Potala Blog
Musings on the Arising, Abiding, Changing, and Subsiding
February 2010 What Broke? Two dishes have broken in our house this month. Two whole dinner plates on two different occasions...one his, one mine (scores a Draw, if you like to keep score).
Since our wedding, thirteen-odd years ago, we try to not stand on a lot of ceremony around here. And thank goodness for that--marriage is a lot more survivable without a bunch of rituals and regulations!
Three weeks ago my husband, Steve, dropped Dish #1 while clearing the dish washer. This is His Job, although it is seldom actually performed by the Assigned Party. (And now you get a small taste of how much even a small Ritual or Ceremony can actually kill the Vibe...no point to regale you with the details of how frequently we fuss about this chore.) Safe to conclude I do fill-and-activate the dish washer when it eventually has been emptied.
Back to Dish #1.
As will happen to us all, Gravity got the best of Esteban that evening, and down she went. He described the event in a way that seemed to me as typical for anyone who wants very badly to turn-back-time and get a do-over: Slow Motion, Single Frame Vision. He reported that even the thoughts in his head sounded eerie and drawn-out, "Nnnoooooo! Ssssst-oooooooop!" Apparently the entire descent lasted several minutes...a kind of Plate-breaking Chinese Hell, if you will.
Needless to say, because he could not actually make the plate go slow and his arm go fast all at the same time, poor Dish #1 was a total loss.
Last week (dish washer filling #2 following breakage #1, just in case you are following the score board), while selecting dishes to load for washing, Dish #2 (and I might add, a shatter-resistant brand of plate!) slipped down off the counter top edge-first and shattered into a minimum of a million tiny toothy bits.
I told Steve when he came home why he should take any sharp sensations in the soles of his feet seriously, and he asked me very enthusiastically, "Did it go in Slow Motion?!?"
"No," I said, "it fell Regular Speed."
(Riveting exchange, right? Try having conversations with the same person every day for thirteen-plus years and get back to me!)
Although I was fully aware that it was Possible--there is always a non-zero probability, you know--for me to make the plate go slow and my arm go fast, I was more in the mood to say "Yes" to the most likely outcome (which turned out to be white slivers of formerly impact-resistant glass all over the floor, and not a small amount of swearing while sweeping and blotting them out of the tile grout).
So I watched Dish #2 fall at Regular Speed and strike just beside my bare foot and end its temporary existence in a hail of pretty white glass splinters. If I had made it go Slow, it probably would have looked like a movie scene.
And it occurred to me that if someone cared to market Zen along gender lines, women would flock to Meditation Centers in droves...females being more likely to say "Yes" to what is happening Right Now than males, who prefer to reach into the universe and change things that make them feel uncomfortable or insufficient. Really, who can blame a guy for taking this type of situation personally, "How can it be that I can't simply pick up a dinner plate and put it in the cabinet???"
Men may be harder on themselves under these kinds of circumstances than women are.
Our "conversation" about this subject did reveal a lot, if you read between the lines. There is a good deal of compassion in taking an interest in the details of a friend's disaster, and a good deal of transparency in admitting defeat. And Steve and I DO have quite a number of ritualized expectations and interactions that might bear scrutiny.
May all beings be free from
suffering and the causes of suffering...
May all beings be free from
disease and the causes of disease...
May all beings be free from
hunger and the causes of hunger...
May all beings be free from violence and the causes of violence...
May all beings be free from fear and the causes of fear...
May all beings be free from worry and the causes of worry...
May all beings be free from sadness and the causes of sadness...
May all beings be free from negative thinking
and the causes of negative thinking...
May all beings be free from pride and the causes of pride...
May all beings be free from anger and the causes of anger...
May all beings be free from jealousy and the causes of jealousy...
May all beings be free from ignorance and the causes of ignorance...
May all beings have positive thinking and the causes of positive thinking...
May all beings have happiness and the causes of happiness.
I rest in Vast Awakening...
May all beings have peace and the causes of peace...
May all beings have joy and the causes of joy...
May all beings have faith and the causes of faith...
May all beings have merit and the causes of merit.
I realize Vast Awakening...
May all beings realize compassion and the causes of compassion...
May all beings realize loving kindness and the causes of loving kindness...
May all beings realize awareness and the causes of awareness...
May all beings realize wisdom and the causes of wisdom...
May all beings realize the nature of mind.
I dissolve in Vast Awakening...
May all beings swiftly attain the Enlightenment of the Buddha!
...AH AH AH AH AH (Rest in the emptiness of great equanimity—absolute truth.)
May I accomplish the virtuous path of accumulation.
May I accomplish the virtuous path of application.
May I accomplish the enlightened path of realization.
May I accomplish the enlightened path of meditation.
May I attain the enlightened path of accomplishment.
-traditional Buddhist prayer
"This Constitution is said to have beautiful features; but when I come to examine these features, sir, they appear to me horribly frightful. Among other deformities, it has an awful squinting; it squints toward monarchy, and does not this raise indignation in the breast of every true American? Your president may easily become king. Your Senate is so imperfectly constructed that your dearest rights may be sacrificed to what may be a small minority; and a very small minority may continue for ever unchangeably this government, altho horridly defective. Where are your checks in this government? Your strongholds will be in the hands of your enemies. It is on a supposition that your American governors shall be honest that all the good qualities of this government are founded; but its defective and imperfect construction puts it in their power to perpetrate the worst of mischiefs should they be bad men; and, sir, would not all the world, blame our distracted folly in resting our rights upon the contingency of our rulers being good or bad? Show me that age and country where the rights and liberties of the people were placed on the sole chance of their rulers being good men without a consequent loss of liberty! I say that the loss of that dearest privilege has ever followed, with absolute certainty, every such mad attempt.
