A change, it is a comin'...
Hang tight, campers. I'll be back soon.
-ZT
To look upon the world with these dead, glass eyes,
And listen intently with these old, wooden ears,
Is the gift of all gifts.
Like hunting for sand-dollars on the beach,
Only to find a gold coin.
Like looking for a whore,
But instead finding a wife.
Like trying to count smoke.
Like trying to see the center of the sun.
Is it even there?
No.
It's here! Here! HERE!
Just listen...
The smell of bones
The air of pain
The bubbling of blood.
Not to be shunned
or avoided
but bathed in
as a hot-spring
for an aching body.
Karma to Karma.
Lips to lips.
The kiss of death;
To heal me
of my ignorance.
The world works
Just this way,
And I shouldn't hide
from the truth
Like I once did
When I was so
Full of myself.
Thank you, Great Teacher,
for the taste of wisdom
you give me,
and the way your
incense
fills my nose
with the smell
of reality.
A brief update from the health front:
I'm a lot better than I was. I'd say 95%. The lingering 5% is a result of fatigue brought on by 10-or-so days of iffy sleep due to the massive amount of antibiotics I'm still on. Taking them alone is tiring. They make me feel lethargic due to their body-load. But they also cause a pretty severe insomnia. I think I'll only be on them a few more days. They were a life-saver, to be sure, but we're getting to the point where the cure is worse than the symptoms. The 5am nose-bleeds are getting sorta old as well. That's because the anti-b's kill off a lot of the gut flora needed to process dietary potassium, and a lack of Vit. K means easy hemorrhages.
But enough whinging. I'm spending my time being grateful for all the friends who've expressed concern, love, compassion and metta for me, grateful for all the medical professionals whose skills helped save me, and my daughter and fiancée for being so strong for me in what for them must have been a very scary situation.
I'm headed back to the Zen Temple to get some work in. I'm looking forward to seeing it 10 days after I left it suddenly. Part of me feels a bit robbed that things I was working on were finished by others' hands. But at the same time, I'm more grateful that things I was working on were finished by others' hands.
Sangha: my supreme support.
I am of the nature to have ill health; there s no way to escape having ill health...So as I said in the last post, I wound up in hospital last week for a few days with a rather nasty case of cellulitis. I've had this before, a few years back shortly after I sprained my right knee. It was bad, but after a huge shot of antibiotics in the ass, and a week or so of oral treatment, it was managed.
-The Five Remembrances
This time? Not so much.
I'd been working on the rehab/reno of my sangha's new Zen temple in north Portland. We recently purchased a 100-year-old church for our new home, and there was much work to do. One of the things that I struggle with through this extended unemployment is a sense of malaise; a general feeling of purposelessness. Nothing to do, nowhere to go. One of the things I've been focusing great energy on lately is weightloss (you can follow that story over at my other blog) and I'd been having some really satisfying success. Part of that success is directly a result of all the physically hard work I'd been doing the three-and-some weeks prior.
Working hard, sweating, crawling around in the crap, using my skills and knowledge all felt so good. I'd come home exhausted, sure, but it was that satisfying kind of tired that comes from real ardent effort at something that really matters. I felt energized, strong, and vital. I haven't felt that way in quite a while. I was feeling really good about things.
I was working with a friend planing wainscoting. I was "catching," or receiving the thin boards after the machine milled off the face of each piece, removing a hundred years of paint and dirt, then stacking them neatly. In that process, the closed room we were working in grew rather warm, and I was sweating pretty good. I was also getting completely covered in ancient sawdust and old paint. It caked on my arms. It got in my eyes. I was wearing a respirator, but I'm sure I breathed some of it in, too. As we wrapped up, I could feel myself itch nearly everywhere. I was sweating more than I thought I should be. I'd run out of my allergy pills that day, so I hadn't taken one, and thought I may be having an allergic reaction. It made the most sense to me at the time.
I had to leave to get home and see my partner. I started to feel rather lousy. One of my friends noticed this and offered me a ride to the bus stop, which I accepted. On the way back into SE Portland, I started to feel absolutely awful. A few miles away from my street, I knew that something significant was happening to me, and that if I got off at my stop, I wouldn't likely be able to walk up the hill to my flat, so I called a taxi from the bus, and told them to meet me in the parking lot of a Walgreens next to a bus stop. When I got home, my fiancee was there and had an extra allergy pill, which I chewed, then took a hot shower to wash off all the caked-on crap. It seemed to work. I felt better, with the only major thing now being a roaring headache, and sent her home telling her that I didn't want to snap at her unfairly due to the headache, and what I really needed was rest.
