Ogmin

The Causal Seed of Esoterica

2010-10-21T14:17:00.000-07:00

"The covert intention with respect to interpretation refers to teachings given in a form which is extremely difficult to understand in order to pacify the fault of those who think:

This doctrine is inferior to others
Because it is easy to understand."

~ Dudjom Rinpoche
The Nyingma School of Tibetan Buddhism
Wisdom 1991 p 221

Encouraging Study

2010-10-18T17:53:00.000-07:00

"Sometimes, in the Tibetan monasteries, a younger student or junior khenpo would review the teachings given by a senior khenpo. He might go over the teachings with the other monks. Perhaps they would study the teachings once or twice, and then get together and encourage one another. They often debated, asking each other difficult questions. This, too, is contemplation."

Khenchen Palden Sherab Rinpoche
PSL Shedra Series, Vol. 3 p 47

Lake-born Vajra

2010-07-19T14:47:00.000-07:00

Indrabhuti, king of Oddiyana, was old, blind and lacked an heir. His aged queen had recently given birth to a son but the child soon died. A great famine was raging. The king was depressed; Asenya, the local seer, gives him sagely advice to pacify his heart. As a result, on the first full moon of summer, the king makes great offerings to the Three Jewels, chants Mahayana sutras and vows to open his treasury for the relief of the country.

"This was the time of famine
when men even ate flowers."

While out foraging on the northwest margins of Lake Danakhosha, Trigunadhara, a minister of the royal court, discovers a beautiful child seated upon an extraordinarily large lotus in a forest of udumbara flowers. The boy appeared to be about eight years old. His complexion is radiant, the color of purple seashells. The minister hesitates to bring the child to the palace, for if this turned out to be a problem, he might lose his head. Better to tell the king and let him decide what to do about it. Presently, the king was out at sea and if all went well, was expected to be returning soon.

It had been another rough year, and the treasury was now empty. A council had been held to discuss economic concerns. Schemes involving farming, trade and warfare were considered. And so far, no royal baby was forthcoming. Sorcerers and astrologers were invited to make their calculations. All were predicting happiness and blessings. "Since he has distributed alms without limit, it is sure that a son will be born." King Indrabhuti got caught up in this optimism and felt he might be closing in on his goal. He arranges for massive assemblies of Buddhist and Brahmin pandits to intervene with the gods. The king himself makes great offerings and dramatizes his affliction but nothing changes.

Asenya came with his retinue to beg alms only to be told the treasury was empty. He complains, saying that if they were not given their share, all the sacrifice was for naught. The king trusts his old friend and to show that he is sincere in his efforts to make sure everyone is covered, Indrabhuti invites the old magician and his gang to move into the palace. The situation had gotten so bad, the king had been contemplating a risky sea voyage to seek out gems on distant shores but instead decides to give it another shot using more traditional means, employing the assembly of 1002 Brahmins and Buddhists to propitiate the gods. A sacrificial fire is prepared but as luck would have it, the demons are aroused by all of this and in union, unleash their dark powers. Oddiyana is assailed with 'gnawing sickness' and armed conflicts. Meteor showers rain stones from heaven, violent winds and thunderstorms destroy villages and lives. The king reconsiders his plan; perhaps the sea journey was a good idea after all.

Upon consultation, an old salt warns him that this kind of trip is only for poor folk and desperadoes, not kings, much less a blind one. Many supplies are required, from live pigeons and good rope, to sails and the ship itself. There are countless dangers. The king is not intimidated. He sees to everything and hires the old trader as captain. After the craft and a crew of 500 is in place, Indrabhuti insists on accompanying them. The captain makes some parting comments, giving the king and any crew member another chance to change their minds in light of the dangers. He then offered a few words of encouragement regarding the rewards of a successful adventure before the sails were spread and the ship 'moved forward like an arrow'. Arriving safely at the Land of Gems, the king and captain disembark and row off together in a little boat. Carefully following the captain's instructions, the king soon obtains the wish-fulfilling gem and vision is restored to his left eye.

Upon his return to Oddiyana, the minister Trigunadhara has arrived from his sojourn to the northwest and informs the king of the miraculous child. Indrabhuti is carrying the gem which will restore the health and happiness of his kingdom, but he is intrigued by this news. "We must go near. I had a dream last night that a radiant golden vajra with nine points appeared from the sky and came into my hand; and I dreamed that the sun was rising in my heart." They sail out across the lake and upon encountering the child, the king is amazed. He asks six very ordinary questions.

"Who is your father?"

"My father is the Knowing of Knowledge."

Who is your mother?"

"My mother is Samantabhadri, holy joy and transcendence of the Void."

"What is your country?"

"I have none, having been born on the Essence Plane with its unique caste."

"On what do you nourish yourself?"

"I nourish myself with both clarity and perplexity."

"What are you doing here?"

"I am here devoting myself to the destruction of suffering."

The king and minister both wept. Indrabhuti's right eye now opened. Given the name Tsokyi Dorje, Indestructible One Born of the Lake, the miraculous child was adopted by the king. As the royal entourage approached the palace with the child still seated upon the massive lotus , the town welcomed the procession with banners, dancers, mimes and musicians.

" The greatest actors of the land
put on masks and began their acts."

Song of the Sixteen Great Dakinis

2010-07-19T13:58:00.000-07:00

HUM

On the stem and in the corolla of the wonderful lotus
of Shining Immaculate, pure Plane of Essence,
attaining the pure happiness of the truly unfeigned,
Being unique with the eight names, to you praise and homage!

To the east of the spontaneous lotus, formed with a single stroke,
appearing as Shakya Senge, Lion of the Shakya, perfect incarnation,
surrounded by the host of the Vajra Dakinis,
sitting in the midst of radiant light, without origin and all pure,
to Shakya Senge, homage!

To the south of the lotus, wide and rich in resources,
appearing as Padma Gyalpo, a great wave of gnosis,
surrounded by the host of the Jewel Dakinis,
luminous Universal Knower,
sitting and persuading each one according to his understanding,
to Padma Gyalpo, homage!

To the west of the lotus, most wonderful form on the expanse of the waters,
appearing as Padmasambhava in the body of heaven,
surrounded by the host of the Lotus Dakinis,
sitting among the wonders whose power is to his liking,
to Padmasambhava, homage!

To the north of the lotus of the All-Embracing Work,
appearing as Dorje Dorlod, conqueror of the demons of misery,
surrounded by the host of the Karma Dakinis,
enthroned among the fivefold gnosis, quintuple perfect primacy,
to Dorje Dorlod, homage!

To the southeast of the lotus of the Members of the Awakening,
appearing as Nyima Odzer dispelling dark ignorance,
escorted by Heroes of the Vajra, his retinue,
enthroned among the Bodhisattvas, benefactors of human beings,
to Nyima Odzer, homage!

To the southwest of the lotus, exercising the power of the Nine Vehicles,
appearing as Padma Jungnay who makes the cannibals shut their mouths,
surrounded by Heroes of the Jewels, his escorts,
abiding within the access to the five paths and ten stages,
to Padma Jungnay, homage!

To the northwest of the original lotus of the Being without Birth,
appearing as Senge Dradog, Master of the Dharma of the six knowledges,
escorted by the Heroes of the Lotus, his retinue,
enthroned, pure enchanter, among the cardinal points,
to Senge Dradog, homage!

To the norhtheast of the Unshakable Lotus
appearing as Lodan Chogsed, the flame of wisdom,
escorted by Heroes of Consuming Karma, his retinue,
enthroned in the midst of the depth of the four immense merits,
to Lodan Chogsed, homage!

To the throng surrounding the Master, to the host of the dakinis and servants,
to the four warrantors of the Dharma
and to the four goddesses of the threshold,
to the mamos and to the dakinis who, outside and inside, protect from dangers,
to the sworn guardians of the Dharma, homage!

_____________________________________

from The Life and Liberation of Padmasambhava, Canto 19 Padma bKa'i thang, Dharma, 1978

Pillar Inscription at Samye

2010-07-07T11:32:00.000-07:00

King Trisong Detsan's Royal Declaration
that Buddhism should be the state religion of Tibet;
pillar inscription at Samye Monastery (767 ce)

As the monasteries at Ra-sa (Lhasa), Red Rock (Samye) and other places have now been established as sanctuaries for the Three Jewels, the practice of Buddhadharma in Tibet is never to be abandoned or destroyed and the material support at those sites will never cease or diminish. Hereafter, each generation of the mighty kings in Tibet, along with their royal entourages must swear to such a vow which they must never alter or renounce. Taking as witness the world-transcending deities, the worldly deities, and all non-human beings, the present King with his Princes, nobles and ministers have now sworn to this vow. Further details of these edicts are kept in other places.

___________________________________

Copied from the brass plaque translation of the Tibetan characters carved into a large wooden slab on display in the Sangha House at Padma Samye Ling, Delaware County, New York

Mandala Beyond Origination

2010-07-05T17:49:00.000-07:00

THU JUNE 10:

Through the mysteries of interdependence, we had been called last fall at the request of the Lamas to come to Padma Samye Ling, their New York monastery, to help work on the temple. We made two trips three weeks apart and anticipating future projects, had promised to return in the spring. Due to dharma-centre politics, I had been steering clear of gatherings for a few years. Changes in the mandala and the time spent in New York last fall renewed the connection. The experience was so valuable I encouraged the rest of the sangha to make the effort to spend some time there. Zhibde was ready in May and offered to drive her van and pay gas but only Gyatso was able to go with her. After nearly a week working in the monastery kitchen and tiny garden, they too came back very inspired. Members of my family would have joined them but had other obligations. In the second week of June master carpenter Silas Rigdzin was ready to fulfill our promise to return. His wife Tsering, recently unemployed and would accompany him. As it happened, Dechen didn't have any work at that point, so at the 11th hour, we decided to join them. An open circle in the living room that morning allowed us to sort some of the samsaric confusion which had rocked the house over the past few days, and after a big loving goodbye, we left the hollow at 4:30, descending from our highland camp into the green bottoms of Maury County, soon crossing the Duck and Harpeth Rivers. We made one short stop to meet Mark and load up many boxes of Pema Mandala, PSL's community magazine, published in Nashville. These will be postmarked and sent out from PSL in New York. It sounds incredibly inefficient, and since the usual cost of shipping them would be unnecessary if they could be mailed from Music City, I assume someone has already checked out the options.

Ascending out of the Nashville basin, we ramp up onto the Cumberland Plateau where I-40 makes three crossings of Caney Fork before we stop at a fourth and walk down through the woods to the river. A twilight fog about three feet thick covers the water. We said some prayers and burned some offerings for a safe excursion before continuing into the night. East of Knoxville, we leave I-40 for I-81 and the hills of southwest Virginia. Tsering cues up James Asher's Tigers of the Raj. I nod off. Two thirds of our travel time will be spent on I-81 which slithers across valley & ridge topography, long parallel thrusts and folds of Paleozoic sedimentary rocks covered in deciduous forest. We stop after midnight to sleep in a motel room that smells of cigarette smoke. Wytheville VA was the site of a raid by Union forces in the summer of 1863. An attack intended to destroy rails, bridges, salt and lead mines was repulsed by a small, hastily assembled confederate force. The Yanks had better luck in December 1864 with similar targets in Marion, 25 miles south.

Caney Fork, Putnam County, Tennessee

FRI JUNE 11: DHARMAPALA DAY

Over incredibly expensive morning coffee, Rigdzin and I agree that Tsering's new purse resembles an elephant's scrotum or rather, what we imagine one might look like. The day is beautiful. We stop to throw a frisbee at a grassy rest area and say some prayers on Roanoke Creek before continuing north, crossing two junctions with the Appalachian Trail & talking American history. Over the headwaters of the James (named after the English King) or Powhatan River (named for a Native American confederacy), past exits for Appomattox courthouse, Virginia Military Institute, the farm of Cyrus McCormick who did not fear the reaper, Jefferson and Washington National Forests, Monticello, Woodrow Wilson's birthplace, and James Madison's home. I-81 passes over the Shenandoah River before paralleling it into the valley, Blue Ridge rising dark blue to the east, Appalachians rise green to our immediate left. Signs for Massanutten Mountain recall Stonewall Jackson's military genius, valley campaign (1862) excellent maps and finally, how a late night recon ended with 'friendly fire' from a nervous pickett, his amputated arm and subsequent death. Fields covered in crops today reflect abundance and no sign of social breakdown but it was said a crow flying across the valley would have to pack a lunch during General Sheridan's 1864 campaign. His troops employed the same harsh tactics favored by Sherman in his march from Atlanta. We roll by exits for Manassas, Harper's Ferry, Antietam, & Gettysburg. Beyond the Potomac and Mason-Dixon line (1767) Pennsylvania and the ghosts of James Buchanan, Molly Pitcher, and the Tuscarora (lit. hemp-gatherers), a North Carolinian tribe with ties to the Iroquois. Long abused by British colonials, they asked the Five Nations in New York if they could move back near them. The Tuscarora were embraced as a sixth nation settling in both Pennsylvania and New York.

Afternoon we exit the machine for a second break at a picnic table in sunny Cumberland County before zipping along the base of Silurian-era Blue Mountain, the easternmost ridge of the Appalachians, a great wall running for 150 miles, separating the populous southeastern corner of the state, the Cumberland Valley, from the mountains. A mile long bridge spans the gap where the Susquehanna has penetrated the ridge on its way to Chesapeake Bay. Commercial traffic is prohibited on this longest river draining into the Atlantic. I-81 passes north of Harrisburg, the state capitol. I think of my mysterious ancestors who settled here in a Jewish enclave after leaving Kiev late in the 19th century. Second Mountain is the name given to that section of Blue which lies between the river and Fort Indiantown Gap, after which Blue Mountain continues northeast into the Kittatinny Mountains of New York. I-81 leaves the valley and climbs north through Swatara Gap. The AT descends again to cross the road at this point before regaining the ridge. Well-forested slopes, stunted white birch trees, ancient beds of rock dramatically exposed in roadcuts, darker seams reminding us we are in coal country and cueing the fiddles of In the Blue Diamond Mine. Passing between Mahantango (mid-Devonian) and Sharp Mountains, followed by Nescopeck, and anntenae-studded Penobscot Knob, all outliers of the Appalachians cresting below treeline, some ridges lined with dozens of tall white wind towers.

Out of a relatively green samadhi, patches of white and brown urban chaos appear in the valleys below as we negotiate the Scranton corridor to the music of King Crimson. The Susquehanna parallels the interstate here for ten miles although it is on the far side of town, invisible from the road. Upstream, we cross a tamer Susquenhana for a second time before a final stop at dusk to burn in the bushes outside the police station at the first rest stop in New York. A third and final crossing over a on Rte 17 precedes entry into the Delaware River watershed. Upon learning Rigdzin has never heard the Stone's Gimme Shelter, Dechen cues it up. Now on two lane blacktop we climb past the darkened Cannonsville Reservoir and roll up through the woods to the Buddha Highway and Padma Samye Ling. After turning off the lights and engine, we stumble out into the silent night and carry our bags inside where we soon find Peter sweeping on the third floor of the Bodhicitta Inn. Excited to be here, there is no one around so we settle into a room on the first floor and sleep in yacht-like bunks after noting the position of Polaris.

Buddha Highway, Padma Samye Ling,
Delaware County, New York

SAT JUNE 12: NEW MOON, MIPHAM (1846-1912)

At breakfast in the Sangha House we meet Michelle who is a doctor in New York. As we set up for the day's work, Laya, recently ordained as lama, gives the ladies a tour of the temple and grounds. Rigdzin and I unload magazines, lumber and tools. Our efforts will focus on the western entrance to the temple known as the 'moon gate' which we helped build on our second trip here last autumn. This has become the primary entrance for practitioners. On the farside of the gonpa, the eastern or 'sun entrance' now has a handicap ramp covered with a tough composite like they are using at rest areas and national parks. The temple has no rain gutters. Come winter, icicles four foot long form on the balconies and drop off without warning. Since we have been here, the eight stupas carved in Indonesia had been delivered, installed around the temple and painted. Five life-size dhyani Buddhas from the same igneous quarry had arrived on a previous ship and patiently waited in their crates outside the Khenpos' house for a season. Now they were all seated against the outer walls of the temple giving darshan to beings in the four directions. We met with Ani Lorraine to discuss a design for coat racks, a sign-in table and benches with cubby holes below for shoes. With funds from Turtle Hill Sangha, Rigdzin had ordered planed cedar which we carried from Tennessee. This first morning, we tongue & groove the boards to assemble a double rack for short coats. Lama Laya passes through and asks us to save the cedar shavings for smoke offerings. Khenpo Tsewang also soon comes by and tells us his older brother, Khenchen, is on retreat. This is their mandala as well as their home. We do not expect to see much of Khenchen, if at all, on this trip. He has given us all so much, traveling and teaching relentlessly over the last twenty years, he naturally needs to rest and recharge his batteries once in awhile. We have come to work and be of service. Invariably, we receive more than we could have imagined.

Everyone who passes by comments about the smell of the cedar. Michelle says a fistful of sanded cubes in a little bag would sell for ten dollars in Manhattan. We have plenty of them. Anyone want to hit the streets and hawk them in the city? Other comments ranged from 'just like my grandma's cedar chest' to 'smells like a gerbil cage'. In setting up a work table, we make use of a box labelled 'Nirman plywood and blackboard Co.' Is that ironic? I had to ask. The skies are sprinkling rain. Sergei, resident Russian artist responsible for almost all of the beautiful images on the gonpa walls tells us about the elaborate paintings he once saw in a Nepalese Buddhist temple. By the quality of the work and attention to detail he figured it must have taken years. When told it was all completed in six months, he could not believe this until learning the project was due to the devotion of three talented, young Nepali acidheads. Closer to home, a young man who was not on acid but responsible for lunch got a late start in the kitchen resulting in hard beans and rice that was fairly terrible. The ladies took inventory and Tsering rode with Michelle to town for supplies. We worked late and came down to eat while everyone was attending evening practice in the temple. Dinner was excellent as the beans were re-cooked into a chili sauce served over potatoes with tofu sour-cream. After dinner, we talked with Sergei & his wife Kelly. At 1:08 we were still stargazing on the front steps of the Bodhicitta Inn.

Buddha Vairocana, Padma Samye Ling

SUN JUNE 13: CHOKGYUR LINGPA (1829-1870)

Another late start today, overcast skies, and it is very muggy. Some of the small crew on hand are heeding Khenpo Tsewang's recent admonition to take Sundays off. Rigdzin and I take a moment to rethink the original design for racks and benches, and the suggested changes are soon approved by Ani. We begin work on a rack for longer coats. More tongue and grooving. Sanders begin to buzz removing any roughness in the grain or sharp edges. Sergei stops by to comment on our talk the previous evening. I had introduced Herbert Guenther's ideas about the now dessicated Aral Sea being the legendary Lake Danakhosha and Urgyen being Old Urgench near the once-upon-a-delta of the Amu Darya River. Sergei tells me one of the men who helped build Samye, Tibet's first monastery, hailed from that area and was actually sent for by Padmasambhava. And among the 25 heart disciples in Tibet, one hailed from Sogdiana, one of the few place names that sounds anything like Oddiyana.

Khenpo Tsewang Rinpoche, approaching with upward palms takes your hands, his bronzed forehead leans forth to touch your own. We exchange good mornings before he put palms together to regard someone behind me - the black Amitabha statue seated near the moon gate, here on the western side of the temple. This gesture was so natural to Khenpo, for a moment I felt like I was ignoring a living person. He smiled and repeatedly thanked us for coming, sincerely praising our efforts in a way that almost made us blush. Marveling at the pattern and color of the wood, he says, sandalwood trees are considered sacred but do not grow in Tibet, so Himalayan Cedar is used instead. The wood we are working with, commonly known as cedar or eastern red cedar is actually a native specie of juniper (Juniperus virginiana), but hey.... In discussing work to be done with Sergei, Khenpo Tsewang suggests that the buddhas remain black with some selective gold trimming on the lotus seat and robes, perhaps the ushnisha bump atop the head. He also says something about, 'opening the eyes.' Sergei indicates that traditionally, each Buddha should have a small canopy shielding them from the elements. There is no end to the detail, no finality to the building of this mandala. If there were a thousand people here, they could all stay busy with projects contributing to Khenchen's vision.

Having discovered our love of Pecan Sandies, Ani makes sure we have a whole bag to go with our coffee breaks. Tsering advises stretching like Vajrayogini to loosen up a sore hip, likely acquired by a long sit in the truck. Laya has asked her to paint one of the 'Nirman' boxes red. It will bv used to carry offerings in outdoor pujas. Ngakpa Drakpa and I talk in the Sangha House whereI learn of two new books coming out based on Khenchen's teachings, a large one on the Guhyagarbha Tantra and another which will include the zhi-khro revealed by Karma Lingpa, which is the basis for the Bardo Thodrol, better known as The Tibetan Book of the Dead. We both marvel at the unique Nyingma perspective offered by Khenchen Palden on the Rangtong & Shentong debate.

An amazing spinach-garbanzo-potato soup and cornbread was served for dinner after which I copied the Samye declaration from a large slab of wood carved in Tibetan on display in the main room of the Sangha House. After the sun sets, an orange salamander on a dark road gets attention. We run into Sergei, who is in a rare mood, somewhat excited about a set of thangkas he was commissioned to paint. Over the course of our exchange, he shares some of his unique experiences and perspectives as trained thangka painter in Asia and America. Dechen and I lost track of Rigdzin & Tsering later that evening and in looking for them, re-ascended the large stone steps leading up to the temple, silky new prayers flags waving in the breeze. On the return trip we stopped in the Sangha House for toast and hot soymilk before retiring.

Tripod for fire pujas,
Khenpos residence in background

MON JUNE 14:

Woke to rain, coffee and oatmeal for breakfast before shuffling up the hill to begin setup. Turn on compressor, unroll cords, assemble router, table and chop saws to fashion wood for benches, putty over nail holes, fill nail gun, mucho sanding, always have a tape and sharp pencil ready and general gofering for Rigdzin. His ability to visualize what he wants to build is admirable. I have told him many times that he would likely excel at visualizing the yidam, should that ever become a primary practice. For now, Rigdzin's main contribution is in practical service as a master carpenter in support of the Guru and his community. Khenchen Palden is travelling to Oneonta with Ani to see the doctor today. We might have hoped to see him pass along the road but this did not happen. The ladies are highly praised for the Tibetan Noodle Soup - tukpa, served for lunch. A continuity of good food coming from the kitchen is apparently one of the weaker points in this small, ever-changing gathering of practitioners. As cooks, farmers and carpenters with a strong background in community, our earthiness and hands on experience with the material plane is obviously one of the stronger points we are able to offer.

Come afternoon, the ladies bring coffee to the work site before we take a short walk n the woods behind the temple to top of Dharmapala Hill, the peak above the Khenpos residence. An old road winds past a rotting little hunting cabin, an artifact of the previous owner. We continue up through a thick understory of ferns in an oak and maple forest. Sky is gray and the tang of fungus hangs in the air. Many dead trees standing in these woods. In Tennessee, theywould have been harvested for firewood but the crew here is especially small in winter and all of the buildings run on oil. Exposed Devonian boulders exfoliate horizontally in slate-thick sections. Someone has collected enough slabs to build a small stupa off to one side of the clearing. The grassy crown of the hill is broken up by trees both living and dead between which old prayer flags are strung in great numbers gradually returning their substance to the elements.

Upon return, Ani says KPSR is not improving, that he is actually worse than last year. This was a little disturbing to hear, as she is very close to him. One of the young retreatants asks why we don't come sit with everyone in the temple at morning or evening prayers which happen every day. Dechen explains that because we have prior obligations and can only stay for four days, we have decided to put all our efforts into seva.

The Stupa of Complete Victory
commemorates Buddha successfully prolonging his life by three months
marking victory over all misadventures

TUE JUNE 15:

Whatever it is we are able to do here, we have to finish it up today. Lots more puttying nail holes and seams, sanding, vacuuming. Everyone has been enriched, re-energized in relation to the Three Jewels on the basis of sheer proximity to the physical presence of the Guru. Some of the newer people have spent months working and retreating on the land but very little time with Khenchen. We are gaining a better appreciation of how generous and familial both of the Khenpos have been with us over the last twenty years. Everyone feels it and this is exactly why we wanted to bring the ladies who are both enthused and already talking about returning in autumn. Khenpo Tsewang stops by with Ani and after telling us Khenchen is not doing so well, suggests, 'so maybe say some prayers for him.' Knowing we are leaving in the morning, Ani invites us all to come over to the Khenpos residence at 8 pm. Rigdzin and I stand with hands folded at heart-level as they slowly progress along the path circling the gonpa. Khenpo Tsewang turns to acknowledge us from a distance, smiling under a faded red ballcap. Now Ani turns and with a gaze that is so full of love it can be hard to fathom until you understand what she does, she too raises her palms, bows her head slightly. Before they are out of sight around the corner, Khenpo and Ani turn our way once again; we are honored, blown away by their warm regard.

As the hour approaches, the phrase, 'You might be late for your own funeral but you'd better be on time for the lama' runs through my head. Dechen and Tsering have been helping us today and we manage to wrap it up but are still fairly covered in fragrant cedar dust when we arrive for a short goodbye meeting with the Khenpos. We all sit on the back porch to remove shoes before entering. Ani leads us into the main room where, to our amazement, both of my beloved teachers were sitting, facing west, enough light still pouring through the southern windows that we needed no more. Khenpo Tsewang occupying the closer chair, lovingly motions me to greet Khenchen first. Khenchen is quietly but audibly saying mantra. Rigdzin and I sit to their left, the ladies to the right. Khenchen looks a bit frail. He is in robes but has on socks and longjohns. His features are sharp like he has lost weight, but he does not look like he is in any pain. He is very present, surprisingly youthful and seems almost enthused as if he is about to start on a journey. "How is it in Tennessee?" he asks. Rigdzin replies that it is very hot and that its been nice to work up here in some cooler weather. Khenchen came back with, "you should move up here" all in English. "Maybe we will," I said. Khenchen does not usually speak in English. He looks my way to see if I have anything more to say. I imagine we will be able to talk about more philosophical and scholarly things sometime in the future when he is feeling better. I said, "We want you to get healthy. We still need you. Please do everything you can to get better soon." Dechen having heard about a reluctance to take medicine and his insistence that practice would be sufficient, pleaded, "Please take your medicine, we want you around for a long time." Khenchen held his hand out and made a gradually upward motion from left to right, as if to say, 'I am slowly improving'. "Please..." we implored again. They both thanked us profusely for coming and working, then showered us with gifts, including bells & dorjes, pictures of Padmasambhava blessed by Dudjom Rinpoche's wife, practice texts, a CD of chants from the nuns of Sravasti, jewelry for the ladies and a large thangka for the sangha. Again, one by one, each of us took both their hands in our own, closed eyes and touched foreheads together to receive their blessings before making our way back outside. Dechen said she could feel the energy surging between herself and Ani when they bumped heads, "As we were leaving I felt that Ani wanted to share something with me but then decided not to."

