Doing it Again

Okay, I'm looking out my window again. (Resting my eyes after writing for several hours. And yes, you're right. I really do seem to do this a lot.) Immediately outside my window is a lawn. Beyond that is a road just wide enough for two cars and which ends in a cul-de-sac a little past my building. Beyond the road is a four acre pond with woods on the other side. The geese and ducks are swimming with their respective families of goslings and ducklings.

The road is quiet and safe. I often see parents walking with their children or teaching them to ride a bike. But today, the little girl from the next building went by pushing a baby stroller. (I think that's what they're called. I don't have much experience in this area. ;-)) She's only a head taller than the covered stroller. It's a gloriously sunny day and the lawn and woods are a deep green. The little girl has long blonde hair, which blows in the breeze.  

As she was passing by on her third or fourth circuit of walking, I heard the baby begin to cry. The girl stopped her very professional manner of walking, went around to the front of the stroller, put both hands on the bar in front of the stroller, and leaned in, seeming to access the situation. She gazed for a second or two, and then with her very professional manner stood up again and returned to her position behind the stroller and resumed her brisk, efficient walk. Apparently this assessment also assured the baby that it was okay because when she came back into sight again, the baby was no longer crying. 

There's no great message here. Just a few minutes of old-fashioned tranquility and good mid-western values. I see a little girl looking after her baby sister or brother. I see a group of young women sitting together on lawn chairs next to the grill while one woman brings food to the others. I also see a father showing his young son how to throw a ball. Nothing exceptional. Nothing dramatic. Just family members and friends sharing and looking after each other.

Perfect. 

The Only Really Good Stuff is at the Store

"Like most people visiting Asia, I have experienced the constant dripping of a rain of epiphanies during my stays.  One of these occurred on a trip to Northern Thailand, as I was standing on the edge of a new friend’s yard.  I admired the grove of towering bamboo that edged her garden boundary, in a row so straight I could have marked it off with a piece of thread, with not a single trace of bamboo growing out into the road. 

‘How do you do that?’ I asked her.  ‘How do you keep the bamboo from growing all over the place, outside of your yard?’

‘Well, that’s easy,’ she replied.  ‘Everyone knows how good bamboo shoots are in their dinner.  The minute one shows its head outside of my garden, someone takes it home.’

‘Oh,’ I said, ‘In Canada we hack down the bamboo and throw it in the bushes and buy bamboo shoots in a can at the store.’

But that is what North America is all about.  We have been trained that if it is right in front of our face (e.g. free, accessible) it is somehow inferior, and that the only really good stuff is at the store." (Food Security for the Faint of Heart: Keeping Your Larder Full in Lean Times, by Robin Wheeler, pg. 95)

In North America, the lives are many people are those of abundance. Most North Americans living now have only known good times. Sure there have been some difficult times, but they didn't touch everyone and were soon forgotten. And so we believe the past is forever behind us and the future will be an ever-increasing expansion of technology and scientific developments. 

Our distant ancestors were hunter-gatherers. Our more recent ancestors were farmers. What are we? Consumers. We do not grow food. Nor do we know the wealth of food in the wild that surrounds us.  What we do know is "charge it."  And freezers and microwaves so we can eat the artificial convenience food we charged at the supermarket.

We pride ourselves on being educated and not needing to get our hands dirty as our ancestors did. We believe the good times will go on forever. And we push the past even further away.

We do not live in a sustainable manner because we believe dominion over the earth gave us the right to plunder it. We do not do without so there will be something left for future generations. We are living in a tiny bubble of unprecedented prosperity that cannot be sustained, because we are using up the world's resources.

We are hacking down the bamboo, throwing it in the bushes, and buying bamboo shoots in a can at the store.