I slept like crap that night. I couldn't get comfortable, couldn't stay asleep, and kept being either too hot or too cold, with the headache still in place.
The next day, I thought I felt a bit improved. My step-daughter stopped by in the early afternoon, and we hung out a bit. I was getting ready to make us something to eat when the same shivers and cold feeling crept over me again. I told her to make herself something to eat while I went to try and warm myself up in the shower. If that didn't work, she said she could run me to urgent care.
I had the shower set to "poach", I'm sure. I sat under the scalding water, freezing and shaking almost uncontrollably. Is this blowing up into anaphylaxis? I wondered. It was a moot point; I knew I was in trouble. I called to her from the shower, and said something I hoped I'd never have to say to her on my own behalf: call 911. I was starting to feel like I was going into shock. I knew that I had to get to a hospital, and fast, and that the chances of me physically being capable of getting into her tiny CRX were slim-to-none. I was to the point that I didn't even know if I could get out of the shower. EMS arrived quickly, assessed me, got a temp of 102.8, and took me to a nearby hospital.
My daughter had run into downtown and picked up my fiancee. They were both there, both worried, and both doing their best to be strong. When I got into ER, I was examined, and given IV fluids, a big fat pile of acetaminophen and a dose of Tramadol. It all seemed to help, and within three hours, I was feeling vastly improved to the point that I was able to eat, and they were considering discharging me, willing to write it off to a nasty virus. The ER doctor said "If your vitals show stable, we'll send you home."
They didn't.
For as well as I may have felt, my blood-pressure was screwed up. I have mild hypertension, or high blood-pressure, but the problem was in the opposite direction. I was showing consistent hypotension, or low blood-pressure. The BP readings for me should have been 130/80 or so, but I was consistently showing 90/45. The doctor looked at me and said "I'm really sorry, but I just don't feel good about sending you home like this, so I'm going to admit you overnight for observation." As bummed as I may have been by this, I had to agree with her. I sent my fiancee home, assuring her that all would be well, that there was nothing to do, and that I was exactly where I should be.
Shortly thereafter, not even an hour later, I was moved to a different room. I started to feel terrible again. Sweating, but cold. Uncontrollable tremors. The acetaminophen they'd given me in the ER was wearing off. They gave me more, and one of the nurses took a Sharpie marker and traced the area on my left leg that was going red and radiating hot. It was cellulitis for sure, and it was very angry. They started me on two kinds of IV antibiotics. I knew I was going to be in hospital for at least a few days.
The next day, my step-daughter came and hung out in my room with me, bringing me a few more things from home. Later that day, my teacher—who'd recently found out that I was in the hospital—came and visited me. It was a comfort, and I appreciated it deeply. "How are you practicing with this?" he asked. I told him that I would simply repeat the Five Remembrances whenever it occurred to me, and that I was trying to concentrate on my breath, which was still there, still vital, and still under my control. I remember him saying to me just before he left "Do not make the mistake of minimizing the size of this challenge."
I was discharged the morning after that visit, on Friday. Things looked rather good. I was told to make a follow-up appointment with my personal physician as soon as I could. He was available the next day—Saturday—but I figured that Monday was good enough. The hospital doctor thought so back when we were talking about it, so I scheduled an appointment for Monday.
The weekend was generally uneventful, with the only major addition to my routine being the swallowing of two antibiotic pills a day the size of baby shoes. I felt better, looked better, but was still having trouble sleeping, and waking up hot at 4am. Monday morning, I noticed that a larger patch of redness was showing on my leg. When I got to my doctor, I could see the concern on his face. Is this being resistant? I told him I was tolerating the antibiotic well, and asked if he thought we should double it. He agreed. He also put me on half my normal dosage of diuretic to help get the excess fluid out of the leg. The swelling and edema would only make it harder to heal. That was yesterday. Anyway, that's where I am now: four baby shoes and half a water pill a day, plus acetaminophen as needed.
