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Thought for the day: What if everything worked out in the end, and there was nothing to worry about at all; what if everyone forgives you and you forgive yourself; what if you had a chance to revise and regroup and begin again; what if it was all going to be okay? Da Capo Take the used-up heart like a pebble and throw it far out. Soon there is nothing left. Soon the last ripple…
Every year on the eve of St. John’s Day, a voodoo priestess and her followers gather on the Magnolia Bridge over Bayou St. John to offer blessings for the crops. It used to be Marie Laveaux, the Voodoo Queen of New Orleans, now it’s Sallie Ann Glassman, the Voodoo Priestess of New Orleans. Michael Domenici, WWOZ host of the New Orleans show took some cool photographs this year.
I thought of this poem today when we were having a dharma talk after meditation. My question is why does it seem natural to seek permanence when truly we live in an impermanent world? The desire to fix things in a time continuum is a survival technique, but it might also be what is helping us to die – wars are fought over people trying to keep possession of a thought, creed, or place that…
After meditation this morning at the small Zen center down the street, we talked about the Genjo Koan again and of course, read it aloud again in the odd soto zen way of reading – a rush of words. What stood out – this time, “Do not suppose that what you realize becomes your knowledge and is grasped by your consciousness. Although actualized immediately, the inconceivable may not be distinctly apparent. Its appearance is beyond…
On March 12 my hair started falling out and on March 14th my stylist told me I had alopecia and it looked to him like alopecia areata by the circular bald spots developing on my head. It turned out to be alopecia universalis, which means all the hair on my body fell out. After dermatologist and primary care, and lots of blood work later, I wound up at an endocrinologist who informed me that I…
Since Tin started at Waldorf, I’ve been reading more and more about anthroposophy and Rudolf Steiner. Steiner was all over the map – writing about the need for a nourished earth to provide us with nourishing food – biodynamics; the need to move our bodies – eurythmy; the spirit body or etheric body and on and on. I’ve met Waldorf and Steiner at a most opportune time in my life – I need to simplify.…
I had lunch with a friend on Friday at Canal Street Bistro, a lovely cafe that has recently opened and serves very yummy food. The guy, Miguel, had opened a taqueria in Kenner and it was a little hole in the wall that soon became a victim of its own success and so right before the Federal Flood Miguel saw an opportunity to move uptown and open the motherlode of all taquerias – downstairs served…
I realized yesterday or rather it was pointed out to me that all of my “new life” talk wasn’t actually in practice. My nurse friend in the park said the reason that woman couldn’t get a vein and stabbed me so many times is she didn’t know what she was doing because she had not found perfect practice. “Perfect practice,” she said, it’s what my teacher used to tell us but I never knew what…
I have dropped OM for OOMM the last two weeks – out of my mind – the idea that we are leaving here for two months in under a week is beyond the pale. I have so many lists, I now have redundant lists, and things that are not on the lists, and all sorts of jumbled up jumble of stuff that keeps rumbling and I’m now mumbling. OOMM.