Sun Temple

Happy Solstice

These last ten days of the year serve as a non-secular retreat for most of the western world. Not much of a contemplative retreat but for many, a certain anticipation of leisure and good food. Nuts will be cracked! Blogs and media retrospectives will summarize the year in politics and entertainment, obituaries, sports, the best and worst of '08' lists are hurriedly being composed. And that ain't all...

Amongst my friends, there are impoverished buddhists who invest way more time, money and energy in celebrating Christmas than they do in any Buddhist holiday. Ask and they will say they do it for their kids or grandkids, (who are neither Christian nor being raised Christian). When I consider this kind of situation, it seems redolent with suffering. Having failed to create/discover an alternative means of expression, people resignedly conform and initiate the young into the mindless rituals of consumerist culture, encouraging cycles of expectation and disapointment in relation to the year's 'take'.

From where i sit, the midday sun streams thru the highest branches of the tulip magnolia in the yard, throwing a broken shadow on some of the plants clustered at the base of the glass door. It will only be like this for a few more days as the arc begins ascending higher into the sky. If you think of it, pull back the curtains and note the westernmost place where the last direct rays of sun strike a wall in your home before sunset tonight. Mark it! If the sky is clear, you should be able to do this unless your apartment faces east or north. To complete the mission, do it again on an equinox and the summer solstice. Now you live in a sun temple.

Last night we were talking about how it is increasingly common for us to consider the nature of the food we eat, means of production, cost, how it is prepared and the quality of the environment wherein it is consumed. That's a big source of our energy but by no means the only one. So as we move into this period, remember the supreme gifts of appreciation, consecrated presence, simple mindfulness, conscious breathing, relaxed alertness, good humor, good company to y'all...

Trust

We rarely lock our doors. Years ago, when we first moved here, our only neighbors were two brothers, local boys and their wives, occupying separate trailers. One of their little girls would remove any prayer flags she came across in the woods or by our spring. We simply replaced them. The child's grandmother was equally curious and quietly climbed the hill behind us to see what the hippies do up there and discovered what she called 'kung-fu altars' which was apparently a relief as there were rumours about 'devil-altars'. Good woman that she is, Christine checked the hill out our for herself and assured her friends that whatever it was that we were doing, it was definitely not demonic. Eventually, their little clan moved away and sold the land to other members of our sangha.

An assortment of crystals and stones, some carved into the shape of turtles, dorjes, bells, sea shells and antlers, conchs, and buddha statues cover these little shrines and beyond changing a worn cloth or adding a new offering, they have sat undisturbed for decades.

My closest neighbors are friends who bought some of the land next door. They live another quarter mile into the woods where the road comes to a dead end. We often make use of this stretch for short afternoon walks. They had attended a Christmas recital at the local school where their kids performed Mozart's Night Music and came home to find their house had been robbed. We are pretty sure we know who did it. It is pretty quiet back here. Sometime in the afternoon, a car sped up the road so fast that the noise got my son's attention, allowing him to identify the vehicle through the now bare woods. The police were called. Everything is replaceable except the trust.

December Twilight

Returning from a late afternoon walk we stopped to look at the sky in the west. Above the hills, luminosity pouring through a network of bare trees like stained glass, a few dense clouds hovering in the upper branches of the hickories glow fiery orange, soon burnishing an intense bronze before cooling to purple. Padmasambhava's Copper-Colored Mountain is said to be somewhere in that range of light to the southwest.

One day the three masters decided to have a horse race and see who would win. Chokgyur Lingpa, on a dappled horse, came first, followed by Jamyang Khyentse on a dark blue horse. Kongtrul finished last and arrived crying like a child. “I am so unfortunate,” he wailed. Some people said, “Jamgon Kongtrul is usually a great lama, but he weeps when he loses a horse race.” Others said it was because he was the oldest. The real reason was they were seeing who would first reach the Copper-Colored Mountain.

-from The Life of Chokgyur Lingpa as spoken by Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche

The Western Quarter

There is a wooded hill directly behind my house occupying about twenty acres and rising a hundred feet or so above the valley floor. The slopes are covered in trees. Three paths lead to the top; one on the north, one on the south and one on the east. The center of the hill is grassy, open and park-like. To have access to such a place, which is bigger than many urban parks and far more secluded is a good dream. I moved here to get my family out of the crowded, spiritually sterile and criminally overpriced suburbs of New England. Nineteen years ago, after having lived on this land for a year, my sons helped me begin tracing a circular path through the woods around the crown of the hill. At first they just followed me as we shuffled our feet and kicked leaves out of the way. Then we raked and set up rough little altars that were generally oriented in the cardinal directions and sat a little metal Buddha statue on each one.

Four years later, after a lightning bolt struck the northern altar and burnt it to the ground, my good neighbor Rigdzin replaced the old stumps with a simple slab of sweet cedar laid across cedar posts. The ladies sewed altar cloths in bright solid colors, one for each of the four directions. These cover the wood and are replaced about once a year. Gradually, each altar was outfitted with an incense burner, a bell and dorje, prayer flags, a conch, flowers, a turtle shell, a bench and many other offerings.

According to the Vajrayana mandala, spring is associated with twilight and the western direction so today I sat on the bench before the fire altar at sundown. Two tall oaks, one red and one white, frame the seat. A small mossy circle around the altar and bench has been raked free of leaves, but we are in the woods. A fair mixture of oak, hickory, poplar, and tupelo with white flowering dogwoods illuminating the understory. The land falls steeply away into a dark valley toward the creek before quickly rising again. Another heavily wooded hill of the same height rises a few hundred yards to the west with trees so tall that even here on the crest of the hill, I feel as if I am still in a valley; the density of the wood and spring foliage conspire to raise the horizon so that everyday fewer beads of orange solar fire bleed through the new growth.

The bench I sit upon features a large blood red triangle bordered by a two small disks, one red and one white, symbolizing sun and moon. The western altar is associated with the element of heat and illumination, so the fading cloth and tattered prayer flags between the trees are all shades of red. Amitabha, the Buddha of Infinite Light holds a bowl of immortality nectar and Guru Padmasambhava sits before him, brandishing a dorje vertically before his chest, the Diamond Axis which does not change or die. A chubby Hwa Shang lounges and laughs.

Offerings include two perfect flint arrowheads possibly fashioned by Chickasaw hunters discovered in local fields which echo the triangle shape. A shiney black core of obsidian from the highlands of Guatemala , a dense igneous stone from the top of a 13,000 foot volcano, lava rocks from New Mexico, sandstone from Canyonlands in Utah, a delicate conch with a good sharp tone from the Gulf of Mexico, a clear finger of crystal emerging from a fist of white quartz with a few smooth red stones from the Colorado Rockies, various shells, beads and many crystals.

This is the dimension of the lotus, the blessings of the ever youthful Padmasambhava, who along with Great Silent Shakyamuni, is considered an earthly manifestation (nirmanakaya) of Amitabha. According to Indo-Tibetan lore, the natural beauty of the peacock's tail is a result of her ability to consume poisons. During this dusk of transition from cold of longest night to heat of longest day, things are seen in an ever new light. The heat and energy of desire is transformed into discriminating awareness wisdom. The true nature of perception is revealed as infinite light.

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Along with the Mahayanist expansion of the buddhist sangha to include layman in the common era, there also evolved an arsenal of upaya (skilfull means) including the use of celestial bodhisattavas such as Avalokitesvara as a devotional focus. The tantric cartography of these principles gave rise to the double-dorje mandala associated with the peaceful deities of the heart center.

One of the earliest forms of such devotional worship and focus in Buddhism was the cult of Amitabha. The Buddha of Infinite Light and his retinue occupy the western quarter of the mandala. Some aspects of Amitabha's qualities may have originated in Iran where prior to the time of the Buddha, the Zoroastrians had developed the HOMA ritual. A sacred barbecue was combined with the use of a vegetable intoxicant. With the coming of the teacher Zarathustra, the use of the sacrament was criticized and associated with moral excesses. His popularity and the politics of the day led to abandoning the psycho-actives at least at public gatherings, but they kept the barbecue ritual central. The energy of the teacher's physical presence and spiritual influence around a communal meal was to replace what in some circles, had degenerated into the obscuring stupor of mundane intoxication. The terms homa and the soma (of the rishis), are cognate.

