A Warrior Monk in the City of St. Francis - Part 2: A Journey to the Sunset

I need to start this blog post with a thanks to my friends... Francis for letting me stay at his flat, Steve for helping me keep track of my place in Sac, and Johnny for giving me comic relief and "my daily dose of start-ass." So with the thanks said, I'm off in the Sunset district, at a small cafe called Park Chow on 9th Ave., having a glass of OJ and a coffee. It's interesting to listen to the conversations that people have while your around and they don't know you're listening. A middle-aged couple were sitting next to me as I was starting up my laptop and discussing the way that companies and workers relate. There was this constant theme that 'I hope what goes around comes around.' in the conversation.... and I couldn't help thinking that it just seemed a bit too sunny an outlook on the human condition. It's been my experience that history teaches us that equity and equality only come after a great deal of strife (usually with those in power winning again) and the poor being killed outright if not just oppressed more than previously done. The powerful have a vested interest in the status quo because they have learned how to work the 'game' they are in.... they don't want the rules to change. And we, we ordinary, everyday, working Joe's just trying to get by are beneath them and not worthy of consideration except where we intersect their own, narrow, self-interests. Depressing... well, I'm note trying to be. I've come thru the interregnum in my life to write just as plainly and straight forwardly as I can without throwing smoke out my ass.

The present circumstances doesn't mean that you give up. Rather, face your situation with a sense of realistic dignity that you know the limitations of your present moment and that you'll do what you can in your own space to make what surounds you a better place as much or as gradually as you can. After mom's passing the quote I keep in my pocket from Napoleon became even more pressing for me... he wrote, "There is no immortality but the memories that are left in the minds of men." OK, I can accept that since I am staring my end in the face ever more clearly with every day that I advance through the Universe and my place in it. "But isn't that rather  nihilistic?" No, not in fact. It is an imperative instead... You have only this life and the time that goes with it. Do what you can, but don't waste it. I remember Tony Curtis being interviewed shortly before his death and he had a quote that has just stuck in my little brain, "Service to humanity is the rent we pay for the time we get to spend on this earth." This has helped me to know why I walk the Earth the way I do and why I teach. I am just doing what I can to make the world a little better place when I leave it than when I came into it.

"Be the change you wish to see in the world."
   -Mahatma Ghandi

A Warrior Monk in the City of St. Francis - Part 1: The Interregnum

I recognize that I have a bad habit of writing in spurts and fits and starts... It is a failing of mine I admit it. But the last year and some odd months have been trying. After my mother then my dog passed, I was in one of my longest periods between significant relationships, and the trials of working a year at school in  20% overtime capacity, I was a bit stretched.... stretched quite, quite thin indeed.

But now I find myself with some new energy, money to put plans into action, and a desire to travel to The City as often as I can. It is a supposition my many evolutionary biologists at this point in time that evolution is not as quite as smooth a process as we were lead to believe when we were taught about it in college. This notion of smooth, gradual change is not as readily accepted... and this is true of the evolution of a man in his life. This interregnum period of my life after the passing of my mother and the death of my plan to be BOTH a lawyer and a teacher has been one point of leaps, falls, fits, and depressions that has changed my view point again... a bit drastically. I will have to say not in a dark or foreboding manner, but one of resignation of the clarity of reality. Now comes the challenges of what to do with that reality.

Today, at this very instant of writing this newest blog entry, I am sitting in somewhat  familiar environs in a dessert shop named Toy Boat Dessert Co. in the Inner Richmond District in San Francisco. With my new look in clothing I walk the streets looking like a warrior monk in the City of St. Francis. My jacket with its built-in hood and my M-Frame Heater Oakley glasses give me a look that as a young man I would never have thought would have been me... Such has been my evolution from simple young geek to the man I am today; flush with experiences, training in many disciplines, and an outlook on the world that it is what it is and I must be the change that I want to see in the world.


Addendum:

Student: "Mr. Meredith, why are you always going to San Francisco all the time?"
Meredith: "Because, I'm trying to establish a wonderful relationship with a beautiful woman."

The Summer Vacation, Part One

Well, so far the vacation has been very non-hectic. It seems that when I loose the structure of the work day I get pretty inertia filled and sleep a lot. Don’t hate the vacation.... become a teacher! [ Just remember that for every up, there are a more than commensurate number of downs... hey, life’s a balancing act. You have your ups, I have mine.] At this very moment, I am working on my blog, starting the first-draft of Chapter One of my new novel In the Garden of the Warrior Monk, and have finished a series of projects in my garden (said inspiration for the aforementioned book) including plantings, landscaping preliminaries, and the back-yard is now set to be automatically watered along with the water cooling for the roof of my house when I’m home. So far a good, relaxing, and yet productive time.