Heated leftovers were more than adequate for dinner. I was exhausted from the day's labor but Rigdzin soon headed back uphill to build a rack for two copper prayer wheels to be installed by the door leading into the temple from the moon gate. Relaxing together that evening, concerned about Khenchen Palden's health, talk turned toward the literal meaning of Khenchen's long life prayer. Upon returning to the Bodhicitta Inn, Sergei gave us some high-quality postcard-sized reprints of his work. I chose an image of the powerful Black Yang-Phur Vajrakilaya and one of Garab Dorje. Sergei encouraged us to make and sell puja tables over a cup of red wine in their little apartment. Kelly showed us their fossil collection. We soon learn the sangha will be holding special services and a general assembly this weekend to pray for the long life of Khenchen Palden Sherab Rinpoche.

In the Medicine Buddha Temple

WED JUNE 16:

We pack the truck which is now parked in front of the Bodhicitta Inn. Sergei hands me a hardcover book entitled The Silk Road, A History as we say goodbye. The ladies have requested a tour of the Medicine Buddha temple and Drakpa obliges. The only full-time resident here is the wonderful art collection and a hot tub which has never been used. Over in one corner of the main shrine room, amidst all the Buddhas and thankgkas, sits a simple bedroll, a felt hat and a walking stick, a touching reminder of Bill, the Chicago devotee and maha-patron who bought the land PSL now occupies, the luminous red tile that covers the floors and wainscot, and so much more. Bill died of a heart attack the day after the temple was consecrated.

At the Cannonsville Reservoir we say a few more prayers for Khenchen Palden and protection on the road ahead. Too soon stuck in traffic for too long south of Wilkes-Barre; all kinds of rock and roll. At one point, we were parked in the left lane, two cars behind an 18-wheeler. In front of him the lane was clear as far as anyone could see, but jammed just around the bend. No one in the right lane paid it any mind as we inched forward. A small pickup tried to pass to our left, rolling over the grass in the central divide. The big truck driver sees him coming and quickly whips his cab to the left shoulder, over onto the grass so that the little guy is forced into the steeper part of the drainage ditch and must accelerate to get around the big guy. Traffic is barely moving again when another driver, this one a woman in a small sedan, attempts to pass around the right side of the truck but he will not let her get by easily either. She drops back as traffic comes to a halt. She wants her place back in the left lane behind the semi. The man in the car ahead closes the gap behind the big truck, shutting her out. Rigdzin slows to a halt and leaves her plenty of space to get in between us, but she doesn't want it, insisting that the guy ahead of us let her in front. She is screaming at him when he thrusts a hand out the window implying WTF! and then decides to let her occupy the space between himself and the psycho in the big truck. DBT sings stories for us as the sun sets, the diesel taking us back across the Susquehanna at Harrisburg. After a promotional build-up inflating expectations, we learn that it was all for naught because the Mexican dude who ran the little restaurant in Woodstock VA went out of business over the winter. We settle for China Wok, where one lovely Chinese girl, an overworked young waitress, inspired possibilities for offbeat fiction. Spent the night under the stars without a tent at Wolf's Gap. After everyone fell asleep, a police car made the rounds illuminating license plates of those camped here before heading back down the hill to Virginia. Wind blows strong all night long.

THU JUNE 17:

We took an early morning walk on the trail that leads to Tibbet's Knob and chanted prayers at a beautiful overlook before speeding south through the Shenandoah Valley, beside rolling fields of knee-high corn, barns covered in bright red or rusting tin, silos capped by shiney domes, others topless, abandoned to ivy and creepers. Narrow, tall colonial farmstead homes of brick or stone, dark green patches of garden potatoes out back, waving fields of alfalfa, the color of wildflowers blooming in the divide, past Elliot's Knob (4458 ft) on the ridge known as Great North Mountain. Black bear and Bobcat still thrive here. We pass the monadnock Sugarloaf (3626), musing on the dark history of Brush Mountain, site of the crash that killed Audey Murphy in 1971 and the kind of violence on the AT that one hesitates to repeat. Blue Ridge runs to our east for over 300 miles until the highway curves sharply west, passing between Walker and the Iron Mountains as we approach the TN-VA border. On the far side of Walker Mountain the hills contain the largest deposits of the best quality coal in Virginia. A bridge south of Kingsport Tennessee spans the dark rocks of a steep-walled gorge over the Holston. We have crossed the point where water drains to the Atlantic and are now in the watershed of the Tennessee River and greater Mississippi basin. In the 18th century, this was the west. The Dead Weather fills the cab as we roll by Sycamore Shoals where a group of Cherokee sold most of Kentucky to Richard Henderson, a real estate speculator, in 1775. The Henderson purchase was illegal and provocative, but in the meanwhile, Daniel Boone was hired to spearhead settlement in the 'dark, bloody ground.' Exits for President Andrew Johnson and Davy Crockett. Soon, the road is suspended above the earth as it bows through north Knoxville. Tall white towers of the Clinch River plant bring to mind the coal ash pond that ruptured and sent a billion gallons of toxic sludge across 300 acres of surrounding land in December 2008. TVA is being fined for that so naturally, our rates have gone up. Climbing the eastern slope of Walden's Ridge, along the base of the Crab Orchard Mountains onto the Cumberland Plateau, past the exit to Padma Gochen Ling, the retreat center built after the Khenpos first came to Tennessee in the late '80's. We originally met them in an old log cabin which occupies the same hollow. Last autumn we met with the Khenpos and the greater sangha for a Vajrakilaya empowerment, the third time they opened this mandala in Tennessee. I was fortunate to have been there all three times. We stop again at the rest area on Caney Fork, leaving the cars and descending through the woods to watch the twilight fade on the cliffs and mist creep over the water, grateful for a safe and productive journey.

OM AH HUNG

Rigdzin & Tsering, Caney Fork, Tennessee

The Seven Line Prayer

2010-06-21T15:52:00.000-07:00

The Seven Line Prayer is the primary invocation of Padmasambhava for Nyingma devotees, chanted thrice at the begining of any sadhana. The prayer is said to have originated in eastern India, revealed by a 'black dakini' who referred to Padmavajra as her brother. This was Kali no doubt, suggesting inherent accord among the highest levels of tantric realizers from both Hindu and Buddhist traditions. [1]

HUNG!

Line 1: On the northwest border of Oddiyana

Oddiyana; a medieval kingdom in central Asia associated with tantric wisdom, translates as going by flying

Oddiyana, the province of Mind, the axial Sushumna, blue Uma, central channel, middle way between extremes and ancient context of spiritual freedom

Invoking Guru Padma 'On the northwest border' - at the extreme periphery of ordinary perception, where samsara meets nirvana

One ground, two paths.

~ Jigme Lingpa

One and the same primordial space allows for the adventures of samsara as well as the peace of nirvana.

The two most obvious objects in earth's sky appear to be round & about the same size but could hardly be more different.

From the heart of the Ganges basin,

west is the direction from which came both conquerors & civilization (reloaded)
north is certain death, barren wastelands, barbarism beyond the pale of society.

Border, junction, frontier, horizon, crossroad, liminality;
Tibetan bardo means between two, the twilight zone of
inner/outer, solar/lunar, form/emptiness; rigpa

Line 2: On the pistil stem of a lotus

Yab-yum flowers, luminous differentiation of attraction
Union of intrinsic awareness & emptiness of objective expanse

Corolla petals as expanse of appearances
Pistil as reflective awareness; joined at stem in
Union of great bliss & true nature

Objective field and the one cognizing are both empty, dependent, co-emergent
Unchanging primordial awareness ornamented with rose apples

Padma gazes void of self-nature, ever-unfolding regeneration
Time's brother, radiant wholeness bearing every apparent division

Line 3: Endowed with marvelous supreme attainments

Liberating presence and power of primordial radiance
Illumines & transforms individual beings whole environments

Emanations of Guru Rinpoche are transcendent skilful means
Arising in response to diverse needs of complex sentient beings

Supreme Siddhi is awakening to Buddhahood;
Flying, healing, alchemy, invisibility are all lesser accomplishments

Solar plexus, seat of the rays of power emanating
Into the crystalline world of atomic events

Line 4: You are renowned as the Lotus Born

The ground, support and source of all has neither
Come into being nor abandoned the world.

Of supreme value to transient beings, the Great One
Is invoked through divine names & forms

If the rapture of devotion overwhelms you,
Breathe out strongly, and then leave everything as it is.

~ Padmasambhava

Padmasambhava; always present unchanging wisdom
Song of liberation seducing mind fixated
On the uncertainties of impermanent phenomena

In Vajrayana, fruition is not associated with the crown but in
Falling out of the sahasra into the heart as in OM AH HUNG

Infinite Light utters HRI &
The Lotus-Born appears [2]

Three dimensions of the heart; outer, inner and secret

the physical organ
the chakra
the secret or vajra heart

The dorje's central sphere, an uncarved thig-le, pre-cosmic seed, mahabindu, nying-po; akin to dharmakaya, secret essence or Vajra Heart - not the anahata chakra associated with the lotus petals (sambhogakaya) emanating off the central sphere.

Line 5: Surrounded by a mandala of many dakinis

Samsara/'khor ba translates as cyclic existence
Mandala or retinue is 'circling a center'/'dkyil 'khor

The difference between simply wandering in circles and
Pradakshina in a mandala lies in one's relation to the center

Sangha is the third Jewel; wherever you find it,
True sangha is a refuge & treasury of friendship & wisdom.

In place of the relative abstraction of Three Jewels

Buddha
Dharma
Sangha

Vajra refuge invokes the immediacy of Three Roots;

Guru
Yidam
Dakini

Padma's mandala or retinue is the natural radiance of pristine cognitiveness

Sanskrit Dakini, Tibetan Kha-dro translate as sky-goer
Transcendent power & activity on the basis of emptiness wisdom

The Guru-kula is the sphere of mystical love, responsive action
Compassion as consort, spontaneous conductivity

Dakinis' native capacity to sublimate karmic winds, outshine mind,
Drawing demons of ordinariness into the central fire

Four Dakini Gate-Keepers surround You;

dark blue pacifying
golden enrichment
deep red magnetizing
dark green subjugating

Among the qualities of attainment are five wisdoms
Omnipresent in essence as five skandhas

Form is a five ton elephant wandering a beach, holding a vajra mirror at dawn

Feeling, a horse-mounted jewel at noon, reflecting the emptiness/equality of all things

Perception, a peacock at twilight in the spring, perfectly discerning all individual qualities

Conception, thunderbird siddhi of accomplishment soars above the northern wilderness at midnight as the world sleeps

Consciousness, a yawning lion, at ease anywhere.

Line 6: Following You I will practice

this is the first line of the actual prayer

Samaya in Sanskrit, Dam-tsig in Tibetan, translates as mind-bond.

This is the way of guru yoga, devotion to dharma
As taught by the lama, realization of supreme bodhicitta.

Of the three precepts of Garab Dorje
'Absolute conviction in the practice is the second imperative'

Having found a qualified teacher, effective vajra praxis rides on
True devotion also called faith, trust or confidence.

Confidence; a deep conviction, lucidity & longing for
Those things which are real, have value & are possible.

The root is the development of confidence.
The root of everything happy is this trusting confidence.

~ Nagarjuna

Line 7: Please come, grant your blessings!

This is the second and final line of the actual prayer

Opening As Vajrayogini we magnify /intesify
Padma's Siddhi, the force of purification & realization.
She is what Awareness Is and Does.

GURU PADMA SIDDHI HUNG

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[1] Indian origin of The Seven Line Prayer reflected in Seven-line structure as keys to open chakras; Tibetan system only names 5, fusing 1/2 and 6/7
[2] Hridaya means heart, central to both Tibetan & Indian systems

The Lion's Roar

2010-06-21T08:41:00.000-07:00

He reduced the three worlds,
he subjugated the three domains,
and received the name of Sange Dradog.

The manifestation for the Fifth Month is named Sengé Dradog, the Lion's Roar, one of two wrathful manifestations among the eight, this one appeared in India. Sengé Dradog is the first of the emanations to actively confront non-buddhist doctrines and practices. He appears in a wrathful form like Vajrapani, the Lord of Secrets empowered by the Buddha to be the teacher and protector of the mantrayana teachings. Padma originally received the name Sengé Dradog while residing in Lotus Pile, a large charnel ground in Oddiyana, in the center of which is a self-manifesting, luminous stupa, where Padma taught for five years. Then, in the cemetery Piled-up Black Clouds, Vajrapani himself, who was like a segment of rainbow, taught Padma the inner tantras, including the Guhyagarbha.

While Padma was practicing in Chilly Grove, a group of buddhist scholars at Nalanda were worried about an upcoming debate. While confident in philosophical matters, they were nervous when it came to demonstrating siddhi or magical power. Protocol of the day demanded the defeated embrace their opponents' tradition. As the scholars discussed this situation a black dakini appeared in the sky, announcing that her brother would be able to help. When they asked who her brother was, she replied, Padmavajra and explained that he could he summoned by reciting the Seven Line Prayer, which she taught them. So the pandits chanted the prayer with devotion from the rooftops of Nalanda. Guru Rinpoche immediately appeared and agreed to help them.

This situation evokes a familiar theme, the need to complement transcendent wisdom with a wide spectrum of skilful means to carry this awareness into the world for the benefit of beings. Buddha's two heart-disciples, Maudgalyayana and Sariputra, were boyhood friends before they joined the sangha. The latter was considered Buddha's wisest disciple while the former was highly adept in siddhi or magical attainment. The theme appears a thousand years later in the story of Khenpo Santiraksita's first mission to Tibet. As subtle and insightful as the Khenpo was, ordinary Tibetans were not moved by his scholarly presentation of the Buddhadharma. To remedy this, he suggested the king invite Guru Padmasambhava, renowned for his 'marvellous attainments' and miraculous powers.

The buddhists easily won the dialectics phase of the debate. In response, the tirthika magicians tried to intimidate them, causing strong winds to blow while thunder rumbled and crashed for a week. Padma summoned Singhamukha, the Lion-faced Dakini, who instantly granted full accomplishment and mantras to defeat all challengers. Transforming into Sengé Dradog, in a dark blue body with a pot belly, he wears a garland of freshly severed heads, a tiger-skin skirt and a shawl made from the pelt of a white lion. Employing the subjugation mudra with his left hand, the terrifying apparitions and subtle obstructions disappear. Nalanda would remain a buddhist university for centuries to come.

According to Dudjom Rinpoche,

Once, when five hundred extremist teachers began to dispute the teaching at Vajrasana, the master defeated them in a contest of debate and occult power. When they cursed him, he warded off their spells by using the wrathful mantra which has been given to him by the dakini Marajita[1]. He brought down a mighty thunderbolt which "liberated" those teachers and set fire to their city. When he initiated the remainder of them into the Buddha's teaching and raised aloft the victory banner of the doctrine, he became known as Simhanada (Lion's Roar).

On another occasion, he appeared in Orissa at the site of a famous lingam. Every day people would slaughter and burn many animals there in ritual sacrifices. Sengé Dradok arrived and pointed his mudra at this lingam until it cracked and burst. People took that as a sign and animal sacrifices were discontinued in that area. In this same wrathful form he took up residence in Nepal at the charnel ground Many Mounds Self-Formed where he turned the Wheel of Dharma for five years while subjugating dakinis and the eight classes of gnomes.

Did Padma really fry those teachers and set fire to their city? The thunderbolt wielded by Vajrapani is the flash of Primordial Awareness which reveals the true nature of things. This terrifies the hounds of complacency and the hens of mediocre aspiration. The Lion's Roar is the thunderous reverberation of blessings and extraordinary activity as the vajra encounters the city of conventional conception and ignites the spiritual process. We should all be so fortunate.

_________________________________

[1] Mārajitā - Subduer of Mara, a dakini who gave Padmasambhava empowerments in Chilly Grove

Song of the Denma

2010-05-14T08:10:00.000-07:00

The Earth Goddesses in Oddiyana, along with their retinues, exalt and glorify the Guru:

HUM
He is born of the lake, he has come to Oddiyana;
there he was a prince and worker of prodigies.
Detached from the world, as his method he chose playfulness.
To him, Padma Gyalpo, obeisance and praise.

He came to India and presided on the Diamond Throne,
triumphed over the fourfold Mara, [1] equaled all the Buddhas,
and assumed the guise of a bhiksu in accordance with the rules of the code.
To him, Shakya Senge, obeisance and praise!

He came to Zahor and presided in Magadha;
in the Chilly Grove cemetery he practiced necromancy
and made twelve Baskets [2] shine in the depths of his heart.
To him, Padmasambhava, obeisance and praise!

He came to the tirthikas and presided in the Garden of Joys,
filling the horizons with his voice and his renown
and clarifiying in peoples' hearts the Formulas [3] outer and inner,
To him, Dorje Dolod, obeisance and praise!

He came to Vaisali and presided in the Funeral Land,
neither conceiving of repose nor seeking contemplation.
Indivisible and containing every directions, he extended as far as heaven.
To him, Padma Todtreng, obeisance and praise!

He came to Kashmir and presided at Singhapura,
winning over all who stayed to listen,
and the Greatly Benevolent was like a father and mother.
To him, Loden Chogsed, obeisance and praise!

He came to Khotan and presided in Yang Leshod Grotto;
he mastered, in the castle of the yaksas, the eight classes of the gnomes of pestilence,
brought to submission the three worlds [4], and dominated the three realms. [5]
To him, Senge Dradog, obeisance and praise!

He came to the heart of Tibet and presided in the enclosure of Tiger's Cave.
Emanation of Amitabha, he protected men,
leading a multitude of the dakinis of the four orders.
To him, Dewa Ngodrub, obeisance and praise!

He came to the rakshasas and presided on Tail of the Yak Island,
tamed the ogres and red faces on the Glorious Copper Mountain, [6]
and bore off the living to felicity.
To him, Padma Jungnay, obeisance and praise!

~ from Canto 49 of The Life and Liberation of Padmasambhava (8th c.), Padma bKa'i thang as recorded by Yeshe Tsogyal, rediscovered by Terchen Urgyen Lingpa (b. 1323), Dharma Publishing, 1978

_________________________________

[1] The four demons of the skandhas, emotions, death and optimism
[2] The twelve divisions of Highest Yoga Tantra (Anutarrayogatantra) consist of six father tantras comprising the aspect of skilful means and six mother tantras of discriminative awareness.
[3] A reference to mantra.
[4] The nether world of nagas, the surface world of humans and the upper world of gods.
[5] The realms of desire, form, and formlessness
[6] Padmasambhava manifested the pureland of Zangdog Palri (Glorious Copper-Colored Mountain) after he left our earth for a different world system. Here is "An Aspiration Prayer to Journey to the Glorious Copper-Colored Mountain" by H.H. Dudjom Rinpoche.

The Lotus Vajra Guru

2010-05-13T16:15:00.000-07:00

Many further adventures happen between the events surrounding the primary emanations celebrated each tenth day of the lunar month. For instance, between last month's expression and this month's, Padma engineers the future rebirth of Zahor's King Arsadhara as the Tibetan monarch Srongtsen Gampo, and goes on to convert Emperor Ashoka, before spending time in Sri Lanka where like himself, Aryadeva is miraculously born from a lotus.

In eastern India, the monastery of Vikramashila had been attacked by tirthikas and all the texts burned to ashes. The glow from these fires caused Naga King Mucalinda, to grow ill. A healer from the human realm was summoned, a monk by the name of Siddhipala. Once restored to health, a grateful Mucalinda hands over the Prajnaparamita and many jewels to Siddhipala who would later become known as Nagarjuna. This was the beginning of the gTer-ma tradition. It seems emanations of Padmasambhava were present at every major event in Buddhist history.

Padma surveys the world at his ease. Having acquired knowledge in many fields and with growing insight into 'the inferior mind,' he contemplates his course. Among recent experiences, he has abandoned a kingdom, ruled and converted another, led an army, survived a fiery execution, hooked up with Mandarava and attained immortality. Now, what else must be done?

Traveling with Mandarava, they descend into the Ganges basin and pass through Bengal where the local Maharaj is persecuting Buddhists and through his greed, impoverishing the people. Padma set out to subdue this king. Mandarava is sent to a street of the capital city to practice her art. "Appear," he told her, "with a cat face!" Now the rebel army, 84,000 strong, is being led by three beings with cat faces. The troops carry mystic pitchforks; the assaults and battles begin. Nobody can resist them. Walls are breached, the trapdoor discovered, the kingdom won and Dharma victorious.

At the same time, great destruction overwhelms the region as IIkhtiyar Uddin Muhammad bin Bakhtiyar Khilji, burns Nalanda University and other big monastic establishments in Bengal (1203). After a run of over 1500 years, these would be the final days for institutional Buddhism in northern India. Seven centuries would pass before the Tibetan diaspora began trickling over the Himalayas in the early 1960's. Khilji, which translates as 'warrior' in Turkish and 'thief' in Pashtu, arrived with a leading contingent of eighteen horseman, and was reported to have asked the monks of Nalanda if they had a copy of the holy Quran in their great library. Upon hearing that there was not one, the executions began. Finally, he grew curious about what kind of works the library did contain, but there was no one left alive to explain. Sources say the enormous library burned for six months.

Orgyen Lingpa misidentifies Bakhtiyar Khilji as Hulagu Khan and has him torching Vikramasila (which he has already stated was burnt by tirthikas). Half a century later, as if by karmic decree, it was cosmic payback time. It came in the form of the Mongol Hulagu Khan, grandson of Genghis, who sacked Islamic Baghdad (1258), smashing the Abassid Caliphate and using the great collection of books and sacred texts in their massive library to build a bridge across the Tigris River. It is said that the waters ran black with ink. Hulagu was assisted in this destruction by crusading Christians as well as his massive horde. Baghdad would not be a real city again for a few centuries. The destruction wrought by the Khan was so excessive that his infamy spread among the Tibetans who did not understand that he had never been to India and that he was actually 'the enemy of their enemy'. Hulagu was no saint but disappointed his Christian wife by dying as a Buddhist.

In the midst of all this chaos, Padma gazed deeply into the subtle mysteries of interdependence, divining a way to influence his home kingdom. He assumes the form of a Brahmin boy determined to acquire a legendary magical substance[1] which will help him accomplish great benefits for many beings. After sufficient inquiry and preparation, he appears as Dombhi Heruka riding a tiger and wielding poisonous snakes on his way to the charnel ground. The locals are not impressed and glibly assume he has drugged the creatures, but in this form he acquires and consumes the mystical substance. Empowered by sacrament, he employs his siddhi in a way that will help in the conversion of Oddiyana but nobody appreciates the nature of his work, except for the woman who runs the local tavern. We will go further into this story with the Nyima Odzer emanation celebrated later (September) in the year.

Padma, seeing that the time is right, appears in Oddiyana with Mandarava. The nobles recall the issues that led to his exile and have grave doubts about his intentions. Upon seeing him with the princess, they condemn his infidelity and decide to take matters into their own hands. A large bonfire is prepared using sandalwood and sesame oil, both valuable and precious substances. This time, guru and consort are bound together to be roasted. Like the funeral pyre in Zahor, this one persists far longer than any normal execution, and after three weeks, the smoke and rumors even got Indrabhuti's attention. On a recent stroll through a cemetery, the king had been bitten by a poisonous snake. Narrowly escaping death, he became attached to the woman who healed him, but that too is a story for another day. The king gradually pieced together the whispers about the extraordinary situation happening on the edge of town.

King Indrabhuti of Oddiyana

Encountering his daughter-in-law Basadhara [2] in the palace, the king asks if this business could possibly involve her former husband. She is jealous and dismissive. "That fellow, my husband? Oh no, he is only a man." Later in secret, she whispers in the king's ear what she knows in her heart. The king goes to the balcony, sees the lingering plume of smoke in the distance and muses, "If this is a divine emanation, I think he will not burn." He arranges a trip with his royal entourage. Arriving at the scene of the execution, they behold a lake of sesame oil in the center of which is a great mound of charcoal supporting a lotus stalk upon which the entwined couple was dancing, 'beautiful, shining, wafting perfume and coolness'.

"Those who recalled the old days,
now sought their salvation in his mercy,
beseeching the Being with the Death's Head Rosary."[3]

The Earth Goddesses along with their retinues, exalt and glorify the Guru. The vision is overwhelming and the crowd is ecstatic and amazed. All notions of rank and social hierarchy evaporated. King Indrabhuti, his queens, the royal court as well as the entire kingdom became quickly established in the Buddhadharma. Having appeared in transfigured union with Mandarava, now Queen of the Dakinis, the Second Buddha became known as Guru Padmavajra 'the Guru with the Lotus and the Vajra' and served as the king's teacher for the next 13 years. Mandarava will organize the construction of a number of temples dedicated to wrathful deities. At various times, according to need, the princess manifests as a rainbow, a jackal and a fairy. All her efforts are devoted toward insuring that the Buddha's teaching would continue to bring benefit to sentient beings far into the future.

Padma travels to the plains of India where a child has been born to a couple of poor weavers. Mother dies in childbirth. Father brings them to the cremation ground, abandoning baby as well. Mandarava, having perfected the power of shape-shifting, now appears in the form of a tiger to suckle and raise the child. As a young girl, she learns to spin and weave wool. At 14, she will meet Yeshe Tsogyal and receive the name Kalasiddhi. She would become one of the Guru's five principal consorts.

_________________________________________

[1] the flesh of one born a brahmin for seven consecutive lives was believed to have magical properties.
[2] Padma's first wife. Her name is likely a form of Vasudhara, goddess of worldly wealth.
[3] The Life and Liberation of Padmasambhava (8th c.), Padma bKa'i thang as recorded by Yeshe Tsogyal, rediscovered by Terchen Urgyen Lingpa (b. 1323), Dharma Publishing, 1978

The King's Praise

2010-04-23T09:33:00.000-07:00

HRI:

To the Body of Essence, lama unfeigned and free from ego-action,
to the Body of Fruition, lama of blissful actions,
to the Body of Metamorphosis, lama who manifested from the lotus stalk,
to the Three Bodies, to Vajradhara obeisance and praise!

