Workin'

I've spent the mornings working outside and the rest of the day dividing my time between a number of different activities-- though have not spent nearly enough time preparing for my upcoming Teacher Training course in Chicago! I've been helping my mom sift through what seems to be thousands of digital photos from our trip in Europe and finding a way to print these out-- can't really put a jpeg in an album.

Even though the property here is not overwhelming in terms of its size, it is quite varied as to what the landscape is. This, compounded with the fact that the record of the previous owners with maintaining the property is almost unimaginable, makes for constant mornings of work-- that is, barring sub-zero temperatures or mounds of snow. Which is far from the case now, as that hot Coloradan sun beats down on you through the thin air and high altitude. Even after quite a few dumpster runs over the years, we are still finding all sorts of trash in some corner of the property, or buried or half buried in the ground or weeds. A week ago we took out a great deal of barbed wire, chicken wire, and weeds to open up a hillside. It was a contstant series of pitchfork and wheelbarrow runs to the firepit for what could burn, and some serious wire cutters to try to manage throwing this tangled mess away.

Then I got it in my head that it would be quite nice to help out in providing a nice path to make walking up and down the hill easier. I realized that with our property being as varied as it is, you'd see a lot on a walk in the way of views, trees, brush, water, garden, house, etc. At Vipassana meditation centers there is always a walking path, and somehow just the mere existence of one gives way to a greater number of introspective strolls. Why not create one here? I had no idea how to go about it-- I wondered if laying gravel would be best. Eventually I began digging a kind of trench (just to make the 'physchological' component of on-the-path/off-the-path clearer), and then I got some large rocks, flagstones, and bricks, and dug them in. Boy was this a lesson in trial and error! How to dig it out, how to make them stay firm in the ground, how to have curves up hillsides... but a lot of fun! Fun to be providing a nice service to my family, and fun to learn so much about the task. I have definitely found through experience that no matter what one is engaged at, to approach it with an attitude of humility, the lesson can really be profound. How much I learned doing my task of cleaning toilets for ten days at the Swiss meditation center! Not to say that it's always easy to go from presenting some academic paper at a conference to sweeping the floors, but the benefits are always worthwhile.

Unfortunately in my work outside I've disturbed the homes of many beings. Once I uncovered some boards to find a whole family of snakes! (just one managed to stay when I went back for the camera-- the first sight was damn impressive) Additionally I've come across a bee hive and all kinds of groundhog holes and squirrels (and acorns buried deep), as well as a very large ant colony living in a rotted out log. These are my days for now... may be headed up to the cabin this week!

Funny stuff

I bought this lighter in Burma a couple years ago, and it had what looked to be quite an ordinary sticker on it with infintesely small writing. After a little while the "Announcements" note caught my eye and I managed to read it-- as amazing as even the wackiest stuff I saw while in Japan, which is saying something! I could never bring myself to part with the lighter for the comedy of the words, and decided to record it now in posterity...


Oh, and I just found out where the page is for my graduate school's internship photo contest. To see some neat travel photos (some by me :) check out this page!

Also, I put my photos up of my time in Poland (including Auchwitz and Krakow)...

And here is England and Switzerland....

Some slow days at last...

My mom and I came back from the Vipassana course outside Denver. It was good to see some old friends, and best of all to provide Dhamma service to one of my own parents! Being able to support my mom's meditation with actual service as well as metta-- how lucky! The weather was a little on the cold side, although it could just be with that heightened awareness you go deeper into it. There was much turnover in people coming for a day or two to provide service, but I found the kitchen experience to be quite smooth.

Now I am back in our small Colorado town, helping out with household tasks, arranging (read: trying to throw away) various personal effects, watching the local hummingbird battles outside on our deck, and preparing for an upcoming Teacher Training course I'll take in Chicago. Looking forward to taking some walks and hikes, bike rides and runs around the area, hope that the two hours of sitting will keep my mind fairly quiet and balanced.

They have done some really amazing work around the house, and every time I come the trees are bigger and some new ones have been planted, and some other projects have been completed. The back outside my room has been leveled and an entire hot tub has been added! There is also some nice stonework around. Here is a picture to see below:

Okaeri ne...

I had a lovely final dinner with Rupert, Rebecca, Patrick, and my friend Lauren who I studied with at University in Oregon and knew as well in Tokyo. I then slept for just a few hours, waking up at 3.30 am to have a morning sit with Rupert. With my bags hoisted, I walked to the bus, caught the tube, cleared customs and check in, and flew to New York while watching my first movie since my flight to Prague in June. I waited 5-6 hours at JFK, then flew to Dallas, and finally to Colorado Springs. The next day my mom and I drove back to Salida, where I am now, tired and bewildered and a little out of sorts and deflated as I usually feel upon returning to this country.

Here is a photo taken upon leaving Dallas of a very red sun burning into the horizon... no way a photograph could have captured how amazing this was...

Oh, and some photos are now online. To see some Prague photos, go to... http://www.kodakgallery.com/ShareLandingSignin.jsp?Uc=bjovs9y.23o0bz2y&Uy=rs66uh&Upost_signin=Slideshow.jsp%3Fmode%3Dfromshare&Ux=0

For Terezin concentration camp, go to http://www.kodakgallery.com/ShareLandingSignin.jsp?Uc=bjovs9y.a5is9mhm&Uy=-cmyqjd&Upost_signin=Slideshow.jsp%3Fmode%3Dfromshare&Ux=0

You can see them by signing in or by pressing the option to enter the album without signing in. I suggest viewing them via slideshow, otherwise they are so small!