I still have various projects to get to such as: [1] Getting the robots back into shape for cleaning chores. [2] Finishing the automation of the Front Yard [3] Finishing working on some weapons projects and starting the first forms of my own Bushido Kyo or Kai (I haven’t decided which it should be) [4] and some home projects like finishing the painting the living room and replacing the iMac with a new Intel-based iMac. But I have time... so far no calls for interviews from the boss so we’re still up in the air as to what the department is going to look like at the beginning of the Fall Semester. With the State of California’s Budget, is it any great surprise? And finally, I have a great party for mid-summer planned with Tessa Evans singing for my guests for about 3 hours. I hope everyone I’ve invited can make it. But now, this instant, the novel’s the thing where in I’ll catch the conscience of the King!

The Tiger and the Mantis - A Zen Tale

"The Tiger and the Mantis - A Zen Tale"

© Marcus Alden Meredith, November 2010

The Tiger was well known in the deep forests of China for being the fastest animal. He could rush out from from any hiding spot at a great speed. He could almost out race his own growl and roar it was said. All the creatures of the forest feared the speed and ferocity of the Tiger. The Tiger was very proud of his strength and stamina. There were none in the bamboo forests that could defeat him.

One day while walking through the tall, dewy grass in the morning to track down his breakfast, he caught a sound that he had not heard before. The buzzing was not something he recognized... and it grew louder and louder each second. Suddenly, a Mantis landed upon the Tiger's nose. He was panting from having flown in the heavy morning air and was dripping with dew drops on his hard shell body.

"Pardon me, Lord Tiger for landing on your nose but I have been having difficulty flying in the heavy morning air and..."

But before the Mantis could finish his explanation, the Tiger yelled, "Get off! Get off me now!" Then he shook his head so hard the the Mantis was flipped up into the air. Proud of his strength as usual, the Tiger began to smile. But while flying through the air, the Mantis effortlessly somersaulted in mid air, spread his six legs and landed upon the Tiger's left ear.

"Please wait, Lord Tiger and let me ask a gracious favor that I might..."

"Get off, insolent insect!" and shook his might head again now from side to side. "Get oooofffff!" he yelled again.

But this time the Mantis held on with his forelimbs and said again, " Mighty Lord Tiger let me ex...."

Too late. The mighty Tiger began to run through the grass. The blades struck the Mantis as the Tiger ran. But the Mantis held fast. Faster and faster the might Tiger ran and every time he sped up, the Mantis dug the tines of his forelimbs deeper and deeper into the Tiger's left ear.

"Oooooofff I say!" the Tiger kept yelling. The Tiger ran through one field, then a grove of trees, then another deeper field and on and on. The Elephants stopped dead in their tracks as the Tiger ran past them. The Water Buffaloes scattered and the Deer fled but were amazed that the Tiger was not after them. Faster and faster and faster he went.

"Please off me! I'M .... GETTING.... TIRED!!" he yelled again and again. " JUST LEAVE ME ALONE!" he yelled like a child... and all the while the Mantis was firmly attached.

Finally the Tiger slowed and stopped.... panting heavily with each moment. And then...

He just fell down on all fours in the tall, dewy grass trying to catch his breath and exhausted from the fastest running he had ever done in his life....

And still the Mantis was there on his left ear.

After a moment, the Mantis let go, deftly scrambled over the Tiger's head to his nose, turned and looked him in the eyes. Then, he bowed a deep bow, and said, "Oh Mighty Lord Tiger, my apologies for what must have startled you. I merely wanted to ask permission to dry myself in your lustrous coat of fur so that I might remove the heavy dew that was keeping me from flying off and had put me on your nose. I meant no disrespect of your might form."

The Tiger was astounded at the grace and courtesy of the Mantis. He now felt bad about being so short with the Mantis. "Is that all you desired? I would gladly have let you had I known you were such a gracious insect. Why had you not told me so?"

Still gracious, the Mantis said, "Lord Tiger, I did try but perhaps you could not hear me over the wind in your ears. Perhaps I should have spoken louder but that is not my way."

Now the Tiger felt quite sheepish and that he had done the Mantis a great wrong. "My apologies to YOU Great Mantis. I had perceived you as a problem and was running to get rid of you."

The Mantis, now dry from the wind from the Tiger's great run, bowed deeply once again, spread his wings, and prepared to fly away. "My Lord Tiger, I am a Mantis, with arms that catch the fastest fly and climb the highest trees with no fear. You cannot run away from me any more than you can run away from any problem in life."

And with this, the Mantis flew off into the morning light of dappled shadows in the forest canopy. The Tiger remained in the grass... meditating on what truth the Mantis had just revealed to him.