To the Body: immutable body of Samantabhadra,
to the Speech: which is impartial and full of knowledge,
to the Heart: unwavering and ineffable thought and expression,
praise to Padma Gyalpo, to the Conqueror's Body, Speech, and Mind.

To him who appeared as benefactor, Amitabha,
to the Being adorned with many blessed perfections,
to Padma Gyalpo who dominates the world,
to Dorje Todtreng Tsal, Vajra Strength of the Rosary of Death's Heads, obeisance and praise!

To Vajra the Pacifier, Dorje Todtreng Tsal,
to the Great Artisan, Ratna Todtreng Tsal,
to the Dominator, Padma Todtreng Tsal,
to the Sorcerer, Karma Todtreng Tsal,
to the One formed All at Once, Buddha Todtreng Tsal,
to the Master of Perfect Deeds, obeisance and praise!

HRI:

To the Uncreated exempt from any fault, to Padma Jungnay, praise!
To the Realizer of the Perfections, to Padmasambhava, praise!
To the Illuminator of the Shadows, to Nyima Odzer, praise!
To the one who tames the fourfold mara and evil guides, to Shakya Senge, praise!
To the one who vanquishes tirthikas and the gnomes of pestilence, to Senge Dradog, praise!
To the one who is open to all that must be known, to Lodan Chogsed, praise!
To the one who dominates the three worlds and the three domains, to Padma Gyalpo, praise!
To the one who annihilates Mara and evil guides, to Dorje Drolo, praise!
For him, perfect happiness has been achieved -- to Yeshe Khandro, praise!

~ composed by King Arsadhara of Zahor, father of the Dakini Princess Mandarava,
as recorded by Yeshe Tsogyal and discovered by Orgyen Lingpa in the Padma bKa'i thang, c.41

Burning for You

2010-04-22T17:17:00.000-07:00

Saturday April 24 is a White Day. The emanation celebrated during the third month (snake) of the Tibetan lunar calendar is Padma Jungnay. Jungnay is a Tibetan word equivalent to Sanskrit sambhava, meaning becoming, born or springing forth. Padma Jungnay represents Padmasambhava's entry as a teacher into the world of men.

OM AH HUNG

Princess Mandarava of Zahor was a beautiful girl. Soon after her birth, a Brahman is summoned to read the omens. She is not of human lineage; she is a dakini of knowledge who has appeared in the abodes of men. Approaching maturity, the princess attracts suitors from many lands, but this extraordinary girl had no desire to marry and only wanted to follow the Dharma. Her father King Arsadhara, was very concerned about this and tried repeatedly to change her mind.

One night at the dinner table, he felt very unusual. Feeling blissful and fiery, very agile and energized, he suspected he'd been dosed. Calling for his queen, he threatened to kill her if she did not tell him what he had eaten. The queen mother has no idea what he is talking about. Mandarava had brought home the groceries. The princess is summoned and threatened at knife-point before she explains that she had gone to market to buy meat but it was closed. On the way home, she passed the corpse of a child on the side of the road and realizing it was the appropriate time, decided to separate the muscles from the limbs. These were taken back to the palace kitchen and prepared with spices before being served to the king. The princess explains all this and then innocently asks, "Was it poisoned flesh? What is wrong?" The king realizes his altered state is an effect of having eaten the flesh of one born seven times a Brahman, a fate endowing a body with magical properties and powers. He orders Mandarava to retrieve the boy's remains which are then diligently processed into sacred pellets and stored in a special cask to be watched over by dakinis. While Arsadhara is distracted with this project, Mandarava escapes from the palace, cuts off her hair and takes up ascetic practices. Learning of her departure and reluctantly yielding to her determination, the king asks Abbot Santaraksita to ordain the princess. He then builds a palace where Mandarava and her attendants can live as nuns and practice the Dharma.

While meditating on the summit of Vulture's Peak, Padmasambhava looked out over the rounded green valley of Rajgriha, at the five peaks surrounding the town, and into the sky beyond the dark mass of defensive walls that snake along the ridgetops. He was ready to begin his work in the world.

Versed in the Tantras of the wisdom born of contemplation,
I do not fear to test the limits of the spiritual faculties.

Spontaneously transported to Lake Danakosha where he had originally emanated, four dakinis of the sea islands assembled. Padma then gives teachings to them as well as to the nagas of the seas, the gods of the planets and stars who all promise to serve him. Realizing he must go to Zahor to instruct Mandarava and her retinue, he suddenly appears in a rainbow of glory, seated in the sky above them before settling in their midst. Padma is a real hit with the ladies but his presence leads to scandalous rumors in the surrounding countryside. Eventually word gets to Arsadhara and the king sends his men to arrest the Guru. Mandarava protests that Padma is her spiritual master but is ignored and by the king's command, confined alone in a dark pit. The henchmen then carry Padma to a desolate valley where he is to be burned at the stake. The materials are gathered, the mass is ignited and smoke rises for a week. Curious about the outcome and intrigued by the persistent column of smoke, Arsadhara mounts his chariot to visit the desolate valley, where he encounters an incredible visionary display. He cannot believe his eyes.

Expressing the Dharmakaya in a form of the Youthful Vase Body, the Guru appears as an eight year old boy whose skin was as though dyed in the purple of seashells, and whose face was covered with a dew-like perspiration seated upon a large lotus in the center of a lake surrounded by ditches filled with fire whose flames were burning upside down. The Child berates the bewildered king, who falls to the ground and rolls around with great emotion. Confessing his sins and moved to express the depth of his devotion by offering his silken robes, five-sided hat and entire royal domain, the Guru accepts for the time being. The king retires to a park with a retinue of friends to practice the teachings and the entire kingdom is soon transformed. Monarchs in surrounding lands hear of incredible changes happening in Zahor. Assuming the country is caught up in spiritual fantasy and collective delusion, they decide to attack. Padma demonstrates his martial prowess and the enemy withdraws without a battle.

The old king becomes highly accomplished before he dies and is succeeded by a son. Guru Padma and Mandarava go off to practice in the Maratika Cave where they have visions of Amitayus, the Buddha of Infinite Life. They become Knowledge Holders with the Power Over Life, the second of the vidyadhara stages associated with the path of seeing. Arsadhara and his fellow monarchs symbolize the self-possessed ego, solely concerned with exercising power, controlling territory and perpetuating legacy. Princess Mandarava is our own dakini nature, at home in the expanse of primordial awareness with no interest in samsaric pursuits. The king's attempt to have it his way, isolating the dakini and burning the teacher, yield to sincere regret and deep devotion. True to their vows, the dakinis transform the executioners funeral pyre into a Buddha mandala reminiscent of the cosmic refuge tree. Handing the kingdom and a celestial daughter over to the Guru inevitably incites the ambitions of worldly challengers but with the teacher's protection, they are easily overcome. The land prospers under the influence of Padma's Siddhi. Hung!

Having become the world, the indestructible absolute awakens to the heart of life, now clear and unobscured. The alchemy of mystical passion coupled with profound insight into the nature of experience, liberated these lovers to attain the immortal Rainbow Body.

A kalpa had arisen in which the world would not be empty...
Padma obtained life within a cycle that was not empty.

________________________________

-all quotes from Padma bKa'i thang, The Life and Liberation of Padmasambhava,
by Yeshe Tsogyal, discovered by Terton Orgyen Lingpa, Dharma Publishing, 2 vols, 1978

Inconceivable Lotus Mandala

2010-04-07T07:57:00.000-07:00

Sunrise over Shenandoah

PART I: SUN GATE
Note: This long post is composed of edited notes taken from journal entries compiled last year during two trips to New York to do seva at my Lamas' monastery.

WED AUG 26
Tuesday was an all-day drive across Tennessee and most of Virginia. We spent the first night high on the ridge which serves as the West Virginia border in a quiet campground called Wolf's Gap. After determining that there were no mosquitoes, we laid a white canvas work tarp on the ground, threw spongy ridgerests and bed gear down and crawled in. Very trippy laying there warm in our bags in the dark, hundreds of miles from home and family, the wind rocking the big oaks above us. We talk and drift, releasing mundane hopes and fears as stars glow in the spaces where the leaves allow.

S is sixteen years my junior. I was originally friends with his father on the farming crew back on the old commune. We have been friends for over twenty years and next door neighbors for almost as long but this is the very first road trip we have taken alone together. We lay there in the dark with the unfinished fragments of our lives flashing before us and he thanked me for coming with him. I told him I was more than glad to be along. Both of us are realizing what domesticated home-bodies we are. We are aware there is a very real if slight possibility that we might never make it back home and are blown at how precious and fragile this whole mysterious thing is. At one point in response to a flood of unanswerables, I said, "I really don't know, I was just born here ... and I didn't make all of this up."

Mind looped back to that first meeting with the Khenpos twenty years ago. We had taken refuge earlier in the day and were hanging out between events when we got word that they wanted to meet with us. Nine of us gathered in the little upstairs room of the log cabin where they were staying. Discouraging our attempts at prostrating upon entering, we sat on the floor and they urged us closer. They insisted we scooch right up next to them and told us how special it was that we had met, especially that it was on an equinox as well as a dakini day. I did not write it down, but here is my best recollection of what they said. "The blessings of Guru Padmasambhava are very powerful and special and have brought many beings to full realization very quickly so it is extremely fortunate, not only for ourselves, to have met and enjoy this opportunity to bring these beautiful qualities to fruition in our lives. As you know, we are from Tibet and because of the trouble there, we may never have a chance to go back, so we've had to accept that we may spend the rest of our lives a long way from home. In the years since we left, we have lost most of our family. When Dudjom Rinpoche asked us to come to America to share these teachings we thought it would be a good idea because there are people like you who have a sincere interest and this may benefit many others, so here we are. And here you all are. It is not just a coincidence that we have met but has deeper causes and conditions. Being invited to Tennessee and then meeting you has come about through the aspirations to bring more peace, love, joy and enlightenment into our lives. Our love and respect for these wonderful teachings have brought us together this weekend and we wanted to tell you that we both feel like we are meeting our new family. We are treading the same path and developing our buddha qualities. We are traveling together in the same Buddha mandala, so like family, we will try and help one another along. If there is anything we can do for you, don't hesitate to ask. In the same way, you might hear from us sometime if there is something you can help us with."

Outside of editing some transcripts, the Khenpos have rarely asked me to do anything.

Dawn found us rolling downhill in neutral to coffee at an interstate truck stop where a Mexican kid who didn't speak any English was sweeping. We made good time moving north, crossing the blue Potomac into Maryland, and the wide Susquehanna at Harrisburg. I gaze at the surrounding hills and think about my father's Ukranian Jewish ancestors who first settled in this area sometime after 1882. Here, Interstate 81 begins to run in a valley south of a long ridge known as Second Mountain before cutting north through Swatara Gap. There is coal throughout Appalachia but these hills contain large deposits of anthracite, the best quality coal on earth. The Appalachian Trail crosses the road as it descends off Second Mountain before regaining the ridge on Blue Mountain. One hundred miles north through forested valleys and roadcuts exposing ancient basement rocks of Pangea, we are again in the Susquehanna Valley at Wilkes-Barre, encountering mid-day traffic and road construction.

We stopped for brunch at a rest area in north PA and talked with a liberal mustache from VA on vacation with his wife. He was going on about how this culture is living beyond its means and said Rush Limbaugh should be arrested for incitement. I tucked my mala into a belt-loop before we went off to throw Frisbee, disappearing into the bush by an old stone wall to burn and then sitting on a concrete table to share wham sandwiches for lunch. I would never see my mala again; an old ox-bone thing acquired in Santa Fe 20 years ago with silver double bell & dorje counters. But was I attached? Yeah, a little. Apparently it fell into the grass while tossing the Frisbee and i didn't notice till we were quite a ways further up the road. In consolation, S offered some entertaining distraction, turning me on to my first hearing of Zappa's 'Billy Was A Mountain'.

Arriving in Delaware County New York around one in the afternoon, we lacked good directions after crossing the state line, figuring we'd remember what to do once we got close enough. Both of us had visited the Khenpos here, at different times many years ago when they first acquired the property but before there was anything built on the land. Population density is about half of our home county in rural Tennessee and the lowest in the state outside of the Adirondacks. Clueless, we would explore these ancient valleys for the next three hours.

We stopped in Delhi and asked for directions at a groovy little coffee shop with wholesome sandwiches and nice pastries. A friendly hippie lady says oh yeah, i've catered to them before, confidently directing us up a series of hills on the outskirts of town where another Buddhist group, Karma Ling, has a retreat center. There, an old western monk who'd visited PSL many years ago, gave us his best recollection which wasn't quite good enough either. After a few long circles, we decided to stop by a river to relax and burn as we are wont to do. A weathered piling of quarried stone revealed an old bridge abutment. A tin sign warned boaters to remove their craft from the waters at this point. Mist rolled in and light rain began to fall. We had lost an afternoon but felt content to be this close and were relatively unconcerned about timing. The break must've tweaked telepath neurons; hopping back in the truck, we inquired at a nearby mechanic's shop and were promptly handed an excellent map of the area, closing on our destination before sundown.

A green state sign labeled Buddha Highway winds up a wooded mountainside to our Lamas' main seat in North America. Palden Padma Samye Ling translates as Glorious Land of the Inconceivable Lotus. The name Samye is derived from the first Buddhist monastery established in Tibet (8th c.), built and consecrated with the help of Guru Padmasambhava. After passing a few nice residences separated by thick woods, including a modern hotel-like guest house (three stories high) and a platformed tipi painted with snowlions, we arrive at the main parking lot for the sangha house, a two-story rectangle with a red tin roof. We immediately disembark, encounter no one and walk like conquerors to the top of the hill where a great red fortress rises from the grass, commanding a view to the southwest above endless green valleys. In awed silence we pull on the golden makara handles to enter the darkened main hall, removing shoes before proceeding through another set of heavy wooden doors into a large main room. I adjust the track lights on the high ceiling and hit the rugs for a round of full-length prostrations before daring to look around.

The main shrine

The general effect of being in the big room is sensorially stunning. A well-polished floor of sparkling amber red tiles patterned with natural parallel lines reveals the organic grain of sediments and has an effect like ocean waves or tiger stripes. Lower walls are wainscoted in the same amber red tile trimmed in black. Above shoulder height every square foot of wall space in the building contains colorful images of great Vajrayana masters, bodhisattvas, arhats, dakinis, trees, caves, animals, mahasiddhas, and holy sites, all of it skilfully rendered with fantastic detail. The work has been supervised and in large part executed by a talented vajra brother from the Ukraine, a longhair named Serge. The impact is delightfully overwhelming.

Three large statues, nearly life-size, dominate the main altar. A blissful Shakyamuni Buddha looks down upon us from the center, a beautiful, glaring-eyed Guru Padmasambhava sits on a lotus to the Buddha's right, a bejewelled Tara on his left. Padma is flanked by standing dakinis Yeshe Tsogyal and Mandarava and backed by an aura of many smaller gold statues, eight of his emanations and a few others. Tara is accompanied by a halo retinue of 21 golden mini-Taras, all identical. When meditating on their forms, the contrasting countenances of Shakyamuni and Padma create a subtle good cop/bad cop dynamic. Buddha is afloat in samadhi; Padma wonders why you aren't. In every direction the eye meets with images of realizers, celestial buddhas, wrathful deities, sacred landscapes, places of pilgrimage, scenes from Jataka tales, animals, rainbows, protectors, mantras & lineage monasteries.

Back outside, the mist thickens. Lumber lay exposed on the grass in the temple yard. We cut some Tyvek to cover the piles as people began coming up the steps. Two ladies enter and start preparing the altar. M, a new friend from TN who is a few years older than myself, appeared. He has already been here for a few days, looking to get some perspective on life and do what he can to help on the work projects. A 40 year old gentleman named Laya is a resident monk, hailing from western Massachusetts. He introduces himself and already knows my name. Laya invites us to attend the evening sit. We will be reciting Tsasum Lingpa's Vajrakilaya, The Dark Red Amulet, along with a few other prayers to dharma protectors.

S and I dug our zafus out of the truck, zen black and pagan green, and sat on pretty oriental carpets. Laya beat a big drum as he led the chanting. Drakpa, also in robes, manned the incense, tormas and serkyim. We weren't handed any copies of the sadhanas, so I sang along by heart but was silent for the dharmapala offerings which are part of the daily temple liturgy. Chanting is enhanced by the sublime resonance in the big room. I am not the yogi I once was as it went on a little long; at some points I felt like i needed to just sit there and be quiet. Whether the Khenpos attend or not, this practice happens here every night of the year around sundown. Far from the cities and intrigues of 21st century samsara, the pure blessing energy of prayers and mantras emanates from a quiet hilltop temple hidden among the misty forests of the Catskills.

After practice, we walked down to the sangha house where we will be staying. Laya showed us around the kitchen and we shared some pasta.

The sangha house

THU AUG 27
After a good nights sleep, I made coffee and we walked up the hill. We introduce ourselves to Dave and George, two local fellows who are the masons. They have completed the block for the first room that we are to work on, one of two wings where folks can remove coats and shoes before entering the temple. This will save money on winter heating bills and keep the shrine room warmer. As morning progresses, I am readily impressed with S's social and professional skills. He is very competent and efficient with our time together, amusingly friendly with all comers and knows how to do his job well, so well in fact that he can direct two or three other people so that the project progresses on a few fronts in smooth choreography. I wrote down measurements, cut and carried many a board while M drove to town for more lumber.

Khenpo Tsewang and Ani Lorraine soon came up and talked with us. Khenpo in a maroon ballcap readily recounts the precise years and circumstances each of us had previously visited. Elder brother Khenchen emerges from his house, wearing a long faded yellow shirt and looking a bit frail as he makes his way across the grass. He had just woken from a mid-day nap; you know dreamy how that can be. I walked over to greet him and he kept thanking me for coming. Khenpo Tsewang joined us as did S. We all headed toward the gonpa where they wanted to show us the brass roof ornaments ordered from Nepal. We had a short discussion about how to mount the 'ser-tos' (golden points).

Brass roof ornaments

I wondered how my energy would hold up without having had any breakfast, which has become my habit at home. It was a breeze, at least today. It feels good to be able to keep up a good pace even though I haven't labored like this in many a year. For lunch Laya had cooked up two skillets of food; one vegan and the other with cheese. The former was a mix of fried vegies on a slab of something brown, likely some kind of unleavened cornbread, altogether quite terrible. The vegie topping consisted of thin slices of pepper, unchewable ornamental kale, a few coins of overripe squash and zucchini with waxen skins. The best part was the fake vegie meat. While masticating through this primal fiber-fest, I spoke with Devon, and his mother Marie from Chicago, as well as Andrew from Kentucky. After lunch I met Andrew's brother Drakpa, who is a monk. With such a coarse introduction to the vittles, I was a bit discouraged and thought I might have to survive on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

Having set up the inner walls in the morning we got to work on the roof afternoon. Carry, cut, carry, lift, tighten bolts on the top of wall. By three, I was beginning to lose it. My foot hurt; I removed a sneaker and massaged the arch while sitting very still in the shade. Anticipating a slowdown, Tsewang Rinpoche and Ani showed up with delicious hot coffee and some very fancy snacks. I recovered enough to get up and be helpful for another few hours before people started streaming up the hill to gather for evening practice. In the last half-hour of the day, we had all the boards cut for the main part of the roof and S went bananas with the nail gun, putting the seal on the day's accomplishments while M and I stacked lumber and cleaned up. New cars appear in the parking lot as people begin trickling in for the Anu-yoga shedra retreat this weekend.

I took empty coffee cups back to the Khenpos' house, which sits a hundred yards east of the temple, leaving the mugs on their porch for Ani to collect. Crates of stonework occupy nearby woods, large dark Buddhas and lotuses from the same volcanic stone quarried for Borobodur. A few deer gather in the open fields at the foot of the hill. The telescope on the porch of the sangha house brought them closer; a group of healthy does, some browner, some redder, all fat.

Igneous Buddha from Indonesia

S and I walked off into the maples at sunset and found a large old boulder to sit on while we contemplated the universe and our families. I didn't want to attend practice tonight. I really do much better when I am rested. I was just glad to be here, able to be helping out with something that the Lamas required to further their work in this world.

Coming from a community that once attracted hundreds of young hippies, ready to give their all to further the material or spiritual progress of the movement, S and I are both surprised that there are not many more young folks living and working here. It is terribly ironic that the Farm had so many aspiring bodhisattvas willing to serve under a half-baked teacher while the Khenpos are real gems and the crew is so minimal. Andrew who works on editing transcripts, is in his early thirties, hails from Kentucky, and says there are plenty of good-looking youngsters over at Penor Rinpoche's center less than an hour away. Good for Penor! Outside of a few young men, most of the folks here are middle-aged women or older. So when the Khenpos called us in Tennessee, S and I felt obliged to kick in with whatever we have to give at this point. S said he felt they really needed us and that he thought it would be a good opportunity for him and wife to take a break from the great workout and get some perspective on their relationship. Beyond that, we both wanted to re-establish our connection with the Khenpos.

Om Ah Hung.

We entered the well-lit dining room after dark to discover a big pot of brown rice, another full of lentils and some great Louisiana hot sauce. I had three helpings; muy deliciosa. Good conversation with Andrew, Peter, who was studying Tibetan, and Devon, about our little Turtle Hill gang, the Nashville Yuppie Parisad 2.0, The Old and new Farm, etc.... I eventually head down to our room where M was reading Dolpopa. S ascended the hill to call home on his cell and learned that everyone back home was at the funeral of a friend who'd been attracted to Buddhism, even played in a band called Dharmakaya but had never connected with the Khenpos and wasn't disciplined enough to avoid a drug overdose. Talked with M about the legend of Padmasambhava, the Guhyagarbha Tantra, music, parents, and encounters with the Nashville Bahai group. The story of how M's father died was incredibly tragic and deserves its own space.

There are two toilets for men in the sangha house. One full of shit and paper would not flush. The other had the water turned off because the tank float was busted and water wouldn't stop flowing. The stink was so bad, I was hesitant to shower. S in his manifestation as Rigdzin Boone was determined and courageously manned the plunger. Afterwards, he scrawled a note and taped it on the bowl which read, HEY PAL, WTF?*@X%#! EVER HEARD OF PLUNGER?

FRI AUG 28
S awoke troubled by bad dreams. We breakfasted with Eric, a Brooklyn monk of Puerto Rican descent and young Devon from Chicago. Coffee and a peach will do it for me. Talked about the genesis and fall of Gaskin's dream, meeting the Khenpos, the beginnings of THS. As the work day began, clouds rolled in and drizzled on and off. Snacked on some vegan jerky and soymilk, S provided vanilla wafers. Lunch was served about an hour before we arrived. Anticipating rain, we stayed busy putting rafters and hips to roof before enjoying a good spread of lentils, green salad, rice, some stir-fried vegies and a slice of watermelon.

Determining the roof angle for the sun gate

Upstate NY is as culturally rural as anywhere in TN. The masons working on the opposite or 'moon gate' will not be here for the next two days. They must attend a wedding and then there's this bluegrass festival... S has obligations at home and realizes we will not be able to stay long enough to finish both mud-rooms. Maybe we can return in a few weeks to complete the other. (Another 2000 mile round-trip?) Tasks today included walking downhill, rummaging through used lumber piles to salvage boards once used for the sangha house porch (now rebuilt), carrying them uphill and converting them to roof hip supports.As I ascended the stone steps I could not help but notice a stainless steel furnace chimney and mushroom cap sticking out of the temple roof easily seen from the front of the building. Lordy. How did the architect ever let such a thing happen?

One of the men bidding on the copper work showed up and talked with S. A stout little troll of a fellow with a big belt buckle which read TURK and seemed to hold him together. He rocked on his heels and explained that metalworking is a union job and that to roof the block we are framing will cost $13,000. Immediately after he left S said, "What bullshit; I don't like that guy."

Mid-afternoon, Khenpo Tsewang arrived with coffee and delicious halvah that he had made. I mentioned the offending chimney and he explained it was done without their approval. No surprise there; they are not pleased. I tried to lighten it up and give it a folksy spin. "Makes it look a little like Tennessee, eh?" which didn't get any laughs. I suggested that they should just paint the pipe gold and print mantras on it; maybe even put a false one up on the other side of the roof for symmetry. The Khenpos had already thought of that.

Tsewang Rinpoche stayed with us for most of our break and inquired about our families back in Tennessee. He had recently acquired a driver's license. After hearing of my recent misfortune, he told me that he has lost his mala 'so many times.' We notice him limping as he departs. 'They (knees) are actually getting much better.' He doesn't know how they ever got weak. He added, "And you look like you are doing quite well Shugchang. We have seen you running back and forth here. You are feeling good? That is really great."

After dinner we walk back up the hill for better reception and talked with our families before I return to the bedroom, tired, a little wet, but not hungry enough to want food and considering just turning off the lights and crawling into my sleeping bag. There is a practice happening in the temple. Kirby and Sandy, friends from TN, have arrived for the weekend retreat. We roll one and walk off into a light drizzle. I tell S that I feel like I am flanking myself in time.

"How so?"

"There's a twelve year old kid on the far side of those hills who has no idea that we are out here or what I remember about him." As a boy, I had spent a few summers at camp in Bear Mountain State Park not far to the east.

Back in the room, M said he needed to practice his songs and having brought his guitar, played a few for us. I appreciated hearing S talk to M about our band, offering his perspectives and insights in ways he does not usually express when we gather to practice. We ended the evening watching the first half of Horton Hears A Who on the Mac. Very psychedelic little flick. Then we slept like babies.

SAT AUG 29
Day started with light rain and we hit it early, long before teachings began but it came down ever heavier so after getting a good start on the roof, we rolled it up and joined the sangha in the temple. We chanted for awhile and then listened to the first part of the day's teachings. Anu-yoga is the highest tantric vehicle, surpassed only by Ati or Dzogchen. Khenchen was talking about its many divisions including the 36 empowerments, the definitive, common and superior commitments, the five Maras to be renounced, the four enemies to be destroyed etc., all of which is an extremely conceptual consideration about what is essentially non-conceptual view. The vibe was like, 'Looky here kids, you are almost out of yanas, so if you don't already get it, you might want to reconsider every major topic that you should know at least something about by now and see if you've missed a beat.' Reminded me of remedial learning and a yoga for those in the crowd looking to be entertained or just bliss out while the Khenpos sing and tell stories. It had stopped raining so I poked S; "Lets get lunch now so we can work while these folks are eating." We slipped out and convinced Derek, the heavily tattooed pro-caterer currently manning the kitchen, to give us a break and let us eat early.

