt so much the connection to the story.
Thank you, Anita. Thank you, dear guests and dear readers. Remember: the plot may twist and turn; but the story is about beauty. It's about magic. It's about the metta that fits it all together. Eat puris. Laugh together. Enjoy the moving pictures.
Dear reader, as you might have guessed, I've been somewhat scattered here of late, what with the finishing of summer coursework, the insomnia, and several other issues that have lately arisen. With the scattering came many questions; and I believe that from time to time we often begin to question the capacities, our abilities to maintain the rhythm of all the objects in the air when we begin to juggle, so to speak. That's when we have to remind ourselves to stop thinking about it so much, and enjoy the show for what it is: and most especially since it's our show to put on. We can juggle what we wish, and throw back and forth to whoever is willing. We can swap plates for bowling pins; bowling pins for flaming torches, for chainsaws or pineapples: we just need to keep it in motion. We can keep it to ourselves. We can let it all sit as we rest for awhile. We can pass it back and forth to someone waiting to jump in, or pass off to someone completely unawares: see what happens. What's the worst that can happen? Pick it up and begin again. Find out that you prefer chainsaws to pineapples. Or be touched by delight at the back-and-forth; happy for the synchronicity of motion.
And so it is, dear reader. On Sunday morning, I saw the father of one of our students, Vermillion (a pseudonym, of course). He said that when called by name at home, Vermillion often responds, I'm not Vermillion, I'm _______!; and that Vermillion will often choose one favorite character from stories to "fill in the blank" on that day for the "I'm not Vermillion." So on Saturday, it was I'm not Vermillion, I'm neroli! Such an unexpected happiness, dear reader: as if Vermillion had passed a pineapple to me: me, completely unaware, and all the happier for it.
On Sunday night, I was unable to see the meteor shower, for the cloud cover was drawn completely over the sky. Yet the night was still gorgeous, and I remained outside to hear the sibilance of insects with the knowledge of the motion above me, hidden from sight. I began to do the metta meditation: may you be safe and protected may you be peaceful and happy may you be healthy and strong may you have ease of well being, and accept all conditions of the world and then went inside and had the best night's sleep I've had for some time. A lovely, delicate surprise.
Yesterday I was running on behind, and feeling that I've been juggling too many things, as has been my usual of late. When I got to the university, I logged on to do some blog reading before the beginning of class. I was surprised and touched to learn that Bee and Jai had chosen to gift me with this: I've long admired their work: they are master jugglers who craft an amazing juggle, and are most generous in the tossing-back-and-forth to others---you know what I mean? I arrived at home late last night, stiff and tired, and decided to go for a walk, for the night this night was clear and glowing, most conducive to the coaxing of stiff joints and muscles. As I walked in the bend of the road, the one place without streetlights, and thought of all these things---of Vermillion, the metta meditation and the lovely sleep that followed it, of Bee and Jai and the community of friends here in the blogosphere---I looked up; and there, just so, dear reader, there it was: a meteor, long-lived and colorful, falling down through Scorpio, and fading just as quickly, as if it had been sugar melting into the warmth and skipping of my heartbeat.
Sometimes it seems life loves to toss to you the pineapple, the chainsaws, the flaming torches not because it wants to cause you to feel overloaded, but because life has a way of knowing just how fun it is to juggle and to take joy in the moving; of knowing when you just need to walk into a surprise party.
When it came to decide where to bestow this gift next, I looked to the point in time before I myself arrived here, to those whose words I've followed for a long time. I thank you, dear writers, for your words, and sharing your show with us. I'm passing this lovely juggle to:
Little Guy has been most enamored of the Discovery Channel program, Man vs. Wild. Some things stand out for him (and consequently us) more than others, such as the time the host Bear Grylls ate a rather large spider after plucking it from its web in the recent Autralian Outback episode: LG, the image of this fixed in his mind, resolutely refused to eat the following day, ostensibly because of the "gross factor;" though he did allow that should I manage to obtain some bacon for him, he was fairly certain that he could eat that. We now have a platform in 0ur apple tree thanks to the Everglades episode. It was from this platform that LG announced to me as I hung wash on the line that he had prepared a stick, and with this stick, he intended to hunt a squirrel or a rabbit by hurling the stick at the quarry's head, much as Mr. Grylls did to a rabbit in the Wile E. Coyote episode. (Sorry, no one remembers where that happened: only that it did happen.)
Before you ask me the obvious---yes, I am. But LG has to develop his own sense of ahimsa in order to completely own it; and I have to allow him the freedom to do so. It is a difficult kind of love, but it is mine as these children grow. You know how it is.