Looking West...

It was a great time in the Northern county of Suffect and town of Saxmundon visiting Rupert's parents. But a notable story before leaving... I left his London flat Friday morning to be greeted by a summer rainfall, and to my surprise saw the streets entirely deserted with police line tape on either side, and police cars, men, and dogs behind it. I walked out rather confused until a policeman called me over. "A suspicious package has been delivered to the local Mosque, and we are taking it extremely seriously." Luckily evacuation of the flats turned out not to happen, and soon enough the police determined it was nothing dangerous. The neighourhood is wonderfully diverse, with a heavy population of Turks and people from the West Indies, and Muslims as well. I rarely see other Caucasions walking down the street, and the food is excellent!

The time up north was "positively lovely" as a Britisher might say, we "had a crack" and now I'm "knackered" (every now and again here I need translations of items into American English). It was nice to take a break from avoiding 18 foot long double decker English buses on London's midievel streets-- they've got to be the most confusing in the Western world! I went with Rupert and his roommate Rebecca (one of those rare Irish Jews-- whose ancestors probably knew mine back in Lithuania and Latvia), and another Irishman named Sean, with more friends coming later, as well as Rupert's brother Charlie on leave from his military camp. Being all meditators we had a pleasant (or as pleasant as it can be) group sit on the train, boarded a local train, and got off to await a passing storm before biking a few miles to the house and being greeted with cold homemade elderberry juice. There we stayed in a beautiful cottage whose rooms reminded me as being out of C.S. Lewis' Narnia series or Peter Pan. We were treated to some exquisite vegetarian food during our stay, sitting round a large wooden oval table in a beautful study/dining room with views of the garden and rows of books behind us.

The next day we had an early sitting and drove out to Rupert's father Philippe's boat. We took a slow ride away from the dock and got off at a shingle beach, crossed it on foot and beheld the sea. We went back to the boat, got off at the pier, and took hold of the bikes we had brought with us all the way from London. On beautiful country roads we passed farms, many wild rabbits scurrying into bushes, castles and churches, fields and fields of crops-- many wheat, and had a brief encounter with some pigs as we tried to discern their peculiar habit of chewing rocks.

After a few hours we ended up at Rupert's mother's house, where we were treated to another splendid meal and in a splended garden, after which a bout of fatigue descended and seemed to wash over everyone. With great effort we managed to rouse the crowd and take to our bikes again to take another leisurely ride home, making it about 50-60 km in total.



We collapsed in bed and had a solid sleep, another great breakfast and set out with sore bottoms to walk to the ruins of an Abbey from the 12th Century. Rupert took us foolishly on a "public footpath" that lead through barbed wire fences and into patches of thistles and stinging needles and ultimately into someone's backyard. The Abbey was impressive in scope and size and beautiful and tragic in its ruins. We walked through the site and on a grassy field played an hour or so of frisbee, the juxtaposition of this lighthearted fun on such a ground being quite interesting. After a brief ride to the beach to walk the dogs (who also gathered stones in their mouths in order to encourage them to be thrown), we took the train back to the City, having another group sit, and then went out to again brave the 18 foot double deckers after having a very jolly dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant. Everywhere you go in the world the City and Country distinctions seem similar in many ways, and this was no exception.

Now I am finishing last errands today (email and the purchase of English tea) before heading back tomorrow. I may leave the house as early as 4 am and brave layovers in NYC and Dallas before arriving late in Colorado Springs. The next day I'll be back in Salida, and the following day my mom and I will attend the last half of a Vipassana course near Denver. Then it will be a slight rest...

London etc.

Fast forward a month and greetings again from London. I am staying with the very dynamic and renaissance man Rupert Taylor, my friend who I will eternally be grateful for his role in introducing me to Vipassana meditation while in Japan. I am staying in his flat in Northern London, who he shares with another Irish meditator and which is leased by a German AT. After just a day braving the noisy streets of Milan, I am counting my blessings at having landed in such a wholesome environment :)

Sometimes meditating can feel like you're walking up a path that has withered away to a hard and steep rock cliff edge and there is no where to proceed to ahead, and yet despite this (illusionary) hopelessness, you stumble along far enough until you see the very easy entry way between two boulders and just like that you're out of it. This continually reminded me the importance of viriya and, as the title hints at, sampajanna.



But for now, present anecdotes first. I took two very tense flights from Milan two days ago to get here that involved traveling ticketless and standing in a chaotic security line where a British couple got in a shouting match with some West Africans for asking them to hold onto their bags, making connections with only minutes to spare. London is still struggling with its recent terror, with entire subway lines shut off, police everywhere, often hollering out directions for this or for that.


My first full day in London, yesterday, I was given a mission to take the bus to Waterloo station, secure a chained bike with a flat tire, change the tire (or tyre) and ride it home (the bike, not the tire/tyre). All went well until one stubborn bolt wouldn't come off, as hard as I pulled in sitting in the park across from the river Thames and Big Ben. I found a bike shop and they got it off, and in an alleyway hastily (and clumsily) tried to put it back together. I was doing a horrendous job, and an old Italian man passed by and with few words took it back apart and then together again with quick and able hands, refusing my plea to take him out to lunch for his help. I then navigated the medieval city streets (and pass the fascinating Financial District) to get back to Rupert's flat, exhausted, black, and bleeding (and nearly charged £30 for riding on the sidewalk instead of the madenning narrow streets).

This weekend we'll take some trains to the countryside and ride around on our bikes, staying with Rupert's family. Next week it's return to Uncle Sam!