We returned to the gonpa and worked diligently on the roof, right on through afternoon teachings as unobstructed rays of sunlight touched the earth again. Ani brought tea and banana bread, followed a little later by cinammon coffee delivered by Khenpo Tsewang. Taking breaks with the Khenpos and Ani is very special. Sharing time, conversation, a little snack and a lot of love. This is a taste of what my ladies enjoy when they cook for the Khenpos at retreats in Tennessee. Today's discussion touches on the architecture of Samye, the first monastery built in Tibet, which includes separate sun and moon temples mirroring elements of Buddhist cosmology. Here at Padma Samye Ling both cosmic luminaries are merged with the Utse, the central temple building. Khenpo said that the side entrances we are working on could stand for solar and lunar 'gates'. I quipped, "That is very non-dual," and he chuckled while repeating it. Conversation ranged from family life to the wealth of artwork inside the temple. S asked if they were almost done painting the interior walls. I had noticed an outline of a monkey in the entrance hall but little else seemed unfinished. Khenpo Tsewang related the story of the Himalayan rock ogress who gave birth to six kids. They would grow up become the ur-ancestors of the six realms, including the original Tibetans. According to Khenpo Tsewang, the monkey was reticent to mate with the ogress but she insisted so he prayed to Avalokitesvara for guidance. The Buddha of Compassion told him, "You should do what she wants; just go along with her." We all chuckled and knew he was talking to us householders.

After the day's teaching was over, Khenchen Palden came out and talked with S and I. His color and energy looked better today. S said I had volunteered to accompany him on this trip and that working like this would help keep me young. Khenchen said, "Really? I think Shugchang might have preferred it if you just came by yourself and let him stay home. He would probably rather be out west climbing mountains," laughing slyly before assuring us he was only kidding. Cotton-picker. For the past few years, I have not been attending retreats, sometimes because I was out west, at other times because I had become fed up with the pettiness of sangha politics and torturous socializing. I came to the same understanding at the end of my trip to India when I realized I enjoyed a much better retreat situation by simply staying home. Khenchen indicated my whitening whiskers and asked, "So its true that young people grow old? That's funny, because they all seem to think they will stay young forever." Had we made too much noise with the power tools while he was teaching? "Oh no, it was fine, fine. You know I have to speak in Manhattan and it is always noisy there with sirens and traffic, day or night. And India, oh my, it is far worse with all the cars beeping, beeping. If you have an accident they will say it was because you didn't beep enough! We have heard this." We stood in the shadow of the temple and he lingered a good while as if to reassure us of his love and appreciation. His kindness blew me away.

On a second coffee break at days end, Kirby joined me on the tailgate of the truck. Kirby is the current president of the Nashville sangha and we have been seeing each other at retreats in Tennessee for many years. I shared my concerns about various aspects of the situation here on the land, such as the skeleton crew; why are there not more young people on the scene to help move things along? Where are all the yogis? I noted Laya's struggle to become an efficient contractor/administrator and a history of flakey, over-priced contractors. I suggested regular APBs be relayed to the sangha at large for seva volunteers. We discussed problems in the gonpa architecture, (he had a few disturbing tales of his own to share) and the poor design of the sangha house which leads redisents directly through the center of both men's and women's bathrooms in order to access the upstairs dining room.

In recent post on a web forum, I asked Kirby to share any wisdom he had garnered over the last few years while heading up the Nashville Sangha. We both laughed about that. "Man, I must have put you on the spot cause I haven't heard a peep since I posted it!" He began to offer details on the current fallout. Student X evinces some good qualities and quickly rises to a position of responsibility in the laid-back Tennessee sangha. But a little is too much and using subtle manipulation, begins driving others out of the mandala, fundamentally changing the character of the community. We had watched this tragedy play out over the years and both concurred, "Yeah, we could see it way back when...." So now the other shoe has dropped. She wants to be her own teacher. As a western hippie dharma bum, I and others could see her ambition clearly long ago. The Khenpos are high-stakes rollers; they took a chance and backed her. When it comes to some things, the Lamas are very much like the rest of us. Nashvega. So it goes.

Night has fallen and rain picked up again. I am alone in the room. Most of the folks who arrived for the shedra are upstairs in the main room going over their notes on the day's teaching. S and I came in late for dinner and listened for a bit before I decided to come down here. S walked up the hill to try and call home.

When the rain stops, S and I ramble off into the dark. For some reason he recalls these fictional creatures called 'swamp-wriggles,' naga types who guard wisdom treasures but have attitude problems. He says they remind him of his dad and his new wife. We touch on the energy of transmission, the need for faith, and the nature of Dzogchen teachings being so open that they might even even seem threatening to those who adhere to lower paths. In consideration of his own realization, S says he feels the need for a deeper understanding of Buddhism so as to be a better bodhisattva. Upon returning to our room after dinner, M joins us for part two of Horton Hears A Who. Afterwards S left to shower while M and I discuss the dukkha accompanying family life. Brother's depressing weir, grandparents so poor that one of their babies got hungry and ate lye, followed by a long tale about trying to smuggle opium back into the US from Vietnam, many years ago.

Vajrakilaya torma

The lion's roar of the Supreme Vehicle --
Appearance and existence
primordially the great bliss of purity and equality --
Terrifies the herds of deer
that teach falsely throughout the three worlds,
the vital points in the meaning
of the profound and vast vajra tantras.

-Jamgon Mipham

SUN AUG 30
Today is a White Day as well as Sunday, the last day of the shedra. By inauspicious coincidence, oatmeal was served with white sugar as we are out of brown. Complemented the mush with coffee and hot soymilk before a trip to Oneonta. On the way, I witnessed an American bald eagle casually perched on a backyard clothesline. Sunny day, beautiful, quiet countryside. M emphatically shares his views on the current soap opera in Tennessee. Two different people, both from the Volunteer State, say to me, "Don't tell anyone, but X was asked not to attend (the currenty shedra)." M considers X a close friend and says she wasn't planning on it anyways. So there. One of those 'you can't fire me; I quit!' situations. I sit in the back seat, holding little copper kila, reciting mantra while they shop. People-watching, sky-gazing, reading, writing, dozing, I clean up the cab a little before we seek out a health food store in sleepy Masonville. Ginger beers, blue corn chips and vinagered-spinach pockets courtesy of S who insists he likes to feed people.

The gonpa (literally, mediation place) at PSL

Back at Padma Samye Ling, we install light fixtures in the sun gate, drill holes in pine studs and pull wire. At three we removed shoes, placed zafus in the extreme southeast corner of the big room with Chemchog Heruka and Vajrakilaya on the wall to our left and Shakyamuni in full nirmanakaya glory to our right. Many people showed up for the ganachakra and we were within smelling distance of the ts'ok table which was amazingly long and heavy with good foods. Mipham's Shower of Blessings was the main practice with lots of extra prayers thrown in. At one point, a group of ladies, most of them sporting ngakpa shawls and dressed like Tibetans stood in a group and sang a traditional Tibetan tune. Then Kirby rose and read a beautiful ts'ok prayer by Jigme Lingpa. After the vajra samaya substances were served, a number of us took our plates outside and sat on the front steps of the temple to eat and talk in the late August sun. S wrapped his sweatshirt atop his head like a Sikh. When Khenchen Palden came outside, he looked at him, muttered something along the lines of "Oh boy, take a look at this guy," and then shouted, Punjabi! All the while a huge, dramatic cloud front was moving in from the west and would pour down a heavy rain which tapered before sundown.

We wrapped up the tools as the light faded, and disappeared into the maples to occupy our exfoliating metamorphic rock, where we expressed a sincere appreciation for the efforts of Mexican farmers. A chance Modiano discovered in my Shower of Blessing text featuring a dried swab of dark greenish tar spread upon it from some past era; score! We huddled for warmth and let our hearts speak. S wept while coming to understand that in spite of his intent, we can only do so much and each of us must take responsibility for ourselves. We talked about his in-laws, conditioning and the causality of an oft-troubled heart. Returning to the sangha house, we connected with M, talking more sangha history as I began to type out these notes for the day. S, ever-helpful and energized, worked on replacing the toilet mechanism we'd bought in town before deciding to scrub both stalls.

After showers, all three of us ascend the stairs for a late dinner, snacking on blue chips and sweet corn-black bean salad. The evening stretched out in the high company of novice monk Eric, hermano Jorge & black Marcos from PR and a few other nice young men who were gathered at the dining room table. Eric shared a tale wherein he encountered the Aro dude Ngakpa Chogyam outside East-West Books in Manhattan. This was in the mid-nineties before he'd become a monk. A long hot afternoon had included a couple of beers, inspiring him to walk right up to the Welshman in his self-styled robes, glaring an intense presence with his oversized, wrathful eyeballs before growling, "I AM NYINGMA," as if he himself represented the whole Ancient lineage. Ngak-ngak replied, "Maybe you shouldn't drink so much beer." Hilarious.

MON AUG 31
Hung door, cleaned up. Met with the Khenpos in their living room, as requested, before heading south. Ani served coffee to M, S, and myself. They expressed their thanks and Khenchen emphasized the great store of merit associated with working on a temple. Even if the place is completely destroyed, the good karma continues, long after the dust from the place is blown away. They honored us with many gifts and nearly brought me to tears with their humble gratitude. We promised that we would return soon.

Soon after leaving the land, we stop to chant, make offerings and give thanks at the Cannonsville Reservoir. Water flows from here through a 44-mile tunnel before entering a 85-mile aqueduct on its way to NYC, providing residents with about 50% of their drinking water. In service since 1964, the old town of Cannonsville was destroyed in the process. We notice dozens of small boats cached in the woods lining the shore and pondered the old ruins at the bottom of the lake.

Dozens of giant white windmills rotate on green Pennsylvania ridgetops as we roll south listening to NPR. After dark we passed through some strangely lit road construction projects before getting off in Woodstock, Virginia and enjoying amazing burritos crafted by a Mexican dude who'd recently moved here from Texas, we wandered in the dark on back roads before finding out way and spending a peaceful night up at Wolf's Gap, arriving home Tuesday afternoon safely and without incident.

The Khenpo's residence, Delaware County NY

PART II: MOON GATE

MON SEP 21
During the middle Ordovician Period 450 million years ago, plate collisions began that would build the Appalachian Mountains. Uplifts continued periodically throughout the next 250 million years, combining and renewing older features into mountains rising higher than the Himalayas and then repeatedly weathering them down to fill in low lands and basins with sediment. By the Cenozoic (65 mya), the area had been worn flat and began a final uplift that has resulted in the current landscape.

In 1528, the Spaniard Cabeza de Vaca encountered the Apalachee Indians near Tallahassee, Florida. A dozen years later, de Soto explored the southeast and applied the name of this tribe to the mountainous region to the north. The uplift runs for over a thousand miles from central Alabama into eastern Canada. Our journey will take us from the eroded western fringe of the blister in middle Tennessee, over the main spine, north along valleys east of the main plateau before winding back into the Poconos and Catskills. Renowned for its poverty, moonshine and bluegrass, the quiet heart of the region is often hidden like a cluster of wild grapes, full of soulful, dark history. Washington Irving suggested that the United States be renamed Appalachia, if not Alleghania. Our trajectory is generally northeast and after passing through Knoxville, the entire trip will take place away from any cities. By days end we will have travelled 500 miles east and less than 280 miles north.

I will be riding in the middle of the back seat this trip. A small garuda hangs from the rearview mirror and seems to flying on the road ahead of us. S drives a converted diesel which can run on cooking oil. Half of our last trip was fueled this way and to cut expenses further, we will be bringing more than the tank already holds by carrying a few extra jugs. D and S, father and son, occupy the front seat. D is seven years my elder and about a foot taller than myself. We have been friends for over three decades, but we have not spent much time on the road together. Beginning in 1994, I did many mobile retreats into the Four Corners area with the sangha and a few extended trips into the wilds of eastern Kentucky and Tennessee but D hardly came on any of those. For much of that time he was living away from Turtle Hill in different scenes, trying to find his 'people'. His typical reluctance was made evident the first time our group met the Khenpos in 1989. Seven of us took refuge. D hesitated, deciding to wait a few months just to be sure and then took vows at a subsequent retreat.

After all of the positive resonances resulting from our last trip, S and I thought it would be a good idea to get the rest of the sangha up there, but employment and other commitments would put that plan on hold. In the meanwhile, we invited D to come along. He was still recovering from serious health issues which had developed over the last year and had some free time, so off we went.

In spite of his vegetarian habit, D had recently suffered a heart-attack and a few mini-strokes. We will stop more often on this trip so he can exercise. He carries a big bag of smelly medicines and a CD collection, so he will be the deejay today. In east Tennessee he put on some old UK rave music that was so bad, S asked him to change it but otherwise, D usually has pretty interesting, eclectic taste. At rest stops he does yoga, while we play Frisbee. His frequent asking, "What?" leads me to believe that his hearing has suffered but then again, at other times he seems to hear amazingly well.

We seek out bio-diesel truck stops as we roll up I-81, passing over forested hills and cruising between vast rolling cornfields in the Shenandoah Valley. Not long after dark we turn west onto side roads about 50 miles from Maryland, and park at Wolf Gap, a quiet site on the WV border, around 9 pm. This is the third night we have spent here in a month and we are glad to have found a nice free place to sleep. We unroll the tarp and lay our bedding down. I am soon asleep. D can't sleep easily, believes its going to rain and tells S he wants to set up the tent, so they do. When he finally does nod off, D snores loudly. No rain falls.

TUE SEP 22
Autumnal Equinox. To begin the day we decide to follow one of the trails toward a local peak. The woods open up here above a great autumn-tinged valley. Where the path switches back up a grade, we sit on lichened rocks. After chanting a bit and passing to the left., D asks if we would like to hear a song he wrote. Sure, why not. "I wrote this at a time when I was still pretty reactive to you," he tells me. Great; can't wait to hear it. He continued, "The lyrics were originally about you but the second half reminds me more of YHWH." Wow; a song addressing both me and YHWH. Now I'm pumped. Thus D launched into his performance as S and I listen, trying to relax beyond awkwardness and wondering why or where he was going with this. After hearing a couple of choruses of You Ain't Nothing But A Bag of Skin we all sat there in miffed silence. D finally said. "Of course I no longer feel that way; I love and appreciate you a bunch." Okay; whatever. I have weird friends who still need to dramatize the pain of old wounds.

Once back in the truck, I scribble in a notebook, "What is a song? An expression of the spirit of an idea. That idea might be feelings about a relationship, a place, or an event. The entire spectrum of human experience is subject - just listen to any radio song. Do you really want to sing about your own ego's emotional reactions? Singing about the Three Roots is the form that holds the most attraction for me, giving voice to the deities and dakinis."

As the sun burns off the morning mist, we pass through Winchester, a town that was taken and re-taken over 70 times by troops fighting the Civil War. Mid-afternoon finds us at the rest area in northern Pennsylvania where I lost my mala last month. We saunter across the grass and search back at the stone wall with no luck. I ask one of the maintenance workers if there is a lost and found box and she leads me to a back room where to my amazement, a sandalwood mala with a red tassle hangs on a nail. "Is this it?" she asks. "Nope, mine wasn't made of wood, but thank you." Spacey.

The broadleaves are beginning to turn deep red, orange, and gold. Sumac berries are ripening, purple and gold wildflowers bloom in the roadside grass. Here and there along the way, short crosses mark the last moments of unfortunate travellers.

We arrived at the gonpa before 5 local time, and attend evening practice. S and I sit off to one side and in spite of having most of the texts, we find it hard to keep up. After supper the three of us walk in the foggy dark to the Medicine Buddha Temple to sit upon a rock wall where I listened intently to an interesting father-son conversation. It was as if they had not spoken at this level in years. D pondered his once-upon-a-marriage to S's mother, recounting the later chapters of their lost adventure, featuring many a mixed messages, crossed signals and demonic timing, as all hope for a loving reunion slipped away like two listing ships passing in the night.

After showering, I discover that not only did we neglect to load the carton of soymilk and gluten so lovingly prepared for me, I only have two pairs of pants including the ones i am wearing. Twelve pairs of socks, a half-dozen towels, but no pants. Ani brings me a photo album to look through and tells us that Atlanta is flooding. Before retiring, we called home from the basement of the gonpa and let them know we arrived safely.

When he does sleep, D snores chronically whereas his insomnia features clicking beads in the dark. I would lay there, awakened by one thing or another, meditating on old age, sickness, death and the need for more compassion. Self-references abound in D's conversation. He is amusingly inconsiderate in his late night and early morning movements. My old friend is teaching me patience and tolerance.

The Khenpo Rinpoches

WED SEP 23
Breakfast images include D chomping and slurping like he was not raised with human beings. Once back on the job, we put up soffet boards on the sun gate, literally bumping heads with the Khenpos early in the day, reminding them it was 20 years ago that we originally met and took refuge. They let me snap a few pictures of them on the lawn out front of the temple. Lunch featured good conversation with some of the younger dudes about politics, value judgement and discriminating wisdom. More coffee with fresh raisin bread appears as an afternoon snack and I have a sore right foot by days end. We started with fairly light work but were dragging ass as the sun passed overhead, S as well. My back/kidneys ached from not drinking enough on the road and we had skimped breakfast to get the ball a-rolling this morn.

Serge happened along the cool dark stone slabs which line the khor-wa where i lay prone to take an afternoon break in the sun. He is the main artisan responsible for the hundreds of images displayed on the inner temple walls. Last trip I had asked him if the poet-saint Shabkar appeared anywhere in the temple. I had been posting Shabkar poems online for months with the intent of turning a larger audience on to his works. At the time, Serge had replied, "No, he's too crazy." This morning, he is telling his beads, sees me laying there, welcomes me back and adds, "Hey I checked out the poet Shabkar after you asked about him last time; very cool dude, thank you..."

We attended evening practice again. Much shifting back and forth between booklets and loose papers. Ann Helm, a resident here, currently observing silent retreat, came over and kindly showed us what page we were on. Wrathful deity homages with the big drum resounding are Vajrayana heavy metal. Closing prayers included sending good energy to someone's brother who had just died and a recently deceased dog, beloved to a student. The sheer oddity of sitting in a big empty temple with a few people on a dark rainy evening, far from home, hidden away on a cloudy mountaintop, praying for a deceased canine, washed over me.

G occupies a nearby room. He is quiet, so quiet that he vibes like a Lorazepam robot - up all night watching movies and sleeping all day. Big night rainfall and waking to kidney/back pain when turning over in bed.

THU SEP 24
S slept in a bit so I read from Lynn Margulis' Microcosmos before a breakfast of hot soymilk & a slice of peanut buttered toast. We began work on the moon gate, help set up sites for stupa placement, moved benches, guided in trucks, backhoe, man shovels, all hands in on the big action in preparation for the arrival of eight stupas cut from black volcanic rock, currently arriving in New York harbor via ships from Indonesia. Khenchen has painted mantras on small rocks to be placed within the bases. Drakpa is excited and photographing it all as long-term plans begin to crystallize. Unloading long sheetrock from a truck crane, I visualize dusty mines in Arkansas, and while restacking piles of Czech lumber closer to the work site, fleets of ocean-going boats bound for New York, shipping containers loaded with European pine. Cutting and emplacing roof rafters and wall plate, we discovered that the original block room is not quite square. I am trying to remember to drink more water.

Placing the bases for the stupas

I sat next to the lovely Maya from Florida at lunch. Mid-afternoon brought hot cardamon coffee, with excellent ginger, & maple cookies, lovingly delivered by Ani. Chili for dinner on brown rice. Andrew read aloud to us from King Trison Detsen's original inscription on a stele at Samye, the text of which has been carved in Tibetan on a large slab of wood which sites in the dining hall. Today was a beautiful, productive day. The trees are turning so nicely as they often do in this part of America, with late afternoon skies full of pretty cloud formations. After showering, S lends me a pair of pants before we walk off to occupy our favored rock. The sun gloamed the western sky and D attended evening practice. I am limping again.

Emerging out of the woods, seeing the illuminated temple, the Utse, as Sumeru, Dharmakaya, the centrality of Awareness. We both agree that there is something literally inconceivable about being here which helps one recognize the truth beyond appearances. This is not an egoic setting. Its not where you come home to after going out to work. The spirit of the teaching and the Khenpos' pure intention for the land and all beings predominates. Back at the sangha house, helping Laya unload goods from a town run before walking up the hill in cool wind to call home. Lots of rain in Summertown. Back in the room, D and S exchange back rubs. By 11 pm both roomies are in bed. I will slip upstairs for a cuppa and then brush teeth and Ahhhh.... exhausted but must still work at rehydration.

Paving stones

FRI SEP 25
Cold morning. Managed to crap while reading Microcosmos before spacey G from Orange County shut the light out on me. Microcosmos, like Dawkin's Selfish Gene rocks the anthropocentric view. I carry it to breakfast where Drakpa lectures me about the shortcomings of the scientific view. As the awaited trucks return we make our way up the hill to the job. The shade makes big differences in temperature as Dave works the backhoe in a t-shirt, digging holes for stupa bases while I opt for denim with the sweatshirt lining. S struggling a bit, figuring out the hips but as the day warms, it all comes together, and like an ancient reptile exercising inveterate hunting skills, S was soon back in his groove.

As gofer, I make many passes through the main entrance hall. Above the doors that lead into the main shrine room, it reads (in both Tibetan and English)

THE GLORIOUSLY INCONCEIVABLE
CHANGELESS AND EFFORTLESSLY CREATED
GREAT LOTUS TEMPLE.

I am still meditating on the 'effortlessly created' part. As is traditional in most Tibetan monasteries, the Guardian Kings of the Four Directions (dikpalas) so colorfully rendered, dominate the outer walls of the inner shrine room. Tibet's Samye includes a entire temple for each of them. Kubera squeezes a mongoose who vomits jewels; another mongoose in a dewrag rake's them up and stacks them in orderly pyramids. The Buddha himself asked that the Wheel of Life be painted on temple walls so that non-literate folks could contemplate the teachings in this way. Lord Yama clings to the bhava-chakra right next to the moon gate. Nearby I noticed a delightful image of the late maha-patron Bill, a devotee from Chicago whom I was fortunate to meet here in New York in '93 and then again on pilgrimage in India in '96. The painting depicts Bill standing with Ani, the Khenpos and their late father, Lama Chimed, all gathered around a magic phurba surrounded by features of the local landscape that are gradually becoming familiar.

Khenchen Palden stopped by the moon gate to talk with me today and we were alone for a few minutes. Knowing it was cold, he played Marpa to my Mila, suggesting I carry the lumber around to the other side of the building so as to cut it in the sun and then laughed when I winced. He mentioned the Borobodur mandala when talking about the coming stupas and when I referred to Serlingpa he lit up. He underscored the fact that wonders like Borobodur were destroyed by an Islamic Jihad, the likes of which we are still seeing today.

Long-nailed G from Orange County was shuffling laps along the khor-wa path. Earlier in the day S had asked him point blank in a very non-threatening and matter of fact way, exactly what he was doing here. G explained that one Lama Dawa in California, in response to a question about the perfect teacher, immediately pointed him to Khenpo Tsewang. So he took Dawa at his word, flew to Binghamton and has been here on and off for the past year. As he rounds the building again, S, in his best NASCAR voice, "And Orange County has the inside lane...!" Ani is attending a funeral so Khenpo Tsewang served refreshments and the white sugar has run out. Laya brought us some brown; so it go. The strains of coyotes yipping on the hill west of the gonpa are a surprise. By days end, the moon gate is ready for decking.

Khor-wa path from roof of moon gate

After watching half of a fine flick set in bayou country, Little Chenier, we grabbed plastic buckets as we walked by the work shed, opting to sit on the edge of the field under a half-moon. D heads to practice late with no Khenpos present. We spend long silences looking at stars. Words begin with a question about Delphinus, moving on to Aquila, Jupiter, Cygnus and Sagittarius. Came back and watched more of the bayou flick before heading upstairs for dinner. Called home on the khor-wa path in the light of the Utse. We finally located Polaris and realized the gonpa faces southwest. Up later than my roomies again, hot soymilk at 11, dozing in a chair upstairs before making my way to bed.

SAT SEP 26
No waking until early morning to the serenade of D snoring, sun daggers already cutting through woods and windows. Not long after breakfsast, cold winds bring dark clouds. Early in the day Ani and Darjeeling provide much needed encouragement; Khenpo Tsewang happens by with maple cookies and coffee later in the afternoon. Finished preparing roofs for copper, rolled out waterproof rubber atop sun gate with the help of Ani on the ground and Laya in robes on the roof as wind picked, howling and pissing horizontal at days end. An old hippie named Antonio held the ladder and Ani helped cover lumber as the furies closed in.

Called home from the basement as practice proceeded in the temple above before heading down hill in cold rain to sangha house where S and I watched the first part of Iris Chang's Rape of Nanking. We waited awhile for D but he never came so we headed out to share with the non-humans. Wild Rice again for dinner and more conversation with Laya, Kerry and David. Ann Helm said she was attracted to the Farm way back when. Brother D seems a bit self-conscious, holding his chin in hand while nearly covering his mouth with fingers, he mumbles even though he himself is always asking, "What?"

SUN SEP 27
Rainy day. Up early with Microcosmos in the dining room, talked with Kerry over soymilk. D joins us at the table with Hudson's The Southeast Indians, and a bowl of something or other, chewing loudly with mouth open, he unconsciously snorts and slops through dried apricots and sliced apple while persuing the text. S had mentioned that he thought D's snoring would be relieved somewhat simply by cleaning his nose. Some of D's primordial self-centeredness is obviously an effect of being an only child with no regular demand to be considerate of others. On his pre-dawn trips to the bathroom, he invariably shuts the door mechanism to our room so that it clicks shut loudly as he leaves and again when he returns. After his exit this morning, S turned over and asked, "Man, why does he have to do that?"

"Dunno. Maybe so nobody steals us."

We framed out the interior walls today, I worked the chop-saw. S was feeling weak early on so we sauntered down into the woods with D to the rock of destiny where we got blitzed and then returned for more punishment. Rain picked up, Ani arrived with refreshments and our friend G from Orange County in tow helping to carry some of the kit. When it became apparent that there were not enough chairs for all of us, I offered to fetch another and Ani, like a good mother, interjected, "No, don't bother because G would really like to do that for us, wouldn't you G?" We squeezed together while sipping and dipping ginger snaps and vanilla cremes. Ani said that when the leaves fall, you can actually see sunlight reflecting off the Cannonsville reservoir from the top of the hill. Then she shares the big news. She will be travelling to Tennessee in a few weeks with the Khenpos. They will be giving a Vajrakilaya empowerment. Really? Wow. Great. I will definitely be there. This would be the third time I have received these teachings from the Khenpos. I mentioned that perhaps my ladies would volunteer to run the kitchen." Ani lit up. "Oh really? That would be wonderful!" They got me; I had been re-captured. We talked about trying to come north again in the spring and possibly bringing a bigger crew. Lovely. Wonderful.

