A New York Times travel article takes readers on a Buddhist Pilgrimage in San Francisco. Interestingly the article is headed Escapes.

“Since the 1800s, San Francisco was the most important gateway for people coming from the Pacific Rim,” said Charlie Chin, artist in residence at the Chinese Historical Society of America in San Francisco, who also leads tours and gives lectures. “They weren’t proselytizing Buddhism, but they brought it here with their other cultural beliefs and practices.”

Today, a spiritual tourist, whether Buddhist or not, can find inspiration if not enlightenment following in the footsteps of American Buddhism on a pilgrimage throughout the Greater Bay Area.

I’d imagine America is rocking following the election results. Some rocking with gladness and others with….all sorts of emotions. I’m keeping a thought for all of the people in this bowl of stew. Now is the time to be still in the midst of conditions and continue the pilgrimage.

This post is in memory of the Halloween nights I’ve sat nervously eating the children’s give-away candy while waiting for the Priory door bell to ring. I felt besieged, I was besieged.

In Edmonton Canada the children came with pillow cases to collect the sweets. In Reading England in the early 1990’s just a few children came, neighbours children. In Eugene Oregon in 1988 I became transfixed by the carved pumpkins arrayed on the porches in our neighbourhood.

You too can carve a pumpkin

This is for all those who are besieged in their homes and for the woman I spoke to this afternoon, now cooking for the oncoming hoards. Who are you going to call?

What, or who, are you going to call on when you become besieged?