What's Real?

I've been sick for a few days now. At first I thought it was a bad cold, but now I think it's the flu, maybe even the dreaded H1N1, aka "swine flu."

I had a hard time falling asleep last night because I felt so hot and feverish. I kept running a damp wash cloth over my forehead and cheeks--ahhh, cool. But the intense heat soon returned.

I don't remember falling asleep. But I do remember waking up with a very small, very intense pain in my gut. Uh oh, I thought, diarrhea. So I got out of bed and sat on the toilet in the dark and tried to relax while the pain twisted its way through my bowels. But nothing came out, not even a fart. I went back to bed. When the next cramp came, I got up again and sat on the toilet in the dark. I did this several times because I really did not want to release a pint or more of liquid shit onto our bed or the hardwood floors. Finally, sitting on the toilet, with my head between my knees, half-asleep, I felt my bowels began to release. Ahh.

It wasn't what I'd call diarrhea though it was nasty enough in its own way and took its own sweet time easing out of my feverish body. I remembered reading about a woman, my age, in good health, who died of swine flu. I thought, I don't care, let me die now. Then I looked out the window and saw by the light of the just waning moon, the maple tree in our back yard. Ah, that's real, I thought. And went back to bed.

ALL Beings?

The other night, as I was brushing my teeth, I leaned over the basin and let a dollop of toothpaste infused saliva fall from my mouth. Too late I saw the tiny green bug upon which--plop--the white glob fell.

I felt bad.

At first, I tried removing the mess with my finger but my spit was so sticky and the bug was so small. Then I got the idea of gently using an ear swab to pick the whole conglomeration, bug and all, up with one deft swirl. I put it into a small bowl and rinsed the bug clean and then, using the other end of the swab, picked it up and put it on a dry spot on the counter.

When I got up in the morning the bug was not where I left so I thought, "maybe I saved it."

That night, sitting with Margaret on out patio eating supper, I felt a mosquito bite. One slap and it was dead.

What kind of mind is this?

A Bag of Manure

Once Linc Rhodes JDPSN offered a student a bag of manure for her garden. The student politely refused, saying, “Oh, no, I couldn’t." Linc told her, “When someone offers you manure, you should always accept it.” The student was enlightened.

Commentary: One by one each thing has it. One by one, each thing is complete.

Questions:

1. What did the student attain?
2. If you were there, how would you have answered?

Singing Impermanence

I've been doing most of my blogging over at Professor Hauck these days. You might want to mosey on over there for a look at some of the other sides of my blogospheroself. In the meantime, here's another reflection from the Cave:

Even before Margaret and Linc and I stepped out of the Providence Zen Center on Tuesday night, we could hear the frogs in the pond calling loudly to one another, singing for love. I felt so happy, knowing they had awakened from their long sleep in the cold mud and were ready to do it all over again, the feeding and singing and breeding. Pretty soon tadpoles will be swimming voraciously through the shallows. Many will be eaten by larger creatures, koi and egret, but many will survive, tails dissolving, arms and legs sprouting. And then they’ll hop up on the shore and add their voices to the cacophony. This is the way of the world.

Frogs hold a special place in my heart because of their transformation, not simply from baby to adult, but from fish-like swimmer to reptilian hopper. They are visible and audible manifestation of the impermanence of all things.

You know perhaps that frog populations are in decline world-wide. Scientists speculate that they are ultrasensitive to environmental changes such as increased toxins and shifts in air temperature and water quality. A day may come very soon when the frogs sing no more in the spring. This is very sad, and yet completely inevitable. Their extinction—and one day ours—is as much a part of the vast cycles of birth and death as the changing of the seasons. We all know these things, but as we go about our day-to-day business we tend to push them to the far frontiers of our consciousness. It is hard enough to contemplate the death of those we love or of our (gulp) own dear selves, but almost unbearable to think about the extinction of life on our planet.

As it happens, a friend's death had brought us and many others to the Zen Center that night. We all felt very sad, because JW suffered so much before he died and because we will miss him and because one day each of us will also pass. So the loud lewd singing of the frogs lightened my heart because I could remember that all this suffering and death is part of a larger cycle, one that is perhaps too large for us to grasp.

When we got back to Linc’s apartment, Margaret gave me a gift she had purchased earlier that day thinking to give it as an anniversary present in August. But suddenly decided it was supremely appropriate for that time and place.

Will it surprise you know that she gave me a sterling silver frog pin?

As long as I own that pin it will remind me of more things than I can say, of Margaret’s great love, of JW, the singing frogs, the blue tiled roof of the Diamond Monastery high above the pond, our dear teacher, the waning moon, our grief and our laughter, the long ride home.

Ji Jang Bosal

JW Harrington, May 8, 1958 - April 7, 2009.

JW, for twenty years the Executive Director of the Kwan Um School of Zen, took his own life yesterday afternoon in Providence, Rhode Island. He is survived by his wife, Jayne, his mother, and thousands of friends around the world.

I did not know JW well, but in our many phone conversations and emails he was always friendly and efficient. Once, during Kyol Che, I did some office work for him. He had such a beautiful calm light. Now I feel so sad for him. He must have felt so desperate and alone.

Let us keep one another close.

Last Breath

A friend of a friend died yesterday. His name was Ken. I didn't know him. But my friend was distressed, and I feel sad for her. 

I suppose I feel sad for us all. Death is so close to us always, separate from us by nothing more than the thin tissue of our breath. But it's only when somebody dies that death becomes visible. We shiver. We draw closer together. Then life sweeps us up again, and we forget this constant companion who one day will take each of us.

The proximity of death is one reason to practice. It gives us the courage to keep following our last breath, without fear, whereever it leads.