After rolling up the tools and cords, I took some pictures in the rainy mist before heading to the room to finish the documentary on Nanking. D joined us and we all wept at what we saw and heard before heading out. We followed a trail downhill and sat on a log in an open field near a pond to make offerings. D soon left us in his characteristic way: "Speaking of (fill in whatever term might summarize the subject we had been talking about).... looks like I need to be (insert metaphor relating to previous topic anticipating some personal involvement) myself..." S and I linger, check out the pond, returning the long way around. Rain pours as I circumambulate the sangha house on the wrap-around porch many times saying mantras of the Three Roots while S ate dinner. I help unload groceries when Laya returns from town, and finished the last of the soymilk. M doing exercises on the floor, has no qualms about his robe falling aside to reveal lumpy white flesh. Tomorrow is a 10th day.

MON SEP 28
Russian black tea, a slice of toast with peanut butter. Wet but not strictly raining, we pulled and stapled wire inside the moon block and cleaned up. Andy asked for help moving a new woodstove into the Khenpos retreat cabin. Driving up from Tennessee, M showed before lunch and hard rain fell. Lunch was corn on the cob, pasta with tomato sauce. Conversation touched on the origins of life in a way that had me ask, "So what exactly are you looking for, God? Buddhism sort of assumes that life is inherent in the manifest cosmos and does not need to be added to it by outside agency, no?" Explained redshift and Amanda's eyebrow was attentive to the amazing fact that amino acids have been found on meteors.

By 3 we are sitting in the gonpa. Khenpos enter and we start with Mipham's Shower of Blessings, switched to Dharmapala practice, then finished with more prayers from the Shower. Ann Helm rose to make a special offering, singing a version of All These Forms, a supplication written by Padmasambhava at the request of Namkha'i Nyingpo, one of his 25 Tibetan disciples. She sang in English to a tune she herself arranged. I later told her I'd recently put the same words to music for our band, and she was delighted. "Hey, you should play it for the Khenps when they come to Tennessee. Maybe it will become 'a thing!'"

There was roast beef on the ts'ok table as well as sweet grapes, breads, chocolate tort, figs, fresh dates and gourmet cookies. Serge and wife hint that they may be coming to Padma Gochen Ling in Tennessee for the upcoming Vajrakilaya retreat if they can get the money together. Serge lived as a young boy in Mongolia. I told him his work was beautiful; he replied that ours was too. Fantastic clouds and blessing showers blew in as we stood on the porch out front of the temple. We said goodbye to Wes and Maya who were leaving for FL before tossing Frisbee with S and then heading off to the rock with brother D in tow. On the way back to our room, I mentioned returning to the world after having been to the mountain, and D says, "Yes, we need to see what can to do to support ourselves." Is that what we need to do? Strange take I thought, especially coming from one who is almost sixty and independently wealthy. Fell asleep listening to a CD of Jeffrey Hopkins speaking about emptiness.

TUE SEP 29
Russian black tea with peanut butter on toast. D left early as planned, to visit an elderly Aunt who lives nearby. Almost threw my back out before the day even began moving sheetrock alone. Later heard that Ani had busted a toe and fractured others when she dropped a sheet on herself. Rocked the sun gate with M, started soffets of the moon gate but rain returned us to sheetrock. Two very nice local guys, Jim and Pat, are doing the electrical work. Jim knows Robert Rifle, Thomas Collier and others who comprised the old Franklin Farm, once a satellite of the mother ship in Tennessee. Jim says, "Hey can I ask you something? Are Buddhists vegetarians?" I reply, "Great question Jim." And give him an earful of strong opinions about the first pratimoksha precept. S sees in Jim a chubby version of the Yes's Jon Anderson.

I suspended my vegan habit to partake of fresh yogurt made by Khenchen Palden at lunch. We pondered Do Khyentse's claim of being able to secure auspicious rebirths for any slaughtered animals he eats. Drakpa was cautious. I laughed aloud. After a full day's labor, we loaded the tools up in an orderly fashion as we are finished with carpentry. Walking off at days end we again carried plastic buckets to sit on so as to avoid the wet grass on the edge of the field. We huddled under the prayer flags and watched the moon, the temple aglow on the hill as we pondered our relationship with this mandala. Andy stopped by and talked about arranging a goodbye meal for tomorrow which sounded good but would never happen. D made it back safely from his Auntie after dark. He is now snoring loudly after doing his evening stretch routine, semi-naked (spare us) and taking his blood pressure.

WED SEP 30
More Russian tea and peanut butter on toast. Wet and cold out there; haven't crapped in days. Sheetrocking the sun and installing door hardware before moving west to the moon gate where D was busy insulating. Ani came with tea and banana bread in the morning, coffee and cookies in the afternoon. Make that green tea for M, please. Brown rice, squash for lunch. As we had arranged, at 4 we head down to the Medicine Buddha Temple to photograph the stained glass Buddhas with Ani and Drakpa. Two of these were put together by Padma Tenkar many years ago and she has asked me to take some photos. M stayed behind to paint soffets. Truck will not start; nights are too cold and glow plugs are not sufficient. Finished screwing rock and mudding the sun gate with S before heading out toward the wrap and roll haystacks with M. Cold but our last night here so we linger and work praises toward the Triple Gem. M talks about organizing a fundraiser in Nashvegas and wonders if our band would play.

THU SEP 31
Cut and hung sheetrock in both sun and moon gates. Diesel still too cold to start. We make fire, place pan of coals under the block, skirting the truck with plywood scraps to concentrate the heat.

Before departing, we are again invited into the Khenpos living room and served coffee, lauded, showered with gifts and insistence that we attend the upcoming Vajrakilaya retreat in Tennessee without worrying about money which due to poverty, principle and politics has been something of an issue in the past. I realize that the Khenpos have gracefully magnetized us back into the mandala. For over 15 years members of Turtle Hill Sangha have served as cooks, crew and umdze at spring and fall retreats. All of that changed when Madame X came to prominence. Our absence had become predictable in recent years. Now that she was on her way out, we have been invited back in, by the Khenpos themselves.

Spent night at Wolf's Gap

FRI OCT 1
An early morning walk up the trail that leads to Tibbets Knob with great views high above the Shenandoah Valley. Late in the day, D slips in a haunting tune by Eliza Gilckyson

beautiful world circling infinitely
fragment of sun marbled in blue
turning in time and tuned like a symphony
beautiful stars beautiful view
beautiful world intricate web of design
shadow and light playing out on the land
billions of years come down to a point in time
setting the stage for the folly of man
pitiful man

View from the Tibbet Knob trail,
overlooking the Shenandoah Valley, VA

Radiant Beatitude

2010-03-25T13:06:00.000-07:00

Upon leaving Chilly Grove, Padma seeks out the best minds of his time and becomes learned in astrology, medicine, language and letters, alchemy, lapidary, sculpting, casting, tailoring, carpentry, distillation, metalworking, weaving, haberdashery, shoemaking, pottery and other useful arts and sciences. This is followed by ordination as a buddhist monk and an extensive course in study of the Tripitaka and mantrayana teachings. At this time, he was known as Guru Shakya Senge, 'Lion of the Shakyas'.

At the end of this period the text states,

"By means of the external Formulas and those which are esoteric and of great meaning in their conciseness, he knew how to wish and to obtain, attaching the spiritual chain of perfect effort. But he knew not at all how to perceive the meaning of the inferior mind." ~ Padma bKa'i Thang, c. 27

This inability to fathom the common mind is borne out in the following which details events resulting in the naming of the second manifestation associated with this month, Guru Loden Chogse.

Padma settles in a cemetery known as Radiant Beatitude in Kashmir.

Far to the east, a Bon priest gets drunk on millet beer and loses his gong 'with the 3000 sounds' but finds a cow. Hungryman has lost his cow but finds the gong and takes it home where his hungry children beat it. The Bonpo leads the cow home and milks it. Each accuses the other of stealing and wants their possession back AS IT WAS (the cow unmilked, the drum unbeaten). Not being able to come to terms, these two reasonable men eventually present their argument to the king who apparently isn't listening very closely, summarily declaring, "Yes, So be it!"

After leaving the palace unsatisfied, Hungryman kills the Bonpo and takes up with his wife. Upon learning of the crime, the King's words are unmistakable; "Let the guilty one keep company with the corpse!"

Hungryman is forced to ride the cow while being beaten with the gong on the way to exile in the cemetery Radiant Beatitude. Upon arrival, Padma asks, "What is the crime?"

"A Bonpo has killed my father and I the son am accompanying his body here," Hungryman lies.

Granted refuge in the cemetery, he is told to live by means of the cow's milk and is invited to study the Dharma with Padmasambhava. Hungryman is not at all interested but has no other options at the moment. He is very opinionated about the guru and his retinue and has no faith but he plays along.

The cow soon dies and the guru asks the local monkeys not to harm Hungryman but to let him eat of the great tree of the tombs. While gathering fruit one day he falls from its branches and the monkeys go to great lengths to save him from the creatures lurking in 'the waters of the tomb Horrible Decay'.

Soon after this, Hungryman longs for a reunion with his family, and decides to shake the trunk of the tree to gather fruit in dreamy anticipation of their reunion, causing the sleeping monkeys to tumble into the lake where they are promptly seized and killed.

Hungryman tells Padma that a great wind blew the monkeys to their deaths and he alone managed to hang on. The guru knows the truth and is disgusted. He says that because of this, Hungryman will not be able to leave the cemetery without attracting man-killing demons. Hungryman is resentful and does not believe it. Recognizing his willfulness, Padma assures him he will soon be with his family. Hungryman leaves the cemetery and rejoins his wife and children. Leading them back toward Radiant Beatitude to harvest fruit, he is attacked and devoured by wild beasts.

In consequence of Padma's training in many worldly arts and sciences and his attitude of parental caring, compassion and loving-kindness for all beings, he was named Loden Chogse, 'one possessing intelligence and supreme desire.'

Sitavana

2010-03-03T19:54:00.000-08:00

When Padmasambhava arrived at the cremation ground of Sitavana, it was already a well-known location. Generations of yogis had practiced here. It was a beautiful and quiet setting, a level stretch of ground not far from Bodhgaya surrounded by thick jungle. There were said to be five hundred different 'walks'. Buddha practiced here as did many of his students, both male and female. King Bimbisara meditated in this area while his enemies moved against him. Jamgon Kongtrul had a statue of Mahakala carved by Nagarjuna out of the black rock of Chilly Grove. Garab Dorje settled here in his mid-thirties, a few years after getting the planet's first Dzogchen empowerment from Vajrasattva. Sri Singha met him here as well as Manjusrimitra who came to argue and eneded up offering to cut out his tongue. This is where Padmasambhava studied with Vajra Humkara and would become part of the mandala of eight vidyadharas. On the dark green outskirts of civilization, this was the last destination anyone would want to visit, and no place for a casual stroll. Anyone attempting to avoid walking through the clearings where decaying bodies were exposed to vultures and jackals risked getting bitten by poisonous snakes in the surrounding jungle.

As Hsuan-tsang, a Chinese monk wrote of his travels in 629 CE: "Now this cold forest (sitavana) is the place of corpses abandoned there. Everyone esteems it an unlucky place, and the people of the land avoid going there and passing through it." It was actually here in Sitavana where the Buddha was staying when Mara asked him to leave the world. The Buddha replied, "You'll be happy to hear that I will pass away within three months." As always, the Blessed One kept his word.

Chilly Grove

2010-02-26T12:50:00.000-08:00

The new moon in early February marked the beginning of the Tibetan year of the Iron Tiger. In the Nyingma tradition of Vajrayana Buddhism, there is a day each month to celebrate the life and teachings of Guru Padmasambhava, the tantric master who came to Tibet in the 8th century and helped establish Samye, the first Buddhist monastery in the Land of Snows. The tenth of each lunar month is designated a white day when practice and a ritual feast centers on a period in the life of this great teacher. Eight of these emanations are traditionally grouped together and often individually depicted as the main subject in thangkas. The other four, though not as well known, also derive from Guru Rinpoche's biography. The order in which these emanations appear throughout the year does not reflect a chronological unfolding of events in Padmasambhava's life but is presented as a way to contemplate the manner in which the extraordinary energy of transcendent awakening is expressed amidst the conventions of human society. A text composed by His Holiness Dudjom Rinpoche states,

The First Month: On the Tenth Day of the month of the Hare, having renounced His kingdom, He practices austerities, yoga, and liberation in the great cremation ground of Sitavana, "the cool forest." At the time of gathering all the Matrikas and Dakinis under His power, He became known as Guru Santaraksita, "the Guru who is the guardian of peace."

So the first form indicated in the sequence is not a birth story but instead focuses on the immediacy of the young prince dropping out of courtly life, walking away from the power and pleasures of the kingdom and taking up residence in a cremation ground. Demonstrating a fierce determination to abandon all worldly ambitions marks this course of action, liberating energy and attention to initiate the yogic process of purification culminating in ego-death and full awakening to ground awareness

On the outer level, the appellation 'Santarakshita' echoes the name of Padma's enlightened cohort, the abbot of Nalanda and their work together with King Trisong Deutsen introducing Vajrayana Buddhism to Tibet. The name Santarakshita is Sanskrit and may be translated as 'peace-protector'. On the inner level, this reflects an intensity of resolve to break through the social and psycho-emotional confines of worldly involvement where there is no peace or lasting contentment and to re-orient and transform body and mind in the light of dharma. According to the Padma bKa'i thang, "Now the Prince who was the best of men thought: "By assuming the throne, I will not ensure the good of human beings; they will fall in great numbers into the abyss of perdition. I will find a means of renouncing the kingdom."

Having left Oddiyana, he hastens south. Arriving in the Ganges basin, Padma dismounts and occupies a cave where he "attained the perfect state" within seven days. Then, thinking of the work ahead, he travels further east to Chilly Grove, a site not far from Bodhgaya where he will spend the next five years in the presence of a crowd of dakinis.

The emanation of Guru Sanataraksita indicates fearless renunciation, the determination to walk away from all pointless involvement and open oneself to the rawness of naked experience, to know mind and what is directly, devoid of hope, fear and pretension. This is where the path begins. Dwelling in the cremation ground of Chilly Grove opens understanding to the true nature of self and world.

Mid-winter notes

2010-02-02T09:30:00.000-08:00

Here on the Highland Rim, we often get one thin blanket of snow a year, just enough to tease the kids, scare southern motorists and close the schools for a day before it all melts away. Last week we got our once a decade storm. Many big limbs fell and long after the chainsaws had cleared the way, silence and untrammeled snow defined the world outside. The electricity was out for over 40 hours as middle Tennessee was blanketed with five inches of snow followed by an ice storm. We hauled water from the creek, set up a Coleman propane camp stove for cooking, lit candles and tuned up the acoustic. One neighbor offered us fresh eggs (we're vegans), another reminded us of the six bushels of potatoes we stored in his basement and then stayed for white bean soup.

Over morning coffee, I read passages aloud from Bernard De Voto's The Course of Empire (1952) whereby I discovered that Lewis and Clark were not the first white men to traverse the American continent north of Mexico. That distinction belongs to one Sir Alexander Mackenzie who made it to the Pacific Coast early in 1793. His route up the Peace River and over the continental divide to Bella Coola was not commercially viable, but then, neither was Lewis and Clarke's. The fact that we were never taught this fact in school is a good example of American faux-triumphalism.

"The forests of the western slope, much rain, much cold and occasional ice, peaks, cliffs, valleys, marshes, lakes -- and ebbing strength as the food ran out. Indians clustered round them now, eaters and worshipers of the salmon."

-Bernard De Voto

The Texas Mission

2009-07-18T13:38:00.000-07:00

MONDAY, JUNE 29: EL CAMINO

Three of us set out early from Turtle Hill, descending off an eroded highland remnant on the western margins of the Great Eastern Plateau, crossing the Buffalo & Tennessee Rivers and a handful of creeks draining the verdant plains of west Tennessee before ramping up in Memphis onto the Hernando de Soto bridge, 109 feet above the Big Muddy onto Arkansas floodplains green with young soybeans. Arching over the heart of the Mississippi basin, the second biggest drainage in the world with tributaries in 32 states and two Canadian provinces, a watershed encompassing 40 percent of the contiguous United States. At a rest area in Prairie County, land which once served as the Western band of Cherokee Reservation (1812-1836), we break for sandwiches and pass the one-hitter amidst too many flies. By noon we are in motion over the Arkansas on the Little Rock bypass through the ancestral home of the Quapaw, climbing the foothills of the Ouachitas near active geothermal vents, unimpressed by the 'Brick Capital of the World', skirting the mouth of deep crystalline tubes and zipping by a presidential birthplace. Afternoon strings out over miles of unremarkable interstate, crossing the Red River Valley at the point where east flowing water changes direction and begins moving south, as RT's Rumor & Sigh helps us navigate through monotonous corridors of broadleaves.

Mystery wind, are you strong enough
To fight for your right when the time get's tough?
Plague and hunger and burning rain
Too many good men blown away by the mystery wind
The mystery wind

We are entering the former ranges of people known as Caddo, Wichita, Hasinai. Vast open spaces, the simplicity and order of newly planted fields disappear before the double border town of Texarkana, a feast of gas stations, motels, overpasses, restaurants, parking lots, commercial and highway signage, electrical transmission towers, hospitals, rental garages and acres of car lots. 105 air-conditioned miles into Texas, we leave the interstate for two-lane blacktop, eventually passing over the Sabine, unofficial dividing line between Jackson's Old South and the New Southwest of Austin and Houston. No longer in the massive watershed where we began the day, any rain falling in this vast region stretching from dead south to far west, from here to beyond the Rio Grande, drains a separate basin into the Gulf of Mexico. Everything south of the Red River Valley (the border of east TX & OK), from the Sabine (border of TX & LA) to the continental divide in western New Mexico, is the only section of the Great Plains which does not drain into the Mississippi. This marks the natural divide separating French Louisiana from land originally controlled by New Spain. In our general motion today, we are retracing (in reverse) a primary route of agricultural diffusion, from the gardens of northeastern Mexico, across the interior lowlands toward the Mississippi and Tennessee Valleys. Such a trek required a way across these same rivers, complicating the journey while providing rehydration, making an overland route through deserts possible. These seed-carrying trips began sometime around 7000 BCE.

Rainfall in this florid eastern corner of the basin is 3/4 of our average at home. Peaches and watermelons fill tables at roadside stands. Bronzed heads of millet, acres of stunted, browned corn stretch to the horizon. Bypassing Tyler, the "Rose Capital of America", named after our 10th president, when a smaller Lone Star was annexed (1845), past the site of Camp Ford, largest Confederate P.O.W. facility west of the Mississippi, before spontaneously contemplating the eternal mystery of afternoon light on open water, crawling in traffic on the causeway over man-made Lake Palestine at day's end, surprised to see this much water anywhere in Texas.

The main employer in Palestine is the prison with almost 4000 workers, followed by Wal-mart with nearly half that number. In 2003, pieces of exploded space shuttle fell in nearby fields. East of town there is a quiet park, a terminal on the Texas State Railroad, now a tourist line. Prices start at $36.50. Originally laid by convicts in 1881, the track was to deliver firewood to a prison iron smelter. We don't have correct change for the campground fee envelope but then nobody comes to check. A persimmon tree, already full of green fruit grows nearby the tent. I read Time-Life's leathery volume, The Texans by light of the Coleman lantern long after dark.

Weeks passed. Sam's mother was distraught; family and neighbors scoured the woods. Eventually, Sam's older brothers, James and John, found him on Hiwassie. He was seated under a tree reading Alexander Pope's translation of the Iliad. Marking his place, he coolly informed them that he, "liked the wild liberty of the Red men better than the tyranny of his own brothers" -- and added that he preferred to read in peace.

For the better part of three years, Houston lived with the Cherokees -- "wandering," as he later wrote, "along the banks of streams, side by side with some Indian maiden, sheltered by the deep woods ... running wild, sleeping on the ground, chasing game, living in the forests, making love and reading Homer's Iliad."

-the boyhood of Sam Houston
as told in The Texans

TUESDAY, JUNE 30: AL SUR

Waking early I circumambulate the loop of asphalt surrounding the grassy island where the tent sits, bone mala in hand, magically close to a lotus pond opening to sun's rays. Dark skies to the southwest offset a rainbow. A shiny green pick-up dark with park employees rolls in as we head out. Trees now noticeably shorter, exposing low rolling hills as we cross a half-dozen rivers, all of them flowing southeast. Near Mexia we ford the Navasota, upstream of where the intrepid La Salle was murdered by his associates (1687). Rain falling so heavy vision is reduced to staccato white lines and glowing red bindus of tail lights floating in a grey fog. Return to Interstate at Waco, small town transformed into big commercial city by the construction of a suspension bridge over the Brazos (1870). The same architect went on to build the Brooklyn Bridge the following year. Named after a Wichita tribe who once lived and farmed here, it is the birthplace of a superior soft-drink known as Dr. Pepper (1885). It is also a name widely associated with state terrorism (1995). Rain continues to fall heavy as we pass through Temple, "Wildflower Capital of Texas", famed for its medical centers and boasting more physicians per capita than anywhere in the country.

Clouds ease up as we approach Austin, another concentration of skycrapers to the south. Scissor-tailed flycatchers and hawks perch on roadside wires on the outskirts of "The Live Music Capital of the World", as homeless people with shopping carts take shelter under an overpass. Skies clear as we enter San Antonio in the humid blaze of mid-day, eyes stinging with salt from perspiration in the blinding heat, we set up tent under a leguminous tree at Mission Trails Campground and head for showers, lunch, and wifi internet before driving to the San Antonio Museum of Art, open free to the public on Tuesday afternoons. Onward to the section of pre-Columbian America to gaze at a great collection of artifacts in earthenware, ceramic, basalt, obsidian, gold, lapis, turquoise, mother-of-pearl, many of the items over a thousand years old. In other rooms we contemplate the Virgin of Guadelupe, St. Theresa of Lisieux, St. Andrew, a north-Indian Yogini, Amitabha, a golden Urgyen Lingpa with phurba and dorje, a small golden stupa, two paintings by Diego Rivera, one portraying a communist celebration in Red Square, and an elaborate sand mandala under thick plastic which I did not photograph in honor of the Tibetan monks who agreed not to destroy it for the sake of a western museum exhibit.

On the way home we stopped at Wal-Mart to buy reading glasses that were not actually lost. I amused my companions by refusing to remove the large plastic price tag which covered most of my forehead being certain we would find the lost pair and be able to return these. Back at Mission Trails, gusting winds have taken down a large branch but the tent is not damaged. Rainfall in this part of Texas is 2/3 of the average in middle Tennessee, the humidity focusing sunbeams like a lens. We retreat to the day room for wifi and showers, a Matrix sequel on the tube. Night falls, and I concede defeat, using a Swiss-army knife to remove the plastic tag from the glasses moments before Tenkar hands me my old ones discovered in her purse after all.

The book opens and I disappear into the realm of Moses and Stephen Austin, Sam Houston, Fannin, Deaf Smith, Santa Anna, Crockett, Travis, Bowie, and of course, the Alamo. The tent is bathed in the amber glow of nearby streetlights - all night long. The soft buzz of a cooling unit on a nearby house isn't loud enough to disturb sleep. A miniature dog in a nearby yard attempts to let us know this is his territory but his bark sounds like an asthmatic sneeze and he soon retires to a cooler spot to sleep.

Seated Dog
earthenware with tar pigment, Vera Cruz, 550-950 ce
San Antonio Museum of Art

WEDNESDAY, JULY 1: RITUAL

We are primed. The alarm proved unnecessary as predicted; I am awake before the beeper. The route has already been laid out, the mission is on schedule as we head west on Military Drive, cross the San Antonio River through one continuous ten-mile gauntlet of strip malls, broken only by the Center for the Study of Infectious Diseases, to an entrance of Lackland Air Force Base. Soldier at the gate explains which papers must always be ready. The ladies thought he bordered on rude; his manner struck me as forthright & practical. We are steered toward an orientation in a big auditorium. A short video shows various aspects of basic training. The veteran airman presenting gets big applause announcing that our kids have finally gotten out of the house and are now receiving a regular paycheck. As if that was our concern, but this apparently strikes a big chord with most of these folks. Ksana was already on his own. The majority around me seem happy that their kid has launched a career. Whatever; I am realizing that we have been dragged over the barricades into the camp of 'military families.' As a friend in Chicago would later say, I was now confronting the bardo of what you thought you already knew, a whole new world of emotion.

After a long delay at a shady picnic table consuming more amazing Lone Star history, we joined with families from all 50 states lining both sides of the troop-walk as the flights approached, separate male and female units in gym clothes running in tight formations, each group chanting a marching limerick at volume in an identifying t-shirt, led by a flag-bearer with the group number on the banner. We scan for Flight 322 and realize they are approaching in predictably good order. 'Welcome to the house of pain!' Somewhere in this display of vital energy and bobbing shaved heads is our boy; he warned us that it would be hard to pick him out. We finally spot Ksana; brow furrowed, head wet with perspiration. Named after a Sanskrit word meaning 'mind-moment' which helped me make sense of an early series of acid trips, Ksana is our youngest son. The flights disappear as quickly as they appeared out of the wavering mirages to the northwest.