Back to the conversation as it unfolds: Hopefully, a squirrel. Hmm. Then what happens when you have hit the squirrel with the stick? Then Dad and Big Guy and maybe I will eat it. Okay. So you are just going to pick it up, and start eating? No. BG or Dad will use a knife and cut its skin off, and then cook it and then eat it. Oh. Okay.
I go into the house to break the news to Snowy and BG: LG is out on the platform. He has a stick, and he wants to hunt a squirrel with it, just like Bear Grylls. Snowy and BG chuckle. He expects one of you all to skin it and cook it. Immediately BG says, If LG gets a squirrel, then I'm eating it.
And the fact that the author cites the glorious Le Voyage dans la lune as something that informed some aspects of the book makes me incredibly happy. It is that strange, ethereal, stop-motion-so-fast-image of that space-ship, that moon, that is one of the first visuals I ever remember being aware of seeing. I do not know in what context I saw it, only that I remember it: and in some fashion, that wavering, silvery surreal image has been informing my sensibilites ever since.
And while toodling on the site about the book linked above, I found that the author was also an enthusiast of Edison...well, I will let you discover your own happy thoughts should you go there, dear reader. I will leave you with another link, and this one is especially for my paper-folding pals. And how 'bout if we made this one for Swampy? This one I've chosen for myself preparing to do the Ego-Eradicator posture in a certain kundalini kriya...or wait, how about this one: I'm just pretending that the caveman is a giant gulab jamun. It's a beautiful, brilliant moon out tonight: same as it ever was. I'll take my beauty when I find it, be it past or present. I wish the same for you.
And if you can't see the moon from where you are, please clickhere. (Just like a riff on a koan---we've avoided the middle-man!) (or finger, pointing)
Those happy days when Nacha was with her seemed so distant now. Nacha! The smells: her noodle soup, her chilaquiles, her champurrado, her molcajete sauce, her bread with cream, all were far away in a distant past. They could never be surpassed, her seasoning, her atole drinks, her teas, her laugh, her herbal remedies, the way she braided her hair and tucked Tita in at night, took care of her when she was sick, and cooked what she craved and whipped the chocolate! If she could bring back a single moment from that time, a little of the happiness from those days, she could prepare the King's Day bread with the same enthusiasm she had felt then!---Laura Esquivel, Like Water for Chocolate
One of the reasons for my procrastination of yesterday's homework was my feeling of intimidation. Or, to put it into behavioral terms: I engaged in procrastinating behavior (form) to avoid my feelings of inadequacy and intimidation (function). This is a pattern that sometimes emerges for me. It's an old monkey that, though banished, will sometimes attempt to drop out of a a tree, and land squarely on my back. Every now and again, he'll try to keep a hold, but usually slides off and hits the dirt in short order; and by that time, my coordinates have already changed. As monkeys-on-the-back are, he's a lazy sort; so he'll take his time getting back up into the tree. The other side to that particular coin is that one never knows when he'll drop out of the trees again. So being ready for it is essential.
To deal with this particular monkey-on-the-back, I need to employ tactics which will decrease my thoughts of inadequacy and intimidation, and therefore my behavior to avoid the task and the situation triggering these behaviors. The best tool in the toolkit for me when this occurs is a tandem one: the one-two punch of dedicating the merit of others (the "rejoicing" limb of 7-limb practice) and mudita. Quite simply, I contemplate upon the good qualities in the people that seem to trigger my intimidation. I think about how these qualities are not cause for anxiety, but rather, for real joy and excitement. And just as Gardner's MI theory or Shantideva's Engaging in Boddhisattva Behavioror the New Testament would tell us, that good stuff that we recognize and rejoice in others is also ours. We all have the good stuff: how we manifest it to ourselves and to the world is what matters.
I use this tandem tool for all manner of situations. For example, on one of the most hot and humid days of the summer thus far, Little Guy and I picked cherries. Upon returning home, LG asked for a cherry pie. I must tell you that the making of the pastry for pie has always been an undertaking with uncertain results in my hands. Though I have been enjoying more consistent results since using my long-gone grandmother's recipe, hand-written, well-worn, the results are never completely assured. As it should be, I suppose, in life and pastry; and there's some joy to that. With my love for LG as primary agent, I began to think about my grandmother, my Almeda, and how well she loved us: how she taught us to bake, to do needlework; how she let us fill her bathtub to the brim and soak until we were wrinkled as raisins; how from her hands we received cakes, and pies, those plump cookies pressed together like hands in namaste: how, Almeda, can I make pie dough on such an infernal day?