If not earlier, the Zoroastrian strain of the fire puja practice eventually migrated across the Hindu-Kush with the Parsis around the same time that Padmasambhava was visiting Tibet. It is likely that both he and they were fleeing Islamic oppression. India has had contact with 'lands beyond the Indus' since the times of the Mahabharata (5th c. BCE) and fire rituals were old hat, and were even performed by Brahman priests at the time of Sakyamuni. The Buddha taught his listeners the inner meaning of such ancient practices and openly criticized the superstitious, corrupt and spiritually inefficient rites of the old tradition and the caste system in which it operated.

The Western Pureland tradition blossomed on China's Mount Lushan in 402 and the mantra of Avalokitesvara, a bodhisattva in Amitabha's retinue, was chanted by the Tibetan King, fifty years before Padmasambhava came to Tibet Over the centuries since the Buddha's passing, various sacred forms had evolved to help practitioners recall the teachings and to invoke the spiritual presence of the teacher. But it seems that the actual practice of buddhist fire pujas began after Padmasambhava began working on the construction of Samye, the first monastery in Tibet. Originally, it was the smoke from burnt offerings which carried the essences to the host. The fire puja was intended to pacify demons both internal and external, obstructing worthy efforts. Padmasambhava had very likely been exposed to both Zoroastrian and Manichaean (with its legions of devils) teachings in his homeland and possibly adapted elements from indigenous Bon shamans as well.

An interesting note on the possible geographic location of Oddiyana, long assumed to be in the Swat Valley of Pakistan, although supportive archaeological evidence does not yet exist;

According to the late H.V. Guenther in Wholeness Lost, Wholeness Regained, "There is no evidence for either Alexander Cunningham's or Giuseppe Tucci's identification of Uddiyana with the Swat Valley in Pakistan. On the contrary, all the evidence points to Central Asia south of the Aral Sea. What they overlook or deliberately ignore is the unanimously accepted tradition of Padmasambhava's birthplace being associated with a lake and the overwhelming frequency of the ending, -ana in Central Asian place names, for instance, Sogdhiana, Drangiana, Ferghana, and so on, and even the name Urgensch (see Edgar Knobloch, Beyond the Oxus, p. 73). It therefore seems to be more reasonable to connect his birthplace with Sogdhiana, situated around Lake Aral, and to take note of the fact that the Sogdhians were highly educated people whose religion "was a synthesis of many creeds and currents, incorporating elements of Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism, Buddhism, and Christianity, together with Greek and Indian mythology. Trade with China was entirely in their hands and their outposts and settlements were scattered practically all over Chinese Turkestan" (Edgar Knobloch, Beyond the Oxus, p. 54). This synthesis, if not so say, syncretism is quite evident in Padmasambhava's own writings. It is more than likely that, when the Sogdhian civilization was crushed by the Arabs, he came as a "refugee" to Tibet and, in order to protect his relatives, who were left behind, declared himself to have neither a father nor a mother.

Mississippian Era Mud

The earth is still very alive. Early this morning slipping outside and pissing in the overgrown grass before spreading a cup of bird seed on the little wooden platform. Mowing late this year and offering free brunch has attracted more birds than usual. A Rose-breasted Grosbeak couple has recently nested in the neighborhood. I came back inside, turned on the 'puter when Dechen leaned over the railing above and asked if I'd felt the earthquake. Really? I hadn't felt a thing. She awoke at 4:37 a.m. with the bed shaking, the rod iron design on the wall above her pillow rattling. She wondered if the roof was going to blow off from a low pressure cell, (not an uncommon feeling around here) and then realized it wasn’t a storm at all, maybe density waves from helicopter blades? Recognition that the entire house was moving gave rise to a transcendent sense of place. She was feeling the release of great pressures deep in the earth's crust in a fault zone associated with the New Madrid earthquakes of 1812. Turtle Hill rises about 200 miles SSE from the epicenter 7.2 miles below the Wabash Valley of southeastern Illinois, but the shift woke her up. Tenkar felt it too, thought it a hellacious wind and drifted back to sleep. A harmless earthquake is a bit like a good entheogenic opening; a powerful reminder that things are not as solid or permanent as they may appear.

I was fast asleep for this one and have not experienced a good temblor for nearly thirty years. We were living in the hills above Lake Atitlan in Guatemala experimenting with soybeans and amaranth. In nearby Nicaragua, Sandinista Rebels had recently deposed the intolerably corrupt second generation dictator Anastasio Somoza. An electric surge of emotion accompanied this news as it spread through the highlands with the poor in good humor and the rich sweating new fear. The ongoing civil conflict in Guatemala was about to enter its most violent years. Tenkar was pregnant with Zoe, our third child. I was digging a hole for an outhouse. Progress stalled in the subsoil, where a layer of highly compressed volcanic clay required an initial breakup and loosening with a pick before filling buckets with chunks of tal-petate to deepen the hole. I was on my knees in the rubble a few feet below ground level, filling a tin when a wave passed which seemed to turn the ground to jelly beneath me, lifting and dropping one knee and then the other as the earth rippled like a snake and folks came tearing out of the main house hollering.

As the unquestioned abstraction of a solid earth persists in spite of the occasional quake or gamma ray blast, mind tends to casually equate a reality and stability to objects they do not possess. Basking in the seeming permanence of life, paying easy homage to idols of worldly happiness and counterfeit spirituality, the worship of fabrications, the fruit clinging to a seed of assumed existence; the separate self located within the infinite multiplicity of a world machine. We do not refer to real objects but deal in psychic artifacts, relative classifications of phenomena, manufactured according to user needs with no real borders; adopted and abandoned at will. Mind looks to relations and things, rituals of seeking through knowldege, friendships and possessions -- for keys and fulfillment, clinging to familiar forms and habits, reference points to continually recreate and identify a center of control, to re-affirm a sense of self-existence.

Inseparable from all of that, Mayapple groves simply appear on the lower slopes of Resistance Ridge and tulip poplars climb straight up toward the clouds. An old bearded friend who favors a beret lives up top, his movement and conversation hidden behind a thick grove of dark green bamboo. It is the same way on this side. This great hillside mass of organic silence and resistance between us offers vision and privacy and most years, hosts the play of barred owls.

Dechen, Tenkar and I walked further up into the hollow this afternoon, past magnolia, down the road below unimaginably pink redbuds afloat in the understory, an intensity long natural to this forested place, nameless hollow in these low hills of southern Tennessee. The gray gravel path runs beside a thick mat of watercress thriving in a spring called virtue. Further up red road identifying leafless trees by bark alone hackberry, sycamore, sweet gum, cherry and beech growing down out of small islands in multi-braided creek. The path leads around the biggest white oak on the land curving upon a ledge, creamy narcissus looking civilized among old foundation stones where the blacksmith's family settled long ago. Small pale yellow-green flowering dogwoods tweaked contrast under overcast skies at catkin time, a thousand baby junipers showing promise, chickweed, purple phlox and coils of fiddleheads laughing on mossy paths with a dozen other kinds of wildflowers blooming everywhere through the woods transforming clear light above into multi-color life below before the canopy mosaic fills in warm green summer shadows. A lizard scampers up a drain pipe and two black snakes, one coiled with head lifted and tongue flickering in bamboo, another gliding across dry leaves as we pass through a scattering of deer bones. "A charnel ground," I mutter as satin gray slithers off into a brush pile.

Descending out of the woods toward the soft dirt around the edge of the pond we come upon plenty of deer tracks. As beautiful and attractive as such open places can be, the water hole is notoriously dangerous. Nobody but human beings and their dogs drink at ease here. Dechen calls me over to look at a large footprint and what certainly appear to be bobcat tracks. They usually walk with their claws retracted so this one must have been on the move. First time I've seen those in these parts. I’ll bet I know what he had for dinner.

Bobcat track next to deer hoof print in soft Mississippian era mud (shot by Tenkar). According to Wiki, "The Bobcat's range does not seem to be limited by human populations, as long as it can still find a suitable habitat; only large, intensively cultivated tracts are unsuitable for the species. The animal may appear in backyards in "urban edge" environments, where human development intersects with natural habitats."

Aggregates

Pinson Mound

The largest Middle Woodland Period (200 bce - 400 ce) archaeological site in the Southeast. Twelve mounds, a geometric earthen enclosure, and ritual activity areas cover four hundred acres. Five large rectangular platform mounds (ranging in height from 7 to 72 feet) of Middle Woodland age underscores the unique nature of the Pinson Mounds site.