After more delays, allowing the cadets a shower, they are marched by in their blue formal uniforms for the main ceremony. The introductory speech contained the phrase, the greatest air power in the history of the world (no doubt) blasting out from the loudspeaker, followed by martial music both canned and live before a recitation of the Air Force pledge and distribution of graduate coins. Finally, we were invited to approach our 'airman', a process akin to the reunion of Emperor penguins and their chicks. All troops remain at attention unless someone 'claims' them. Not everyone has someone. After initial hugs and kisses, Ksana is wary of exhibiting too much intimacy. He has been warned by his FC that it looks 'unprofessional'. No holding hands, no skipping along or being silly, no walking on grass, cross streets only at cross-walks, little blue cap on when outdoors, seam perfectly aligned with the nose, and don't touch your face, always be ready to salute a superior officer, regular attention to trim-line, meaning the edges of your shirt- button line and fly must be well-aligned. We learn about the garters which hold the tails of his shirt to the top of his socks and he complains that the metal clips dig into his leg. Staying hydrated is a constant concern for everyone in this heat and failure to take personal responsibility and to avoid sunburn, beyond ill effects, merits disciplinary action. Off to the on-base mini-mall for Starbucks, more talk and some fast food. Ksana has very little memory of the first few days on base due to rather extreme stress. He has no hesitation in telling us that he now feels a bit foolish having joined, that its not quite like he thought it would be and that if he knew then what he knows now, he would be somewhere else. Having said that, it seems like the worst of it was over and that since the only way out was a dishonorable discharge, he was going to make the best of it. We are relieved to hear that trainers can't get physical or even curse at recruits. Crossing the street to Flight Photos building where formal pictures are ready, a new kid dressed in camo calls our boy sir and invites him to move to the front. We wait in a cool mezzanine under a building soon observing a flight marched into our shade for squaring off maneuvers around brick columns or something. They are halted and reprimanded for going too fast. A soldier up front is confronted in an exchange that ends with, "Do you think you can handle that?" barked about four inches from his nose. Later, at a picnic table in long afternoon big-sky western Texas sunbeams, we snack and talk further, presenting the graduate with a groovy little digital camera, ostensibly for graduation; it is just a good tool to have. Naturally, we take a few pictures.

After saying goodbye, it was not easy to find a way off base as most of the gates are closed. Eventually we arrive back at Mission Trails campground. I shoot the sun setting over the interstate through a cyclone fence and discover a fig tree in the surrounding neighborhood, before taking refuge in the air-conditioned room. A line from the Yes song We Agree sticks in my head;

If we are one, then we are refugees,
we are the prisoners of our own design;
If we are one, seen through the eyes of a child,
we will perpetuate this song of love.

Ksana (22)
BMT graduation ceremony, Lackland AFB, TX
freaking out his parents by becoming an airman first class

THURSDAY, JULY 2: DESFILE

Another morning to rise early and drive directly to the Air Force Base. The presence of four other bases in the area has led to the title 'Military City, USA' but for the most part, this town feels like the northernmost Mexican outpost, the point of mutual overreach for two ambitious peoples, which is what it originally was. A group of Spanish explorers and missionaries arrived in the area in 1691. Within 25 years, they began building mission-plantations known as presidios to attract and convert native Americans. For over a century it was the capital of the Spanish, then Mexican state of Tejas. Now occupying nearly 10,000 acres on the southwest margin of the city, Lackland is home to the 37th Training Wing, largest in the USAF. A community of 45,000 live here at any given time. Known as The Gateway to the Air Force, fifty classes a year are processed (86,000 troops), so there is a constant flow of friends and families from all 50 states coming to San Antonio for graduation ceremonies. Visualize Niagaras of cash flowing out of government coffers directly into base accounts and lesser cascades emerging directly out of civilian wallets into the sprawl of motels, restaurants and Wal-marts lining the southern margins of the city. The presence of this base alone contributes about $2 billion annually to the local economy.

This morning we are directed to Bong Ave., to stand at the edge of a wide open parade ground surrounded by full-scale models of retired aircraft. Fans blow a watery mist under canopies shading aluminum stands. Soldiers in camouflage picket the perimeter. Flights are marched around in formation with a great display of flags and martial fervor. The maneuvers are pleasing to watch but remind me of Lincoln's frustration with General McClellan. I admire their discipline until once again we are allowed to approach. This time I managed to find my son by spotting an unfortunate tattoo inscribed on his left forearm. Ksana introduces Tyree who designed the 322nd Training Squad's fierce eagle t-shirts. Their motto, Second to None, plays on their number.

Invited to take a quick look at their sleeping quarters we witness floors shine, chrome sparkle, beds perfectly align, not a wrinkle in a blanket, drawers immaculate. We are called into the presence of the flight commander. Ksana, like many of the boys here, had passed around pictures of his family. Some airmen, (including Ksana,) wondered if someone like me would even show up for the occasion. A few expressed interest in meeting me and introduced themselves. I think the FC wanted to get a look at us as well.

Allowed off-base for the first time in eight weeks, we are soon downtown, passing the tall steel orange sculpture known as the Torch of Friendship, an acknowledgment of the bi-cultural nature of the place. After we park, an intoxicated little woman asks for money to buy something to drink. Tenkar hands her a dollar and within a block or two of searing midday heat we stand before the Alamo Memorial. 183 names of those who perished are carved into the marble as well as full 3-d likenesses of gentleman Travis, a vital Crockett in laced moccasin boots and on the opposite side, Bowie who seems to have had his nose replaced. No wonder; he was the one with orders from General Sam Houston to abandon the fort, remove its guns, and blow down the walls, "as it will be impossible to keep up the station with volunteers." He was accompanied by over thirty men to help him remove the artillery. Instead, the 40 year old alcoholic Bowie chose to help strengthen and defend the place where he and everyone else would die. The Alamo was an unnecessary slaughter of men with more courage than brains. Rather than a shrine of liberty it is an example of macho foolishness. 183 men were attempting to defend a perimeter of a quarter mile, three acres of ground that was never intended to be a fort, against an onslaught of thousands of Mexican troops; a suicidal quest for glory. Worth reflecting on but hardly admirable.

We enter the main room of the monument, a cool open vault which used to be a church but was quickly converted to a powder magazine and sleeping quarters before the siege. This is a real break from the heat and glare outside. Everyone is pretty quiet and reverential as we wait in a long line as if there is something to see. After about five minutes, we arrive at some old wooden doors on the far end of the room and to cut to it, there wasn't all that much to see there. A nicely embroidered hippie-style vest owned by Crockett was a highlight. To hear the story well-told is the real mind-blow. This is the place where it happened over 13 days in the spring of 1836, but all that remains is some evidence of 18th c. Spanish architecture. The mission plaza and surrounding fields have become central downtown real estate.

The ladies offered to return to the car to fetch some food while us men looked at Bowie knives and a well-executed model of the battle. While ogling at these incredibly huge blades, an older man turned to my son and said, "I want to thank you for your service. If you wasn't for guys like you, well, we wouldn't be here." Wandering out through a quiet garden to a shaded bench to wait for the ladies, sitting there amongst luxuriant tropical foliage, we talked a little and expressed our love for each other in a few words, as what is forever beyond expression surged, the emotion of the moment washing over me like a warm salty wave and we both teared up. I instinctively donned sunglasses. He said he wasn't allowed to wear any and we laughed.

Moments later everyone was eating spiced rice neatly wrapped in pickled grape leaves. Leila discovered them in a little Arab food store near the base where two dudes sat smoking a large hookah on nice rugs while surfing the net. Turned out that one of the men knew Leila and her Palestinian father from a similar establishment frequented in Michigan years ago. Leaving the monument, we wander over toward the striped awnings and full length windows of Haagen Das, where we take a table in line of fire from the 'Palisade;' Crockett's position with his Tennessee boys, a 75 foot gap between the church and low barracks which was considered the most vulnerable part of the fort. Four four-pounders occupied the rampart. The manager of the ice cream store, a chubby Hispanic man, approached our table to congratulate Ksana and sang the praises of a 26 year career in the Air Force. There were a few others as well; people who would never look twice at me are approaching my son to offer thanks and congratulations.

We descend away from the center of town into a valley behind the buildings and enter the River Walk. After a flood in 1921 killed 50 people, plans were made to divert the river into a storm sewer to facilitate the waters exit from town. An architect named Hugman had another plan and the city council bought the idea. Heat index and noise level go down a few degrees as we descend below street level to meander along paths lined with indigenous plants, exotic botanicals, palm trees, and giant hemlocks growing side by side on the manicured banks of the San Antonio River as it winds along a natural horseshoe at the foot of the Alamo, through the backyards of downtown businesses for miles. The walk is the best idea to hit San Antonio since ice and is constantly being expanded. Bars, restaurants and Venice style tour boats are the main businesses in the world below. Sometimes, water flows on both sides of the path as new tributes appear in waterfalls from sluices in a hidden canal, bubbling over rocks, through fountains and terraced gardens before passing under the walkway and into the river. Cities across the world could learn something here about making use of natural systems to create attractive environments, softening the human experience while enhancing the aesthetics of urban environments.

Back up on the street, we cruise the strip past Tussaud's Wax and Ripley's Believe It or Not! Museums until we find 39 cent sodas at 34 degrees. Shopkeeper is a dark, heavy-set young man of Mexican descent who has lived here all his life. He inquires about the weather in Tennessee and I tell him that it is not too much different on some days but that we usually get a break at night. I learn that San Antonio is the seventh biggest city in the country yet has the highest crime rate in the nation. Another young man, lithe and white, approaches with an offer to check out a time-share unit, urging us to just sit through the rap for a quick $5o. We drive north of town for some Indian cuisine and mango lassies while a Bollywood comedy runs on a wall-mounted flat screen near our table. We have the entire restaurant to ourselves.

The Kinks' Muswell Hillbillies provides a soundtrack on the rebound and Ksana said he remembered hearing these songs when he was a baby. The journey back to the base was tinged with anxiety that our Airman would be late to check in as we again had trouble finding an open gate and poor Ksana had no clue about where to enter as he had not been allowed out until today. The demand for functionality, while inconvenient to the individual is great for organization. A strict refusal to tolerate excuses without consequences actually sounds somewhat refreshing. Dropping off our investment in world peace with two minutes to spare, we escape out the Truemper Street gate, back into civilian airspace. Leila checks into a motel reserved through previous online arrangement, a brightly painted establishment owned and operated by a family from Bombay. We make good use of the pool and I wonder about a lone German Shepherd who sits in a vacant lot across the street. Is he waiting for someone? Back at the campground, brushing teeth before bed, Tenkar points out a large tarantula who occupies a hole near the water faucet.

To paraphrase Santayana, if we do not want to repeat the mistakes of the past, we should excel in learning. So I study the history and can't help but remember the Alamo. More inspiring though, was Sam Houston, who with all his faults, turned out to be a much wiser and more capable warrior.

Recuerde San Jacinto!

Leila & Ksana
River Walk
Guru Rinpoche Day

On the Tenth Day of the month of the Sheep, since certain Tirthikas from South India were causing great harm to the Buddhist Doctrine, with His great magical powers He ground the Tirthikas gods together with their guardians into dust. At the time of the waving triumphantly in the sky of the victory banner of the Doctrine of the Buddha, He became known as Guru Senge Dradog "the Guru who roars like the lion."

-Dudjom Rinpoche

FRIDAY, JULY 3: MOTEL

A black Labrador, a little bigger than our Nala comes to the tent door as soon as I am up in the early light. Opening the tent zipper to greet him, I must grab his collar as he tries to enter. Through trees in a nearby backyard, the traffic lights change on Military Drive. We shower and hit the road, narrowly missing an accident and passing another that had just happened in the morning rush before picking up Ksana at the base mini-mall. We consider a trip to see the other old missions but the heat is intimidating and we opt to spend the day at the motel.

To give them some time alone, I surfed for a hours in the air-conditioned office where unlike at home, there was access to high-speed internet. The Hispanic woman who worked the morning desk was more than willing to recount the rugged outlines of her life, raising children in Ohio as a single mom before moving to San Antonio. She has never visited Mexico. Her electric bills during the summer are over $200 a month, another $50 for city water, and she is often behind on rent because she only gets minimum wage. I also met her son, a friendly mechanic who stopped by long enough to tell me his father got a dishonorable discharge from the military before the divorce.

The afternoon desk was manned by an old Air Force vet, his long, yellowing-white hair falling out from under a well-worn Red Sox cap. Upon seeing him, I quipped, "Boston? You're a hell of a long way from home to be wearing that, aren't you?" He stares, asks where we are from and when I say New York to incite, he turns and asks, "Who let these people in here?" We got on well. Born in Northhampton, he dubs it the gay capital of Massachussets but I had to wonder if he'd ever been to Provincetown. I soon came to find out that he was stationed at the same base in Thailand as my older brother back in the late 1960's.

"So how did he like his time over there?" he asked. I told him about the fighter jets that would buzz the runway after successful bombing runs, coming in fifty feet over the tarmac upside down before rocketing up straight and spiraling back down. Boston responded to this, saying that he was present the day pilots had shot down three MIG's and in celebration, officers gave out their ID cards so that ordinary airmen could get into the officers club. The only other thing I could remember that brother told me was that he spent most of his days drunk in whore houses. A few years back I was dealing incense and he got a whiff of one variety that reminded him of the kind they used to burn overseas. I renamed it Bangkok Brothel in his honor.

"Aha; so he was an American railman," the old Airman quipped. "That's what we'd call that sort of assignment."

"How so?"

"He stayed busying laying Thais. An American railman, yah, that was quite an operation..."

Ksana, Leila and Tenkar drove off to eat lunch while I declined and busied myself at the keyboard. A Twitter pal from Northern California aware that I was having a rather intense week dedicated Chet Atkins' Tennessee Stud to me and as I listened, a world of feelings washed over me again. My people soon returned, and we retired to the room where the television was running Sarah Palin's swan song. Soon we were all asleep on the big bed. This was boy's first nap in two months, and he rested with his fiancee in one arm and his mom in the other. Mind-moment would not go into the pool but after dropping him at his quarters that evening, the three of us returned to spend twilight in the water. The German Shepherd was still there alone, wandering in a wide field by the car wash. Darkness fell, the pool lights came on and I got back online in the main lobby as the wifi was not accessible from the room. The ladies stayed in the water. The television weatherman announced 96 degrees at 10:30 at night, and I wondered if this was the norm when he added, "This is ridiculous..." I stayed online talking with friends and family till long after midnight in spite of knowing we were going to hit the road in the morning. We stop at a Valero gas station to fill up on the way back to campground. It is a San Antonio based business but being unfamiliar with the Spanish name contributed to illusions about avoiding multi-nationals and improving the lot of Mexicans somewhere. Valero is actually the largest refiner in North America and is taken from the original name of the Alamo Mission, San Antonio de Valero, meaning Saint Anthony of the Bullet Mold, a translation that I agree, is highly suspect.

San Antonio

SAT/SUN, JULY 4/5: AL NORTE

Woke with the certainties of the day's journey in mind, quickly took down the tent, guzzled some cold soymilk and rolled out of campground before sun was high. Today is the Fourth of July and the officer at the gate informs us that today is a holiday and that the base is closed. Tenkar starts to respond, then realizes he is kidding. You have got to love these guys. Finished reading The Texans in the car on base while waiting to pick up our charge. Small contingents of soldiers drill in the field before us, others carry banners back and forth on a nearby path. Tiny young women in camouflage wear surgical gloves to pick up litter. When Ksana arrived, we drove straight to Leila's motel shared coffee and goodbyes before we left the young lovers. In less than 48 hours he will transfer to a base near Wichita Falls to begin aerospace medical training.

Over the past few days, I have become enamored by the songs on Magnification by Yes (2001) and as our chariot merged with the traffic flowing north, it played for the fourth time in half as many days, lyrics standing out more than ever in light of current changes and the stripped-down sound provided by the absence of a working right speaker. This trip has unexpectedly opened up a whole new aspect of mind and feelings to consciousness. Staunch anti-war hippie forced to recalibrate views in support of son and realizing a measure of non-duality with our warrior class. Could not help but notice the camraderie, monk-like discipline and good heart observed by these kids. Some critics point to my obsession with the Civil War and how in spite of my pacifism, while home-schooling I taught the kids to appreciate the bravery and self-sacrifice of those who work for the benefit of others, regardless of the imperfections of their means.Personal experience oriented my inner compass to live and work as far from the mainstream as possible. This is how a kid from Queens ends living in a nameless hollow by a little creek in the mountains of Tennessee. Mind-moment is doing everything he can to immerse himself in the wider channel. We would all love to change the world.

For the next hour, the little red machine pushes on under long rows of beautiful cumulus mounds stretching into the northwest like unbaked loaves of bread, taking a quick left into the gridded heart of Austin. It is 11 AM and by prior arrangement, we are going to meet Phil (@qjohn on Twitter) at the Hideaway Coffee Shop on Congress Avenue, just down the street from the State Capitol. The steel columns and arches upholding the dome on that attractive building were forged 160 miles to the northeast by prisoners at the Palestine foundry (1888). Phil drives a late model yellow cab. We share iced coffees, enjoy some small talk about our trip, our paths through life, current events and the Tweet community before he directs us back to the interstate.

Hours of road later we are on Rte. 31, moving northeast through Navarro County, where the first commercially significant oil source in the state was discovered (1923). Outside Tyler we stop at a quiet monument situated under a lone tree, dedicated to people who died in an Indian massacre in 1838. Names of survivors are also included on the stone. Night falls as we enter the low hills and taller trees of Arkansas. By ten we are parked in the darkest corner of that same rest area in Prairie County, once home to the early migration of Cherokees into eastern Arkansas. We share some food before adjusting the seats for sleep but swarms of mosquitoes demand we keep the windows shut and the heat is oppressive . We toss and groan for two hours, turning on and off the AC every twenty minutes until about 1 AM when grace descends in the form of light rain cooling the air and allowing us to drift off until about 4:30. After scaring a young man attempting to bathe in the rest room - its alright -- I strapped in behind the wheel and drove until shortly after sunrise when we stopped for coffee and Tenkar took over. A missed exit led us south of town, crossing 112 feet above the Mississippi on the older Memphis-Arkansas Memorial Bridge and through downtown, across a barricaded Beale St. before regaining I-40. We passed through early enough to avoid the normal police roadside profiling and shakedown so common in east Memphis and soon exited at Jackson, riding 412 back into the dark green corridors of mid-state and home. Clouds and cool weather seemed to follow us through rural Tennessee as we listened to Ray Davies, Other People's Lives.

It's the bravest move they'll ever make, but they have to make the break
That's the risk that they take, so don't hesitate, then so unexpectedly-
It might hit you on a sunny afternoon
Without a warning there's a thought,
It just comes over you...

-Lonesome Train
(Ray Davies)

Skies over Navarro County, Texas
Saturday, July 4th

The Revolution

2009-05-22T18:21:00.000-07:00

On the same day that tea-baggers across America offered their lilly white sacks to the national meat-grinder, a popular buddhist magazine, the Shambhala Sun, ran an online poll on their audience's dietary practices and preferences. This was announced on Twitter at 11:26 on April 15th in the following manner;

Meat or veg? Which is best for a spiritual practitioner? Vote here: http://tinyurl.com/cx7jlq

- where six options appeared.

1. Do you eat meat?
2. No. In fact, I'm vegan.
3. No. I'm not vegan but I am strictly vegetarian.
4. I try not to but I might have a little from time to time.
5. Yes. But I don't eat red meat.
6. Yes. Call me what you want, just don't call me late for the BBQ.

My impulse to respond was motivated in part by the importance of this issue but also by the ridiculous way the question was put. Which is best? As if there is an objectively superior way for all spiritual practitioners. So I went to the site, voted and left a comment.

"Buddhists and their rationalizations; I vow to ignore them all. When it came out that eating animals is a bigger contributor to global-warming than automobiles I thought, high time for the environmental movement to get on board, ain't it?"

I checked the box to let me know if anyone responds and then went back a few minutes later to see if it posted and noticed that someone had given my comment a 'thumbs-up'. Yay! Narcissist that I am, I immediately reloaded the page and noticed that my comment had been removed altogether. Anyone with any experience on the net knows that flakey moderators are as common as Nigerian heiresses. My first response was to tweet a query to @shambhalasun simultaneously sharing it with the 600+ who receive updates from the Sun via Twitter, as well as to my personal mandala of Tweeters (83 at the time) who are only on board for items of interest and this was definitely one.

11:43 @shamabhalasun: went to your meat or veg survey: my comments were censored. Why?

My second comment went out a few minutes later to the same audience.

11:46 I voted, commented & was censored: comments removed -WTF? RT@shamabhalasun: Meat or veg?

I waited a few minutes, got no reply and then decided to ask for some feedback from other tweeters about the nature of my post. I typed out my original comments and then asked -

11:55 How offensive was that?

Dirk Johnson (@dirkjohnson) in northern California replied: 'wildly offensive, man, wildly offensive. LMAO'

I tried to generate some compassion for the poor fellow who undoubtedly felt he was just doing his job. I could imagine the Sun's web-master reading the first sentence in my post and assuming I was a non-buddhist troll. Mr. Sperry who had posted the poll, also left comments to the effect that his own metabolism demanded a retreat from vegetarianism. I got a strong hint of the same defensiveness I expect to hear from most carnivores who could care less about this issue and have taught me to do the same in their company, but I had not initiated this diagloue which was presented in the context of the sangha. I thought I might get under the radar by indicating that their hyper-vigilant defensiveness suggested lack of good humor, so crucial to buddhist practice. They had simply mistaken my sense of humor, my lead sentence echoing the solemnity of buddhist vows in an attempt to cut through what is too often an endless defense of sensory attachments. Still no answer forthcoming; maybe they were having a late lunch.

12:20 @shambhalasun surely you ready these msgs. Why was my post deleted? No free speech on yr. site? No sense of humor? You asked for comments....

A few of my tweet buddies were miffed by all of this and passed the word to their own followers to see if they could elicit a response through some complex logarithm of degrees of separation. It probably drove some traffic to the poll as well as getting the attention of a Twitterer who tracks censorship issues of all kinds. Every time your name is typed anywhere on Twitter, when preceded by an '@' symbol (a well-established convention in the Twitterverse) you receive notification. So the web-master @shambhalasun was aware that this conversation was afoot over the next few hours.

Before the clock struck 4 (CT) my post magically reappeared in the queue on the Sun Space website. This got me high because I felt, if even in the most basic way, not only had I been able to ask for and promptly receive relatively informed opinions from my peers but I was encouraged by the even more amazing fact that those opinions had a certain weight and actually made a difference in changing the situation. Reflecting on our prowess after this triumph, fellow buddhist guerilla 'RyderJaphy' (@ryderjaphy) tweeting out of Chicago offered, "....just give the word and I'll hot wire the CAT P_M-565B parked down the block, I'm ready to roll."

The revolution, solidarity and all that...

Footprints of the Ox

2009-03-01T15:41:00.000-08:00

The sangha celebrated the Tibetan New Year last night in Dewachen. Enter the Ox. The official date for Losar happened mid-week but most of us work for a living, so Saturday was fine. After a long evening of conversation, burnt offerings, blueberry pie, and ritual rock and roll* on the very last day of February, we stepped out into the silence of midnight snow. Seeing as we got off pretty good and snow isn't very common in this part of the world, we took it as an auspicious sign. Shared hot chocolate soymilk around the woodstove before waking to Tenkar's footsteps and six inches blanketing the world. White radiance flooding in every window illuminates morning's living room. Tenkar took this shot on the road leading out of our dead-end hollow. Jack is checking out the chickens who live in the yard over his shoulder. The footprints of his best friend & bunkmate Nala lead off into the distance.

*A few of our songs can be heard here.

The Bottom

2009-02-13T20:40:00.000-08:00

This year we are getting an early start on the garden. Ian mans the one row plow like those used by our Amish neighbors. In place of horses and absence of tractor Dave guns the Ranger and pulls the blade through some of the darkest soil in this part of Tennessee. View is to the south, 900+ ft. above sea level.

Happy Trails

2009-02-13T16:46:00.000-08:00

Son Isa and I walked into the nursing home last week and were immediately hit with the acrid smell of piss. We said nothing, actually expected it and walked straight to the desk where a girl asked who we wanted to see. "William Dowling" She recognized my face from photos that Mr. Dowling had on his wall and gave us the room number before pointing us down a hallway. I made eye-contact with a few of the patients sitting in wheelchairs along the way. Most of them did not acknowledge any exchange. Bill was sitting up, watching television. He immediately shut it off and we all hugged.

Once upon a time, Bill was a hard-drinking truck driver in New England and had apparently pissed off his family so bad that none of them wanted anything to do with him anymore. He still felt strong and big around the shoulders, even after six operations for cancer. His eyes welled up as he spoke, "Man, it is good to see you guys again. It gets pretty lonely in here."

"Yeah, I'll bet it does."

His roommate entered in a wheelchair. He was one of those in the hallway who had not responded but now asked Isa to open the door to the bathroom for him. To show us that he was not totally defeated but was dealing with his situation like the man he is, Bill said, "They just made me a greeter, so I'll have something to do around here now." Even more significant, a woman on the other end of the building had recently gifted him with one of those battery powered chairs to get around in and he was happy about that. After about 15 minutes, we walked out of there vowing to visit again soon.

This morning we learned that Bill passed away last night.

Happy trails old friend.

Tax Season

2009-02-04T22:52:00.000-08:00

When I lay me down to sleep at night, the bed pillows are stacked at the base of a window in the north wall. I don a nightcap rather than draw the curtains. On clear nights, the last light I see before closing my eyes has traveled oh so far (124 and 79 light-years respectively*) through near empty space. Dubhe and Merak are the two stars in the Big Dipper known as 'the pointers' because an imaginary line extended through them leads directly to Polaris, the only star in the sky that doesn't seem to move. 150 years ago, runaway slaves knew these asterisms by another name and would follow the Drinking Gourd north to freedom. In the same way that all 'appearances became text' for Rigdzin Jigme Lingpa, the pointers are an astrophysical sign speaking to me of the world's axis, the space beyond conception, the still point where awareness comes to rest each night, before birth and after death.

The winter morning routine begins before dawn at the kitchen table where I share coffee with the ladies before they drive north, not to freedom but to man the trenches on the frontlines of samsara. Here they work as tax preparers and secretaries, serving a public that is too often rude, impatient, uneducated and under the illusion that they are dealing with government employees. Growing evidence of our failing economy appears in the form of customers crowding the office seeking advances on their returns in spite of the 35% interest the banks are charging. Beyond the stress of dealing with the public, down servers and poorly designed software, misunderstandings and disagreements with friends and co-workers can make this time of year a real test of patience and joyful effort for all of us. More evidence of the big squeeze came a few days ago when a twelve mile section of divided highway which had been posted at 65 mph for years was suddenly changed to 55. Thousands of people, many with marginal factory and service industry incomes drive this stretch everyday and have become habituated to the speed as the road was originally constructed as a way to bypass the town. The cops are having a field day preying on the overworked and underpaid.

