Always going, going, going on beyond

Do re mi fa so la ti

2016-12-20T20:44:00.003-07:00

I had a singing lesson tonight. To match notes seems like a noble goal. To sing Silent Night once a year seems worthy. To feel my voice freely leaving my throat without a care of where it lands seems like something I can do.

But can a perfectionist learn to sing? That will be my real challenge. The lesson was via an online video service called Zoom. Just like being there except he can't hear me when he is singing and I can't hear him when I'm caterwauling. Kind of like a video CB conversation. Over. This is what it sounded like when I played back a recording of the lesson. My teacher would sing a 4 note scale and I would try to match it.

"Oooo, that last note wasn't good," I said.

"Actually, the last note was the only one that was good," he replied.

Oh. Shit.

He's got his work cut out for him.

Here's a video. It clearly illustrates the distance between my goals and my current status.

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Heart to heart

2015-06-13T09:10:00.000-06:00

A client with cancer gave me a 1952 penny today. Rita Dove, an American poet, was born in 1952. This is one of her poems.

---

Heart To Heart

It's neither red
nor sweet.
It doesn't melt
or turn over,
break or harden,
so it can't feel
pain,
yearning,
regret.

It doesn't have
a tip to spin on,
it isn't even
shapely—
just a thick clutch
of muscle,
lopsided,
mute. Still,
I feel it inside
its cage sounding
a dull tattoo:
I want, I want—
but I can't open it:
there's no key.
I can't wear it
on my sleeve,
or tell you from
the bottom of it
how I feel. Here,
it's all yours, now—
but you'll have
to take me,
too.

by Rita Dove

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"Tension is an indispensible prerequisite of mental health"

2015-06-02T16:36:00.003-06:00

Looking for the tree of knowledge.

Hello. Anybody out there? I've been travelling through space and time on a large ellipse that took me away, but now brings me back within communication range. It may not be for long.

---

"What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for a worthwhile goal, a freely chosen task."

"... rather than being a symptom of neurosis, suffering may well be a human achievement, especially if the suffering grows out of existential frustration."

Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning

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Disconnect (a very short play about suspicious country folk)

2013-07-19T18:44:00.004-06:00

I had a referral from a Viking doctor to see a 94 year-old Holden lady for a swallowing assessment. I called. Her son answered (he's in his 70's?). It went something like this:

Me: I have a referral to do a swallowing assessment with Mildred. Are you a relative?

Son: Yeah. I’m her son.

Me: The doctor asked me to do this assessment.

Son: Yeah?

Me: Is your mom there?

Son: Yeah.

Me: Can I speak to her?

[pause, I listened to him breathe in and out three times]

Son: MOM! PHONE!

Mildred: (old lady voice in the background) I’m on the toilet. I'm taking a craaaaaap!

[another pause, more breathing]

Me: So, can she come to the health unit for an appointment?

Son: It’s OK. She doesn’t need an appointment. CLICK.

[dial tone]

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The ultimate defence: love yourself

2013-07-14T14:32:00.001-06:00

After I filled up my motorcycle with gas yesterday, I took off my helmet and walked to the station to pay. A young woman in the car behind my motorcycle, waiting to fill, said, "hey, can you move your bike ahead so I can fill?"

I had my helmet off, I was closer to the gas station than my bike, and her tone was a little demanding, so I said no.

Her instant (anticipated?) response was, "fuck-you asshole!"

I felt my heart race. Fight or flight streaming from my animal brain. But I acted like I didn't hear her and went in to pay.

She followed me in and continued her salty comments about how it only would have taken a couple seconds to move my bike. She followed me in! Early 20's, bleached platinum hair with pink highlights, very girly in a princess pretty kind of way.

"Have a nice day," I replied after paying and second guessing my gas-getting routine. It was hard to concentrate. Did I get my card back? Did I write the mileage on the receipt? Was she going to try to punch me? Was I ready to let my karate training do the talking? Did she do anything to my precious Honda!?

I drove off without incident, and as soon as I hit the freeway I cranked her open. 130. 140. 150. Leaving everyone in my dust. Thinking about all the things I should have said, but didn't. And I felt pretty bad when I got home. Tense shoulders from holding my head up in the wind. Sore forearms from gripping the handlebar. I was pretending it didn't bother me, but it did. A stranger! Why should I give her an ounce of thought?

Criticism hurts. It doesn't matter who it comes from. Especially out of the blue. An art critique is a totally different thing. I'm a long way -- a long fucking way -- from having my heart so full of Wayne Dyer's love that I can suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune and still be a good person.