A tornado hit Lawrence county yesterday morning, passing about ten miles south of our house. With cloud tops above 45,000 feet high winds approaching from the southwest destroyed four homes and damaged at least 100 more. Five people were injured but fortunately, nobody was killed. That makes 16 tornadoes touching down in our county in the past 18 years (1990-2008).

Memucan Hunt Howard, (1807-1856) expressed a familiar assumption about the lack of indigenous settlements in this part of the country. "I have heard it said that the Indians, when asked why none of them lived in West Tennessee, replied that it leaked too much. For a time, after I first went there I thought it rained, hailed, thundered and lightened with more wind than I had known elsewhere."

At 14 years old, Howard was working as a surveyor in the woods of western Tennessee when his crew came across evidence of 'the one's who came before'. Howard describes the scene of the discovery. "Each party had a trumpet or horn by which we could generally find each other and the packmen, the more readily - The Trumpets were carried at our backs to prevent it from interfering with the with the compass needle. On emerging from the swamp of the middle fork of the Forked Deer River, about a dozen miles above Jackson when going south-to high land we came to a large bold spring of water and camped between it & a mound some six or seven feet high, and extensive enough for Houses & a small yard, and a large body of beautiful rich level heavy timbered land adjacent to it, with which Pinson was so much pleased that some one of the Company proposed to call it Mount Pinson; we did not see or know of the large Mounds two or three miles further South for months afterward, (...) I saw the large mound a year or two later supposed it to be about 70 or 75 feet high, and was nearly four hundred yards in circumference-near it was a square Mound (I think it was square) about twenty feet high smaller Mounds dikes etc. abounded thereabouts."

These earthworks are some of the oldest evidence of human communities in North America. The park where they are located is often empty and silent, a good support for walking meditation best visited between autumn and early spring while the forms of the hills are revealed and the bugs are dormant. Like the monolith in 2001, the mounds present an existential gravitas that plunges the mind into a deeper consideration of our evolutionary origins and cultural patterns. Sir Arthur C. Clarke who passed away last winter gave the monolith the same ratios as the UN Building on the East River in Manhattan. On the most basic level, such consecrated mass evokes a sense of the inherent order of the universe including the ability and obligation to come together and conduct this energy in a pure way. The ultimate artifact has been communicated in various ways throughout history, but beyond all drama and formal expression lies the primary mandala of contelligence, the truth of interdependence. Earthen altars invite participation in the great process of cosmic alchemy, bringing together elements both sentient and non-sentient, bridging past and future, spontaneously harmonizing the aggregates, as loving friends, couples, families, communities, and natural systems in expressing what is already whole by nature.

Built up by manual labor, one basketful of dirt at a time, the mounds contain burials and like major complexes in Mexico and Guatemala, reflect an awareness of astronomical patterns framing yearly agricultural and ritual events. Pyramids, medieval cathedrals, stupas and sun temples the mounds embody subtle signatures of the essential, unchanging reality of radiant being at the heart of all change, an invocation of the sacred nature of space and time, the non-duality of life and death, bridging the world above with the one below.

Tikal, Guatemala

Some Native Americans are requesting that the mounds be returned to their original state, free of trees. Tom Kunesh, activist and founding member of the Advisory Council on Indian Affairs (ACTIA) writes, "Mounds are the single most enduring physical legacy of Native American people who lived in what we now call Tennessee. When they were created the people were reminded daily of their passed relatives and leaders and their relationship to the earth and sun. In the past they were kept clean and visited. Now new gods, both foreign and domestic, have replaced the old ones, and the mounds are covered in trees, testimony to their religious and cultural insignificance, proof of the atheism of their descendants."

Pinson Mound, TN

The Back Way

Rose early to sit with the ladies, to share coffee and some of the best conversation of the day, before they drove north to work. I processed some email, strapped into the old vandura and cautiously lumber south. A 20 year old GMC, with 160K on the engine and she never breaks down.

Before hitting the asphalt, I pass Zoe's trailer which they were going to move today but recent rains have made the ground too soft. I turn onto an old paved railroad bed which parallels the creek, passing a stretch of white-flowering trees. I decide to cross on the first bridge and climb out of the Saw Valley and take Buffalo Road into town. This is one of many 'back' ways into Lawrenceburg, about 14 miles south in any case. The two lane road dips and climbs through a rural setting over the headwaters of the Buffalo River. Shamefully, I lived in Tennessee for many years before knowing that this was not just a good strong name, but that big hairy buffalo, technically bison, were actually common in this area for over three hundred years, having crossed the Mississippi around 1500 CE. I doubt that the Big Muddy has ever frozen over, so they must have swam. Abundant pasturage springing up on the eastern banks in the wake of intentional burns may have attracted them to make the crossing. These controlled fires were used by Indians to drive and trap animals against a wall of flame. Buffalo herds in the east were smaller than their counterparts on the plains, often numbering 50 -100 individuals. Although never as popular as white-tailed deer in the pantry of woodland tribes, the great beast was soon over-hunted by settlers from Pennsylvania to Florida and so disappeared from the east by the 1820's.

My regard gravitates toward familiar references. The shady hollow with the dangerous curve where Dechen's cousin rented a trailer before his fatal accident. The border of pine trees we planted on the Maxen's pricey spread at the top of the hill, and the little wooden house next door that some younger friends used to rent. Once on Buffalo Road itself, I am extra careful. It is very curvey, there is so much to look at this time of year and I don't drive often. Slow moving vehicles such as tractors are common and there is no shoulder. A glance over the hedge at the right moment reveals the house of an old friend still sheathed in blackboard with no permanent siding. They are poor old hippies. About 15 years ago they were forced to leave the community they had lived in for the previous twenty years, so I helped salvage their old house and then rebuild a few miles down the road. Ivan is an interesting if eccentric fellow and used to come visit me once in awhile, but it has been many years as I don't get on well with his wife, who accompanies the old boy everywhere.

I slowed to pass a few Amish men, one walking on roadside gravel, two out doing business in black horse drawn buggies. Two barefoot boys in an empty wagon emerge from a side road, one holding the reins. Everyone waves back. I am driving through the best farm land in the county. The forest opens up and fields stretch from horizon to horizon, interrupted only by a few white houses. The Amish settled here in the 1940's and their busy homesteads occupy these plains. Men wear beards and hats, women long skirts, sleeves and bonnets. They all dress in dark colors, avoid internal combustion engines, electricity and military service. They do however own a diesel generator to run a large carriage saw and provide truckloads of cheap slab for firewood as a byproduct. It keeps us warm through most of the winter.



Purple and blue chromatics from some dewey wildflowers give way to new greens. Are they more or less brilliant because I do not know their names? Patches of earth near the houses have been freshly turned for gardens. An emerald field of winter wheat, thick and headless rises above the bank. At this time of year, passage on Buffalo Road is like driving in a Grant Wood painting.

Made it safely into town, stopped by the library where I picked up a few books o the Indians of the southeast before heading home the 'front' way; Highway 43, formerly Jackson's Military Road, but that my friends, is a topic for another post.

111 over 69

Williamson Medical Center was established in 1957. The Hill-Burton Act provided federal funds to build the hospital, meaning its mission included a focus on providing care without discrimination and regardless of ability to pay. According to their website, Williamson’s beginning was driven by the desire to provide care, to show compassion, to help neighbors. If my experience is any indication, those ideals remain a guiding principle today.

_________

The original idea emerged recently when my friend Fredbear forwarded a hilarious article by Dave Barry about his colonoscopy. A few weeks later, Tenkar brought home a horror tale from work and since I am 52, we decided to 'look into it'. I usually suffice on oxygen and a cup of hot soymilk until early afternoon, so when they told me I couldn't eat anything after breakfast, it wasn't too hard. The worst part was trying to drink a half-gallon of that thick flat lemon-flavored stuff in two hours. Visions of bleached animal skulls near alkali ponds in some western desert; dead from dehydration exacerbated by shitting water faster than it can be replaced.

The nurse wheeled me into the room where the procedure would take place. She was from Oxford Mississippi and used to watch old William Faulkner walk by her school as a child. She squeezed a mound of clear gel onto a tray where a glossy black tube was loosely coiled. Yellow marks and numbers in millimeters along its length provide depth readings.