Timing is Everything

One day I was doing prostrations in my dorm room. The session was fairly long for me and I felt wonderful. As I left the building to go to the main building, I saw another nun. She approached me, looked at me for a second and announced that she had something to tell me. She admitted that, actually, she had had something for a few days but was afraid it would make me angry. (I know nuns are not supposed to become angry but this is still samsara.) She proceeded to tell me her news, and I smiled and said no problem. She was very relieved and we happily walked together to the other building.

To say something to others, we need to find the right words AND the right time.  

Confessions of a Budding Locavore

 

For the past several months I have been going to the farmer's market in Goshen, the town just south of here. This past Saturday I went for my bi-weekly shopping. I live in an area that is next to one of the largest Amish areas in the US. There are also small farms scattered around the area so there is enough food grown even in winter to enable the market to stay open year round.

I could buy the food cheaper at a supermarket, but it wouldn't be the same food. The salad mix I bought from Kate who runs Sustainable Greens, which is just over the state line in Michigan, was picked the day before. Her micro mix is an assortment of spicy greens that adds a wonderful bite to my salads. I also got fresh asparagus from the Amish woman who I have been buying sweet potatoes from. A few months ago, I bought some hulled black walnuts from her. She cautioned me to be careful as they had been hulled by her elderly mother. (The walnuts were perfectly hulled without a trace of a shells.) She doesn't have any more sweet potatoes now, but I got some beautiful locally grown ones at the Maple City Market, the food co-op in Goshen.

Before leaving the farmer's market, I also bought some locally made cheese and fresh radishes. The tiny baby carrots (natural ones not the machine-produced ones sold at supermarkets) were not available this time but I had bought two batches last time and delighted in their colors and sweetness. I still had some eggs from the farmer who assured me he had no roosters so his free-range, naturally raised chickens only gave infertile eggs.

At the co-op I also bought Trader's Point Creamery raspberry yogurt. Located in central Indiana, Trader's Point's cows are pasture raised and are not given artificial hormones or antibiotics. Nor does the creamery use pesticides or artificial fertilizers on their land. The yogurt is wonderful and comes in glass bottles that are ideal for storing other foods when empty or for recycling.

I can't get greens like this at the supermarket. Or asparagus. Or raspberry yogurt.

At the supermarket, I can't talk to the farmers and ask how their food was raised. I can't buy dairy products secure in the knowledge the cows and chickens were raised humanely, and the land was treated with respect and in a sustainable manner. I can't buy food that was picked the day before at the height of its taste and food value, and which traveled not 1500 or even a few thousand miles, but merely ten or thirty or a hundred miles. I can't experience the joy of seeing that a favorite food is now in season and relish the taste made all the more enjoyable by its rarity.

But at the farmer's market and co-op, I can.

I can talk to the farmers. I can buy food raised for taste, not for its ability to travel great distances. I can eat dairy products knowing the animals were raised with care and respect. I can enjoy local foods knowing the land they grew on was carefully stewarded, not plundered until it was worthless. I can chat with the people standing next to me as we wait our turn to make our purchases. I can drive home, relaxed and happy in the knowledge that I did my very best to  "do no harm."

Hatred is a Poison

"To take revenge on trouble-makers is only to create more problems and disturbances. You must realise that negative feelings and hostile actions could only bring harm and suffering to both you and the trouble-maker. In order to take retaliatory action, you have to harbour intense hatred in your heart. This hatred is like a poison. Since the poison is initially in you, surely it will harm you before it can harm anyone else. Before you throw a blazing iron at another, you get burned first. Your action merely goes to show that there is no difference between you and your opponent.

By hating others, you only give them power over you. You do not solve your problem. If you become angry with a person who simply smiles back at you, then you will feel defeated and miserable. Since he did not cooperate with you to fulfill your wish, it is he who is victorious."

"We can live happily without fanning the fires of hatred. Perhaps you may not be strong enough to extend compassionate love to your enemies; but for the sake of your own health and happiness and that of everybody else, you must at least learn to forgive and forget."

~ Ven. Dr. K. Sri Dhammananda