With clarity, I unfolded her tattered recipe. I placed a metal tray into the freezer to roll the dough out when it was complete; I filled an enamel roaster with ice and placed the mixing bowl into it. Without thinking, I measured out proportions of white cake flour, whole wheat flour, and chappatti flour into the freezing bowl, as we were out of our usual pastry flour. As I pressed the tines of my pastry fork against the sides of the frosty mixing bowl, smashing the butter into the flour, the gentle insistence, that scritch-scritch-swish sound of the fork, bowl, and mealy-butter-flour-meal that was to become dough was as sweet as if I had heard Almeda speaking to me. The pastry began to come together, just so. Chill for fifteen minutes, Almeda wrote in her recipe. After rolling out the pastry and assembling the pie, I took a little paring knife to cut vents into the top crust. I cut a heart-shape in the middle, with lines radiating out from it in all directions, Radiant Baby-style, and put the pie into the oven. It was so very beautiful and good when it came out, and we devoured every juicy bite.
After my procrastinating behavior yesterday, I finally returned home and seriously turned my mind to work. I thought about the wonderful qualities of the people I've just met. I thought about how LG and BG were so happy that afternoon. I thought about the wonderful qualities of my grandmother, my Almeda, and how they made themselves present for me in the here-and-now in the making of LG's cherry pie. And how we did benefit from the sweetness! I gathered all these things together, whipped the chocolate in my Chocolate Mainline, and did my homework. And that, dear reader, is How I Got Over Myself. Thank you so much, dear reader, for your kindness.
Have a wonderful day.
------------------------ Almeda's Pie Crust Sift together: 3 cups flour 1 tablespoon of sugar 3/4 teaspoon of salt 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder Cut in: 1 1/4 cup shortening Combine: 1 beaten egg 5 tablespoons water 1 tablespoon vinegar Sprinkle: 4 tablespoons of mixture Mix with fork add 4 more continue till pastry holds chill 15 minutes
Last night I attended the first class of the second summer session of my school. Our instructor discussed her policy with us. We are dismissed earlier than the scheduled time, with one proviso: we are then to follow through to make up the time online by reading and digesting the online resource she provides, write a reflection on the resource, and then post it to a community board. The class is then able to read each other's reflection. Each student must also respond to one other posted reflection, thereby instituting virtual collaborative groups.
Dear reader, I awoke this morning with the Very Best of Intentions. I first replied to your comments. I wanted to write a post, one that addressed my need to cultivatemudita in my approach to this class. (Often when I meet people that I admire, dear reader, for their talents, I feel as if my learning curve will be most steep in order to keep up; in short: I can become intimidated if I am not careful. This is something I would not wish for you, dear reader, so it makes sense that I should work to avoid it for myself.) I began to read more commentary on mudita. Time passed, as it always does. I resolved to visit the online resource for my class, and so I did. I began to type notes as I read. Then Little Guy awoke. It was a beautiful morning, so we had breakfast together, and went outside. LG wanted to practice riding his bike without training wheels, and he needed some moral support; a male and female cardinal pair were chatting and flitting back and forth, and in the name of scientific inquiry, LG and I felt it best to take tea on the back porch and observe this charming pair so as to determine possible nesting locations, and therefore, best avoid disturbing the Happy Couple; soon it was time for lunch, and for the prepping of dinner. One thing led to another, as they say, dear reader, and to make a long story short, we were driving on our way to see the World's Largest Hershey Kiss, Big Guy in tow, as his work shift was complete. Is it real? LG asked as we approached the Venerated Object, the World's Largest Hershey Kiss. Dear reader, he was answered by the wall of chocolate aroma we walked into immediately after he uttered the question, several yards away from the Kiss Itself. Can I tell you in words how wonderful it was to be in the presence of such an object? To celebrate, I had to buy the boys their chocolate confections of choice at the Artisan Chocolate stand: beautiful miniature chocolate pastries, served on a golden disk, eaten at a table beside the Kiss Itself. Feeling happy and Good About the World, the boys began a favored activity: riffing on things that make them laugh. Thus, not only was I treated to a bite from each serving of pastry (fudge-filled shorbread, chocolate ganache-coated marble cake), I was a happily captive audience to my boys re-enacting a Mystery Science Theatre clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0n0EsHB0JY and the gang fight scene from Ron Burgundy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Anchormenweapons.JPG
My homework? I managed to finally complete and submit it before the writing of this post.
What helped me was chocolate: the World's Largest Kiss-induced happiness, courtesy of LG and BG, and my Chocolate Mainline Happiness, the recipe which follows.