"Is that it?" "Yep, that's it."

"Can it squirt water?" "Yes it sure can."

She leaned over and hooked a clear line onto a nozzle.

I had been thinking about it last night when I'd wake in the dark, but had not visualized it as black, or so thick. A meshed cable covered in latex, wide enough to contain wiring for a light and camera, a mini-pincer and yes, a water line. Two monitors, dark except for my name in the corner border the bed. I have an iv in my right arm, an automated blood pressure band hooked to a computer on my left; 111 over 69.

"Turn over onto your left side." I could feel the drug moving through me immediately and had no problem surrendering. The next thing I remember is the nurse telling me I can get up and sit back in the wheelchair. I had been unconscious less than an hour.

"So that's all? I'm done?" " Yep, you're done."

I moved from the table to the chair and she rolled me back to a room where Tenkar helped me dress. I was still a little groggy as we walked through the parking lot. I removed the band-aid and gauze where the iv had been and noticed a bright orange plastic bracelet on my right wrist which read SAFE in big black letters.

Like 50 million other Americans, I have no health insurance. But my recent experience with the Williamson County health care system was ideal. The registrar, the doctors, secretaries and all the nurses were angels and made me feel right at home and very comfortable about the whole thing. There was no hassle about our ability to pay; we will work that out over the coming weeks. I was in and out within three hours. All they asked for was $260 up front, and I will let you know the final price after we run the bill through the system. In the meanwhile, everyone seemed to enjoy their job, looked me in the eye and was very kind. You would think we already had socialized medicine in Tennessee.

Benton Chapel

Last week, on a warm spring evening in Nashville, the magnolia trees were in blossom around the chapel on the hill.

We arrived early for the reception in a paneled room with a fireplace, rugs and lots of dark leather furniture. Not only was there no charge, they had a smorgasbord with wine, cheese, pastries and fresh fruit.

All of a sudden, my little group dissolved and I was left alone in this nice space with two black waiters in vests. Ah, disturbing, yet elegant visions of the old South. The irony is so thick here you could build an entire city on it but goes largely unnoticed. They offered me a variety of drinks, including wines and urged me to check out the food. I declined and asked them if they'd seen Obama's speech that morning. Neither of them had, but were interested to know how it went. I told them I agreed with Reverend Wright in the first place but thought Barry O' did a great job of explaining his views.

The older man said, "Hell yeah; like just to offer one small example, what about the Tuskegee men that were shot up with syphilis and never told about it as a government experiment? It isn't like these things have never happened."

The younger guy said, "He's a smart fellow if he can get people to understand."

Amen.

The room filled with all sorts of folks, only a handful of whom I recognized. Loy finally entered wearing a tweed blazer and mustard colored shirt. He stood and talked with some grey haired men in dark suits. I pointed him out to a few folks near me but they all thought I was kidding. I said, no, really, I google him regularly, he's the dude with the beard and big glasses. Finally, Brother Martin went over and said a few words to Mr. Loy and he immediately approached our circle, introduced himself and sat down with us. A gentle hippie buddhist brother now manifesting in an academic's body with a very sharp mind and comprehensive awareness. Told him how much I appreciated his work and the importance of making dharma clarity available and relevant to a wider audience; building practical bridges btwn bald-headed formalism and pop zen-lite. We talked family and culture for a good fifteen minutes. He had spoken in Sewannee the night before.

Before we parted, David invited us all, yeah, you too - up to the Buddhist Peace Fellowship conference in Cincinatti next December.

David Loy

David Loy, Tenkar and myself

Last night sangha, family and friends met in Nashville to attend a free lecture at Vanderbilt University by Buddhist teacher David Loy. The talk was entitled Healing Ecology: A New Spiritual Perspective on the Challenge of Consumerism. Although he has traveled throughout the world, this was his first trip to Tennessee. A podcast of the talk is available here. Some of David's articles and books, such as the excellent Buddhist History of the West, can be a challenge to read but last night, his personal sense of ease, a long familiarity with western culture and study of esoteric dharma combined in a very easy, clear explanation of complex ideas. Loy builds modern bridges, so sorely needed at present, revealing important seeds of buddhist wisdom and offering ground for the process of insight into causal forces. A comprehensive understanding of the mind behind the rising tide of sociological and ecological crises is where transformation begins.

Here is an excerpt from an article written a decade ago but more relevant than ever;

According to Buddhism the three roots of evil are lobha greed, dosa ill-will, and moha delusion. Traditionally these are personal problems, but today they must be understood more structurally, as institutionalized.

Our economic system promotes and even requires greed in at least two ways: desire for continuous profit is necessary to fuel the engine of economic growth, and consumers must be insatiable in order to maintain markets for what can be produced. Although justified as raising standards of living worldwide, economic globalization is actually leading to increasing unemployment and environmental degradation. The U.N. Development Report for 1997 pointed out that 1.3 billion people now live on less than one dollar a day, and estimated that there are 93 countries which have a per capita income below what they had a few decades ago.

Long after the end of the cold war, the U.S. federal government continues to devote about half its resources to maintaining an enormously expensive war machine. Most other countries also continue to spend much more on arms than social services. There is no sign that the military-industrial complex, or the lucrative international market in arms sales, will be diverted into plowshares anytime in the forseeable future.

The media that might inform us about these problems distract us with "infotainment" and sports spectacles to promote their real function, advertising. Universities traditionally encourage the critical thinking necessary to reflect on these developments, but in the midst of the greatest economic expansion in history we are told that budget cutbacks are necessary because there is less money available for education. Increasingly, the need to become more market-oriented is diverting academia into corporate research and advanced job training for those eager to join what I will argue is a morally questionable world order.

In short, our global economy is institutionalized greed; our military-industrial complex is institutionalized aggression; our media and even our universities promote institutionalized ignorance of what is actually happening.

David R. Loy

THE SPIRITUAL ROOTS OF MODERNITY
Buddhist Reflections on the Idolatry of the
Nation-State, Corporate Capitalism and Mechanistic Science

David's latest book is Money Sex War Karma Notes for a Buddhist Revolution

No Limit

Early this morning Dechen called me to the kitchen window. A brown pickup truck with a plastic amber light on the cab was idling near the end of our lawn. A stout man in a cap and a gloved hand wielding a hammer banging a post into the grass made the sound that got her attention then screwed a sign to it. He's on my land, putting a sign in my lawn. Amazing. What ever might it say? HOME OF FIRST BUDDHIST IN COUNTY perhaps. DISTANT RELATIVE OF GREAT JEWISH POET maybe. Sure, it is a bit odd, but I'm only half-awake and when you are as well-known as I am, you learn to expect this sort of thing. Or similar inexplicable things. Or not. It all seemed relatively unintrusive, quite unlike that telephone polejack out here a few years back, who was a genuine weirdo. Besides, these guys are not necessarily paid to think, but get paid no matter what you think and will invariably tell you that they are just following orders. If you want to complain, call this number, press three and ask for Ms. Nancy.

It was still cold enough and early enough that as much as they love a good rousing bark and snarl at hapless intruders, the dogs didn't want to leave their padded nook on the front porch to badger the dude and at that hour, I felt much the same way. It all looked harmless enough. I really didn't want to have to put on my shoes and jacket and go out there and engage the good fellow. If he is confident enough to live in rural Tennessee and be banging something into my front lawn at this hour, well then, I'll just stay curious and give him the benefit of the doubt. Besides, I'm nursing a cup of hot soymilk here, the only food I will eat for the next six hours; this is definitely not the time to do much else.

It wasn't until he waddled back into the truck and drove off that we could see what the sign said. Whoa. That's a little aggressive, ain't it? We laughed and Tenkar walked out with her camera to record another true-life experience that you might not otherwise believe. Our land ends in those woods beyond the magnolia. We are the very last house on a dead end street. This sign will be seen by my family alone. As if to admonish us for our pace of preference through this world and urging us to conform to the cultural hyper-drive and not only to get with it but to literally step on it as we risk another excursion into denser and often meaner parts of the grid.

We have never driven this fast on our little road, don't intend to start and don't think anyone else should either. This curvey gravel lane soon ends at the blacktop where the schoolbus stops, a mere quarter mile away. Kids living in the hollow walk this stretch at least twice a day.

