Community life involves shared responsibilities and shared work. We have rotas drawn up each week and today was my turn to attend afternoon tea with the resident lay guests. I have often thought this blog reminiscent of the kinds of conversation that develop during one of these informal ‘lay teas’. And, sure enough, a number of familiar themes arose during this afternoons tea.
Let’s see, there was a question about some obscure lines in one of our scriptures about six sticks of ree, and the diamond sceptre branches five which I struggled through while drinking my mug of tea and eating chocolate biscuits. No, that wasn’t reminiscent of a posting that I can remember. There was discussion about feeling at home here and feeling home sick here and about feelings generally and how to deal with them. This is more like it I think.
As a conversational gambit when things slowed down I mentioned February and how I’d written about it on my web log. Then I went on about how February is a hard month, how when living in the country the changing seasons have a greater impact. And here I strayed off the path. So, since plants are influenced by the seasons it makes sense that we would be too… and that’s why Sally might have been feeling sad yesterday! Not very edifying though, likening a guest to a plant! Although I do think we are influenced by the changing of the seasons.
I often feel disturbed as a season moves into another, particularly if the weather is quite different. Considering the moon affects us so profoundly I should think there’s lots we don’t know about the effect of the natural world on us little humans.
February and March…. The months of the tail end of winter when we anticipate the warmer weather like Becket’s two guys waiting for Godot. Your entry for Friday was very evocative, the description of hurrying through the cold winds to evening zazen and the calm afterwards. Tells it like it is.
I also found your last post very evocative – it reminded me how important the changes in seasons are. I’ve been out in the garden, getting all excited at all the plants just beginning to push their way up out of the cold and the dark. That’s what is wonderful about February: after the long winter rest the signs of energy and renewal are all there. I for one can’t wait for the changes. Perhaps your guest might be honoured to be likened to a plant. I can’t remember who it was wrote that we can see Heaven in a wild flower.
And I’m glad, after your explanation the significance of leaving messages, that I have finally worked out how to do it.
I cheated – looked it up on Google.
William Blake – Auguries of Innocence
To see a world in a grain of sand
And heaven in a wild flower
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour
What can I say? Heaven in a wildflower and eternity in an hour…
Thank you kind people for joining me in my musings.
And welcome back John. It is always good to have your reflective input on these pages. The wildflower that signals spring for me is the primrose which is such a hopefull little plant. Abundant in Sussex, where I wandered the woods as a child. Yes, I think I even touched a piece of heaven in those woods in spring time, could go to the very spot.