After being in Walla Walla for the last year and settling in a bit, I had started to look at houses that were in my range of do-ability, and just recently realized that what I could afford also called for at least two years of remodeling and endless puttering, and then I had an Aha! moment, and decided to rent an apartment instead and settle into old age as an apartment dweller. It was a big step in several ways. One, was the simple fact that at my age I need to be realistic and err on the side of caution in my plannings long range.   A couple of AA slogans came to mind; K.I.S.S. (keep it simple stupid) and Easy Does It! 

I had been feeling sort of captured by my ideas about aging and the things that I have schlepped around with me for the past few years after Linda’s death. All MY tools and gadgets and stuff that a prudent homeowner has so they can fix what needs fixing, from shovels to planers, to pole pruners, chop saws, fine saws, one million assorted screws and nails and hinges, and handles and lights and clamps, and gizmos and extension cords, table saws and routers, and another million or so items that are “put away” and I don’t even know I have them. A bed that weighs 14 tons and is a “king”, and I am really, just a former knave. I had lost perspective and become used to old discardable ideas that no longer served me, but rather I served them. So another move is on. It may be my last or I’ve got four or five more, somewhere in the future ’til there is a last.

What’s been currently (last night), interesting is what stolid companionship worry, fear and doubt can be when we least need them (2:11 a.m.). They arise unbidden and give me plenty of opportunity to not only observe and feel (and feed) them, but also to enter the pack as a visitor and sort of knock around with them in the wee hours. I could probably bring a camera crew and get a couple of hours of documentary footage for the PBS “Inner-Nature” program.                                                                                                                   And then it’s time to just, get-the-fuck-up and enter the day. Facing the actual aspects of life that require a different type of participation activity, you know, doing.                              So, my first doing was to put on outside clothing and drive to “Popular Donuts” in Walla Walla, 6 minutes away, and get my usual (once a week), an old- fashioned Chocolate, and a Powder Lemon-filled donut. Then home (Now three minutes away), and a cup of coffee and a few pages of a poetry compendium by Red Pine.

Now, that is an example that the stuff in our minds is basically not real, but Popular Donuts is (and are), real. Life continues and I have to go do some chores around the new apartment and this month use many of my tools for the last time before finding a home for them where they can help others.                                                                                         That’s what tools do. I want to become a tool.

With these hands, also 

This mind, I have wrought

And sown much disaster, as

Well as strife. Now, for

Some years there has been a 

Peace growing within

That informs me, that All means

Every Thing. Every No-Thing.

In and Out

Nothing goes to waste,

Not even time. Not in

The long run.

(Donuts are a good Thing, In moderation)

Or, Karl der Grose, as he is known in Germany.

Charles the First, Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire 800 AD. Every European alive in Europe today is a descendant of “Chuck the Ace” (as I like to call him).

Every one in Europe today is related to everyone who lived in Europe 1,200 years ago. Genetics and probability attest to this.

Everyone alive in the whole world today is a direct descendant of everyone who was alive 1,600 BC.  And, here’s the interesting part, even though the amount of genetic material we all possess is vast it is finite, and at some time in the not too distant future, we will reach a point of ongoing in-breeding for the whole human race.

No matter what planets we travel to or what we bring to bear to this problem, our instruction booklet indicates we will arrive at a position from which there will be no more ‘triumphs’ for mankind. We’ll get smaller, stupider and more prone to diseases, with vastly reduced lifespans and become food for something we can’t escape from. The human genome is an enclosed system. Vast, but not at the Universal level.    

Somewhat humbling. Turns 

Out there is no “It” species.

We can relax a little. Maybe

Go a little easier on ourselves

And others, people and species.

The pressure is off

Maybe less striving is

In order. Time to chill, 

As the young ones say.

Have recently begun to explore actual possibility of finding a small house for me to live in, hopefully something with a small area for a workshop…As I’m looking I realize that I may be priced out of range of what I can actually afford, and I’m looking in what is considered an affordable area. So, reality check, and that’s always good.