The sad thing is that I had just finished being thoroughly entertained and creatively inspired by the light-hearted and hilarious Midsummer Night's Dream at Hawlrelak Park and I didn't think a thought about how great it was until this morning when I woke up. Maybe I can get the feeling back later...

I agree it's OK to have flaws, especially other people, but I still feel like I should be better. The starting point to a lot of healing has to be this unconditional love for self, but I ain't there. Not even close. I can't even bear to meditate anymore. I wonder what it's like to accept one's self to the core? What does it feel like to go on from there? It seems remote and impossible to imagine these days.

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The sky is red

2013-06-12T19:40:00.000-06:00

Talked to my boys today about time. One asked, why does time seem to go so fast?

I responded with an age-appropriate lecture about relativity and how time only exists as our perception.

What about clocks?

A way to measure our perception.

What's perception?, the younger one asked.

It's what your senses tell your brain. The sky is blue. Dust makes you sneeze.

My older boy is starting to think big. He asked, What about the way the planets rotate and spin around the sun?

Well, that seems real, but is it time or movement?

Hmmm.

We didn't talk the rest of the way. I dropped them off, watched them open the big school doors, and I drove away.

And another day passed.

I don't remember the last time I posted. Time flies. Five years ago I had hours to sit in front of this screen and write. Hours and hours of belly-aching. Where did that time go? I just don't see it any more. Perception or reality?

What am I supposed to do with this blog? Shut the doors. Burn my bridges. Disappear into the buzzing and humming of the net?

Maybe it's a good thing I have nothing to talk about and I simply need to be quiet for a while. Am I starting to feel satisfied with this life? Maybe.

Maybe I'm tired of these contrived, time-delayed conversations. Perhaps it's time to talk to real people in real time. Tim Horton's. Walks along the river. Scotch at the kitchen table. Campfire evenings. Listening. No time to consider my response. Edit. Make it sound smart.

Or maybe I need to put that writing energy into something tangible. Like a book. About what, I haven't the faintest. The energy is there. I can feel it waiting. For what? Time? A topic? An audience?

That scarcity of time is real. Work. Children. Mowing the bloody lawn. Catching up on my favourite shows, collecting on the PVR. Time is short. Or. Is. It? Could I not change my perception from one of lack to one of abundance? I'm skeptical. I can say the sky is red, but will I believe it against all evidence? How does one perceive abundance? Maybe it is more of a belief than a perception. Fuzzy lines here.

Movement is change. Change is universal. Can I stop measuring tme like watching the grains of sand drain from the top of an hour glass? That is a hard belief to let go of. Frightening. What if I stopped believing there is an end to life? That time is abundant. Endless even. That my limited days in this life are not a race that I have to rush and fill with experience and achievement. Am I calling sky red or am I relieving myself of conditioning that holds me back. Maybe perception isn't all it's cracked up to be. Maybe the sky is red.

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What's a colonoscopy like?

2013-04-11T18:25:00.000-06:00

Just like an old car, a person gets to a certain age when things start to show signs of wear. Wrinkles, grey hair, those cold mornings when it's hard to bend over far enough to put your socks on.

Today I had a colonoscopy. My doctor suggested it because of my age (approaching 50) and because my old man has had colon issues in the past. I wondered what it was like, but the instructions from my doctor were strictly clinical (insert tab A into slot B). I didn't learn much from my friends and colleagues because it seems most people are reluctant to talk about anything going up the arse. Except nurses. Nurses love to talk about anything and everything that has to do with the body. Especially at lunch. I like nurses.

Here's what happened. Yesterday at 8:00 a.m. I had to stop eating solids. I was allowed clear fluids so I survived the day sipping apple juice and whisky*. I also had to take drugs to get my bowels moving so that the house would be clean when company arrived the next day. My doc prescribed 20 mg of Dulcolax in the a.m. and then 2 tablespoons of Milk of Magnesia per hour until the bottle was gone. By the end of the night, it felt like I was peeing acid out my butt as my innards cleared themselves of the food I had consumed the day before. Vaseline is your friend when this happens. Use it liberally after each bowel movement to soothe and protect that tender tissue from the constant stream of partially digested stomach acid. Burning ring of fire indeed.

Hunger. I've never really been hungry before. Not like this. And after a while it wasn't so bad. Not pleasant, but not so bad either. In fact, we should probably all go hungry once in a while just to appreciate the abundant world we live in. I'm so lucky to have been born at this time in history in this place on our planet. What must it be like to go hungry for more than a day? To grow up hungry? To die from starvation? I had a patient recently who suffered a stroke that shorted out her swallowing circuits and because she had stated before that she didn't want any kind of tube feeding, she was allowed to starve to death. It took her six weeks to die with nothing to sustain her except IV fluids and opiates.