Time to give them a call down at the courthouse. In the meanwhile, money is getting tight (again). Watch 'em try and clock us for driving too slow down our own driveway.

Primeval Dixie

Late last night snow;
this morning
brightness pouring in
through every window.

***

Mankind suffers from the narrow viewpoint afforded by conditional consciousness and the largely egological concerns of this present life. We habitually ignore or overlook those aspects of the cosmos which do not relate to the present pursuit of money, food and sex. Through the subtle complexities of causality, one of the more obvious consequences of this mass fixation on self is the wave of extinctions now taking place on all continents. Short-sighted, expedient actions and decisions made by ordinary people are irreversibly changing and impoverishing us all far into the future. In a saner world, awareness of this situation would immediately lead to a global summit to direct all available resources toward measures which might slow (if not stop) this trend, beginning with attention to the most vulnerable species. Like the dark of the moon, the moment passes and it is already tomorrow.

We will all do everything we can while true transformation will not come about through any mechanical process. The nature of consciousness itself provides the key. Beyond all the hope and hype, the media is fixated on absurdities, congress is chasing down baseball players while all the Presidents men conduct business as usual. It doesn't take a Buddhist to see that on the political front, things are so locked up, fixated on fear, and dumbed down, whatever we might think is practically irrelevant; thus the angle of this blog.

It is now as it has always been, a matter of ongoing education, self-understanding in the widest sense and individual-cum-collective spiritual evolution. It has certainly been said before and I only confirm it here, that the pure land, the great beyond, the final frontier of infinite wilderness, is certainly within you. So without getting astronomical, let's roll it back a few years to get some context on this place. A wider, prehistoric perspective deepens appreciation of the fleeting present.

A few extinct North American carnivores up against a grid of two foot boxes. L-R: Dire wolf (Canis dirus), sabre-toothed cat (Smilodon fatalis), short-faced bear (Arctodus simus), cheetah-like cat (Miracinonyx sp.), and the American lion (Panthera leo atrox). (Turner and Anton, 1997).

Ice ages have been happening periodically for the last two million years. Twenty thousand years ago, massive glaciers two thousand feet thick covered all the land north of the Ohio. Dark evergreen and the smoky blues-greys of coniferous forests covered most of the southeast. An endless sea of spruce, jack pine, and fir extended south of the Tennessee River to 34°N latitude. Deciduous species dependent on temperate conditions either 'migrated' further south or died off. In some parts of the earth, such as northern Europe or central Asia, all escape routes were blocked by massive rocky upthrusts like the Alps, the Tien Shan and Himalayan ranges which are oriented on an east-west axis. Species such as sweet gum (Liquidambar), tuliptree (Liriodendron), and hemlock vanished from Europe completely.

In contrast, the general north-south orientation of the Appalachians provided passage for refugee species during glacial maximum. The northern margins of these temperate zone deciduous forests persisted in sunny havens throughout the full glacial in south—facing pockets and gorges of the highlands and mountains of southern Tennessee. As the glaciers began melting, powerful outwash streams carried Canadian shield boulders hundreds of miles across Kentucky and distributed the glacial till over a wide flood-plain. Relatively undisturbed since the paleozoic, gravity and water work the grooves, draining plateaus, redistributing the earth. A wide range of soil types develop supporting what will become one of two of the greatest temperate forest regions on earth, (the other is in China) displaying great biodiversity. As temperatures warmed, the competition for territory was renewed. The broadleaves, blessed with flowers and co-operative insects began pushing north. Through the magic agency of the living seed enclosed within a fleshy carpel, borne by winds, rivers, mammals and birds, this complex engine of organic productivity known as the mixed mesophytic forest gradually dominated the temperate zones of Turtle Island. Collecting energy from the sun and drawing solutes up from the earth, attracting weather, storing water, providing homes and sustenance for countless life forms.

South of the glacier, an amazing variety of megafauna roamed the marshy grasslands and forest, including four genera of giant ground sloths as big as hippos, giant beavers with six-inch teeth, two types of llama, 'stag moose' - actually a deer taller than a man, dire wolves, mastodons, wooly mammoth, American elephants, saber tooth cats, and the lion-sized scimitartooth (Homotherium), four species of musk-ox, yak like those still found in Tibet, giant jaguar, cheetah like those still found in Africa, capybara and peccary species which still exist in South America, native camels, even maned lions. Lumbering ten foot armadillos, water-loving tapirs, four-horned antelope, horses, asses, a huge species of bison, six genus of longhorn, five kinds of deer, and condors with sixteen-foot wingspans. Perhaps most fearsome of all was the short-faced bear (Arctodus) measuring six feet at the shoulder, eleven when standing, the largest land predator on the continent throughout the ice age.

One thousand years after humans arrived, most of the animals mentioned above, seventy species (80-95% of the megafauna) - disappeared completely from North America, very likely due to a combination of over-hunting, and climate change. Recent evidence indicates an extra-terrestrial impact around 11,000 BCE may have been a major contribution, by generating a mini- 'nuclear winter'.

Russell Cave in NE Alabama provides the first evidence of human habitation in the southeast. Hunter-gatherers occupied it as early as 6500 BCE. Using short spears with sharpened stone points propelled by atlatls, combined with masterful cunning, paleo-hunters were extremely proficient at bringing down big game. By the time that little band of twenty five or so moved into Russell Cave, there was plenty of smaller game like fox, squirrel, skunk, raccoon, rabbit, and bobcat - animals you can still find (in far less numbers) in the woods today. They also fished and gathered nuts, fruit and berries, wove baskets and were fond of wild turkey. White-tail deer and black bear, the only larger animals remaining in the region were both hunted seasonally. Fortunately, both of these four-legged cousins are still with us today.

Chickasaw Bluffs

"By 1800 there was little danger of the Chickasaws warring against either the whites or other Indians. Trade was the most immediate concern, and in 1802 the United States opened the Chickasaw Bluffs Trading House near Fort Pickering. Government trading posts also played a vital role in encouraging Indian land cessions, and President Jefferson was disarmingly candid in this regard. He urged the establishment of a Chickasaw post “for furnishing them all the necessaries and comforts they may wish (spirituous liquors excepted), encouraging them and especially their leading men, to run in debt for these beyond their individual means of paying.” The Indians would then cede more lands to satisfy their obligations. The effectiveness of this policy was almost immediately apparent. In 1805 the Chickasaws ceded land in Middle Tennessee to offset a debt of $12,000. The Chickasaw Bluffs trading post continued to offer on credit an array of high quality goods—the Chickasaws were discriminating customers—and each year Indian indebtedness rose by several thousand dollars. Struggling to meet their material needs and financial obligations, Chickasaw males used their West Tennessee hunting lands to good effect. In 1809 the trading house at the bluffs ranked first among fourteen U.S. trading posts, with more than $12,000 worth of pelts."

-The Chickasaws

Civilization of the American Indian Series, V. 109
by Arrell Morgan Gibson,
Norman, Okla. University of Oklahoma Press, 1981.

Ayali

imagine
being so driven
so desperate
using almost anything
money, liquor, guns, and lies
to take land from people
who'd been here for over 500 years.

imagine
new people
occupying that land
five six seven ten generations
slowly learning what
money, liquor, guns and lies
will buy

and now we
after a half-life in these hills
still under the influence
know almost nothing
of the first people who
laughed and sang here
not so long ago
almost nothing
of their sacred ways and stories
or their word for the mystery

Do you even know how to say goodbye in their language?

Garab Dorje

The skies are too cloudy to see tonight's lunar eclipse but I did not want to let the day pass without paying homage to one of mankind's best friends. Recalling his central message, contemplating his inner experience and sharing awareness that such a one once walked this earth. Isn't that the point? Today the Nyingma lineage of Tibetan Buddhism celebrates the anniversary of Garab Dorje. Born in the region by the Aral Sea in the centuries before Christ, he is the source of the 'Great Perfection ' or Dzogchen teachings. Due to the influence of teachers such as Padmasambhava, Vimalamitra, Longchenpa and Jigme Lingpa, this sublime method of awakening to full Buddhahood flourished for over a thousand years in Tibet, widely renowned as the highest form of the three vehicles of Buddhist practice. Garab Dorje translates as Indestructible Happiness. The essence of his teaching was summarized in a final transmission known as Striking the Essence in Three Words. Namkhai Norbu Rinpoche renders the triad as follows;

1. Direct introduction to the primordial state is transmitted straight away by the master to the disciple. The master always remains in the primordial state, and the presence of the state communicates itself to the disciple in whatever situation or activity they may share.

