Sunday, August 10, 2003
Today looks to be an anxious day. Tim didn't call yesterday, the owner of my 'new company', so I don't officially have a new offer. I want to quit Mon AM! I'm such a case about waiting for certain things. Once I've made a decision, its made and I want to implement everything immediately. Cindy said that he'd call with an offer this weekend, but we were going round about whether he should call, or write a written offer. Perhaps there was some confusion.
I really don't want to give a full two weeks. Since they cut my salary, I think one week is sufficient, don't you?
+++++
I made sushi last night for the first time. I told my husband that if I had ordered that sushi in a restaurant, I'd be very mad! But I certainly enjoyed making and eating it. Sushi isn't something you make perfectly the first time. I had to laugh, because it is such a Japanesse food--it just reeks of zen. You could spend a lifetime making sushi as meditation and still have more to learn. Startling color combinations and beauty. And it is so ephemeral.
I forgot to buy avocado, so my sushi was made of cucumbers (english), carrots, and oyster mushrooms (both sauteed and raw). For G, I made some without mushrooms. The main problem with my sushi was that there didn't seem to be enough in the middle--too unbalanced. I wasn't very keen on the nori (the seaweed wrap) that I bought either. It was a bit thick.
I am freaking out that Phoebe is sensitive to wasabi though. She never reacts to anything that I eat, so I didn't think twice about eating wasabi at dinner on Friday night with the girls. Yesterday, she pooped 7 times--compared to her normal every other day or so schedule, that's bad. Poor thing got all red. I'm hoping it wasn't the wasabi because I ate even more yesterday with my sushi, not having made the connection yet.
++++
Pema mentions in her third lecture (in The Wisdom of No Escape) one of Buddha's discourses on the four kinds of horses: the excellent horse, the good horse, the poor horse, and the really bad horse. The excellent horse moves before the whip even touches its back, the good horse runs at the lightest touch of the whip. the poor horse doesn't go until it feels pain, and the very bad horse doesn't budge until the pain penetrates to the marrow of its bones. Pema comments that practice isn't about being the best horse or the good horse or the poor horse or the worst horse. " It's about finding our own true nature and speaking from that, acting from that."
I've often thought that I am a very lucky person in a way that my mother died when I was young and my sister died young. Not because this made me happy, but because it was and is the saddest thing imaginable. Learning to cope with pain and loss and finding the good in life to go on with---it is its own blessing. Death is the place that I come from. It is where my life started anew. I think about the comment that the bad horse doesn't budge until the pain penetrates to the marrow of is bones and I think, "that's me." Without black there is no white. Without pain, happiness is pale. I think that I appreciate things so much more because I know how precious they really are. ¶ 7:47 AM
I really don't want to give a full two weeks. Since they cut my salary, I think one week is sufficient, don't you?
+++++
I made sushi last night for the first time. I told my husband that if I had ordered that sushi in a restaurant, I'd be very mad! But I certainly enjoyed making and eating it. Sushi isn't something you make perfectly the first time. I had to laugh, because it is such a Japanesse food--it just reeks of zen. You could spend a lifetime making sushi as meditation and still have more to learn. Startling color combinations and beauty. And it is so ephemeral.
I forgot to buy avocado, so my sushi was made of cucumbers (english), carrots, and oyster mushrooms (both sauteed and raw). For G, I made some without mushrooms. The main problem with my sushi was that there didn't seem to be enough in the middle--too unbalanced. I wasn't very keen on the nori (the seaweed wrap) that I bought either. It was a bit thick.
I am freaking out that Phoebe is sensitive to wasabi though. She never reacts to anything that I eat, so I didn't think twice about eating wasabi at dinner on Friday night with the girls. Yesterday, she pooped 7 times--compared to her normal every other day or so schedule, that's bad. Poor thing got all red. I'm hoping it wasn't the wasabi because I ate even more yesterday with my sushi, not having made the connection yet.
++++
Pema mentions in her third lecture (in The Wisdom of No Escape) one of Buddha's discourses on the four kinds of horses: the excellent horse, the good horse, the poor horse, and the really bad horse. The excellent horse moves before the whip even touches its back, the good horse runs at the lightest touch of the whip. the poor horse doesn't go until it feels pain, and the very bad horse doesn't budge until the pain penetrates to the marrow of its bones. Pema comments that practice isn't about being the best horse or the good horse or the poor horse or the worst horse. " It's about finding our own true nature and speaking from that, acting from that."
I've often thought that I am a very lucky person in a way that my mother died when I was young and my sister died young. Not because this made me happy, but because it was and is the saddest thing imaginable. Learning to cope with pain and loss and finding the good in life to go on with---it is its own blessing. Death is the place that I come from. It is where my life started anew. I think about the comment that the bad horse doesn't budge until the pain penetrates to the marrow of is bones and I think, "that's me." Without black there is no white. Without pain, happiness is pale. I think that I appreciate things so much more because I know how precious they really are. ¶ 7:47 AM