I was only hungry for one day and once the initial headache passed I was fine. I hunckered down in my Lay-Zed Boy chair (that's what we call them in Canada) with books and a movie and by this morning (24 hours without solid food) I felt pretty good. I've come to the conclusion that one day fasting is not REAL hunger. Six weeks is real hunger. Watching your child die from malnutrition. That's real hunger. I need to think more about my hunger. I'm getting pretty soft around the middle. I could probably do with a lower calorie diet. And I could probably do something to help those who are truly hungry.

I showed up at the hospital at my appointed time, no line ups, gave the distracted lady my ID and healthcare number (I'm also fortunate to have been born in a country with universal health care), and within minutes I was kissing my wife goodbye and stripping down to my black socks and a drafty gown to wait for the procedure. I had about 90 minutes to drowse, consider my almost public nudity under that nearly transparent gown, and listen to the conversations around me. The fellow in the next booth was in for a broncoscopy because his doctor had seen something suspicious on his chest x-ray. I could hear the fear in his voice: breathy and hoarse from non-stop coughing and years of smoking and tentative in the way he answered the nurse's questions about past surgeries and medications as if he was carefully completing a test, the result of which might influence whether he would live or die.

I also listened to the nurses chatting amongst themselves about banal things. How we spoil our kids nowadays with overloaded Easter baskets. "I used to get one chocolate bunny every Easter. That was it. No money, no DVDs, no clothing, just a big hollow bunny. Kids today are spoiled rotten." Another nurse talked about how her 4-year old daughter insisted on having her beautiful curls straightened out every morning before school and would cry bloody murder if she didn't get her way.

Eventually my turn with the doctor came. My IV was already in place. It stung a little going in and then I forgot it was there. Diane was the first one to introduce herself and chat a little as she rolled me to the endoscopy suite. It was cold in that room. Full blast air conditioning, sterile instruments, and a doctor who asked just the basic questions and otherwise studied a computer screen. A resident worked the scope. I asked the nurse to put the monitor by my eyes so I could watch the procedure. She said, "sure, if you can stay awake." Then she shot me up with Fentanyl for pain (Demerol is too hard to get these days), Buscopan to relax any muscle spasms, and a third drug that I don't remember. It was probably a med for calming the mind. I felt a little high almost instantly, but not at all drowsy. So I watched the show.

My innards are complicated looked at from the inside: pinkish flesh, some pooling of brackish yellow fluid, lots of folds and ridges, and a smooth shininess. I didn't feel much discomfort at the back door as the scope was inserted, but I did feel some poking around in my guts as it shoved itself around corners. I didn't see what the scope looked like, but it had a camera, lights, and a little grabber that reached out to snip off samples of tissue for analysis. If I was to imagine what the device looked like using movie images, the scope would be like the snaky eyeball thing that came down into the cellar looking for Tom Cruise and his daughter in War of the Worlds, but smaller. And the grabber was kind of like the scary snapping mouth thing that jumps out of the dripping jaws of the aliens in Ridley Scott's movie, Alien. But smaller and much less viscious. I'd love to have a look at the device. It must be beautiful in it's reliable, functional design. A great machine indeed.

And that was it. The anonymous resident pulled the scope out, wiped it with a rag for the next patient**, and the kind nurse rolled me out to recover from the drugs. Slam, bam, thank you ma'am.

I didn't really feel drowsy or sick after. 30 minutes and I was walking out the door on the arm of my dear wife. The half-hour wait was kind of fun because the doctor came and told me that he only saw the one polyp that he snipped out and an area of suspicious inflammation that he also took a sample of. He said I would hear from him in a couple weeks with results from the tissue sample tests. It's fun to hear that you don't have anything REALLY wrong with you, but it's more fun to be told that you have to push the gas out before you can go home. That's right, the doctor told me to fart. So I did. At first I tried to be discreet and pushed out some little brown mosquitos, but then (perhaps it was the medications lowering my inhibitions) I started to let her rip. I finally finished with a long juicy one that woke up my neighbor who was much more sedated that I. "What the hell," were his first words on waking.

And that was it. My dear wife took me to my favourite Vietnamese restaurant where I savoured every bite and then bought me a coffee. It didn't take much food to fill me up and I slept most of the two-hour drive home.

I kind of wish the drugs were better.