2. The disciple enters into non-dual contemplation and, experiencing the primordial state, no longer remains in doubt as to what it is.

3. The disciple continues in that state of non-dual contemplation, the primordial state, bringing contemplation into every action, until that which is every individual’s true condition from the beginning (the Dharmakaya), but which remains obscured by dualistic vision, is made real, or realized. One continues right up to Total Realization.

Sri Ramakrishna

Today is the 172nd anniversary of the birth of the Great Swan, the incomparable Sri Ramakrishna (1836-1886). If you are not yet familiar with this man, do yourself a favor and take the time to become acquainted.Even at this distance, he will make you laugh and open your heart, inspiring and deepening your practice, no matter what path you tread. Be delighted and enlightened by his magnetizing presence, and please do so with my full encouragement. He is one of a handful who I recognize as a fully enlightened Buddha; a true gem.

"Suppose a thorn has pierced a man's foot. He picks another thorn to pull out the first one. After extracting the first thorn with the help of the second, he throws both away. One should use the thorn of knowledge to pull out the thorn of ignorance. Then one throws away both the thorns, knowledge and ignorance, and attains vijnana.[1] What is vijnana? It is to know God distinctly by realizing His existence through an intuitive experience and to speak to Him intimately."

- The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna

[1] S. vijnana translates as consciousness

The Retreat Cabin

It has been a busy interval.

On Friday afternoon, a steady stream of visitors began passing through the hollow. My eldest son Isaiah and his wife left Durham NC and drove over the Smokies before dawn to spend some time with us. Zoe joined the three of us for a sunny afternoon walk out to the extreme northwest corner of the property, where we sat surrounded by leafless woods on the weathered porch of what we refer to as the 'retreat cabin'. Here we caught up on recent events. Isaiah and April work at a printing press in Durham. A few months ago he invited his brother Isa to move in and begin working in the same business. Later that evening, after the ladies returned from work, we all enjoyed an excellent meal of curried gluten and rice.

In the Tibetan tradition of time-keeping, we are approaching the first full moon of the year (Wednesday). In relation to the day, early morning is universally considered a good time for meditation. In the same way, the first weeks of a buddhist new year are considered an important time for retreat and spiritual practice. Saturday was the tenth day after the new moon, a day noted for strong masculine energy. In the Nyingma tradition, each tenth of the lunar month is associated with a different aspect of Padmasambhava. This month, in keeping with the emphasis on one-pointed practice we contemplate his supreme qualities as the thunder yogi Santirakshita ('guardian of peace') devoted to ascetic disciplines while dwelling on the extreme fringes of the civilized world.

Saturday morning, I woke to dark skies, high winds and torrential rainfall. So far this year there have been 291 reports of tornadoes, which marks an increase of nearly 500% for this time of year. A peek out the kitchen window reveals a few sparrows picking through seeds spread on the walkway.

Amazingly enough, the skies were soon clear. Zoe and Scott appeared to join us all for coffee and whatnot, neighbor Patty, her son Jeff and his kids showed up at noon as did Dechen's mom and niece Jade. Jeff erected a small platform for bird seed and bread crumbs in the front yard and it has been fairly busy out there since. One rufous-sided towhee seems to favor working the grass, a lady cardinal, a dozen house sparrows, and a few titmice flit between the concrete and the platform. Around sunset, Tenkar, Dechen, Jade and I walked up to One Heart Rise to feel the wind and watch the light play on the underside of the dark clouds. Jade (9) lives in town and doesn't get to do this kind of thing very often.

Soon after the ladies left this morning, Brother Ralph, the self-styled preacher who sold us this house twenty years ago, drove up on his 4x4. I invited him to come in and set a spell. As always, he asked about my 'outlook on the spiritual universe', and told me he wished Huckabee would win the nomination.

Then at last, this afternoon, I began formulating my thoughts and working on this post.

Over the years, I have initiated various forms attempting to provide the sangha with opportunities for creative expression and meaningful interaction. For over a decade we maintained an intense schedule of formal practices, both as individuals and as a group. Rasayana journeys, sweat-lodge ceremonies, ngondro and Vajrayana sadhanas, public rituals, dharma crafts, astronomy class, Tibetan language studies, posting forums, a community website, reading and discussion groups. In the latter half of the 1990's, there were countless opportunities to go backpacking for days and sometimes weeks at a stretch both here in the southeast and in the deserts and mountains of the southwest. The last seven years have seen an emphasis on making devotional music. All of these forms have had their limitations while also serving as primary vehicles to focus interest and available energy in a manner which has virtually defined the sangha at any given moment.

Now the days pass ever more quickly. What have we accomplished here? Years ago when there was more fire and activity in these parts, Khenchen Palden pulled me aside to warn me not to be distracted or sidetracked by the bustle of community and that he could tell me about scenes much bigger than ours which had completely dissolved and are no longer able to introduce anyone to the Dharma because their personal commitment to practice and awakening was weak or secondary.

At this point, we are once again in a sector of the labyrinth where samsaric distractions dominate and there is not very much holding us together as an active spiritual community. At times, it seems my interest is the primary connection of this group to the teachings of the Buddha. This impoverishes us all and should be recognized as a challenge to both our individual and collective well-being. In considering this, I feel an urgent need to finish up the retreat cabin.

Eight long years have passed since the structure began to take form. In spite of our talk and ideals and plans, it remains a dusty shed and sits unused and isolated in the woods. I have often said that I think we would all hassle less and evolve more rapidly if we each spent a few days out there alone every so often. Apparently, not everyone agrees with me about this. Even though we regularly suffer through familiar patterns of discord, there must still be faith that there are more direct and practical ways to move beyond these difficulties than by increasing the frequency of time spent in solo retreat.

We have made good use of the porch across the years as a place to spend Sunday afternoons, a quiet place to share tea and read Longchenpa and a bug-free destination for a day hike but the building itself is not finished. Nobody has spent a single night out there yet. This Year of the Rat we must work to finish the interior and make serious use of it. And considering the benefits that we have gotten from the porch alone, I am equally inspired to make this the year that we construct sitting platforms on both Turtle Hill and Easter Ridge.

Emaho!

Cedar Ridge

Woke early and filled the bird feeder before going next door to say good morning. Yesterday was to have been Dechen's last day of seasonal work but they asked her to stay on for another six weeks. Tenkar has the whole day off. We decided to call our eldest daughter Zoe to come for a walk and try out the fancy new digital-camera. It is barely above 30 degrees but they immediately discovered some crocuses on the edge of the woods before we trudged up Lizard Lane to the ridgetop where an old schoolbus is parked on the edge of the woods. Climbing up through the lower branches of an oak near the front bumper, we settle ourselves on the sunny end of the roof, overlooking surrounding fields, sharing a ginger beer and a catlinite bowl.

Zoe noted clear roads and a half-foot of snow in northern Kentucky and expressed surprise at the existence of good vegetarian restaurants in Louisville. She says her new boyfriend is very amusing and told him not to bother with the Valentine crap. He is cooking her dinner tonight. My eye is drawn into the shadows under the trees over the wirey remains of a hog pen and two piles of unused grey cedar logs. When Tenkar grew cold we decided to keep moving.

Before we got too far, we hear Jack crying because he couldn't figure his way out of an old shed. Nala kept barking at him from outside of the same wall he was facing and whiz that he is, Jack didn't realize he would have to turn around to find his way back out. Zoe went to the shed door and rescued him. The dogs seemed so happy to see one another that Nala charged and head-butted Jack in the chest, sending him flying onto his back. Never seen that before! We all laughed.

When we first settled in the hollow, twenty years ago this April, this high ground to our west was owned by a local family who had only recently acquired it. They wanted to raise pigs and take advantage of the local mast to help fatten them. With this in mind, they left all the hickories but cut down a mature stand of eastern red cedar to make fenceposts, turning a small evergreen forest into hillside pasture. Fortunately, about fifteen years ago, a hippie friend was able to buy half the parcel and she remains the absentee owner. The rest was picked up by my good neighbor Silas. A massive white oak holds the high ground overlooking an abundance of baby cedars, a short fuzz of purple-gray sprinkled amidst the tawny knee-high grasses of these sloping fields. On the coldest nights, a thick red cedar provides a protected, favored place for chickadees and other tiny feathered folk who don't migrate. Unless the volunteers are clearly tagged, they will be destroyed by the yearly bush hog, needlessly perpetuating the open pasture. I will write a letter to see what I can do about helping the glade return.

