Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

In order to observe right speech I avoided the debate last night like the plague.  My husband watched, but I told him I did not wish to hear about it.  Why put that nonsense in my head?  I know it's not a pristine head, and is filled with trivia and bad speech I've heard or read, but at least I have control over this.  Instead, this morning in the paper I read about a woman with three horses who risked her life to walk to the barn and save them and stay with them until the fire had passed by.  I read another article about an organization that is bringing supplies for animals to one of the fires where the animals are sheltered, so that they have enough food and water and first aid supplies.

There is news out there that is uplifting.  In the same paper today someone wrote about a Cooper's Hawk that landed in their back yard and hung out a while.  The animal expert said it probably was attracted by thirst and was a bit afraid of their fountain.  This story brings compassion and attention to detail about the ramifications of the drought, as the other articles do about the effects of the fires.

And in each case there is something we can do, an action we can take to help the animals.  We can write a check or put out water in our yards for wild animals. 

And while we feel for the animals affected by these events, we can also truly help.  Now with the Republican Party, not so much.

Wandering Along the Path; Right Speech

I went to the post office this morning to mail wedding photos I'd printed out.  Better late than never and a picture is worth a thousand words, I hope.  I had a chat with the guy who mans the counter.  This is a young man who is friendly, even chatty, and super efficient at what he does.  He gets you another box if he can save you money, has advice that gets the package there quickly, and also remembers people.  Today he was talking about a new manager and how he's trying to remind the manager that if they have new procedures they need certain supplies.  He's covering his you-know-what by sending several copies of each memo to different people.  So there is pressure, and yet he's real.  Not false friendly but genuine and without sacrificing speed and efficiency while engaging with customers.

He's a Buddha in my world.  I look forward to talking to him, hearing his tips on saving money, and his take on stamps I select.  He likes the Elvis ones too.  Right speech is here all around us, if we take the time to really listen.  It's not in a zendo or church, it's out in the world where people attempt to do their work with a sense of service to others.  So look around you and learn.  Then you'll find your dharma.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

There seems to be a kind of freer speech floating around in films right now on the subject of grandparents.  First I saw "Grandma", which has not a cosy, loveable grandma, but Lily Tomlin as a nasty, wisecracking, break all the rules grandma.  Her life has been a minefield, and she has hurt a lot of people blasting her way to her own personal drummer.  And yesterday, we saw "The Visit", where Shymalayan turns every cliche about grandparents up-side-down and brings us the grandparents from hell.  With references to Little Red Riding Hood and Hansel and Gretel, he reminds us that crones are terrifying, especially to children.  The act of a mother entrusting her children to her parents becomes child abuse.  The director/writer has a lot of fun with the horrors of age as seen through a child's eyes:  crepey skin, incontinence, odd behaviors and the mysteries of old people.  I was not offended.  I remembered clearly how I felt when I was a child around my grandparents.  I loved them, but their skin, their breath, their funny ancient ways! 

For the first time, I thought about how being handed over by your parents to your grandparents for a visit can seem terrifying, and this is just when the grandparents adore you and want you to feel safe and loved.  Their house, their rules.  Too early bedtime perhaps, no nightlight because you are a big girl now, hating the food they put on your plate, wanting to watch TV.  It's disorienting, and your parents are where? 

As a grandparent, I welcome the breakage of the myth of cuddly grandparents.  There are as many types of grandparents as parents, and we welcome being fully humanized.  It's a lot of pressure baking cakes and wearing an apron and humming while you knit.  Sometimes we'd rather be dancing to rock and roll with our grandkids, and screaming on scary rides at the boardwalk. 

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

When I went to hear a Buddhist Abbott two days ago, I thumbed through the index to his book, to see if my teacher in the same Soto Zen tradition was listed.  She studied at the same time as he did, with the same teacher and she also graduated from the same University.  They must have known each other pretty well.  Yet her name was not there.  It felt to me like a kind of erasure.  She was a woman in a man's spiritual world, and she broke off and had her own zendo nearby.  She keeps getting written out of the history of the surge of meditation practice in my area.  Her stories and experience are amazing.  But she didn't have the luck to have a student who wanted to be her assistant, and compile her talks into a book, as so many other teachers have had. 

