the lost buffalo

Yesterday, at our all-day practice period,  I gave a talk about Case 38 in the Gateless Gate koan collection, and had an unfounded but strong feeling it would be the best talk I've given in a very long time, so I decided to record it using the beautiful digital recorder that a student gave me as a gift a couple of years ago.   It turned out to be a pretty good talk, as these things go, and the dharma dialogue that followed was truly wonderful.  A number of practitioners thanked me for it later, saying that it was very meaningful for them.


And so I was excited about posting it here, and on our Boundless Way website, and sat down just now to upload it to my computer, the first step to dispersing it to the world.  I discovered, alas, with some embarrassment and a little bit of amusement, that the talk does not exist anywhere on the recorder.  It turns out that I still haven't mastered the mysteries of this tiny, complex machine.  I put my nose to the grindstone and devoted myself to reading the thick instruction manual, and I am proud to say that I not only learned how to record talks, but also how to delete them -- at least I believe that this is so.    My new knowledge will be a great benefit to all beings in the future, I'm sure.

While the talk no longer exists in aural form, there are still a few thought waves kicking around in my head, and perhaps in the heads of those who heard it.  So in the spirit of beginner's mind, here is the case, in Robert Aitken's translation, with a few comments from the me who exists in this moment, rather than the me who gave the talk yesterday.

The Case:  Wuzu said, "It is like a buffalo that passes through a latticed window.  Its head, horns, and four legs all pass through.  Why can't its tail pass through as well?"

Wumen's Verse:  Passing through, falling into a ditch: turning beyond, all is lost.  This tiny little tail -- what a wonderful thing it is!

And I will simply add:  Not understanding how to operate a recorder!  What a wonderful thing it is!

Bodhisattvas Arising From the Cracks in the Earth

The past couple of weeks have been fraught with unusual events, some joyful, some not so much.  High winds from storms with the names of women have disrupted life in many ways.  One small event that has happened again and again here at the Temple is the fall of one particular string of Tibetan prayer flags.  The city has an ordinance against street signs on this residential block, and so we use the prayer flags to signal our presence to the world as a Zen Buddhist temple.  (I have heard some remarks that the flags also make our parking lot look a little bit like a car dealership, but this is a minority opinion.)

One day, with winds blowing strong, I was attempting to put up the flags once again.  It was a hopeless task, due to the fraying of the string and the fact that I needed three hands -- two to hold the ends of the strings, and one to tie them back together.

A car driving by gently stopped,  backed up and came in to the driveway.  A lovely woman called out, as she exited the car, "do you need some help?"  She had driven by the flags, and the Temple, and the big Buddha, many times, but she said that she had never seen them until today.  All she saw was my struggle, and she appeared, ready to help, and with some twine that she carries in her car, because one never knows when one will need twine.  A Buddhist practitioner from another tradition, she was astounded to know that there was a Zen temple right on the main road into Worcester.  We tied up the prayer flags, and she offered a stick of incense to our big granite Buddha, and went on her way.

Yasutani Roshi used to say that, when we call out to the universe,  bodhisattvas arise from the cracks of the earth to come to our aid.  And so it was this windy day.  The suffering world is full of compassionate beings, ready to help.  They come in many forms, and some drive cars and carry twine with them, because one never knows when one will need twine.

Amsterdam radio interview

David and I spent two amazing days in Amsterdam, being interviewed by Femke Wijdekop for her radio show, and giving a workshop at the American Book Center.  Here is our radio interview for you to enjoy.

The Sunny Side of the Street

Another episode from our conversation with Tom Hall of ImprovLive 365.  I love the song at the end of the video.  Enjoy!

Costa Rica next February

Click on the link below to discover a delightful place for a very low-key retreat.  My dear friend Florence Meleo-Meyer and I will be teaching at Blue Spirit Resort in Costa Rica, through the Omega Institute.   Hope to see you there!

http://eomega.org/visit-us/omega-costa-rica/schedule/week-5?content=LNK&source=Fweb.BLACM.ws

What is it?

More from our interview with our friend Tom Hall at ImprovLive365:

On having no hair

Josh Mu'nen Bartok, Sensei, James Myo'un Ford, Roshi, David Dae An Rynick, Roshi, and me

At our last Boundless Way Zen sesshin (silent retreat), all of us teachers decided to shave our heads.  We were going to ordain a priest, and part of the ordination ritual involves shaving the head of the ordination candidate.  We all wanted to support our new priest, and it was fun to gather in the bathroom and trim and shave together.  (Josh and David had already shaved their heads, and were very helpful, along with James' wife Jan Seymour-Ford, in fulfilling our sudden inspiration.)  

Heading-shaving is a symbol of leaving behind the ordinary world of day-to-day concerns.  I had first shaved my head when my teacher James ordained me, and ever since, I've kept it pretty short for a girl.  Many women Zen teachers and priests keep their heads shaved, but I always felt that it set me apart from regular folks in a way that wasn't particularly helpful.  After I became a priest, strangers were extremely polite to me, and friends who didn't know about the head-shaving tradition or Zen in general would gasp or embrace me with sadness, hoping that I'd feel better soon.  The fact is, in our culture, choosing baldness for men is a fashion statement, and for women, most usually, it means that we're in some stage of chemotherapy for cancer.  (Of course, for some bold women, it is slowly evolving into a fashionable choice.  Very slowly, and not so much in Worcester.)  Even when I wear my Zen outfit outside of the Temple, if I'm not asked about my health, I am usually asked if I do martial arts.  

This time, I have to say I enjoyed the feeling very much.  It coincided with a hot and humid weather pattern, so I felt much cooler than usual.  In terms of temperature.  And...at sesshin, it felt very normal.  But once the retreat ended, and I went out to meet the world, I felt immediately how my shiny head made me special, and not in a good way.  Rather than being a symbol of renunciation and simplicity, it became a symbol of being different and apart.  And odd.  Or sick.

For me, Zen is partly about dissolving the barrier between self and other, and my very short hair creates a new barrier.  There are some benefits -- if people ask me about it, I get to tell them a little bit about Zen.  And, I have to admit, although I don't like the pity, it's interesting to be treated with kid gloves by shopkeepers.  At the farmer's market,  I was sometimes given the best vegetables, at a slight discount.  I figure I must have broken a few precepts by accepting this generosity and not explaining that my baldness wasn't earned through suffering, but had been a choice.  As I walked away from one booth, I heard a woman say, "what a shame!"  And her friend replied, "well, we all have to go sometime."

My hairdresser (who I will not see for a few months) told me that human hair grows about a half inch per month.  I am saving money on shampoo, and hot days are more comfortable.  But once my hair grows back, I'm thinking I'll keep it short again -- short for a girl, that is.  It feels like the friendliest option, and the one designed to help those barriers between us fall.