Neroli's Chocolate Mainline Happiness Bring to a near boil: 1.5 cups water
Add: 1 heaping teaspoon jasmine tea (Earl Grey would also do quite nicely). 2 plump green cardamom pods, crushed. Steep for 3 minutes. Strain into a deep-walled saucepan, and place the saucepan on a warming burner on the stove.
Chop: 1-1 ounce square of 99% chocolate. I've used Scharffen Berger; it blends ever so nicely.
Add chopped chocolate to the strained hot tea in the deep-walled saucepan. Whisk vigourously: not only to blend the chocolate, but to whip and froth the chocolate.
Pour into your favored drinking vessel. Inhale the scent and drink happily, dear reader.
Dominique Bretodeau gets back his childhood secret box and to feed his grandson with his most special favorite, the "oysters" from a roast chicken. http://www.offoffoff.com/film/2001/amelie.php3
Parathas stuffed with pea filling hot off the iron skillet, eaten with rhubarb chutney.
I am most fond of the "Mutts" comics. Patrick Mc Donnell's work is absolutely marvelous, and makes me very happy. The Little Pink Sock is a frequent character. It is the much-loved object of the Mooch, the kitty protagonist.
Dear reader, I am most glad that you are here to keep me "on task," as the shop talk goes. I've challenged myself here in this venue not only to develop the habit, the practice of writing, but to assign words to that which I normally would---as the New Testament was fond of saying about a practice of Mary the Mother of Jesus---keep and treasure in my heart. Whenever I would read this about Mary in the Bible, I would say, yes, I can see that; and in reading these accounts, I would always feel a well-springing forth of good feeling and deep affection: one that was not replicated when reading any other part of the Gospels.
This summer here has been so humid and still, as it has for you as well, perhaps. My sons and I have spent much time at our lovely river. The boys enjoy wading into it all, to see what they might find, scooping up and sifting silty through their hands: crayfish, minnows, pebbles, skipping stones. That boy I would chase by this same river, he the Gingerbread Boy, I, wanting some sugar, is now taller than I and teaching his much younger brother the finesse in the skipping of stones. He's even perfected the art of skipping crayfish. Can I say what a gleeful thing that is? And how eager his younger brother is to move onto that craft? Me, I enjoy sitting on the soft bank, in the green-silver light that reminds me of the light of della Francesca or that other Northern Italian Renaissance painter who so articulated the quick-silver shimmer. It is often spoken in Zen practice that one may practice zazen most anywhere, doing most anything, and I attempt to realize this in my day-to-day. Laughing at skipping crayfish as they bounce upstream, knowing that their Mr.Toad's Wild Ride will be over soon enough is one of the ways that I practice.
I've mentioned Buddhist practice before to you, dear reader. What I must tell you is that I have no official affiliation as to my form of practice; I attend no bricks-and-mortar sangha. I am one who feels very much at home with the minimal or the baroque: thus I find my practice is informed by not only Zen, but by the distinct Mahayana form of Buddhism that is Tibetan Buddhism. As Zen is particularly amenable to solitary practice (thanks, Boddhidharma!), Tibetan Buddhism is best realized when practiced under the tutelage of a lama. Having no access to a Tibetan-lineage sangha, much less to a lama, when I sometimes feel the need of a lama, I think of the experience that I've held and treasured in my heart, as Mother Mary: the puja destroying the sand mandala. I think of the aged lama who led the puja, who with beauty and ferocity in slow motion took gorgeous complexity and brushed it into a pile of muddy-colored sand.That first moment, when brush came to sand, seemed to turn the world in every sense to me.
Dear reader, it is one of the things I keep and treasure in my heart.
My younger son and I visited the river one day last week when we found ourselves to our own devices. Yes, he caught a few crayfish; after collecting them to see who was biggest? who was tiniest? they all were happily released to the current. On his way wading out, he noticed something from beneath a rock, and plucked it out: a small rodent skull, perfectly clean of flesh and hair. May I keep it? he asked. Sure, I replied. As he set it on a rock to adjust his shoe, we noticed it leaking. (Here, I must tell you, if you are somewhat squeamish, please skip ahead.)Although the skull was perfectly clean, the cold temperature of the river, in tandem with the inverted position in which it was wedged beneath the rock, must have allowed for the retention of some small amount of brain-matter in the skull cup to remain, and to decompose at a much slower rate than the rest of the flesh. Can I keep it? And so, dear reader, this is how I found myself shaking a rodent skull over the river to dislodge the remaining funky brain-stew so that it might exit the small aperature at the base of the skull through which the spine, with its bundle of nerves went crackling: you can imagine how it went, dear reader; it was exactly the action one uses when one shakes the ketchup out of the bottle onto a plate of fries.