*Not true, I didn't drink any whisky.
**Also not true, they dipped the device in a big bottle of blue chemicals*** like they use with combs at the barber shop.
***The last lie of this story. I have no idea how they clean the scope between patients.

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Slowly, slowly!

2013-04-07T17:59:00.000-06:00

March 23, 2013

O snail
Climb Mount Fuji,
But slowly, slowly!

-Kobayashi Issa

The robin and the roaring engine

2013-03-16T18:34:00.000-06:00

Why don't my kids need naps? Once they are up for the day they stay up until they are forced/coerced/bribed to go to bed. Not me. I love a good Saturday afternoon nap. Today, I slept so deeply in my big brown chair, that I woke up drooling. I dreamt I was walking around with my eyes closed, that is I couldn't open them, but no one around me seemed to notice or care. I was carrying on my daily routine with my eyes closed (Hello metaphor!). Next in my dream I was trying to rinse my mouth out with water because my tongue had stopped working and of course, I woke up drooling.

While I was unconscious, my children told me that they watched old Scooby Doo episodes on a retro cartoon station (Really? We need to keep seeing them?), they played Jenga (I remember crashing blocks), they read comics, and they scorffed down one of the baguettes I had made for supper (I'm glad they like my baking).

What could I have done in two hours? Did I really need all that sleep? Could I have finished the boring book I have on improving learning by incorporating body movement and moved on to the novel I'd much rather be reading? Could I have written this blog and then started fixing a short story that's been sitting around for months? Could I have taken worn the belts off my snow blower and run down to Canadian Tire to buy new ones? There are 10,000 things I could have done!

When I finally woke and wiped the spit from my beard, the boys were watching mud bogging on TV. In this "sport," a redneck man or woman buys a truck, puts a tall suspension on it, fat tires, a snorkel for the air intake, and then takes turns racing full throttle through a mud bog to see who will make it through fastest. Tires spin, mud flies, drunks slip on muddy inclines as they walk into the bush for a pee (yes, that part was televised), and those unmuffled engines roar like, like ... well, like unrestrained 8-cylinder American engines -- there is no simile for that! It's like trying to say what a robin is like. A robin is like a robin.

My inner 12-year old still loves the sound of a loud engine roaring fossil fuels through narrow, unbaffled pipes into the atmosphere. I wish I still had the energy and will to stay awake like my 12-year old self did when all that mattered was growing up so I could have my own jacked-up pickup truck. I want to spin my tires, pee in the bush, and drive home with so much mud on my metaphysical car that you can't tell what colour it is. And I want to shout and roar like a souped-up American V8, sending my voice up into the endless, blue empty sky.

Yeah, that's what I want.

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How do you keep track of the blogs you follow?

2013-03-13T18:58:00.001-06:00

How do you keep track of the blogs you follow? I've been using google reader, but that will be discontinued in June. Not sure what I should switch too...

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Supported communication

2013-03-10T14:42:00.000-06:00

Supported communication is a method of helping a person with aphasia better understand what they here and have a chance at expressing what they want. (Aphasia is a loss of ability to understand and/or express oneself because of damage to the language centers of the the brain.)

One way we can support someone with aphasia is by writing keywords for them to read as they listen to us talk. Sometimes if you can see what you hear (the important bits anyway) you can understand better. I've experienced this watching French movies with French subtitles. I can't understand by listening alone, but if I can read and listen, my comprehension soars.

I was explaining this to Barb the other day. Her husband, 51, had a doozy of a stroke last month and now has trouble with talking and listening. He'll ramble on endlessly in a somewhat non-nonsensical way without knowing what he is saying does not make sense. He can't hear himself so he can't fix it.

As an interesting aside, this man has damage to the part of brain that coordinates body movement (cerebellum). Only he has no motor difficulties. His hands, arms, legs all work fine. I'm starting to appreciate how much the cerebellum does to help us coordinate our thinking and language through sub-conscious self-monitoring.

The example I used to explain supported communication to Barb was telling someone about how their CAT had to go to the VET because it was SICK. Writing those keywords can help them focus on what you are saying. Then I went on with a spontaneous story about how the cat was too sick to save without expensive treatment and had to be put to sleep. I'm not sure why that story came at that time.

15 minutes later, Barb came to my office to tell me she was freaking out because her husband's dog got sick two days before and had to go to the vet. Just like my fictional cat, the dog (Trinity) was too sick to be kept alive without suffering so she was put to sleep.

Barb and I paused for a moment wondering how I came up with that story at that time and then she told me how she was so afraid to tell her husband, poor man stuck in the hospital recovering from a stroke, that his dog had died without him. She didn't know how he would react and was caught between wanting to spare him the news and thinking that he would want to know.