This situation finds me in the kitchen once again around sundown to jam with the kids at putting together something that will pass for dinner. Our culinary skills are humble but gradually evolving. My last stint as a cook took place over twenty years ago when we lived in Jamaica and Tenkar was pregnant with Isa, our fourth child. Truth be told, I haven't had much practice since then but so far, so good. Isa, Kyema and I have a great time putting our limited talents and knowledge together to prepare something we can all appreciate. Our 'beginner's mind' usually manages to provide a measure of creative variety in spite of the simplicity of the fare. Our specialties are rice and vegies with 'secret' miso sauce, tortillas with fixings, bean soups and pasta.

Long after dark headlights wind their way up the drive,and dakinis emerge out of the darkness greeted by the barking of dogs. Depending on scheduling, they might arrive home together or alone but in any case we immediately head for the comfort of the woodstove to share stories of the days trials and trivia before sitting down with plates of hot food, often followed by a cup of tea and only a few precious hours to share before retiring. This is not the time for anything very demanding. Herb, foot-rubs, some talk of current events; they often do not have the energy to stay awake through an entire movie. This is how it goes during the peak period of tax season.
*****

*
For whereas the mind works in possibilities, the intuitions work in actualities, and what you intuitively desire, that is possible to you. Whereas what you mentally or "consciously" desire is nine times out of ten impossible; hitch your wagon to a star, or you will just stay where you are.
D.H. Lawrence (1885-1930)

The years in which the light presently perceived was generated by these two distant suns happen to frame the birth [Dubhe] and death [Merak] years of Mr. Lawrence's brief time on earth.

Minor Hill

2009-01-01T10:11:00.000-08:00

We spent a few hours visiting with Dechen's granny Betty Lou in a small white cottage on Minor Hill, a little community about 25 miles to the south and about as far from the Alabama border. On the way, I notice massive white pillars holding up new sections of widened roadways snaking from side to side through these green valleys. In the spirit of true pork-barrel spending, it seems every two-lane blacktop in the state is being expanded into quasi-interstate highways, regardless of local needs.

Dechen, Tenkar and I will be the only guests for dinner this afternoon. Betty Lou lives with her son Joe who was absent, house-sitting for a friend. Years ago, Granny lost her elder son to suicide and a daughter in a car accident. Dechen's mother is Betty Lou's child but refuses to visit or even return her calls on the basis of clinging to some old painful karmas that nobody understands very well. Betty Lou seems resigned to this sad state of affairs with a measure of understanding and surprisingly, no bitterness.

The kitchen is narrow and we immediately sit down to a spread of iced tea, pinto beans, green beans, corn bread, creamed corn, macaroni and mashed potatoes. She apologizes for the age and wear of the chairs, laughs about spilling the black pepper and having to rinse it out of the the macaroni and underscores how Joe loves potatoes; he virtually survives on them. We dine on fine English china produced by a certain Churchill which is usually kept in a glass cabinet made by Betty Lou's brother who has since sold all his tools. A fading color photo of Dechen as a child hangs on blond paneling bordered by two candles like a small shrine. Names of relatives dead and alive dominate the conversations. Granny compliments Tenkar on her necklace and after a closer inspection, Tenkar offers to make her one just like it. Dechen shares photos from the Grand Canyon and her sister's wedding. She mentions email and Granny says that they recently dropped their internet connection because of the monthly fee although Joe still uses the computer to store digital photos. In the background, the satellite radio station on the television plays easy-listening versions of old hits that my mother would like and chocolate pie is served.

After the meal, Granny begins going through boxes of things in the living room. She has decided to give away the Christmas dishes because 'us getting together on the holidays seems to be a thing of the past'. Chet Atkins picks out the melody line of a Carpenter's song against a background of strings. When Dechen asked about her taste in movies, Granny said she liked Gregory Peck but never cared for Cary Grant or Liz Taylor. I begin to doze on the couch, the ladies giggled and I decide to step outside to get some air and catch some of the year's last twilight. I sit on the backyard grass, recognizing our location on a ridge as tree tops stretch to the horizons under clear skies. I breathe easy and say dakini mantra while observing the display of forms and colors around me. Few cars pass. People out this way don't have any money to speak of but nobody goes hungry. Whatever there is of real poverty out here is in our heads and hearts.

Sun Temple

2008-12-21T15:19:00.000-08:00

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

2008-12-19T14:35:00.000-08:00

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

2008-12-10T16:41:00.000-08:00

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

2008-05-01T18:01:00.000-07:00

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.

********

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

2008-04-18T22:28:00.000-07:00

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

2008-04-12T08:41:00.000-07:00

Pinson Mounds

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.

The Clarke/Kubrick Monolith of 2001
appearing somewhere in East Africa near the 'Dawn of Man'

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."

The Back Way

2008-04-02T15:14:00.000-07:00

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

2008-03-26T18:13:00.000-07:00

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

2008-03-24T16:00:00.000-07:00

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

2008-03-19T14:00:00.000-07:00

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

2008-03-11T14:28:00.000-07:00

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

2008-03-08T08:31:00.000-08:00

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

2008-02-26T20:59:00.000-08:00

"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

2008-02-24T13:25:00.000-08:00

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

2008-02-20T20:35:00.000-08:00

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

2008-02-18T20:04:00.000-08:00

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

2008-02-18T16:08:00.000-08:00

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

2008-02-15T00:16:00.001-08:00

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

2008-02-14T23:11:00.000-08:00

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

2008-02-12T14:22:00.000-08:00

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

an unremarkable place

2008-02-10T15:59:00.000-08:00

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

2008-02-09T18:52:00.000-08:00

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?

Year of the Mouse

2008-02-07T07:59:00.000-08:00

Greetings My Human Friend,

Today is the first day of the Tibetan New Year, Earth Mouse 2135. Mouse/Rat holds the 'mid-night' slot (11pm-1am) in the Sino-Tibetan day, associated with winter, and the cold dark of the north. Symbolizing inquiry, intellectual curiosity and the exploration of esoteric wisdom, the mouse is the vehicle of choice for Lord Ganesha, elephantine remover of obstacles. Mouse energy may bring a degree of progress, prosperity and plenty. We would all welcome that, at any number of levels.

In Mayan cosmology, rat opens the door to wisdom in helping the Hero Twins discover their true path in life. In gratitude, they guarantee that rat will never go hungry. Occasionally on cold winter nights, you might hear his cousins collecting offerings in the pantry. At best, think Mickey Mouse as the enlightened, good-natured individual; non-threatening, humorous and helpful.

Traditional outlines warn not to overextend or take too many risks this coming year, more than likely cause the world is going to hell and you ain't made of money. While some dark hearts out there are predicting the end of America and the death of billions in '08, I prefer to take refuge in uncertainty and must confess, "I do not know." Therefore, let us proceed mindfully knowing that the time we have is limited, and observe with a sense of wonder, to engage our time in the world in the spirit of love and deep appreciation. A phrase comes to mind, permanently burned into my soft tissues during the sixth grade through forced memorization of a commentary on the eighth commandment in Luther's Old Catechism; put the best construction on everything.

Thanks for stopping by. With the start of this new year, I will make an effort to keep blogging here regularly; we'll see how long it lasts!

Gutornadoes

2008-02-07T07:52:00.000-08:00

the day between gutor,
averting negativity of the old (yesterday)
and losar,
new year of the mouse, (tomorrow)
is today, traditionally designated a house-cleaning day
yesterday it was so warm we sat outside
in the moist dark after sunset
talk of the ecliptic, Polaris, horizons, season and degrees latitude
watching skies flash blue white, big trees sway,
winds howling across the hills
recited the black phurba, burned one, clouds racing northeast
revealing, hiding Orion, Taurus,
Pleiades in the poplar
a display of great power soon drove us indoors where
i fixated on the colorful graphics of current radar maps
till long after everyone went to bed, just in case ya know...

our compassion goes out to the 50+ dead, the wounded
and those whose homes and property were destroyed.

map

Song of Tiger Fort

2006-04-13T09:24:00.000-07:00

The following is based on Shabkar's Song of Tiger Fort (Takmo Dzong). While reading it I was struck with how much his description reminds me of the place where I have lived for the last 18 years, so I typed it in to share it with the group and took the liberty of changing a few details.
___________________

Mind-emanation of the Buddhas of the three times,
Father, Dharma King, Palden Sherab,
I supplicate you without ceasing.
Grant your blessings that this vagabond
May be able to keep to mountain retreat.

Making joy and inspiration arise,
This solitary place, Rubal Ribo, and I are in complete accord.
I'm of the mountains, my mind is there:
Thus do I sing my song.

Turtle Hill -- hidden and auspicious,
A place where many great beings once stayed.
A forested hill without -- within, a home.
Its southern door is bathed in light, even in winter.
Spring and fall -- the air is cool; mind is clear.
Water, wood for fires -- everything I need is easily found;
My perceptions here are always lofty and joyous.

Above, in a sky without boundaries,
Hawks circle, gliding.
Celestial juniper trees ornament
The ridges to the north-west
Their scent spices the air.

Before me, six-legged honeybees hum, hovering over
Wild flowers spread out across the meadow.
From a stream's clear water rushing over stones
Come continuous murmurings.

Wild animals bask on the slopes,
Frisking, gamboling, they saunter or stroll about.
In the deep green forest, from the highest branches,
Various birds chatter and sing.

Rain clouds hang overhead like great canopies.
From clouds swirled like scattered white silks
And patterned with perfect rainbows
Summer rain falls in a fine mist.

The guardians of this place
Are on the Dharma's side:
Anything wanted is right here.
There are no villages nearby, no temples, no noise:
Everything is slow and serene.

Through the lama's blessing,
And by the grace of the place itself,
Meditation experiences and realization
Arise easily in one's mind-stream.

I, a renunciate of these mountains,
Call out the clear tones of my song.

How wondrous if all those who practice,
With minds turned toward the Dharma,
Had the support of a place like this!

To sing like this --
Go into the mountains!
By this merit, may all those practicing the teachings
Make use of solitary places for retreat,
And may they become fully perfected.

________
Shabkar Tsogdruk Rangdrol
(1781-1851)

from The Life of Shabkar, Snow Lion 2001, (pp. 72)
translated by Mathieu Ricard

April Cyclones

2006-04-08T10:00:00.000-07:00

Our local news channel is usually corny and amateurish; but when it comes to tornados, they have great computers and competent meteorologists who keep you updated and even better, they cut out all the commercials for hours. This is an example of community television at its best. Saw it coming on the radar around 5 pm, big cells headed right for Summertown. We are usually safe from anything coming directly out of the west as the eroded ridges east of the Tennessee River often act like a ship's prow or an icebreaker and send weather glancing off to the north or south of us. Trouble is brewing when we get flanked from the south like we did yesterday. The winds were coming up across northern Mississippi and Alabama to the southwest of us and would be avoiding the protective 'prow' to visit destruction upon our heads. So I packed up the guitars and put them under the bed, started filling water jugs, grabbed a knapsack and filled it with valuables and got ready to head out of the house to somewhere safer. Sat here in front of the 'puter with my sneakers and jacket on, the backpack by my feet. Then the satellite connection went down but I still had a general idea of what was happening thru internet weather (good old dial-up).

Fortunately, the winds were not very strong around here. We got plenty of rain and lightning. Later in the evening, some members of the sangha arrived to play music, but we ended up sitting in a circle, talking, sipping tea and counting the time between lightning flashes and thunder to judge how close the hit was and whether it was safe enough to warm up the amps. The flash and boom never stopped and we eventually fell over and called it a night. Tornado warnings continued to 4 am; almost twelve hours. Used to be we were beyond the extreme eastern edge of what was once dubbed 'tornado alley'; seems like the boundaries should be redrawn.

Over 36 folks were killed this week by twisters in Tennessee. Blessings and strength to those who lost loved ones or their homes.

Red Day

2006-03-24T17:30:00.000-08:00

sangha means inseparable
but we have been reduced to fragments

red day
moon waning
minding
even though
issues lurk
is it a virtue
to say nothing

without understanding
if this is the right kind of peace
or simply the mask
of mundane politics

the inherent frustration
in spending great sums of energy
merely to observe the world
fail to communicate
anything of value
throws me back on
the essential wisdom
in just sitting
---------------

there are four non-virtues associated with speech;

1. lies
2. harsh words
3. slander
4. gossip

I think we tend to be intimidated and constrained by a simplistic definition of what these words might mean. These four represent only a general outline of the many possible ways to effectively perpetuate the experience of samsara for both oneself and others. This is why there is a lot more shastra and commentary than original scripture. Coarse definitions do not really address what the Roman Catholics have dubbed 'sins of omission' which may require both deeper insight, courage and the energy of compassion to overcome. Right speech is not merely a form of restraint, but an empowerment to act and speak in the current of liberation.

Mothers

2006-03-24T16:32:00.000-08:00

Besides sending flowers to Mom, Mother's Day is another good excuse to reflect on the fact that throughout countless aeons, all beings having been our mothers, repeatedly, and the great debt of immediate compassion and eventual liberation that we owe them.

The following, known as the Four Sky Mothers, originated as sutra. It was later embedded into a terma revealed by Terton Namcho Migyur Dorje in The Seven Dharma Seeds of the Great Compassionate One:

All motherly sentient beings,
equal in number as the sky is vast,
take refuge in the guru's All-pervading Dharmakaya Body.

All motherly sentient beings,
equal in number as the sky is vast,
take refuge in the guru's Sambhogakaya Body of Great Bliss.

All motherly sentient beings,
equal in number as the sky is vast,
take refuge in the guru's Nirmanakaya Body of Compassion.

All motherly sentient beings,
equal in number as the sky is vast,
take refuge in the guru as the Precious Buddha.

Mandala

2006-03-24T16:05:00.000-08:00

Over three decades ago I was introduced to the mandala of the dhyani buddhas through the writings of Lama Govinda. Meditation on the patterns and associations of qualities continues to draw me deeper into the living tantra which connects all events. This past week, we were discussing the mandala and considering the animals associated with the thrones supporting the Buddhas in each quadrant. If the same mandala had evolved in North America rather than on the plains of India and the foothills of the Himalayas, Asiatic species would naturally be replaced with local critters.

The Vajra family in the east represents the Indestructible Mind of the Buddha. Elephants support the throne; in the relative world Akshobya appears as the form skandha consorting with the water dakini. The transformation of aggression into mirror-like wisdom is their accomplishment. Pacifying is the primary activity. The time is dawn, the season winter. To hindus and early buddhists, elephants symbolized great natural power which could be seen every year in the monsoon rain clouds which the god Indra would ride while tossing lightning bolts (vajras). Native Americans had no elephants but mastodons and mammoths were definitely around for awhile. Related through an association with (yogic) power, unperturbed stability and the element water, the Blue or any of the great whales might be a non-extinct option, particularly in relation to the motif of superhuman power. Turtles, snakes (their relation to nagas in the orient and lightning amongst native americans) and the blue heron fit well into the same retinue.

Horses (brought here by the Spanish almost 500 years ago) support the throne of the Jewel-born Buddha in the southern quadrant. In the relative world the yellow buddha appears as the skandha of feeling while his consort Mamaki is earth. The transformation of arrogance into the wisdom realizing emptiness is their accomplishment. Associated with the Qualities of the Buddhas, enriching is their activity. The time is midday, the season is autumn. Ripeness, abundance. Representing the Three Jewels and all derivative wealth, the residents of Turtle Island might find similar qualities in such useful herd animals as bison, deer, elk, caribou or bighorn sheep.

Amitabha, the Buddha of the Padma family in the West, sits on a Lotus throne supported by peacocks which are said to eat poison and transform it into the brilliance of their tails. (I flashed on the Mexican eagle pulling the snake out of its hole and thought, nope, that's not quite the vibe...) In the relative world the red buddha appears as perception while his consort is the element fire. The transformation of lust and desire into the loving intelligence of discriminating wisdom is their accomplishment. Magnetizing is their activity. The time is twilight, the season is spring. Evanescent beauty. The reds, rusts, yellows and blue feathers of the multitude of songbirds found locallly. Their songs also reflect Amitabha's association with the Speech of the Buddhas and the practice of mantra. Our local choice, is the Wild Turkey. This also reflects a classical polarization between birds and snakes with birds in the celestial above (fire/red) and snakes in the aqueous realm below (water/blue).

To the north is the Garuda throne; owls, ravens, crows, vultures, hawks, eagles, 'the mythical thunderbird'... Subjugating is their activity. Time is midnight, season is summer. Here Amogha-siddhi, associated with Buddha Activities, sits yab-yum with Green Tara. In his relative aspect he is volition and she the element wind. The transformation of jealousy, paranoia and instability into the fullness of all-accomplishing wisdom is their transcendent alchemy. Quickening, effective action, cutting through obstacles, sealed by the Double- dorjÈ.

The central place is the domain of the lion, king of the jungle. Who's top of the food chain in the west? Bear. Fearlessly representing the Body of the Buddha, Vairocana turns the Wheel of the teachings. Vairocana is Buddha free of appearance, the clear light of Dharmakaya which shines through all colors. In his relative aspect he is self-reflective consciousness consorting with the queen of heavenly space. The transformation of ignorance regarding the true nature of existence into dharmadhatu wisdom is their supreme accomplishment.

Ogmin

2006-03-24T08:32:00.000-08:00

ogmin

i had the most outrageous DMT trip last night
way better than the first round a few days previous
i got the first toke this time
and it was huge
i was off before i even passed the pipe
just sat there, mostly with closed eyes
and let pattern grids come on
very visual but i was still there witnessing
incredible rainbow auras
way more optix than acid or shrooms
but then the little pipe came around again
so i hit it the second time
after barely having released the first toke
and whoa
i had to lay down and sprawled on the kitchen floor
where i was alone and pulled into a deep black hole
still holding my breath, i was dying and they were silent
and i must have died and they knew it too
i gradually began to breathe again and got up after a bit
to sit in the circle with everyone
and they had been so quiet and meditative the whole time
all sitting up straight with half-smiles. it was a conspiracy
seven of them
and they were all perfect buddhas
i saw that they were very wise and compassionate
way more than i usually give them credit for
it was like a surprise party for me
in a pure land
and then i laughed hysterically
and said 'you guys are terrible...'
it was so funny
you see i felt like i had died and gone to Ogmin
and that my friends were already there, always had been
and that the earthy appearance of their life and karma
was all just a lesson, an elaborate demonstration for me
and that they already understood everything i have ever tried to teach them
they were just waiting for me come full circle and to understand
and that all my efforts to communicate to them
as well as their seeming ignorance and resistance
had been just a play, a wisdom display for my sake
so I could exercise some level of patience
generosity, and joyful effort
and gradually bring my actions to fruition
of course this was just a vision
but a real good one
a revelation of our true nature
which we have not all quite awakened to as yet
i saw it in myself long ago; so now a similar opening reveals
the secret nature of my friends and that in the ultimate sense,
there is nothing to be attained or added to 'what is'
of course the challenge of practice and realization is always there
but it is a good and timely reminder put together,
offered as a gift courtesy of Bay Area chemist Justin Thyme
thank you brother
- visually there is nothing which compares to such good DMT
like Padma's samboghakaya lightning beauty;
swirling rainbow crystalline multiple auras dominate the field
and lead to contemplating the deeper patterns of inner space;
ray mandala was kind in playing pied piper
insisting we all together to do this
cause we probably would not have done so otherwise...

(careful with that jewel)

Originally written in July '05

Rocky Hill

2006-01-22T17:54:00.000-08:00

Like so many others who have been drawn to travel, I am also beginning to appreciate the fact that I was raised in a very special and unique place. I am not merely referring to the geology and natural history of the area, but to the fact that it served as a setting for a prolonged exposure to formative influences. In specific, I refer to a natural elevation in western Long Island which occupies an area of about four square miles. Although no one ever referred to it as a named hill when I was growing up, I now realize I lived, slept and played on the slopes of natural feature once known as Rocky Hill for the better part of eighteen years. Evidence for the name comes from century old maps and railroad literature; there is still one Rocky Hill Road somewhere in Bayside but little more in the current area to suggest that the name was ever used locally much less applied to the entire mound. The toponym has been long forgotten but the extent of my discoveries in this place are incalculable and stay with me.

Our little brick house was built in the years before WW2 and sat third from the corner upon the outwash plain on the southeast apron, nestled half a block from Alley Pond Park and one street away from the gates of Creedmoor Psychiatric Hospital. Unlike blocks further up the slope, we were able to play ball out front of the house although the mild angle still influenced the best way to lay out the bases. The hillock also determined which way rainwater flowed in the gutter, provided great downhill stretches to glide along on a bicycle, and in the winter, the park afforded a choice of long slopes to sleigh down with open grassy fields to safely receive you at the bottom.

The kettle hole topography in the northeast quarter of Rocky Hill eventually led to the area being set aside as Alley Pond Park, the second largest in Queens. Bordered by ravines too steep to be used for development, the area had come to be known as 'The Alley' over 300 years ago. A A few months before the great stock market crash in 1929, the park was acquired by the city for 1.3 million dollars. Mayor Jimmy Walker said, 'This is an attractive offer and parks must be anticipated for the good of the increasing populations. There is no better site in Queens.' Good move. In 1935, Mayor LaGuardia and Parks Commisioner Robert Moses attended a ceremony opening a bird sanctuary in the mature woods of the uppper park.

The Old Motor Parkway (OMP), designed for auto-racing at the beginning of the 20th century by the Vanderbilts, provided banked turns, no traffic or crossroads and a steep gradient as it descended the east side of the hill. A second good run, even longer is an old narrow asphalt path which parallels the Cross Island Parkway, descending through the woods into the ravine along the eastern edge of the park as it heads north to the junction of Horace Harding and Cross Island. McCormack and I tripped down here one summer day and got eaten up by mosquitoes from the nearby swamps.

At 206 feet above sea level, Rocky Hill is the second highest point in Queens. Bordered on the east by Cross Island Parkway, on the north by the Long Island Expressway, on the west by the Clearview Expressway, and to the south by Hillside Avenue. Due to the suburbanization of the area, it is rarely conceived of as a hill even by those who live upon it or drive over its slopes regularly, but there is no question about it. The effects of topography are undeniable. Before the sewer system was improved in the late sixties, it was not uncommon for there to be waist--high flooding on various stretches of these low-lying borders after prolonged rains.

The Grand Central Parkway (GCP) cuts through the southern portion of this 2X2 mile square, riding along the crest of the moraine, less than half a mile northwest from our house, a continuous swish, roar and purr of steel on rubber. Being designated a parkway, it was originally supposed to include 'ribbon parks' for walking and biking along its edges. By the time I was a teen, that plan had been so scaled back that it appeared as if they had merely decided to run a large, noisy roadway through a sequence of existing parks, compromising the reserves while providing no green 'ribbons' in-between. While I am recounting trivial details, there is an interesting manmade feature unique to the area, just north of GCP. Running from the overpass above the OMP in the park to the brushy area just west of Springfield, is a large drainage tunnel featuring a walkway and iron railing passing under both Union Turnpike and Springfield, directing the water into natural depressions at both ends; Pea Pond to the west and what I used to think was Alley Pond to the east. (it ain't; see Alley Pond post)

A huge silver-blue water tower stands just south of the GCP near the summit of Rocky Hill on Springfield. This steel tank can be seen from miles away on the southern outwash plains and was very likely the source of our household water. The quality was exceptional and the pressure always sufficient.

Not far from the crest was Redeemer Lutheran, the church-school I attended for eight years. Our pastor as well as many of the major patrons of the congregation lived in the immediate neighborhood. Pastor's son Mark was a rebel with sideburns, a leather jacket and beatle boots. When dad stepped out one evening, Mark played Dylan's I'm Only Bleeding LOUD on the Church's big sound system as David and I, serving as acolytes, readied the altar for Advent services. A few minutes down the street was the Catholic school whose coach let me play third base; our school didn't have a team at the time. Try-outs were held in the open lot on the corner of Bell and Union where big tents blossomed and mechanical rides rotated during the annual bazaar which my folks would not allow me attend. The whole thing was a bit too pagan and degenerate, something Jesus would have chased out of the temple no doubt, at least that's what Pastor thought. The White Elephant sales held by the ladies of our church auxiliary commitee were another thing altogether; no games of chance.

American Martyrs Roman Catholic church was eventually built on the corner sandlot and stirred up some controversy as its non-traditional circular design resembles a Greek Orthodox temple. Across Bell Boulevard was the little library where I obtained my own card, walking there alone after school and then riding a city bus home. Two of my first selections were a well-illustrated editions of Dickens' Magic Fishbone and Sandburg's Windsong.

Most of my friends, a few relatives, and my godparents lived here upon this knoll. The kids I played with after school everyday were from middle class Irish or Italian Catholic families on 236th or nearby streets. The southern slope east of Springfield was covered in acres of those horrid little two story projects which tended to be populated with Jews. Similar housing is found between 73rd Ave and the OMP where Nonnie lived. The hell isn't only of the upstairs/downstairs variety; Daryl would try to play his drums on Saturday morning and the guy on the other side of the wall started banging and yelling about how he worked nights and wanted to sleep.

The wealthiest neighborhoods on the hill are found in the vicinity of the Lutheran church, between GCP and Union Turnpike. Large, well-landscaped brick homes, many with tudor designs, blue slate roofs, attractive stone work and even a few castle turrets are to be found amidst an abundance of azaelas, rhododendrons, maples and evergreens on the very top of the hill. This was a largely German neighborhood, and come December, this is where we would cruise to see some of the more elaborate Christmas light and lawn displays. It is unlikely that any black folk were living anywhere on Rocky Hill. Although there were never any Jim Crow laws (de jure) in New York, Queens racism a la Archie Bunkerwas rampant, de facto. Black neighborhoods were literally on 'the other side of the tracks'; the rails being the property of the Long Island Railroad on their raised bed south of Jamaica Avenue.

On this little patch of earth I learned to walk and talk, to read and write, found turtles, took my clothes off and ran naked in the street, would spin in circles in the living roomtill dizzy and then hold onto the piano leg and wonder if the world was really rocking or was it in my head, learned about Jesus, learned to ride a bike, and that Aunt Marion would have said goodbye had she known and that even little kids can die, and that kites need a tail, learned to watch birds because they are beautiful and might be as wild as it gets in the city, saw sunspots and craters on the moon, visited my grandmother, peeked inside a Catholic church for the first time, rode the city bus alone, walked outside the day after a snowstorm on a path shovelled through drifts a yard over my head, went house to house collecting newspapers in a wagon, trick-or-treating or selling packets of seeds, experienced my first kiss, learned to play guitar, was introduced to all kinds of music, took strong psychedelics, smoked lots of dope, walked in the woods, wrote poetry, became a vegetarian, prayed, got laid, got enlightened, threw the I Ching, read Hesse, Huxley, Dostoevsky, Bradbury, Clarke, Zelazny, Whitman, Sandburg, Ginsberg, Leary, Watts, DT Suzuki, Lao-Tzu, RH Blyth, the Gita, the Upanisads, Eckhart, Merton, and the Bardo Thodrol.....