We walk through a wrought-iron archway and across the grassy openness of Oneheart Rise and down through a small stand of mature cypress. The path continues up another hill on a track snaking between tangles of green briar and the barbed-wire marking the western border. This south-face was also logged for cedars and poplars but unlike Oneheart Rise, no bush-hogging has been done here in over a decade, so it is quickly recovering. From the high shoulder the view opens to the south beyond our little hollow, the intervening space stretches across a blurry sea of wintry buds and grey tree tips, connecting the eye to a far horizon, a wooded ridge on the far side of the Saw, about a mile distant.

Here the path re-enters the trees, passes a small triangular pond and traverses Cedar Ridge, which still holds a fair number of older cedars, but not without a struggle. Back in the day when Silas had recently been granted title to this land, a local fellow drove up on this ridge with a logging truck and went to work, insisting he'd already contracted to harvest the trees. Silas said this was not part of the deal and asked him to please stop cutting until the problem was sorted out with the former owner. When the sawyer refused, Silas called our friend Ivan, who came over with a loaded shotgun in the trunk of his old Chrysler to see if he could help change the fellow's mind. The sawyer drove off without Ivan ever opening his trunk. Through rigged connections in the local courts, the sawyer ended up successfully sueing Silas for a few thousand dollars and soon after died of a heart-attack.

Later this evening, Dechen, Tenkar and I discussed the need to produce two more benches for the eastern and souther altars on the hill as well as initiating a plan to finish the retreat cabin. Tomorrow I will take a walk out there and write more about it.

Firewood

The other morning a thin coat of ice covered the porches and car windshields, a light dusting of snow melted on the ground but remained for most of the day throughout the woods on the top layer of last autumn's dried, curled leaves only because they are exposed to a layer of cool air between their underside and the slightly warmer earth.

A few surprisingly fat bluebirds landed on the mulberry out front of the kitchen window as if to say how 'bout it? They are regulars in these parts but this is the first I have seen them this year. A very cold morning and having been well-treated here in years past, they were looking for a handout.

After stoking the woodstove, I went next door where the ladies were sharing an early breakfast, getting ready to head off to work. We have no bird seed, they say, but there is some old bread and tortillas that I could throw to them. I break it up and spread it on the narrow strip of concrete leading from our front porch to the parking lot. Cracked and lifted by the roots of a nearby hybrid poplar, this twenty foot walkway was one of the only places our kids could use chalk when they were younger. Now, all of a sudden, those days are long gone and I am feeding birds instead of children.

Around noon, an old friend stops by, dropping off a loaf of day-old sourdough from a Nashville bakery, a copy of the Drive By Truckers' Southern Rock Opera for me to sample, a package of lemon cookies and reminding me that I need to order more Tibetan incense, which he has been buying from me for the last 15 years. Before he left, my daughters (ages 27 and 15) passed through to say goodbye and grab a road atlas, en route to Kentucky to see some friends. As the weather is less than ideal, I tell them to bring blankets and wear long-johns. The elder says good idea while the younger rolls her eyes.

Cold weather means burning more wood; the pile on the porch is almost gone. After shaking down the ashes, I wheelbarrow the ashpan to the far side of the parking lot and dump it on the compost. Nearby is the woodpile. Most of what we burn is slab, the rounded outer layers and bark from logs rough cut into squared timbers at the local Amish mill. This is usually a mixture of green and seasoned, hard and softwoods cut into stove length sections. If the price is right, we may also buy a small amount of hardwood rounds for the coldest weather. So far, we have spent less than $100 on firewood this year.

If you have to split your own wood, some things quickly become obvious. For one, no matter how macho you are, you simply cannot split rounds from a gum tree. Gum barely accepts the imprint made by the edge of an axe blade before bouncing it back at you without initiating even a hair-line crack in the grain. Further experience reveals the difficulty of splitting significant knots or branch junctures. In many cases, this is not altogether impossible, but invariably requires more energy.

Come mid-February, depending on the groundhog, the ratio of remaining slab to rounds becomes a concern. Looking around the pile my eyes are drawn to one big knotty piece that will never fit in the stove as it is, but would provide a bed of live coals for six or eight hours when split. Checking closer, marks indicate that it has previously been tested by my axe. Perhaps it was still green and tough at the time and will now yield easier. No such luck. I shift plans and instead of attacking the center, decide to work the edges. After a few well-placed strokes, the chunk is just narrow enough to slip through the mouth of the stove.

A few wheelbarrows worth are rolled to the porch, I replace the ashpan, shut down the stove and tailed by both dogs, set out on a path along the creek to ask if my neighbor has any bird seed. Past the old sweat lodge site, across a footbridge, up a mossy bank and in the back door. Warmth, the smell of food, bright with electricity and people noise. Four friends sit around the kitchen table, four kids watch a show on Alaska. Mary offers tea. Silas points out a half-bucket of bird seed on a nearby porch. The television narrator compares the changeability of a certain Alaskan river to a woman's moods. I would never get away with saying anything like that, but Dave explains that this guy is alone in the wilderness or he might not either and everyone laughs.

We share breaking news. The youngest son of our local mechanic was in a bad car accident and will need every bone in his face reconstructed but he will live. A small trailer has recently been moved out into Skymetal field to accommodate the rowdy nephew of the man who used to own all this land, although no one is living in it presently. Patty and her son Jeff both have their homes out on the edge of Skymetal, an open stretch of grassy ridgetops hosting a few ponds defining the high ground to the east. To discourage further development, Patty will not grant access to her electricity. I thank Jeff for putting up a no hunting sign accompanied by a prayer flag on Easter Ridge. And everyone concurs; it is a good place to watch the sun rise and set and we should probably build a small platform for sitting out there. Anticipating the coming spring, Jeff said he was surprised the other morning when he saw what appeared to be a bush in full bloom which quickly transformed into a family of goldfinches huddling in the early light. The circle soon broke as darkness fell and we wished each other a pleasant evening before I followed the dogs home, lugging a bucket of seed.

37: Family

Yesterday afternoon, Jack and I walked up Easter Ridge, a thousand meter long finger of higher ground covered in young oak and hickory, slowing to kick down some of the branches that had fallen across the mossy path along the way. We looked for a log to sit on, but it seemed like they were all either too rotten, too close to the ground, or angled away from the sun. Instead, we settled in a patch of sun on some dry leaves with a young white oak to lean upon. Light plays on the wispy webs stretched a few inches off the ground between saplings. Off to the west, a pair of Barred Owls were hooting. This is the first time I have heard them this year.

A dozen vultures circle effortlessly high in the sky to the south. A hawk passes below them.

Nala appears over the rise with nose to the ground. She has followed our trail from the house. Jack hears her coming and jumps up running to greet her but Nala does not recognize him. She stops, startled at Jack's approach and prepares to turn and run before she recognizes the little dog she sleeps with every night. Much jumping and tail chasing before they settle down.

I walk to get out of the house and enjoy what this part of the universe offers up for free everyday. People spend so much time doing things they don't want to do so that they might be able to do some of those things they would like to do. And far from a just reward, they are often underpaid, taxed unfairly, exhausted and dehumanized by jobs that may be outsourced, ultimately looting the middle class and further enriching those who are already criminally wealthy. The other day, I saw a chart indicating my family's income level is among the lowest 10% of the national average. Still, we live comfortably, eat well and want for nothing. And like so many other people across the earth, we have no stocks or insurance. Oh the great reckoning will surely come! In the meanwhile, you could kill yourself trying to get adequately insured.

Developing a taste for simplicity and meditation generates great personal wealth. In particular, the magic quality that transforms the mundane into its deeper, luminous context is appreciation.1 Exhausted by news of a world descending into madness, I head out to spend more time in the little wilderness that remains. The other day, I was saying to a loved one that I have always been of the opinion that a litltle ganja, a holy book, a patch of woods to get lost in and friends to share it with are the essence of a good time. What else do you need? Culturally, we seem to have lost any meaningful context to understand ourselves. Considering what we are up against in these latter days, it sometimes feels like man is a very small, impermanent thing. I don't always feel that way. Letting go of such concerns for the moment, I take refuge in the three kayas and light the bowl, look around and listen to the distant wind. A waxing crescent moon floats in the empty blue above the sun. Both are visible in one field of vision.