I went with her to tell her husband the bad news. I was supporting her communication with my presence I suppose. He had no trouble understanding everything she said, speaking volumes about the hidden layers of communication that we share without words. She told him the sad news, he responded calmly and ended up soothing her because the telling upset her so much. And it was all accomplished with touch, eye contact, and the look of a saint on his face.

There's so much more than just words when we allow ourselves to connect to each other, when we see through the illusion of isolation. Even through the distance of time and space as in a novel, words are just the surface of something much deeper.

"we are so, so much more than this physical body and mind, so much more than the limited perceptions of our senses, that we are something much greater than the separate isolated, vulnerable being that we deem ourselves to be." - Rev. Alicia, Field of Merit Blog.

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Golden calf for sale

2013-03-03T15:06:00.000-07:00

The void isn't all that scary. It is filled with compassion.

In church today we discussed (others discussed, I listened) how the Israelites in Exodus got into trouble because they wanted a golden calf to worship while they were waiting for Moses to come back. They were tired of waiting and wanted something to worship. They wanted to feel like they were doing something instead of feeling like they were suffering for no good reason.

The first commandment is "thou shalt have no other gods." Here's my take: false idols are beliefs that take you away from the truth. The truth? I'm trying to define this for myself. God? Nirvana? My true self? I'm getting caught up in language and well over my head in this area of comparative theology.

Leaving definition of "truth" aside, what takes me away from it? My beliefs: if only I had enough money I would be happy. If only I could buy the things I want RIGHT NOW I would have peace. If only I didn't have debt I would be happy. The void I fear threatens me and I must escape it. These are some of my major idols. I have minor idols too: that bag of chips I have when I watch TV, the whisky I crave after a hard day at work, a nice pair of shoes, ... all of these (there are many more) make me feel good. Hurt + comfort (minor idol) = peace, but it's only a temporary peace. That is what I'm learning from this money crisis I've created for myself. I can't buy the things that make me feel better, these false idols, so I have no choice but to face the void that I've been using material pleasure to avoid. It's natural to want to avoid discomfort and chase after pleasure. It's human. It's also the cycle that keeps us trapped (according to the Buddha) in this life of suffering.

I'm starting to find out what happens when I don't have my comforts. When I face the void, this thing, this state I can't define. I may be getting to a point where I can choose not to avoid my fears (the void) and instead find a way to accept them. Live life as it is.

The void isn't all that scary. It is filled with compassion.

Today's church conversation feels as if it was organized just for me. It gave me what I needed today and helped me make a connection between Christian theology and my Buddhist faith. DBS, you are the kind of friend I'm so grateful for. I want to be like you! You are a Bodhisattva today. I love the concept that my ego is crumbling. It hurts, but it means I'm getting somewhere that is beyond this self-induced suffering. Sometimes a wound has to be roughed up a little to let light and air into where it's festering. Pixie, it means a lot to know you experience everyday life the way I do, yet you still find reasons to laugh and make me laugh.

With this support and the endless patience I'm learning from my dear wife, I'm starting to feel like this suffering is worth it. Like it's marking a transition to a different phase of life.

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If you've got the money, honey, I've got the time

2013-03-03T00:09:00.001-07:00

How come the things that are most interesting to me are not things I can bring up in cafeteria conversation?

"How's your day?"

"Not so good. I'm having a metaphysical crisis -- a crisis of identity. It seems to be over my largely unconscious beliefs about spending. Money drives me crazy."

"Interesting. Well. Look, I think I'll eat at my desk today. I've got a pile of email to sort through."

The topic of money is banal and easy to avoid. Do we all worry about money? Some of us are born with the ability to save (you are the types who leave the marshmallow on the table). Do these delayed gratificationers worry about money? Or is it the grasshoppers like myself who tend to live and spend spontaneously that worry most. Why did I buy that RV? How in the hell am I going to pay for it now?

More than 20 years ago, I was steaming wallpaper off the walls of my new apartment. I had just dropped off my lover a block away from her house so that her boyfriend wouldn't see us together. She told me then, that she couldn't see me anymore. She still loved her boyfriend and I was a mistake. I don't remember how long I stumbled around willing myself not to feel any pain, but when I ran the steam nozzle up and down the walls of that crumby old apartment, I cried. Not the kind of tears you wipe away when you hear a story like the boy who burned 80 percent of his body when he returned to his inferno house to save his baby sister. Tears for a story like that are sweet and they don't last. You wipe them away and then you go on to the next story or the commercial about the new Subaru.