The double dose of anti-b's make me very photosensitive, and give me a crashing headache, but appear to be working. The red patch is cooler, less diffuse and more defined, which is good. The swelling is down overall. I'm still a bit nervous, but that's not really going to accomplish anything helpful.
This has been, and continues to be, a rather significant challenge. I went from feeling so good, so vital, and my lowest weight since high-school, to completely helpless and dependent, shivering in misery in a hospital bed hooked into IV's, or laying on my couch with my leg in the air, watching the Hysteria Channel about 10lbs heavier than this time last week. It seemed so instantaneous.
All that is dear to me, and everyone I love are of the nature of change; There is no way to keep being separated from them.All that is dear, including my own health.
Once again,
"...it's always the image of change that really makes the poem..."
-Alan Watts
A close friend and dharma brother recently asked me about a term we bandy about in our community/shanga: "practice edge". "What the hell is an 'edge' of practice?" he asked. I used cutting metaphors, cliff metaphors, etc. It worked, but I left the conversation feeling like I gave a thimble full of water to a thirsty man asking for a drink. Not short-shrift, but by no means quenching.
I wound up in hospital for a few very miserable days this past week. I'm healing well, but my sleep schedule is completely out of whack, so I was up at 4am. I did zazen for about a half an hour lying down in the dark, then got my phone to watch something while laying there, hoping to fall back asleep for a bit. That didn't work at all, because I made the grave mistake of watching something so utterly engrossing that I woke right up.
If you look at life like a perfect, flat, uniform sheet of paper, it has four edges. If you consider or assume that those edges define its scope in any direction, and beyond those edges is nothing (and by definition, beyond that life) you have a pretty interesting and generally useful model for the human life, or human experience.
Now, if there are no imperfections in that sheet of paper—no dimples, tears, creases or folds—you have a rather homogeneous existence. Everything just flows evenly from edge to edge, even if that plane is twisted. It all just goes along smoothly until it suddenly stops.
I think that would be a very boring life.
But put a crease in there, and suddenly, without affecting the contiguousity (yes, I just made that up) of the experience, you've now got more definition. You have difference, you have realm, you have texture, you have shape.
We all think that we want a smooth life. Wrinkles, crinkles, tears or messy bits in the flow of our existence tend to upset us, make us change course, or do something in a manner not of our original or current desire. But to quote (with minor modification) Billy Bragg; "...all (life) is strange, and you have to learn to take the crunchy with the smooth, I suppose."
As I said, I wound up in hospital recently, and at one point, I was laying in my bed, soaked in misery, watching a stunningly beautiful full moon arc across the slightly cloudy skies through the huge windows of my room, and I remembered a favorite audio bit from Alan Watts I stumbled upon a year or so ago...
"So we are living—as it were—on many levels of rhythm. This is the nature of change. If you resist it, you have dukka, you have frustration and suffering. But, on the other hand, if you understand change—you don't cling to it, and you let it flow—then it's no problem. It becomes positively beautiful, which is why in poetry the theme of the evanescence of the world is beautiful. When Shelly says:Change gives us dynamism. Difference gives us definition. Choice gives us opportunity. Smoothness gives us rest. The dimples, tears, creases and folds in the fabric of our lives—those places and points where direction changes without our consent, where the shape morphs into something we're not expecting or even wanting, where roughness pushes us out of a comfortable flow—these are the edges of practice.
The One remains, the many change and pass;Now what's beautiful in that? Is it heaven's light that shines forever, or is it rather the dome of many colored glass that shatters? See, it's always the image of change that really makes the poem..."
Heaven's light forever shines, Earth's shadows fly;
Life, like a dome of many-coloured glass,
Stains the white radiance of Eternity,
Until Death [shatters] it to fragments.
Space and time themselves are not smooth, we now understand. We perceive them as so, but they're not at the most basic and fundamental level. Quantum particles pop in and out of existence, creating a seething foam of ever-changing texture. Time is bent by the laws of physics, slowing the closer you get to the speed of light. As I said, we perceive them as so, but in reality, they're anything but. The error in perception is, as always, a matter of scale.
But I'm all about texture...
The day awaits,
hard like cold iron,
waiting to be heated and
hammered into some fresh, new shape.
The loud banging of the hammer and anvil
a song to be heard throughout the day,
but yet to begin.
