A Buddha's Birthday

Merry Christmas, Frohe Weihnacht, Wesolych Swiat Bozego Narodzenia. Happy Birthday to the Buddha from Bethlehem.  Here in the Nordrhein-Westfaelischer Space, tonight, Christmas Eve, is the celebration, with gift-sharing and a family meal, as it is in Poland and was in Mayfield, Pennsylvania.

For me, it is a special time, even here on Steinstrasse, where I am alone, but not lonely.  My meditation today will be a special one in which I bring everyone I have ever loved or been loved by into my mind.  It will be crowded, but it will be wonderful.

I remember many things about Christmas Past, including trains and planes and tinsel and ornaments from the old country, carols and kolendy, and on this morning, running about the neighborhood wishing all of the neighbors "Na szczęście, na zdrowie, na tę świętą Wigilię!" in the hopes of receiving a few coins, an orange, or a handful of nuts.

It's okay, I've got enough coins, oranges, and nuts for one old man, you don't owe me anything, except maybe if you'd keep your Christmas Spirit everyday.  I'd like that, so would all of the Buddhas.......Merry Chritmas!!!

The Moat Behind the House

There's a calm stretch of water running behind Steinstrasse 1A.  It is a diversion of the River Aa to protect the walls of the city from attack.  Today, it houses herons, ducks, geese, the occasional swan, grebes, muskrats, and all manner of aquatic insects.  I derive a sense of peace from it, knowing that it protects me from my enemies, which, in a psychological sense, are wrongly directed desires, the purveyors of fear and anger, pain and suffering.   I can hold them at bay with the psychological moat of right mindfulness, which in its turn creates the other seven folds in the eight fold path, but in times of laziness, it is easy enough to stand on the balcony and stare at the water!

I put bread I've forgotten to eat on the table on the balcony and my winged friends come to eat it.  It puts them at ease with me and I am given an occasional concert for my small efforts.  The birds and the water come together to form a small meditation of their own which makes me even more certain that the chain of cause and effect has placed me on this perch and it is my task to make the best of it.  Given the time of the year, the lateness of the sunrise and the shortness of the days, the moat is a sustaining factor in holding sanity close and the primeval depression at bay.

On the other side of the house, is the Gaensemarkt, where, in this time of year, a village of huts house fairy tale characters, little automatons who recite their tales for children.  There's Frau Holle who makes it snow, Hansel and Gretel, Rotkaepchen (Little Red Riding Hood) and the Wolf, and a little railroad that carries the children around and around.  With fairy tales surrounding me, it is a good winter day.  May yours be even better!

Tales of the Weihnachtsmarkt......

The Woman Who ate Potatoes

I used to have a friend who liked to eat at Weihnachtsmarkts.  She especially like the baked potatoes with sour cream.  I would always eat mine with herb butter.  I saw her out of the corner of my eye the other day during the lunch hour, standing at the same corner of the same booth where we used to eat potatoes together, and she was eating a potato.  

It's one of the things I like about the Christmas Season, this ability to make all memories good ones.  I can say Bah, Humbug, but I never mean it.  So, to the woman who ate potatoes, and to all my fond memories, I wish you a fun and peaceful Advent Season and may the twelve days of Christmas be 365!