The tears I cried in that empty apartment were wrenching. Involuntary. They came from an unknown place that felt like dying. I was afraid of them and tried to resist their flow, but I soon gave in and let them come with howling sobs until they were done. Then I got up off the floor and finished removing the wallpaper. The wall under the tattered dusty rose paper was the colour of robin eggs crushed at the bottom of a birdhouse. It was shiny, polished, and stained like an old tea cup. It was impervious to my grief and my longing. My failure. My future felt empty. I was a driver in a highway car racing up an incline on a moonless night. As I approached the crest, I had a primal kind of fear of not knowing what was on the other side in the dark. My headlights were pointing up and the road ahead of me disappeared into nothing but darkness. Was there a cliff? A sudden sharp curve? I hated the feeling of travelling alone into the unknown when all I want was to be loved by the one I loved.

My pain tonight feels like that. Like my heart is broken. Not by love, noble love, but by banal boring money.

I paid all my bills. I made the extra payment on my motorcycle loan. I socked away some cash for next summer's camping trip and next December's gift giving and there was nothing left. No money for a jaunt to the city or a movie or a burger. My boys played at home, watched TV, fingered their video games, and saw nothing new. Learned nothing new. I kept busy with chores and avoided them because I didn't like the feeling of watching them waste their time. We made it through the day. They are sleeping and I am trying to write. There will be church tomorrow morning. Then lunch. A book to read. A nap. More TV and then back to work.

Sacrificing my immediate spending desires is like facing the void over the crest of the hill. It does not return any echo of what I want. It is black nothing. My eyes ache from gazing into it as if the darkness sucks the sights I have already seen from my brain like an occipital lobe stroke. It is taking my life from me second by second as I try to see what I want to see instead of the black nothing. Wanting is the problem said the Buddha. His first noble truth says that all humans suffer in this life and the second noble truth says that we cause our own suffering because we crave. I suffer tonight because I want what I cannot have. It is the wanting that causes my suffering, not the object of my wanting or the story I create about something outside my control that causes me to want. When I offered my love those many years ago and received rejection in return, I suffered. Now I only want to rent a movie or drive into the city for some shopping or buy a new bottle of scotch but I can't. My pay cheque and my past choices to buy expensive toys (to satisfy my craving) are rejecting me. Add to this the pressure to pay for piano lessons, replace worn out shoes, the school ski trip, the karate tournament next month, and my sweet son's eighth birthday next month and the pain, the frustration, feels the same. I can't satisfy my craving to consume and to be entertained and to avoid facing the void because I have to support my growing family. I have to be responsible and pay back the money I borrowed. I am caught without my armour. My armour protects me. It makes me feel better. My armour is escape (movies & theatre). It is soothing (whisky and music). It takes me anywhere but here facing the unknown alone.

My dear wife of 18 years just sent me a note on my phone to tell me that she is bringing me bubble tea. Her uncomplicated love for me reminds me that I don't think about the woman who broke my heart way back when. Somewhere along the path, I've accepted my loss and found another love, a lasting one. If I can do that, then maybe I can embrace my craving heart and give up my fear of the void. Maybe I can learn to live on this strict budget, not give in to indulgences, pay my debts, and support my family with a free and balanced heart. If I do that, then maybe I can give up this unwholesome, yet natural desire the Buddha talked about

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All the meditation is driving me crazy

2013-02-18T18:47:00.000-07:00

My meditation has taken a turn for the worse. I was hoping for theta-wave bliss, understanding, and maybe some self-control, but it turns out my daily zazen is fraught with visits from devils. Anger. Confusion. Doubt. Fear. All have become my sitting partners. I welcome them most to the time and occasionally I see that they are my old friends. We've been through a lot together.

So together we sit and try not to try too hard. Let's see what happens next.

Self-portrait with crazy straw, February 2013

Some light bowling

2013-02-18T18:38:00.001-07:00

Winter light, January 2013

Catch the sunset, February 2013

Let's try that again, February 2013

Waiting for the results, February 2013

Endless winter

2013-02-18T18:33:00.000-07:00

Release the light within, February 2013

Never buy a house in the winter, February 2013

I dare you to lick it, February 2013

Pull me some spring, February 2013

Photo Smorg!