The fog,
gripping.
grasping,
clinging to everything it touches,
trying so very hard not to lose its tenuous hold on life,
whimpering as it slides down the hillside.
The crows beckon,
from on high and down low,
their voices stabbing through the quiet,
making their intentions known.
What they're saying
is readily heard;
what is being said remains a mystery,
lost in translation.
The sound of all things,
loud and quiet,
gentile and shrill,
soft and sharp,
caresses me like the hands of a lover,
with a mind of their own,
wants and needs of their own,
and their own
agenda.
Fannys on zafus in honorable poses;
Sit in the zendo and breathe through our noses.
Inos and doans. The large bronze bell rings.
These are a few of my favorite Zen things.
Sore, achy muscles from sitting through sesshin.
Avalokitishvara, Dogen and Kuan Yin.
All bodhisattvas throughout the world sing,
These are a few of my favorite Zen things.
When the tire's flat.
When I feel fat.
When I'm seething mad.
I simply remember my favorite things,
And then things don't look so bad.
Work in the green-house or samu in kitchen;
Wrestle the bramble into short-term submission.
Straighten your rakusu: the only zen bling.
These are a few of my favorite Zen things.
Chanting and kinhin and bowing to founders;
Sanzen with Hogen when my practice flounders.
Koans and parties with puppets that sing.
These are a few of my favorite Zen things.
When I'm freezing.
When I'm roasting.
When there is no breeze.
I simply remember my favorite things,
And then I'm more at ease.
Red cape and cap because Jizo gets too cold.
Practice my dying--hopefully when I'm old.
Boat-loads of metta for all living beings.
These are a few of my favorite Zen things.
The gateway to freedom is zazen samadhi.
Be one with the moment: heart/mind and body.
For a great Heart of Wisdom: the moment's the thing.
These are a few of my favorite Zen things.
When I'm stressed-out.
What's this about?
Try to seek its source.
The Great Way is easy for those without
"favorite things" of course.
To what do I owe the pleasure?
To thee, of course.
To years of truth that cut like scalpels, knives and saws,
Leaving me bloody, but lighter.
To years of fire that burn away the underbrush, deadfall and chaff,
Setting the forest floor for growth anew.
To years of flood that have washed away all the loose, fetid rot of me,
Where my "good" and "bad" are not distinguished.
To the wind, ever-present, blowing hard from all directions;
Challenging me to stand in the face of it and howl back.
To all those energies that have come to manifest my life;
Each person, place, thing that has helped me become more verb-like.
The magic of banality, the wonder of boredom, the thrill of ennui;
Each sting of assumption and error a Zenji.
To sit
As a stone
In a field;
Immovable but by time,
Resolute through stasis,
Confident via gravity,
Stalwart by way of density.
Eternal on the small scale,
Insignificant to the large.
A solid, concrete illusion.
An æons-old, tenuous conglomeration.
Dependable,
Yet ever crumbling,
atom
by
atom
back
into
aggregate.
Out of time,
out of place,
out of form,
The Universe spreads her legs,
and
Noumena is born.
Looking upon this place
With blurry,
unfocused,
impossibly blue eyes;
Seeing that all is right with the world,
and greeting it with a awful, confused wail.
A Universal Recommendation of Zazen
(aka: "FUKANZAZENGI")
-------------------------------
The Way is originally perfect and all-pervading. What need is there for practice and realization?
The Dharma vehicle is rolling freely. Why should we exhaust our effort?
There is no speck of dust in the whole universe. How could we ever try to brush it clean?
Everything is manifest at this very place. Where are we supposed to direct the feet of our practice?
Now, if you make the slightest discrimination, you will create a gap like that between heaven and earth.
If you follow one thing while you resist the other, your mind will be shattered and lost.
Suppose you are confident in your understanding and rich in enlightenment, gaining the wisdom that knows at a glance, attaining the way and clarifying the mind, arousing an aspiration to reach for the heavens. Now your head is stuck in the entrance-way, while your body has no clue how to get out.
Although Shakyamuni was wise at birth, can't you see the traces of his six years of upright sitting? Bodhidharma transmitted the mind-seal from India. Can't you hear the echo of the nine years he sat facing a wall?
If even the ancient sages were like this, how can we today dispense with wholehearted practice? Therefore, put aside the intellectual practice of investigating words and chasing phrases, and learn to take the backward step that turns the light and shines it inward.