I’ve always been a bit of a dreamer and tend to form views that may not be practical, on the other hand when I discover (one more time), that I’m seeing things foolishly; I tend to smile and realize (one more time), that’s OK. I tend to be adaptable and see most things as learning moments and after pummeling myself for a few minutes, or a day or two, depending; I get to move into my new reality and try and work from there.

Recently, I’ve have encountered several references to “doors”, choices or decisions that we may have placed before us. Although we may not know at the moment we have a choice but if we realize later that we had one, we can tend to think in terms of a door opening or closing and our choice having been one of stepping through, or not. Today, my thought is that the choice is always the same, door-wise, in the following fashion.

If something is true spiritually it should always be applicable in our life, as we live it.       If we go through a door to leave something, we have no way of seeing what we are entering into, we may have some ideas, but they rarely comport with eventual reality,  we are more concerned with getting out of something than what we are getting into.

If we are seeking for something “better’ we tend to open a variety of doors to see what’s on the other side, and then perhaps choose to step through and into something else.

So, it strikes me that it may be better to try and look for the door into something, rather than run to a door out of something. Yes, there are many exceptions and variations to this notion, but I suspect they are merely situational, and all situations are better being responded too rather than reacted too. (big quandary “to-do” not too do?).

Ultimately, running from, or running toward,

Would both benefit by slowing down a

Bit, or more than a tad…

I was once advised to make haste slowly

But, was way too young to comprehend.

I may be learning…

I haven’t posted anything for some time now, hadn’t the urge.

Today is the 4th anniversary of Linda’s death.

We met at the AA meetings in Napa in 1983, we got married in 1986. We had good life together, mostly because we made each other laugh, were sober, and had a Buddhist practice informing our growth. She had Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis and in the last two years of her life also had kidney failure and underwent dialysis for almost two years when we decided to stop treatment because, after many years of living with pain, this last treatment consisted of thrice weekly round trips to Spokane with four to six hours of treatment and great discomfort. When we informed nurse and doctor that she could no longer tolerate treatment, they told her; ” Well then, you’ve got 4 to 6 days left to live.”

We were prepared. Our friend Reverend Master Zensho, a Buddhist monk and priest moved into our house, his temple was about 40 miles away in St. Maries, ID, and he had all the preperations for a Buddhist funeral set to go because we, under Linda’s direction, had already prepared everything for the event, some months previous.

Turned out she lived 15 more months, and then died in relative peace in a quiet setting very near our home.

Today, I had my home altar set up dedicated to her and have done some ceremonies and have kept her in my heart. The altar of my heart, where all reposes.

From a Buddhist perspective she lived a good life and converted her inherited and created karmas with dignity and grace. A life well lived, she died sober and peacefully.

Can you remember the first flowering …

No, not the flowering, the budding,

Of  a love; 

When it was soft and tender,

Full of life and not yet open

To the world.      Just ours.

Then,  it did blossom,

(and OH! what flowers)

And nurtured the us with Itself.

Its very nature was to replenish,

To grow.          

When in time, it

Began to fade

(a pale rose, vibrant breeze)

And change, there was

A sadness,

A mature tenderness.

Wistful and Becoming,

Yes, soon to be, a

New hope for our

Spring.

I was talking with a friend yesterday who said she enjoyed my last post and I had forgotten what all I had nattered on about, so I revisited it and noticed that I forgot, in a flurry of nattering, to mention who I was referring in the description of the Marine Corp Major General whom I considered to be an example of a true hero in the classical sense of that word. I was referring to Smedley Darlington Butler, USMC.  He was not a perfect human, like the rest of us, but from what I have read about him he did his best. Plus, a great name.

Also,  I mentioned the “Meal Verse” that I say before a meal and now that it’s Thanksgiving Day I’ll quote a portion of the verse said at the end of the meal in Soto Zen Buddhism, as offered in the booklet, Scriptures and Ceremonies ©  Berkeley Buddhist Priory, Albany, CA).

“The universe is as the boundless sky,

As lotus blossoms over unclear water;

Pure and beyond the world is

The Buddha Nature of the trainee;

O, Holy Buddha, we take refuge in Thee.”

I like that, because it addresses aspiration to a spiritual understanding which must go hand-in-hand with living daily life as it comes to us, in this very world.