2013-02-18T18:27:00.001-07:00

My dog is smarter than your dog , December 2012

The first 200,000 are behind me, January 2013

Wasn't it a party?, December 2012

Whatever happened to..., January 2013

The worst Chinese food in the best restaurant with the best company ... ever, January 2013

Some January colour

2013-02-18T15:44:00.003-07:00

No boy left behind, January 2013

No tracks, January 2013

Snow ninja, January 2013

Some January colour, January 2013

This is who they say I am

2013-02-18T15:38:00.004-07:00

Gachil, December 2012

This is my character from the Starwars Identities exhibit at the Edmonton Space Science Centre (or whatever the heck they call it now). Based on my choices, I'm a clarinet player with an ostrich head. At least that's who I thought I was in December. I wonder who I am today...

A Buddhist goes to a Christian church

2013-01-13T15:52:00.001-07:00

Go back to the beginning you will.

I haven’t been to church in a long time. Aside from weddings and funerals, it's been more than 30 years. My parents used to send my sister and I to Sunday school so they could have some “alone time,” but by the time I reached junior high, I felt alienated and ill-at-ease there (go figure). So I quit. I hated the idea of church after that. I got to the point of mocking the Jesus lovers as blind slaves to a myth of subservience and weakness.

As I aged, I felt the need for something more in my life. Work, pay bills, eat, sleep, weren’t enough for me. Perhaps my early church years primed me for metaphysical thinking or maybe I’m just wired this way. I started reading about Buddhism in the 80’s, but didn’t understand it. I attended a Buddhist gathering once, but the way they honoured the image of Buddha turned me off (scarring from my Pentacostal brain-washing days). Not much happened after that, but spiritual seeds had been planted. I felt like something wasn’t right and that maybe I didn’t have to feel helpless to the whims of fate and my family's predisposition to depression and anxiety disorder.

Eight years ago, I gave Buddhism another try. I had been reading more books and I appreciated how they believe that we are responsible for our own suffering and that we have all that we need inside us to be happy. It’s just a matter of shifting perception and making different choices about how we live our lives. I found a Buddhist group. I found a teacher. And I came to appreciate the idea of ritual and religious community again. I was old enough to understand the teaching too.

It all ended when I moved to the middle of nowhere. Not many Buddhists or vegetarians out here. I like where I live, but attending a Buddhist meditation session means a two-hour drive to the big city. Too much for me and it takes me away from a community I feel comfortable in. That and I wanted to introduce my kids to the idea of religious life.

Then here (in the middle of nowhere), I met some terrific people. Church-goers, but not pushy and genuinely easy to be around. Smart, friendly, raising children like my dear wife and I, and going through the same midlife experiences.

Today we gave Sunday church service a try. Same nice people. Easy-going service shy on ornate rituals and rich in music. And the sermon was ... OK. I learned something. The teaching was about sacrifice, hard-core and dark: Abraham was prepared to slit his own son’s throat to prove his faith to God (I guess there weren’t any sheep around) and at the last second his hand was stayed and God gave him a ram to kill instead. Sheesh. That’s a high price to pay for faith. Even killing a poor sheep is over the top.

How do you get a lesson for modern life from that?! Simple really. You convert the metaphorical music from this death-metal old testament composition to a modern pop ballad and you talk about the sacrifice we need to practice a religion (to practice anything). Buddhism is all about giving up your self so that you can live life free from suffering. Christians talk about being born again. It’s the same thing. I do prefer the quiet, private nature of Zen practice as opposed to the do everything in front of everyone practices you find in a Christian church (e.g., passing around the offering bowl so everyone can see how much you give).

For me, it means if I really want something (something worthwhile like inner peace), I need to give up my old ways of doing things. They don't work! It will take some sacrifice. I want to meditate more often. I know that it will give me insight into my habits and delusions, but damned if I can find the time to sit. It seems, I would much rather sleep an extra 30 minutes on a cold winter morning than get up and sit on my cushion. Can I give up the comfort of my bed, let go of some of my well-worn ideas and develop a regular meditation practice. I would never harm a hair on my son’s head, but maybe I could give up some of my night-time habits so that I could go to bed earlier and then get up early to meditate.

And I can go to church on Sunday morning. I never thought I would ever say that, but it's just down the street, the people are great, and the message is the same. I'll be a Buddhist in a Christian church who is working towards living a better life in the best way he can.

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Facebook: blessing in disguise?

2013-01-01T18:33:00.001-07:00

Written in response to Roxanne's blog post: To Facebook or Not To Facebook …

Facebook is especially deadly now that I access it on my iPhone. Waiting for pancakes to brown? Out comes the phone. Commercials? Warming up the car? Waiting for my dentist? Lets see what’s new with my friends. The result for me is less time to stop and just be. I never need to do nothing ever again.