Your body and mind will drop away of themselves, and your original face will manifest. If you want to get into touch with things as they are, you - right here and now - have to start being yourself, as you are.
For practicing Zen, a quiet room is suitable. Eat and drink moderately. Put aside all involvements and suspend all affairs.
Don't think about "good" or "bad". Don't judge true or false. Your mind, intellect, and consciousness are spinning around - let them have rest. Give up measuring with thoughts, ideas, and views. Have no designs on becoming a Buddha. How could that be limited to sitting or lying down?
When you sit, spread a mat and put a cushion on it. Sit either in the full-lotus or half-lotus position. In the full-lotus position, first place your right foot on your left thigh, then your left foot on your right thigh. In the half-lotus position, simply place your left foot on your right thigh.
Tie your robes loosely and arrange them neatly. Then place your right hand on your left leg and your left hand on your right palm, thumb-tips lightly touching.
Straighten your body and sit upright, leaning neither left nor right, neither forward nor backward. Align your ears with your shoulders and your nose with your navel. Rest the tip of your tongue against the front of the roof of your mouth, with teeth and lips together both shut. Always keep your eyes open, and breathe softly through your nose. Once you have adjusted your posture, take a breath and exhale fully, rock your body right and left, and settle into steady, immovable sitting. Think of not thinking. Not thinking: What kind of thinking is that? Letting thoughts go (Nonthinking). This is the essential art of zazen.
Zazen is not a meditation technique. It is simply the Dharma gate of joyful ease, it is practicing the realization of the boundless Dharma way. Here, the open mystery manifests, and there are no more traps and snares for you to get caught in.
If you grasp the point, you are like a dragon gaining the water, like a tiger taking to the mountains. For you must know that the true Dharma appears of itself, so that from the start dullness and distraction are struck aside.
When you arise from sitting, move slowly and quietly, calmly and deliberately. Don't do it head over heels. Understand that those who transcended the mundane and sacred, and died while either sitting or standing, have all committed themselves entirely to this power.
In addition, turning the Dharma wheel with a finger, a banner, a needle, or a mallet, and realizing it with a whisk, a fist, a staff, or a shout - these cannot be understood by discriminative thinking. Much less can they be known through the practice of supernatural power. Your conduct must be beyond seeing forms and hearing sounds, it must be based on the order that is prior to knowledge and views. Don't worry about if you are more intelligent than the others, or not. Make no distinction between the dull and the sharp-witted. If you concentrate your effort single-mindedly, that in itself is wholeheartedly engaging the way. Practice-realization is naturally undefiled. Practicing the way means to live the present day.
In our world and others, in both India and China, all equally hold the buddha-seal. The wind of truth is blowing unhindered, so just give yourself to the sitting, be totally blocked in resolute stability.
Although they say that there are ten thousand distinctions and a thousand variations, just wholeheartedly engage the way in zazen. Why leave behind the seat in your own home to wander in vain through the dusty realms of other lands? If you make one misstep you stumble past what is directly in front of you. You have gained the pivotal opportunity of human form. Do not pass your days and nights in vain.
You met the Buddha way in this life - how could you waste your time delighting in sparks from a flint stone? Form and substance are like the dew on the grass, the fortunes of life like a dart of lightning - emptied in an instant, vanished in a flash.
Please, honored followers of Zen, long accustomed to groping for the elephant, do not doubt the true dragon.
Devote your energies to the way that points directly to the real thing. Revere the one who has gone beyond learning and is free from effort.
Share the wisdom of Buddhas with Buddhas, transmit the samadhi of patriarchs to patriarchs. Continue to live in such a way, and you will be such a person. The treasure store will open of itself, it is up to you to use it freely.
-Dogen zenji
僧問：狗子還有佛性也無?—The Recorded Sayings of Zen Master Joshu, koan 132, translation by James Green
師云：無。
問：上至諸佛，下至螻蟻皆有佛性，狗子為什麼卻無?
師云：為伊有業識在。
A monk asked, "Does a dog have a Buddha-nature or not?"
The master said, "Mu!"
The monk said, "Above to all the Buddhas, below to the crawling bugs, all have Buddha-nature. Why is it that the dog has not?"
The master said, "Because he has the nature of karmic delusions".