If your American chief be a man of ambition and abilities, how easy is it for him to render himself absolute! The army is in his hands, and if he be a man of address, it will be attached to him, and it will be the subject of long meditation with him to seize the first auspicious moment to accomplish his design, and, sir, will the American spirit solely relieve you when this happens? I would rather infinitely--and I am sure most of this Convention are of the same opinion--have a king, lords, and commons, than a government so replete with such insupportable evils. If we make a king we may prescribe the rules by which he shall rule his people, and interpose such checks as shall prevent him from infringing them; but the president, in the field, at the head of his army, can prescribe the terms on which he shall reign master, so far that it will puzzle any American ever to get his neck from under the galling yoke. I can not with patience think of this idea. If ever he violate the laws, one of two things will happen: he will come at the head of the army to carry everything before him, or he will give bail, or do what Mr. Chief Justice will order him. If he be guilty, will not the recollection of his crimes teach him to make one bold push for the American throne? Will not the immense difference between being master of everything and being ignominiously tried and punished powerfully excite him to make this bold push? But, sir, where is the existing force to punish him? Can he not, at the head of his army, beat down every opposition? Away with your president! we shall have a king: the army will salute him monarch; your militia will leave you, and assist in making him king, and fight against you: and what have you to oppose this force? What will then become of you and your rights? Will not absolute despotism ensue?"
-Patrick Henry, June 5, 1788 at the Virginia Convention to ratify the Constitution, as found in The World's Famous Orations, ed. by William Jennings Bryan and Francis W. Halsey (1906-Funk and Wagnalls)
Moving Day
I'm packed in a box.
But someone forgot
to write "kitchen"
on the side; or
"bathroom", "garage",
or whatever.
Death stands down
by the gate.
Baby snakes lie dead
in mid-slither on the
drought-browned grass.
Born yesterday
into this world, and
today into the next.
But I'm still waiting
for my ride.
from Intimate Love Poems
by S. West, © 2004
Big Nose Books
may not be used without permission
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"Ultimately, America’s answer to the intolerant man is diversity, the very diversity which our heritage of religious freedom has inspired."
--Robert F. Kennedy
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
--Preamble to the Constitution of the United States of America
The Human Rights Commission must
1. promote respect for human rights and a culture of human rights;
2. promote the protection, development and attainment of human rights; and
3. monitor and assess the observance of human rights in the Republic.
The Human Rights Commission has the powers, as regulated by national legislation, necessary to perform its functions, including the power-
1. to investigate and to report on the observance of human rights;
2. to take steps to secure appropriate redress where human rights have been violated;
3. to carry out research; and
4. to educate.
Each year, the Human Rights Commission must require relevant organs of state to provide the Commission with information on the measures that they have taken towards the realization of the rights in the Bill of Rights concerning housing, health care, food, water, social security, education and the environment...
The primary objects of the Commission for the Promotion and Protection of the Rights of Cultural, Religious and Linguistic Communities are-
1. to promote respect for the rights of cultural, religious and linguistic communities;
2. to promote and develop peace, friendship, humanity, tolerance and national unity among cultural, religious and linguistic communities, on the basis of equality, non-discrimination and free association; and
3. to recommend the establishment or recognition, in accordance with national legislation, of a cultural or other council or councils for a community or communities in South Africa.
The Commission has the power, as regulated by national legislation, necessary to achieve its primary objects, including the power to monitor, investigate, research, educate, lobby, advise and report on issues concerning the rights of cultural, religious and linguistic communities.
The Commission may report any matter which falls within its powers and functions to the Human Rights Commission for investigation...
1. The number of members of the Commission for the Promotion and Protection of the Rights of Cultural, Religious and Linguistic Communities and their appointment and terms of office must be prescribed by national legislation.
2. The composition of the Commission must- 1. be broadly representative of the main cultural, religious and linguistic communities in South Africa; and
2. broadly reflect the gender composition of South Africa...
The Human Rights Commission has the additional powers and functions prescribed by national legislation.
1. The Commission for Gender Equality must promote respect for gender equality and the protection, development and attainment of gender equality.
2. The Commission for Gender Equality has the power, as regulated by national legislation, necessary to perform its functions, including the power to monitor, investigate, research, educate, lobby, advise and report on issues concerning gender equality.
3. The Commission for Gender Equality has the additional powers and functions prescribed by national legislation.
--Constitution of the Republic of South Africa (ss 184-187)
Quickly, Before It Rains
Smile for me and turn
that pretty color--sweet!--
like a new flower opening
and showing off her love.
Smile to me and shine
a moment longer--stay
where I can see you blush,
still shaded with desire.
Now this mist that falls
around us clouds your eyes,
drops a tear upon your paling
cheek, and makes me want to weep.
WIP
by S. West, © 2010
Big Nose Books
may not be used without permission
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