At one time, I considered helping her, and offered, but she wasn't willing or ready, and then she moved three hours driving away, and I decided not to take on that challenge of distance and time compounded.  I thought and still think she has so much to say about right speech, but instead of guiding her through a manuscript I'm writing this blog.  Why?  She has slipped cognitively and is unable to organize her thoughts or papers.  I could do a biography of her, but again, it would be time consuming and difficult, though her long term memory is in pretty good shape.  The short term memory, however, is agonized.  It feels like it's much too late to get accurate information from her, and therefore, I'd have to rely entirely on interviews with colleagues and friends.  Lots of time and travel.  And I'm no spring chicken myself.  I'm ten years younger.

So regret arose when I went to the reading, and sadness for my teacher.  Perhaps she will have the recognition she deserves, but I won't be a part of it, other than speaking of her to friends.  I'll always be grateful for her teachings, and pray for her now that she suffers from confusion and debilitation, but I've given up the idea of rescuing her place in the history of Buddhism in the west.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

My husband and I saw the film "A Walk in the Woods" today, and it reminded me of how much a walk with a friend can open up conversation.  The physical exercise, as with walking meditation, can loosen the body enough to relax the communication process.  There is time for digression and confession and inconsequential give and take.  The defenses tend to come down and spontennaity goes up.  There is also the pause/silence thing, because of heavy breathing or slugs of water or needing to stop with your hands on your hips.  And how much less often I walk with friends nowadays, though I did walk with my friend last Friday morning, and it was fun and comforting and meaningful to me, as it is every time we walk.  I take the dogs, so there is lots of stopping for pooping and peeing, sniffing other dogs, dog talk with owners, and the like.  Although her dog is dead, she has the dog lover's tolerance for all this rigamarole. 

What a simple gift walking is, and how we do take it for granted, until we get sick, or break a foot, or the weather prohibits it.  All the great joys are that simple:  a hug, the beauty of a flower, a child's laughter, splashing in puddles.  I came out of the movie theater resolved to walk more, and with my brand new walking sticks from REI!!

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Yesterday a friend seemed dazed and confused, and this morning my husband was in a similar condition.  We're of an age when these signs must be noticed and watched.  I told my friend I was concerned, and yes, she did seem more confused than I'd seen before.  This was after discussing her husband's behavior that was worrying her.  Today it's my own husband.  We are all nervous about cognitive impairment.  And we are each advocates for each other if we tell the truth when we have concerns.  This is hard speech, because we're not doctors and can only say what we feel.  Expressing our concern is as far as we can go.  Then a doctor's visit is warranted.

But our elders are mostly dead, and it's up to us to monitor each other silently at first, gently and with questions not diagnoses.  I hope my friends do the same for me.  Because perspective requires multiple takes on behavior, and quite a bit of courage to speak when changes occur.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I believe this is the day a year ago that my brother killed himself.  His body was not found until October 28, but it was badly decomposed, and the last check he wrote was September 11.  He suffered from paranoia and I'm guessing the anniversary of 9/11 played into his disturbed mind.  I have wondered and stayed up nights trying to figure out what his suicide note revealed.  I have waited for answers.  And now I'm at piece with the mystery of his mind, his life and his death.  HIS.  Not mine to dissect.  I have no right to KNOW.  I will live with uncertainty, as I do daily and hourly anyway.  Mostly I'm comfortable with it, sometimes I'm anxious and desperate.

Now there is only missing his being on this beautiful planet.  His ashes are in my guest bedroom (little irony there).  I will scatter them soon in the woods, where he had his happiest times as a child.  I am in a strange position, since I am the only one grieving him.  My sadness is solitary.  But my love is steadfast.  I loved him as my companion in childhood, I loved him when his suffering caused us great pain, I loved him when he sobered up, I loved him whenever he chose to see us, I loved him through the last thirteen years of his life, when he wouldn't see or speak to me.  There is no diminishment of the love now.  He is lodged permanently in my heart.  And how he died or lived is not connected to that love in any way.   The love just is.