Climbed the ridge onto Turtle Hill. Late afternoon shadows stretch across the crown, the lone cedar appears black. Rows of prayer flags flutter in the wind. The paths and central clearing are covered in leaves. All the altars are intact, the Buddha is snug in his dark blue robe. The long flag on the central cedar pole has been ripped to shreds in the recent storms, the bench in the southern quarter was poured with bad cement and needs to be replaced. Nobody has blown a conch or performed a fire puja up here in months. It feels like an old abandoned ship. The hill has been through periods of neglect like this before. Will she ever sail again? In the trees overhead, a pileated woodpecker flies determinedly toward his nest. He has lived upon on the edge of Skymetal field for years.

I follow the path clockwise toward the red altar and set my shoulder bag between myself and the cold bench. I spent some time with the yidam as the last crimson rays of the primordial blaze bled through the winter tangle of trunks and branches on the western horizon. I have always been enthralled by this particular experience but it was not until today that i could put any words on it. As a clear phenomenal display of the symbolism of elements outlined in the hexagrams of the I-Ching, this is the natural sign of unqualified awareness radiating through the jungle of sentient channel and wind systems.

om ami dewa hri
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1. from Latin, appretiat, appretiare, 'set at a price', 'appraise'. Also, Latin 'pretiosus', of great value. Tibetan, 'rinpoche', great precious one.

an unremarkable place

The past few days have been beautiful; crystal blue skies like you only see in the winter, amber sunsets and a pink glow on the eastern horizon at days end. You would never suspect that earlier in the week, a thousand homes were destroyed in Tennessee and over fifty people were killed by the descent of 69 tornadoes, terrifying in their raw power and arriving in the dark.

Let the stove die down, turn off the screen; it is time to get out there. Winter time in these woods means no bugs. I rolled one, grabbed my mala and denim coat and headed off into the hills, followed by an insecure black mutt named Nala. To give you some idea of the setting, the local version of starbucks is named Siberia, and at 35 miles away, it may as well be there. To be able to disappear into the woods without getting into a car, passing a neighbors house or even crossing a road is one of the many blessings of living out here.

So we walked on the mossy path under the dormant redbuds and came to the junction where three drainages meet and sat on crispy brown oak leaves in full sun on the southern slope of Turtle Hill for an hour. Jack, a second dog, joined us here after a typically cautious approach.

A normally dry creek cuts through the bottom, hidden under honeysuckle and brambles. When it rains hard enough, springs and runoff from Sky Metal Field, Resistance and Easter Ridge(s) wash over the gravel and fallen trees in the defile between ridges until the waters are forced into a narrow stream quickly descending a few feet into a log lined gully. An unremarkable place, wild and overgrown, but when it rains enough, the surface water must go somewhere and this is the way it runs down off the hills. Around the base of Resistance Ridge and through a zinc pipe under the road before joining the year-round creek draining the hollow, down past the old shack and behind Zoe's trailer, under the main road before meeting the Saw running west. Under TVA lines, past vacant farms, behind the old churchyard and down through deeper woods and beaver dams into the Buffalo River. After flowing circuitously over thirty miles west, the Buffalo angles north at Flatwood, merging with the Duck forty miles down stream as the crow flies. Both soon empty into the Tennessee, a disturbingly unnatural 'lake' at this point, 184 miles long. Twenty two miles past the Kentucky dam, the Tennessee merges with the Ohio as things really start picking up. West through Lock and Dam nos. 52 & 53, past Cairo and 'Paddle' is finally moving south on the Mississippi. The descent is long and obvious. Here is an energy pathway that connects me directly to the oceans of the world. And doesn't it flow the other way as well? The return in seasonal rainfall has been a growing concern over the past few years. For the first time ever, our spring dried up for a month last summer. This touches on the topic of nagas, but I will save that for another post. Let me take you back to where i am sitting.

At one point, an old school bus was towed back here, set up on a little shelf between Turtle Hill and the dry gully. We ran long waterlines from my spring and buried a phone line and it was home for a few different folks over the years. This came to an end one stormy Saturday morning in 1996 when the trunk of a big red oak was ripped off the slope of Resistance Ridge by straight-line winds and tossed into the air like a dried corn stalk. Fortunately, Silas was laying on the bed and merely got sprayed with rain and shattered safety glass as the roof was crushed in. All that remains now are a few old concrete blocks, and a stump of white pvc where the phone line surfaced.

Looking across the hollow and up through the woods of Resistance Ridge, a thick stand of tall green bamboo marks the home of my neighbor James. We have known each other for nearly forty years, having first met in a small private high school on Long Island. As fate would have it, we were both expelled and ended up in the same public school. Over the years we have farmed local ridgetops, lived in Guatemala and Cape Cod, played uncle to each others kids, and worked together as roofers and chimney sweeps for years. Many seasons have passed and we don't see very much of each other these days, but it is still nice to have neighbors you know who you are at ease with.

The dogs nap in the stillness of the day. People find nothing of interest in this 'in-between' place. I could wait here for six months and never see anyone pass by. An old logging road winds up the valley disappearing into the shade between Easter Ridge and Turtle Hill. After an hour or so of sitting silent in the mid-day sun, we decided to continue our walk.

Turtle Hill

A few notes about place

The state of Tennessee can be geologically divided into three adjacent regions. The eastern mountains, the central plateau and the western plains. During the Paleozoic, from 570 to 240 million years ago, a shallow tropical sea dominated the region. Life flourished in these waters. Forests of crinoids or sea-lillies, animals that looks plants, dominated the sea floor. Every hundred million years or so, the marine environment would yield to a phase of mountain building. As relentless as the convergence, faulting and skyward thrust, rainfall and streams continually worked to reduce peaks to lowlands so that most of the time the area remained underwater. The muds, silts, sands and river gravel eroding off the slopes spread out in the basins, eventually covering the primordial bedrock with a nine-mile thick layer of sediment.

On the plateau and mountains to the east, the tectonic-powered see-saw between terrestrial and submarine environments ended around 300 million years ago, when the dense rocks of Gondwana rammed into the ancient North American plate. In the east, massive sedimentary beds faulted and tilted skyward as the leading edge of Gondwana was driven under the lighter rocks of the continent where great heat and pressure catalyzed volcanic activity along plate boundaries. Unlike the radical angles of uplift still found in the Smokies, the deep sedimentary beds of the central plateau were gradually raised thousands of feet above sea level in a manner that maintained the original horizontal bedding. This was the third major orogeny in the past 250 million years. As South America rammed north from the Gulf, the horn of Africa smashed westward, creating a mountain range with peaks taller than today’s Rockies stretching from Maine to Texas. Time and water would slowly sculpt and soften the heights while the Cumberland, Harpeth and Duck Rivers and their tributaries worked through soft limestones in the heart of the plateau, hollowing out a central basin, encircled by a cuesta of resistant, crystalline sandstones. Where the escarpment is steep, there are waterfalls.

Previous orogenies had aggregated the proto-continent and erosion provided deltas and coastal plains. What distinguishes the Alleghanian Orogeny is being the first major uplift in the heart of the new supercontinent, Pangea. The Anti-Atlas Mountains of Morroco, the Appalachians, and the Ouachita Range in Arkansas are all relics from that time.

What is called the Cumberland or better yet, the Great Eastern Plateau of North America, is bordered to the east, south and west by the Tennessee River Valley and is geologically contiguous with the profiles of sedimentary beds found to the north in the 'Pennyroyal' area of Kentucky.

To the south, the highland rim is bisected into east and west by the Elk River, a major waterway draining the central plateau into the Tennessee valley in northern Alabama. After skirting the extreme southern rim of the central basin, the westernmost remnant of Elk Ridge extends one last highland across southern middle Tennessee. The dendritic drainage patterns on the western highland are as intensively lobed as those found throughout the plateau, although in more moderate relief. On a topographic map, the visual effect is like a mosaic of white oak leaves. In this sea of broken land, forested ridges and dark hollows, the rounded back of Turtle Hill rises in silence, overlooking a narrow valley tending south.

And where are you friend?