sunday bloody sunday...

"The universe is so vast and ageless that the life of one man can only be measured by the size of his sacrifice."

- a handwritten quote attributed to no one in particular, that sam taped onto the mirror of the bathroom, he and i shared in indianapolis, indiana.

This is Derry, Northern Ireland, site of the sunday bloody sunday massacre known worldwide by the famous U2 song. When my pops and I visited Sam in Northern Ireland (two years ago), he walked us around both the protestant and catholic neighborhoods of the city. During "the troubles" the protestant barrio was called London Derry and the catholic area, just Derry. When I visited for three days two years ago, the city was peaceful yet extremely segregated. Although integration has occured within the northern ireland police force, it is still dominated by protestants. Sam and I went and hung out with his friends at bars throughout the city, still more or less delineated by religion.

Leaving the bars late at night, police patrolled the streets and cobblestoned walkways. To my disbelief the police were harassed like i have never seen in my life. Slowly patrolling with an armored car similar to what the police force in south africa used during apartheid, drunk men and boys would go within inches of these police officers, chastising them, mocking them, cursing them, intimidating them.

As Sam said, "The police can't do shit. If they so much as lay a finger on one of these guys there is bound to be a riot."

This is Sam and Pops over looking the Catholic neighborhood of Derry.

December 2004.

Love and health to all...

cuando voy a ir dormir...

i saw the film, "the science of sleep" during a malacious rainstorm here in new york city. the rain was pouring and a friend of mine and myself jumped in a taxi to cruise ten blocks, hoping not to miss the beginning of the film which was starting in less than seven minutes. 6:59, 6:58, 6:57....

we got to the theatre, took off all our wet clothes, sat back before even the previews began and watched the film, which was well worth the rush and quite beautiful. it was a last minute decision, not planned out and on a whim. that seems to be a theme of the past ten days...

let it continue.

"A Tree in Mexico." Autumn 2003.

love and health to all...

my beautiful brother, sam.

love and health to all...

bowling alleys

hey y'all, anybody out there know who designed the first bowling alley? i went bowling on saturday night, standing on one side of the alley, lane 20, at the end of the lineup, thinking,

"damn, they are all designed exactly the same. everywhere." why? where's the creativity?
love to all...

autumn upstate

i went to visit my buddy, zak, in chatham, ny this past weekend. the autumn foliage was at its finest and the weather was cool. zak, dave and myself spent friday cruising around the town. we found some of the last sunflowers around. saturday zak and i hiked to bish bash falls, went to the old chatham sheepherding company and zak even milked a black sheep. tomorrow, our night at the bowling alley!

love and health to all...

margaret and chris...

My beautiful cousin Margaret got married this past sunday on a gorgeous autumn day that felt like late august. The afternoon sun cloaked the ceremony in warm blessings.

Special love goes to whomever can name the artist of the beautiful batik covering the sacred wedding table with the glass of wine...

Love to all...

Krisha Gotami...

...was a young woman who had the fortune to live during the time of the Buddha. When her firstborn child was about a year old, it fell ill and died. Grief stricken and clutching its little body, Gotami roamed the streets, begging anyone she met for a medicine that could restore her child to life. Some ignored her, some laughed at her, some thought she was mad, but finally she met a wise man who told her that the only person in the world who could perform the miracle she was looking for was the Buddha.

So she went to the Buddha, laid the body of her child at his feet, and told him her story. The Buddha listened with infinite compassion. Then he said gently, "There is only one way to heal your affliction. Go down to the city and bring me back one mustard seed from any house in which there has never been a death."

Krisha Gotami was elated and set off at once for the city. She stopped at the first house she saw and said: "I have been told by the Buddha to fetch a mustard seed from a house that has never known death."

"Many people have died in this house, "she was told. She went to the next house. "There have been countless deaths in our family," they said. And so to a third and a fourth, until she had been all round the city and realized the Buddha's condition could not be fulfilled.

She took the body of her child and finally said goodbye to him for the last time and then returned to the Buddha. "Did you bring me the mustard seed?" he asked.

"No," she said. "I am beginning to understand the lesson you are trying to teach me. Grief made me blind and I thought that only I had suffered at the hands of death."

"Why have you come back?" asked the Buddha.

"To ask you to teach me the truth," she replied, "of what death is, what might lie behind and beyond death, and what in me, if anything, will not die."

The Buddha began to teach her:"If you want to know the truth of life and death, you must reflect continually on this: There is only one law in the universe that never changes- that all things change, and that all things are impermanent."

-adapted from "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying," by Sogyal Rinpoche