I’ve tried taking Facebook off my phone and I can last a week or two before I re-install it. Easier has been unliking all the George Takei type sites and then filtering the people who post Facebook-game crap (that means blocking my mother). All this helps cut down on the quantity I look at.

Is this what a smoker feels like? Facebook is there when my alarm goes off, then again before I sleep. I don't like that.

My current thinking is that this struggle we are sharing points to a type of loneliness. Facebook makes me feel like I belong to something. Community? The question is can I address this “need” so that Facebook loses its allure. I can live without what I read there so it’s not really a question of content. It’s the delusion of feeling disconnected that I would like to address. Perhaps we are not suffering from lack of contact with others, but instead from a gap in our connection with ourselves? Self-alienation.

I don’t know what the answer is. Cold turkey? Probably not. Heal myself instead? Maybe. At least Facebook has helped me see this inner work that needs attention. I feel some urgency also as my kids approach an age where they can do what I do on the computer. Gulp.

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What matters most?

2012-12-30T23:55:00.003-07:00

This question arises for me again: what matters most?

Living with peace or joy come to mind first, but honestly, I don't think that's enough to get the golden key. Life is more than peace and joy. It's chaos and grief too and choosing one side over the other maintains an impossible separation. I think the answer lies in the direction of connection (radical acceptance). Not so much person to person, but self to everything. Much suffering comes from living in separation. Me vs. them. This career vs. that one. Scarcity vs. abundance. All this separation fuels greed, delusion, and anger. And fear.

Maybe versus can become and? If we could just figure out how to take a step back (or a few steps) and see life from a perspective wider than our thinking, I believe we would see the flashing neon "AH-HA" sign.

If it were so easy! Finding that perspective is proving difficult for me. There are so many paths to this truth and I get turned around only to find myself having circled back to where I started.

So. I go again. Always going, going, going on beyond.

All the best to all my blogger friends. May January first be as special as June 11 or August 18 or any other day.

Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn't learn a lot today (or this year), at least we learned a little, and if we didn't learn a little, at least we didn't get sick, and if we got sick, at least we didn't die; so, let us all be thankful.

The Buddha

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2012-11-23T21:35:00.001-07:00

I love choral music. All thoughts of isolation are washed away in a flow of interdependence. The whole exists without the individual, yet the whole cannot exist without the individual. And don't get me going on the parallel ideas of impermanence and timelessness!

This is my new favourite internet radio station:

http://minnesota.publicradio.org/radio/services/cms/choral/

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November light

2012-11-18T10:42:00.003-07:00

my ears are cold
arms wrapped tight
and mind slowed
by longing
and still
there
glowing
in the November light
shines freedom

Invalid Cookery

2012-11-04T21:14:00.001-07:00

I opened a 1967 cookbook today. The cover is gone, the pages are tattered, brown with food spatters and kitchen heat, and my great aunt has written her own recipes on the blank pages. Her handwriting is enviable and greatly resembles my mother's.

Today I made bread. White bread. None of this whole wheat, sprouted, sour dough crap. And I'm going to eat it with butter.

The book is full of gems, but the chapter that really captures my attention is Invalid Cookery. How awesome is that!? We don't even have the concept of cooking for the sick anymore. In my daily work, I often prescribe meals for the ill -- people who have trouble swallowing because of stroke or disease -- but this merely involves changing the consistency of the same food everyone gets. Puree, minced, diced. That's cooking for the sick today.

Here's a sample of the recipes:

Beef-Tea
"Choose lean, juicy beef for the purpose. It ought to be freshly killed."
"Time to cook 2 to 3 hours after soaking."

Lime Water
"Gradually add 1 pt. boiling water to a piece of unslaked lime the size of a walnut."
This is what happens if you ingest calcium oxide: "Corrosive. May attack the esophagus. Abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting may result. May cause serious alkali burns in mouth and throat." (http://hazard.com/msds/mf/baker/baker/files/c0462.htm) I'm going to ask one of my doctor friends what unslaked lime would have been prescribed for. I can only guess the purpose was to induce vomiting. Ugh!

Egg-Nog
Made with brandy or wine. Awesome!

Rice Water
"flavored (U.S. spelling in a Canadian cookbook!) by cooking in it stick cinnamon or lemon rind; sugar may be added." Yum.

Vanilla Ice Cream
Yes, you have to make it from scratch.

Spanish Cream
This looks great. It's basically homemade jello with milk, egg, sugar, and vanilla.

The next time sick in bed, I'm going to request Oatmeal Gruel and Spanish Cream. I'll probably have to make it myself.

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