So what did the river give me? It gave me the most funny koan of a skipping crayfish, like the twirling of a flower. It gave me a message from the lama from afar: like so much brain-stew into the silver current; an affirmation of life in all its complexity and simplicity; beautiful and not-so-beautiful. This is the picture. Treasure. Enjoy. Repeat.
Today was the first day of summer vacation for me.
After the boys went to school, I decided to go to the river that I love. It was a lovely morning, the kind that everyone remarks on in passing, because we just can't believe we've been gifted with such a day.
It was sunny-bright and windy and a little chilly with the breeze that was blowing. In the pocket of my sweatshirt I placed a packet of sand that I keep; it is ironic that I keep the sand given its provenance: the sand is from a sand mandala honoring Chenrezig, known as the Buddha of Compassion in Tibetan Buddhism . The puja was performed by the monks from the Drepung Loseling Monastery; my keeping of the sand is ironic as the purpose of the puja is to destroy the sand mandala in order to speak certain truths about impermanence. Dear reader, you might follow the link to see for yourself: http://www.mysticalartsoftibet.org/Mandala.htm#top
It is at this point, dear reader, that I must disclose that I have been most in need of cultivating compassion.
I must also disclose that I have been in need of integrating the knowing of impermanence into my life.
The first time I visited this river, I was brought there by a former boyfriend. We had meant to surprise each other, and we did, delightfully so: I brought watermelon, his favorite; he brought me to a river, my favorite.
I visited this place often, even after J. and I parted ways. It was running along the riverbank after my-then-2-year-old son (he, pretending to be the proverbial Gingerbread Boy; me, pretending to be in hot pursuit) that I remember laughing for the first time in years. (Dear reader, I had been isolated and abused for some time before becoming free. More words for another time, perhaps.) When I received the phone call that told me of my brother's death, I immediately came to the river, in the winter; where else would I have turned?
Without any other way to explain this, I know these feelings each time I visit, and there is deep and simple satisfaction in it.
I wished to just sit without words for a while. I work in public education in an elementary special education classroom. Our classroom will miss one of our special people (who I will, out of necessity, give a designated pseudonym---Cerulean).
Cerulean's parents came to feel that Cerulean was not receiving adequate delivery of service in our classroom, and they are seeking a new placement. Cerulean left rather abruptly, and I felt very sad, for many, many reasons. We are always sad when we know we will likely never see people we care for again, are we not? I felt sad that Cerulean and classmates were not able to have a chance to say goodbye to each other in whatever way they needed; one of the manifestations of Cerulean's autism is that Cerulean does not use much verbal language.
Attachment, dear reader, is the cause of much suffering.
So feeling some strong attachments to feelings and ideas about the Cerulean situation, I went to the river.
As I was walking the trail before sitting zazen with the river, I met a woman, a young girl, and a large dog on the path. (No, dear reader: although it sounds as if it is a promising beginning to a joke, it is not. ) After pleasant conversation about the beautiful day, I remarked that I liked the lilac-colored Crocs worn by the girl. I laughed a little as I said this, as I myself was wearing a pair of Crocs. The woman said, they are a pretty color. But she keeps being bothered by the mulch getting into the little holes. Does it happen to you? the woman asked.
Sure, but I don't much mind, I said. I just slip them off, dump them out, and start all over again. The woman looked dubious for a fraction of a second, and then laughed a little. We went our separate ways.
I found a rock that proved a perfect seat and sat by the river. The intent of my sitting was to cultivate compassion regarding the situation with Cerulean. The day that Cerulean left was difficult for us for many reasons. That night, I had a nightmare. I was in a classroom with our students when Cerulean jumped up and ran out of the room. I chased Cerulean through the stereotypical labyrinth of corridors and floors of bad dream architecture. I finally was able to catch up in a stairwell. In my dream, Cerulean began to speak to me, in "I need..." sentences. Complete sentences. Many, many sentences. I didn't have anything that Cerulean requested in my dream. In my dream, I did not think twice that Cerulean engaged me in a wave of verbal language.
When I woke from this dream, Cerulean's speech was most wonderful and very sad, all at once.
When I was ready to return to the rest of my day, I stood up, and poured some of the sand in my pocket into the river.
I had to laugh a little again at this point. I suppose I finally perceived the joke, dear reader: you know, the one about the girl, the woman, the large dog, and mulch in the shoe?
I remembered that Cerulean sometimes wore Crocs. When this occured, Cerulean would, as a habit, deliberately insert mulch from the playground into the holes.
