For those who care, who are the carers of those who need caring for, nine bows of gratitude.
For the nurse who was punched to-day, by a patient suffering from dementia, Bows.
For the elderly man with terminal cancer who cared for his wife until the time now come, to be cared for. Valiant man!

Nine bows to all those who, alone or with others, face the task of helping another to get through another day, and another day and another and another…the unrelenting another day. I’ve been there and those days have been privileged days. Perhaps those days never end.

In many ways giving is easy receiving care, not so easy. I hope I have the good grace and fortitude to be cared for, should that time ever come.

The weekend came and went as did very many guests. One person described the gathering on Sunday as a huge block of gratitude. We had gathered together to celebrate the tenth anniversary memorial for Rev. Master Jiyu-Kennett and these occasions are indeed an opportunity to express gratitude and thereby circulate spiritual merit. That’s to offer the power of the ‘good’, that flows from selflessly giving, which liberates beings including oneself.

At the end of the ceremony there is an offertory giving expression to the gratitude we share for our Founders life and work and our collective wish to offer the merit of the gathering to all beings. The offertory opened with: The Dharma Body of the Buddha cannot be seen so long as one is within duality for it is beyond birth and death, filling all things.

The fact that all is of one body, the Dharma Body of the Buddha, has become of special significants recently. There are quite a few people of my acquaintance who are dealing with cancer at the moment. Every situation has its life drama and hard decisions surrounding it. For example I’ve been talking with a woman whose relatively young daughter is due to have surgery in just over a week’s time. The mother knows it will be a strain on her health to be in the hospital during the surgery. Even so she will more than likely be there close by, sitting still and offering merit.

Although I don’t as far as I know have cancer, I’m non the less dealing with it. How could it be otherwise?

The view from here to over there, towards Scotland.

Much activity this week in preparation for a lot of visitors coming to the monastery, some monastic brothers and sisters will be coming as well as a whole host of lay practitioners. People have started to arrive already.

Relatives and friends coming to visit. Memories of my parents and relatives coming here, of my aunt standing in the middle of the ceremony hall and announcing in a loud plumby voice, “I do like a BIG room”. Perhaps she was remembering the large houses she had lived in as a ‘gal’ and had aspired to return to for most of her life, but never did. That large room will be filled on Sunday to celebrate the tenth anniversary memorial for my Master, Rev. Master Jiyu-Kennett.
I was always anxious around my parents visiting, even as early as school sports days at primary school. “PLEASE don’t come”. Now I hear children actually want there parents to come to such events! Here is a chap talking about the parental visit you hardly ever imagine will happen, but does.

Anyway, we are in full preparation mode and once again I find myself with days filled with activity. The kesa now made, onwards to formatting photograph for a notice board. I’ll blog again when time permits.

A kesa drying on the line behind Edmonton Priory.

Photo taken early this year.

I don’t find it easy to write about the Kesa because of the need to talk on several levels all at the same time. So I’ll not try right at this moment as I’m off to make one, and that’s a good few hours work ahead.

When Rev. Master Jiyu gave the first, five striped, brown kesa to a lay woman at Shasta Abbey it fell on me to show the recipient how to put it on and wear it, as well as take it off again. At a certain point she got a tad flustered about the whole thing. Out rolled from who knows where, “Well, what you are doing each time you put on the kesa is wrapping yourself in the Life of the Buddha’s and Ancestors”, “So you are wrapped in the Precepts, right”?

Housekeeping.
I’ve been a bit tardy around responding to comments these past days or is it weeks. However today I went back and left some. The dial-up speed here is 31.2 kbps and so I use what time I have in the day for making new postings rather than responding to comments. It is always good to see what you have to say though and will endeavour to respond when I can.

Now, off to the sewing room.

Each autumn I do some heart searching in connection with being vaccinated against flu. To have or not to have? And not having much information to go on, for or against, and not being keen on injections anyway, I opt out. But is that irresponsible? Is my not having the injection putting others at risk?

The other day I heard that the local doctor was coming out into our wild valley with a bag full of vaccine. Apparently he comes because there are enough of the community who gets vacinated to make a Herd immunity (community)! And presumably worth while for the doctor to make the journey. A heard immunity, by the way, occurs when the vaccination of the majority of the population (or herd) provides protection to un-vaccinated individuals. So I’m grateful for all those who make it possible for the rest of us to remain un-vaccinated, yet protected.

The other subject that has been before me recently is, now taking a deep breath, Psychoneuroimmunology. In a nut shell, this long word encapsulates the truth that mind and body are not separate. A truth that Buddhism teaches and proves true, in fact the discipline of Psychoneuro…….ology indicates that meditation really helps the immune system.

And for people facing cancer the above discipline means that meditation and similar activities can effect recovery, significantly. However, a big however, in Zen, meditation is complete in itself and not something one does to achieve or get anything, or get rid of anything.

Time to spare a thought for all those who are living with seriously compromised immune systems.