"Ku," "mu" or "sūnyatā" is the underlying true nature of all phenomena. Often translated (read: "dumbed-down") as "emptiness" or "void", it is the base level of reality in a Buddhist paradigm. And, (all too) often, this--to outside observers--is seen as being tinged with negativity. "What point is there to life if all things are empty? That sounds suspiciously like nihilism, and I don't like that!" More advanced or formal practitioners appreciate that this is not, in fact, a proper apprehension of the concept. They do, however, understand why so many misapprehend the concept of ku. Were it to be easy, we'd all have a handle on it by now, and render practice unnecessary.
Every practice, every step on the path--be it kinhin, a walk to the library, or a wiping of your ass--is a practice of ku. Every sneeze, burp, fart, back-rub, egg-scramble, oil-change, fapp, nose-pick, letter-opening, thrust, wince, hug, smile, frown... everything is empty and without form. A true apprehension leads one to experience that every sneeze, burp, fart, back-rub, egg-scramble, oil-change, fapp, nose-pick, letter-opening, thrust, wince, hug, smile, frown... everything is the entire Universe. Whole, total and complete, lacking nothing.
As I am off for a week of monastic retreat (or "sesshin") starting on Monday, I leave you with this:
In your life, in your daily experience of now, where do you touch "ku"? Have you? Do you? What has this experience done for you? Where/how does it manifest? Does it inform your life, or vice-versa?May all beings achieve enlightenment, even before me...
I've been struggling the past few days. After returning from the Mindful Eating retreat, I was on a bit of a high. I felt empowered. A tad more in control. I dropped below 240lbs. I had a job interview that went really well, and I look to be employed soon by a non-profit that I really believe in. Our sangha has finally found a suitable building, and will pay a mere song for it, not a Wagnerian opera's worth. I was feeling like... I dunno. Things felt good.
Somewhere between there and here, I've slid back into some old, unhelpful ways. It's illustrated something to me: No matter how "in control" one feels, it's an illusion. A delusion, more rightly. And it reinforces to me Sekito Kisen's admonition: "Do not waste your time by night or day!"[1]
It's so easy to lose sight of what's important, truly important. It's almost as if we--as monkeys--are programmed to lose it. I suppose in a way we are, or else practice would be unnecessary.
The weight has ticked back up on the scale a bit. Not dangerously so, but not insignificantly either. I feel a clinging arising in me lately. A desire to fill voids. A habit of seeing voids where there are none, or making them in my mind in order to feel gratified when they are filled, or by what I choose to stuff them full of.
This I believe is coming from anxiety.
The anxiety isn't as great as it has been in the past about this. I don't feel panicked. I know I'll be fine. I have been needing to do this for quite a while, and I have the support of my teachers and my friends, both inside and outside the sangha. I know I'm "ready" to do this.
I am just railing against the ideas of discomfort and dissatisfaction. Fighting preconceived notions of a future that I think I may have an idea about. How dumb. Here I am, the guy that tells everyone to have no preconceptions, yet I'm busy being bitten in the ass by my own.
But that's just as it goes, innit?
I'm happy, though, in that I do now taste a difference on my palate regarding this anxiety. It's less than it used to be. I'm vastly more anxious about being away from my cat for a week, and her needs, than I am my own. The worse that will happen to me is that I'm mildly uncomfortable and slightly annoyed for a week. I've suffered worse.
I know this is a bit of a scatter-shot blog today. Sorry. Just spitting out a mouthful of what's on my tongue. Maybe if I do it on a piece of white paper, we can have a pretty Rorschach to look at?
My Dear Son George:
I am more than bursting with joy this morning. The glad news of peace arrived yesterday at half-past 2 o'clock. What a relief and comfort to all mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers and all sweethearts.
Every whistle and bell and bugle and horn was heard for miles around. Yes, more than that, the roosters crew all night and Darkey howled and Sport barked and all the cows came bellowing to the barn and everything was at a standstill.
John just got through plowing as the whistles blew. It was a real holiday.
And the night before, they had devotions in our church and blessed the service flag. Sadie and Ella rang for the dedication and thanks to Almighty God and the Blessed Mother, there aren't any gold stars on it yet, if all be true which I hope it is.