One fine day in the winter of 1973, on the southern apron of Rocky Hill, on the first day of a mythology class being taught in a second story classroom of Martin Van Buren High School by one Mr. Vincent Seyfried, Lord of Queens Historians, I took my seat in the back of the room, by the windows. Having been expelled from the small private academy I'd attended for the past three years in Hollis, I was now a senior in a large public institution just a few blocks from home and welcomed the anonymity. In Paris, only days before, North and South Vietnam had finally been able to agree on the shape of tables, and the United States had signed a treaty to withdraw all US forces within three months. Mr. Seyfried was a very animated and expressive teacher whose enthusiasm for the material was contagious. His presentation of the Egyptian myth of Osiris and interesting parallels with the Christ resonated with the perennial philosophy I was already immersed in. In hindsight, opting to attend this mythology class was one of the most important choices I ever made in my life; this is where I met Tenkar, my wife of 33+ years, a few months before graduation.

The Mountain

2006-01-18T22:45:00.000-08:00

The Tibetans say that the present time is a degenerate era; evidence abounds and ignorance pervades to the point where we may even begin to doubt the validity of the whole notion as a form of relief; Ray asked me if I thought there was ever a time that things were better. And although it is widely understood that we need sharper minds and effective morality in government, I myself have never had any desire to get involved in politics. Growing up in the sixties I remember the Friday afternoon in third grade when we learned JFK was dead. Within five years, I would learn of the shooting deaths of Malcolm-X, MLK and RFK. Kent State got my attention too. I wonder how many other kids growing up during this era quickly came to the conclusion that politics was nothing that they wanted to get too close to. Having lived far from any major cities since I left New York at 18, I have never attended a political demonstration or town hall meeting, although I vote every chance I get and nudge my spacey friends to register. I even sign petitions and know far more than I ever wanted to about current affairs.

For years, I was able to ignore most of it by not owning a television and not reading newspapers. The Gulf War had been over for months but I didn't know who General Schwarzkopf was until I saw his book for sale in the grocery store. All that changed one morning in September 2001. I was sitting on my cushion in silent meditation when my wife came in the room and said that a jet had flown directly into the World Trade Center. Like many others at that point, I began following the news religiously. I'm still jonesing.

For better or worse, we have the system we deserve and while the way out of this labyrinth is endlessly discussed, there is no clear path of remedial action which can be effectively communicated and widely established. It is not that I don't care; its just that in my own case, I don't see any way to make much of a difference about what is happening in the world by those means. Instead, over the past three decades, my tendency has been to focus on cultural education, informed by compassion and commitment to personal spiritual evolution in the context of small, human communities. In a recent biography of Aldous Huxley, the author quotes a letter wherein Huxley expresses his belief that anyone with 'a gift for the knowledge of ultimate reality' could do far more good 'by sticking to his curious activites on the margin of society than by going to the centre and trying to improve matters there.' (Murray, 2002, p. 332)

A little more than a decade ago, I had a desire to travel to some of the power spots on Turtle Island, in particular, to places I had never been before. Such places are often secret because while they are unique in their ability to absorb and re-emit spiritual influences, they are only akin to batteries or capacitors and do not of themselves generate blissful or meditative experiences. They must be regularly frequented by good people who truly contribute something essential to the accumulation of good energy in these places. A certain quality becomes available to the entire world in a non-local way when a site is properly empowered and repeatedly imbued with the effulgent samadhi of non-dual wisdom. A site that is neglected too long or contaminated with an excess of arbitrary impressions begins amplifying the resonances of mundane interests and the mood of separate self, effectively obscuring the extraordinary nature of such a specially endowed site to draw one in. Beyond neutralizing a potential wellspring of spiritual healing and knowledge, negative effects may also manifest as social and political turmoil, natural disasters and disease.

This clogging of the visionary channels with the conventional sludge of self-concern and impulsive dogmas of endless consumption has accelerated our slide into an unecessary war with no end. The open line to infintiy is plugged with the dregs of phantom ego-clinging. The wisdom channel is blocked and we are caught in a satanic loop. Still, the contemporary form of community in the west has no place for the shaman. This ignorance and lack of understanding and support for shamanic activity is one aspect of our current troubles which is not likely to be discussed except in small groups of initiates.

Having visited many of the famous national parks, I was looking for isolated settings that were natural and somewhat off the beaten track, the kind of places that call one to them, to bear witness, to play, to observe. So I began to listen closer and seek out locations where I could be completely undistrubed by the presence and artifacts of other human beings. This would obviously require travelling a good ways from roads and power lines.

Attention was initially magnetized to the rarefied atmosphere of the mountains on a road trip from California to Texas as we passed by a lone volcanic peak in western New Mexico. The afternoon sun lit up its majestic slopes and seemed to say I Am Here; all the time you are running around trying to accomplish this or that, hoping your plans work out and fearing unforeseen obstacles, trying to acquire this and avoid that, counting these and discounting those, all the while you sleep or struggle, argue and augment, whether rain or night falls, still I Am Here...

Oddly enough, this sort of presencing appears to have very little to do with the size or physical mass of a thing as I came upon this same solid feeling of unqualified being seemingly communicated by sectors of empty space six miles above the Atlantic Ocean one golden afternoon. But unlike a rock, the sky does not afford us the convenience of a clearly defined position via precipitation into tangible form. As embodied beings, composite objects may invite a return visit for more intimate and prolonged communion; ordinarily this merely describes our bondage.

This mountain was quite naturally considered sacred to four tribes of Native Americans living around its base. The Dineh (Navajo) view it as one of four directional peaks, physical manifestations of spiritual awareness radiant with life force, defining the pattern of the Dineh cosmos. After learning the significance of these mountains, I felt a deep affinity with this ancient tradition which recognizes the part such entities play in connecting the upper and lower worlds, the inner and outer dimensions of existence. In the language of the Dineh, this is an essential aspect of the Beauty Way.

Having long ago been introduced to the mandala principle through Vajrayana Buddhism, I had an appreciation for these arcane crosses as intuitive maps of the living world. Mandalas reflect an internal compass, a means of tuning into a deeper sense of place and purpose, a portal to central intelligence from anywhere in the four quarters of the world, a cache of meaningful reference points to navigate the dark sea of experience.

I soon learned that this same mountain was also heavily mined for uranium, an operation which shortened the lives of many indigenous miners and the tailings have contaminated local springs. That a sacred mountain should be the scene of such a conflict was hardly surprising and only heightened my desire to make a pilgrimage to such a place.

Human beings have always sought out high places to pray, to gain another perspective, to recalibrate and reconsider their habitual approach in a clearer light. The journey to the summit becomes a means of focusing breath and attention, purifying intention and gradually harmonizing the powers of heaven and earth in a singular quest. From the intial planning and preparation to full execution, pilgrimage is an opportunity to take account of the present, to magnify a simple spirit of gratitude and generosity, to make pure offerings and strengthen the bond between the timeless, ineffable reality beyond change and this impermanent world of fleeting appearances. By such efforts, the adept consecrate all forms and aspects of everyday activity to the point where awareness manifests inseparable from real compassion. Conscious regard of persons and situations is accompanied by a shower of blessings, as the heart becomes fully engaged, blissful in its central place as a spontaneous conduit for essential humor and liberating truth, two primary elements in the great conversation.

There is a natural exchange involved in such journeys. One may be inspired or energized and takes home something of the place in the form of relics like memories, photos, perhaps a little rock or feather, but at the same time, the interaction is not complete unless one gives something of themselves, at the least a respectful motive has fueled the effort to arrive but it is not uncommon to actually leave something of value or possibly make new resolutions and commitments. Expressions of heartfelt devotion recharge the place with the power of sincere prayer and transcendent awareness. I wanted to contribute my mite in the spirit of protecting and honoring a sacred view of these mountains and the rest of the natural world, quite obviously including ourselves. With the intention to benefit all beings by these efforts, I decided to ascend the four peaks of Dinetah in the southwestern United States.

Alley Pond

2006-01-17T17:06:00.000-08:00

In the process of sleuthing through old maps and verbal descriptions of the area, I realized that although I was raised less than a block from Alley Pond Park, I had no idea where the actual pond is located. The 'Alley' originally referred to the steep ravines encountered on the northern and eastern slopes of Rocky Hill, a broad mound of glacial debris which formed the island, deposited about 22,000 years ago. Rocky Hill occupies the area currently bordered by Hillside Avenue to the south, Winchester Blvd. to the east, Horace Harding (& the LIE) to the north and the Clearview Expressway to the west. The kettle hole topography found on the northeastern quadrant of the hill would eventually become known as Alley Pond Park.

Apparently, the original catch of water and namesake was not that stagnant and polluted body occupying a kettle hole next to Grand Central Parkway in the upper park. Far from the old tires and empty bleach jugs, off the mound to the north, not far from the junction of Horace Harding, Winchester and Douglaston Parkway, is a low lying area with a little pond which has always been hidden from the road behind thick blue-green reeds and cattails so that you can't even see even the water. McCormack and I fought our way in one afternoon, just to take a peek. That little swampy spot is what is left of Alley Pond.

From here, all three roads lead uphill; west through Bayside, south to 'Little Plains' (Queens Village) and northeast to Little Neck. Alley Road (Winchester) climbed out of the ravine to the south before descending the southern slope of the terminal moraine along the western border of the Creed Farm until it merged with Springfield Blvd. Horace Harding, once called West Alley Road climbs the hill to the west. Originally a man-made mill pond central to a small settlement with a general store and post office which served the nearby community for almost a century, the pond lay at the junction of two ravines in a meadow opening at the extreme northern end of the park. Today those narrow valleys serve as roadbeds for the Long Island Expressway and Cross Island Parkway.

The first settler in the area was Thomas Foster who obtained a grant of 600 acres from the English King in 1637. Foster built a stone house by the pond with one window to defend against possible Indian attacks. His family remained in the area for seven generations. From here, Alley Creek still flows north into Little Neck Bay. The location provides easy access to pasture, springs, saltwater marshes and the bay. Oysters and other shellfish supplied plenty of food and the shells were profitably worked into beads and woven into wampum belts, highly value by natives throughout the region. The interaction of tides, marshes and freshwater springs supported a wide variety of marine species and waterfowl. The abundance of birds and sealife in the area is what originally attracted the Mattinecock Indians to settle here. The Algonquian word Sewanhacky -- which roughly translates as 'Place of Shells' -- appears in Dutch records of land purchases in western Long Island.

One of thirteen Algonquin speaking tribes living on the island when white settlers arrived, the Mattinecocks were decimated by small pox which swept across the island in the 1630's as the Dutch began negotiating for Brooklyn while the English worked the east end. A Dutch account written in 1650 estimates that two thirds of the Algonquin people living on Long Island had died from the epidemic. Some of the settlers saw the Hand of Providence in all this. Daniel Denton, attempting to encourage English settlement, authored a pamphlet entitled A Brief Description of New York (1670) wherein he states "it hath been generally observed that where the English come to settle, a Divine Hand makes way for them, by removing or cutting off the Indians either by Wars one with the other, or by some raging mortal Disease.

In 1764, a concerned member of the tribe dictated a plea to the Lieutenant Governor of New York stating that his people were gradually wasting away and that they are exposed to, and suffer great Inconveniences from the Contempt shewn to the Indian Tribes by their English Neighbors. Even as small, marginal communities, the settlers tried to prevent the Indians from gathering firewood and they continually incroach upon their occupations, by fencing more and more of the Indian's Lands, under Pretence of Sales made by their Ancestors. That your petitioner and his Associates are in Danger of being crowded out of all their ancient Inheritance, and of being rendered Vagabonds upon the Face of the Earth . . .

In 1789, the Flushing Courthouse burnt down, destroying all records of transactions or land claims with the tribe. Northern Boulevard cuts through an old Mattinecock graveyard and the Zion Cemetery in Douglaston contains a monument which reads Here lie the last of the Matinecoc.

To make their way to Flushing, residents of Little Neck had to descend Douglaston Parkway, travel south of Alley Pond and then climb a steep hill to the west to travel along West Alley Road. There is a historical sign on this hill commemorating a visit by Washington in April of 1790. He wanted to check out the suitablity of agriculture in Queens and toured in a fancy, off-white coach, drawn by four large gray horses.

Good agricultural practices were a serious concern of Washington. He wrote to his own farm manager, "I shall begrudge no reasonable expence that will contribute to the improvement & neatness of my Farms, for nothing pleases me better than to see them in good order, and every thing trim, handsome, & thriving about them; nor nothing hurts me more than to find them otherwise." The General took time to eat well, stopping to visit with and thank people who had been part of the spy network on Long Island during the eight years of British occupation. The trip was low-key, and uneventful; the countryside, still largely unoccupied and quiet. Meadows and woodlands were gradually giving way to farms and pasture. Most people living on the island were either working directly in agriculture or fishing or in supportive industries such as blacksmithing and ship-building.

The first major commercial nursery in the country was founded by Robert Prince in Flushing in 1737. The president had visited here the previous spring with John Adams and wrote, "These gardens, except in the number of young fruit trees, did not answer my expectations. The shrubs were trifling and the flowers not numerous.'' Apparently, George was not impressed with the soils of Long Island either, which were poor and unproductive. Crop rotation was still a novelty and fertilizer use was just catching on.

In 1824 a blacksmith named Thomas Brush settled on the edge of the common pasture which would one day become Queens Village. The same year a road was completed across the marshes to the north (Northern Boulevard), directly linking Little Neck and Flushing and making the long detour around Alley Pond and the steep ascent up the north-eastern slope of Rocky Hill unnecessary. In 1826, the post office was moved to Flushing.

When the railroads came to the north shore of Long Island in the 1830's, the community around the pond became a backwater. In 1955 the pond was truncated to provide a solid footing for the $1.9 million dollar stone bridge supporting the Horace Harding roadway as it passed over the Cross Island Parkway.

Creedmoor

2006-01-17T04:03:00.000-08:00

My latest inquiries into the mysterious nexus of elemental and cultural forces comprising that little sector of the world where I was raised involved typing the words Winchester Boulevard into a search engine and then scanning for images. The first photo to get my attention appeared on a site about historical railroads on Long Island. The picture was shot across a swath of asphalt horizontally bisected by a double yellow highway line, the lens focusing on the butt end of a brick block of two-story apartments behind a small iron fence; nothing remarkable. I immediately recognized the place. Some developer had squeezed these units between the backyards of an unusually wide block west of Winchester Boulevard. This precise location was the halfway point between my family's house and the home of David Kershaw, a friend who lived on Springfield Boulevard.

When I first started taking psychedelics as an enthusiastic teen, after confirming a deal by phone, David and I would meet here, about a ten minute walk for both of us. Here in this suburban no-man's land, we would pause, share a few short words and make the exchange.

I read the caption above the large, color picture; LOOKING NORTH FROM WINCHESTER AVENUE, FORMERLY ALLEY ROAD.

Knowing that Winchester defines the eastern boundary of the park, I immediately associated the name Alley Road with Alley Pond. These apartments occupied the old right of way for the railroad bed. Further research revealed the existence of a mile long trestle landing a half mile from my house and ascending to the top of 'Rocky Hill', the local summit of the glacial moraine which runs the length of the island and at 206 feet, the second highest point in Queens. The old rails of a few spur lines embedded in the asphalt of some nearby streets were the only clue that trains had ever run through here, but I never had any idea of where they came from or went, what they carried or how long ago it was operable. Nobody ever talked about it.

The decade after the Civil War was a time of great investments in railroads. In 1872, the Long Island Central ran a line from Flushing to Floral Park with depots in Kissena, Frankiston (73rd Ave. in Bayside, formerly Black Stump Road), Hillside, Creedmoor and Floral Park. Agriculture and cattle dominated this part of Queens until after the second world war.

The Creedmoor property was obtained by the NRA in 1872 by a group of Union army veterans who felt their troops were poor marksmen and needed a place to practice. Flat, open land in eastern Queens which had originally belonged to the Creed family farm had been acquired by Central and North Side Railroad. One can get an idea of the extent of their holdings by the location of the Creed family farmhouse (1780) on Springfield (once Creed Road) and 93rd Avenue. The railroad owners felt that the range on the rural outskirts of the city would stimulate business for their trains and sold the NRA a 70 acre parcel. An NRA officer commented that the grassy open plain was akin to the Scottish moors and the resultant name stuck. This acquisition marked the beginning of the National Rifle Association (NRA). General Ambrose Burnside of Fredricksburg infamy, served as the group's first president. At first, the range was exclusively used by the NY National Guard and trains full of reservists would arrive each summer to practice. Tournaments were held and a dramatic American victory over an Irish team in 1874 drew international attention.

Two hotels operated between the range and the Creedmore Depot. On the corner of Range Road, proprietor John Klein built the two-story Creedmoor Range Hotel in 1877, which promised 'refreshments of all kinds, ales, wines, liquors and cigars, kept constantly on hand.' Captain Klein was killed in the summer of1879 after being thrown from a carriage. Mrs. Klein continued to run the business for nearly three more decades.

Accomodations were also available on the range at the Creedmore Clubhouse and Pavilion. One of the 'prominent features' advertised was the 'handsomely furnished Ladies Parlour and Retiring Room, with proper attendance' which probably meant there was a black woman to help you dry your hands. Women were also granted exclusive access to the 'extensive Piazza running the whole length of the building' which offered an unobstructed view of the shooting range. Men dressed in formal attire could be observed firing at targets from 200 to 1000 yards away. Creedmoor was billed as a 'delightful and attractive resort to everybody taking an interest in the National Sport of Rifle Shooting.' Now that the war was over, gun manufacturers wanted to to find new avenues for sales. Remington Arms manufactured a Creedmoor black powder rifle.

*****
The gun was a beautiful weapon, known as the long range "Creedmoor." It was a Remington, highly finished, and cost $125. It had a front sight, known as the wind-gauge, with the spirit-level, and with the vernier sight on the stock, which is raised from its flat position when the hunter wishes to shoot a long distance, and is graduated up to a thousand yards, carrying a 44 cartridge.

"That isn't of much account in this part of the world," said Sam Harper, passing the weapon back; "it's light enough, for I don't suppose it weighs more than six or seven pounds."

"It's just the thing for these woods," said Herbert, in his important manner, "for I calculate to bring down game a half mile away, if I happen to see it."

-Edward Ellis, Through Forest and Fire:
Wild-Woods Series No. 1 (1891)

Winchester, Springfield and many nearby streets are named after weapons and martial themes; Musket, Pistol, Saber, Range, Gettysburg, and Lyman (black powder guns). Some say Annie Oakley 'got her gun' here (although I have not come across anything more definitive about that). Still, the management was aware that not everyone in the weekend crowds arriving from the city was into spending the day amidst the smell of gunpowder. They made sure to provide 'croquet, archery, lawn tennis and other outdoor sports' for the ladies. And plenty of liquor to be sure.

Construction of the rail line from Flushing was rapid, the only difficulty being the descent off the glacial moraine, as primitive steam-shovels were employed to move tons of earth and a mile-long trestle was built on the southern slope of Rocky Hill, near the point where the Grand Central Parkway overpass presently crosses Springfield Boulevard (formerly Rocky Hill Road).

This portion of the Central Line ran for less than seven years. By 1879, new routes established by competitiors put an end to rail business between Flushing and Creedmoor. The Central Line was financed by two rich immigrants. A.P. Stewart came to America from Ireland and fathered the modern department store, pioneered mail-order and founded the town of Garden City. To provide rail service from his community on Long Island to Manhattan he invested in a line which became known as The Stewart Road (map c.1905). Long Island rubber tycoon Conrad Poppenhusen, a German immigrant already in the New York railroad business, was also involved and oversaw the operation after Stewart's death. Stewart died in 1876, the third richest man in America behind Vanderbilt and Astor. Poppenhusen, a name virtually unkown outside of College Point, went bankrupt in 1878 and never recovered his losses.

Public interest in marksmanship was waning and by 1890 the NRA became dormant. The shooting and tournaments continued until technical improvements provided longer range bullets, and complaints about drunk guardsmen and stray shots from surrounding residents led to the closing of the rifle range in 1910. In 1912, the land became a 'farm colony' for 32 patients from Brooklyn Psychiatric Hospital. The idea, prior to the current emphasis on pharmaceuticals, was to get people out into more natural environments involving manual labor to facilitate better healing and emotional integration. Before WW2, there were over seventy buildings on the grounds and the institution became known as Creedmoor Psychiatric Center.

When I was growing up, the name Creedmoor evoked the archetype of an underfunded, inhumane mental institution, a place of social isolation and unspeakable horrors. We always referred to it as the nut house. The window in my childhood bedroom faced east, the eye being drawn across the relative confinement of backyards toward the space between brick houses, across the pot-holes of Winchester Boulevard, beyond the iron and evergreen barrier no more than a hundred yards away, where a large American flag still flies on the grounds of Creedmoor. My brother and a few uncles were employed as janitors there at various times. A troubled teen named Lou Reed got electro-shock treatments here in 1959. On the upside, a little publicized program undertaken in the early sixties, provided daily doses of acid and psilocybin to boys in the children's units for months at a stretch. According to the report, nearly all of the children, many of them severely autistic and schizophrenic, "responded, became more straightforward, and here".

American folk-hero Wood Guthrie passed away here the day after I turned 12. Pete Seeger wrote, About eight months before he died in 1967, I visited him once more, this time with Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee. Woody was in a wheelchair. He couldn't walk anymore, so the hospital attendant wheeled him out onto a porch where it was warm. Sonny, Brownie and I played some music for Woody. We did "Rock Island Line", with Sonny blowing his harp, sending beautiful notes into the air. Woody must have liked what he heard because you could see how much he wanted to be part of our little group. He tried to get his arms going, but they were just flailing around like a windmill. It got to the point where it looked as though he might hurt himself, so the attendant said, "You better quit playing that loud tune" and we played some quiet blues instead.

In the words of a former inmate, "Creedmoor Hospital was the most picturesque and traditionally gothic of the psych institutions in which I ever slept. Some of the more modern ones were worse in terms of their determination to establish complete control over the inmates, but for sheer creepiness, Creedmoor stands by itself."

The old railroad bed between Flushing and Creedmoor is still traceable through the Kissena Corridor, a green strip obvious on any good map, crossing the Long Island Expressway southwest of St. Francis Prep (formerly Bishop Reilly High) School and disappearing into the woods on the east side of Francis Lewis Blvd., before reappearing as a dirt track in the woods northeast of the junction of Clearview Expressway (formerly Queens Road) and 73rd Ave (formerly Black Stump Road).

I originally came across this old right of way while exploring the woods northeast of the junction of 73rd and the Clearview with cousin Daryl, (who would also eventually get electro-shocked in Creedmoor) back in '67 when we were barely 12. Always on the lookout for the hidden doorway, we had wandered into the woods and soon came across the old right of way. Eager to see where it led, the road was sandy and hard to ride so we decided to drop our bikes and sit down to talk for a minute. Things being what they are in this world, a man had followed us in and while standing about twenty yards away, exposed himself and commented on the process, "Excuse me," in what was probably a fake-British accent, "I just want to show you something. This will only take a minute..." as he briefly explained the process and brought himself to climax in about thirty seconds. He thanked us for watching, pulled up his pants and disappeared. Daryl and I, still pre-pubescent, had never seen anything like this. We laughed and shook our heads. What a world! We were quickly learning to beware.

The sandy bed rolled across the northern end of Cunningham Park, through the projects before sliding under a bridge on the Old Motor Parkway just west of Bell Boulevard. The right of way followed Stewart Road between the Roman Catholic church property and the public school where we used to hold our year-end recitals. Our church-school was just a few minutes further up the hill. Mr. Pittlekow was the principal at Redeemer, and lived in those projects. A few weeks before the above incident, I was standing upon the base of a lampost in the vicinity of 73rd and Clearview, hanging and rotating around the aluminum shaft by one arm when I saw the Pittlekows drive by in their robin's egg-blue Ford Galaxy. Old eagle-eyes saw me and and called my folks to let them know how far I was from home. We were on the northwest edge of our range, although not really that far from Daryl's house. The bike path on the Old Motor Parkway ended nearby, providing easy access and the combination of a chaotic construction scene around the expressway and the lure of nearby woods which converged here was irresistible. Pittlekow was at least six foot nine with shocking white hair, huge, shiney black shoes, and usually favored baggy, ash-gray suits with cuffs on the pants. We were all terrified of this man. He had a piercing visage and what I would eventually come to recognize as a Calvinist temperament. While Mister made everyone uneasy, big-breasted Mrs. Pittlekow was all love and hugs. She wore those thick matron heels, ate cottage cheese and peaches with tea for lunch and taught first and second grade for years. Mr. Pittlekow taught seventh and eighth. I felt lucky that he had died the summer before I was to be in his class.

Rails crossed Hillside Avenue a block east of Braddock Avenue and followed street patterns across Winchester Boulevard behind P.S.18, where I attended kindergarten. A spur line crossed Hillside between the school and the little league ballfields, leading on through the green iron gates of Creedmoor to deliver coal to a small power plant built there after WWI. Even as a child I knew about the rusty tracks running behind the playground but never have seen a train rolling on them. There were some large concrete silos in the same neighborhood which used to hold coal once supplied by freight trains. Along the edge of these tracks, near the abandoned silos, I touched pieces of coal for the first time. Service on this end of the line was virtually non-existent in the sixties and permanently discontinued by winter solstice of 1966.

After crossing Union Turnpike, the block plans around Redeemer Lutheran continue to conform to the gradient of the old railroad bed as it nears the summit of what was once called Rocky Hill Road, with streets running diagonal to the surrounding grid before descending (i imagine) upon a formidable structure of braced posts, a style perfected by Union army engineers during the Civil War. I had always wondered why the section of Hillside Avenue between Martin Van Buren Highschool and Springfield Boulevard was so wide. On the south side of the road, they built the first supermarkets in the neighborhood. To the north, the slope is filled with two story apartments we called 'Little Israel'. Between the two sides of the road lay a stark asphalt median big enough to contain a few football fields, an unexplained open space which was always empty except for broken glass and bottlecaps. Now that I can picture a monstrous trestle and numerous side rails occupying that space, a mere century before I lived there, I wonder why no one ever told me and roused my curiosity about local development and changes in infrastructure. More than likely of course, it is because, outside of a few history teachers or railroad buffs, no one living was aware of it.