Last night I dreamed I seen you coming up the road driving the gray team on an old buggie and you looked so small and thin. The first time I ever dreamed of you. We got all your letters and Johney's letter came a few days ago.
So, you seen General Pershing.
Well, George, I have no more paper and I want to write so bad. Excuse this letter this time.
With love from your loving Mother.
P.S. Schools and churches and everything was shut down the past five weeks. Elmer (Barnes) had the flu so bad he died three times, but still lives and is feeling fine.
(James Mullins, formerly of Manitowoc, and now teaching at St. Ambrose College in Davenport, Iowa, found this letter among his mother's keepsakes after her death several years ago. He sent copies to other relatives, including Mrs. Justin Mullins, (formerly Mary Claire Barnes) who brought it to the newspaper office. Mrs. Grady was her grandmother.
Mrs. Grady writer of the letter, was the former Mary Logan, and the family farm was on County Highway C, where it is still operated by Mr. and Mrs. Gordon Grady and Mrs. Ruth Grady. Ruth's late husband was John Grady who is mentioned in the letter.)
On this Veteran's Day, 2010, 92 years after the armistice, a letter from my maternal grandfather, George Grady, a conscientious objector in WWI, who served as a corpsman and ordinance technician throughout France between 1916-1919, to my great grandmother, Mary Logan-Grady, of Valders, WI.Charpentry, France
Jan 1st, 1919
Dearest Mother-
Well, another year has rolled around and in place of the grim and hideous spectacle which the last few years have found confronting them on taking their appointed place in the ages, it finds all mankind at peace. I can well imagine with what a frenzied and momentous joy the wild bells ushered in this new year of nineteen hundred and nineteen. God grant that all subsequent years finds the world more securely attached to peace and peaceful pursuits.
It would be too bad if this war has been fought in vain, unless the whole world stands as a unit and agrees to abolish compulsory military service and fails to uphold the fourteen points of President Wilson's plan, I am sure in a few years expect the same awful catastrophe to occur again and with more terrible and appalling results. There is no way to judge the future but by the past. My prayers now are for the peace counsil [sic] which is soon to sit. I hope God be with them in their work so that their poor blind eyes be able to see their way clear and guide them aright. On their heads rest the future of this turbulent sphere. How well their work is done determines the safety of it. Let us sincerely hope and pray for the best so that the sacrifices and heroic sufferings and efforts will bear fruit.
-PVT George W. Grady
Ordinance Detachment
American Expeditionary Force
France
To go deeper than ever before
Presupposes a shallowness that may
or may not
be a delusion.
Can the ocean ever truly be shallow?
Can the sea ever be anything other than the sea?
Are there parts that are one thing,
but not the other?
I peak
as a wave
acting alone
but never truly
Alone.
I crest
like a mountain
atop an ever moving
firmament.
I crash
like diamonds
upon an eternal and endless
shore.
I recede
back into the depths
of the infinite potential of
suchness.
I am
as you are.
Same.
Same.
But different.
An ango (安居), for those who don't know, is a period of more intensive practice in a zen sangha or monastery. My sangha observes one every autumn. For us, it's traditional to make an ango vow or commitment; some extra practice like bowing, chanting, memorizing a sutra, daily- or extra zazen, etc. This year, I was having a hard time coming up with something that resonated with me. Last year I committed to sit every time my sangha was at the dharma center (of 32 opportunities, I missed four. Jes' sayin'...). This year, I was thinking of trying to memorize the Shosai Myokichijo Dharani, which always renders me dumb and mum. I may still. I'll be chanting it daily for six days in about two weeks.
But this past weekend, I attended my teacher, Chozen Bays-roshi's Mindful Eating retreat at Great Vow Zen Monastery. The retreat was a gift to me by my friend Bansho, but it was a bit extra significant for a few reasons. I've dropped over fifty pounds this year, and I really wanted to attend this retreat. He's been following my progress, and had purchased this retreat with the intent of making it a scholarship. I suddenly couldn't come up with the finances to attend, and it all fell neatly into place.
I'll talk a bit more about the experience in a future post, but suffice it to say that I came up with my commitment tonight as I ate dinner half ōryōki-style. I will eat at least one meal a day this way throughout all of ango.
Keep at it. Your practice is quite literally of the utmost importance to all beings throughout space and time...
-bows of gratitude-
=/\=
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