Dandelions & Veronica

My May-green lawn is full of yellow dandelions and tiny blue-blooming veronica. It's beautiful. But i look at it and see weeds. The creeping veronica has crept all over the shady sections of my lawn, which might be okay, but it creeps right into my flowerbeds. Arghhh! It is so small, i have to be very picky to weed it out.

This is how it goes with beautiful stuff. It's so pretty--colorful or shiny. (Oh, i am a sucker for shiny things.) And then, dissatisfaction sets in. So pretty, but it's weeds in the lawn. So pretty, but it's too much clutter. So pretty, but it's more complicated than i thought. So pretty, but now i have to fix it.

Dissatisfaction is our clue that stress has arrived in our minds. Beauty is only skin deep. Beauty turns out to be stress in disguise.

We can aim for a beautiful mind, which is beautiful through and through. Beauty without stress.

Daffodil Patience

Yesterday, 2 people asked me why they have daffodils in places they've never planted them. Stray daffodils show up 20 to 50 feet away from an established clump.

Since rodents find the taste of daffodils offensive, it's hard to imagine a squirrel taking the time and trouble to bury a daffodil bulb.

The next, most likely scenario is that the daffodils reproduce from seed. Yes, this is possible. For us, this method requires 5 years of patience. But the garden has all the patience in the world. The garden has all the time in the world, because in the garden, there is no past or future; there is only the timeless Now. The ever-changing Now.

When we notice this Now ourselves, when we see that the world simply unfolds, we too can abide in the calmness of patience.

Spring Comes Fast

Yesterday, the trees were a pale green haze, and today the woods is bowl of salad. Life becomes greener by the hour. Change is happening fast!

We love new growth, the young, the unblemished. It makes us feel vibrant, alive.

Then living sets in, and we become calloused. We go on autopilot. We take things for granted.

Everything must change.
Even us.

Beech Leaves Let Go

Last year's beech leaves are finally falling off beech trees today. Pushed out, i suppose, by new green leaves, rightly curled into pointy buds.

How long do we hold on to old grudges, old traumas? We hold on, hold on, hold on. Eventually our mind lets go. In retrospect, we wonder: What was that about?

While we are holding on, our minds and bodies hold tension--perhaps an unrecognized tension because we are so used to it.

New growth happens when we finally let go.

Celebrating the Buddha's Birthday

Tonight is the full moon of May--the Flower Moon, according to the MoonPhase app on my smart phone.

In the Buddhism of Thailand and Burma, this full moon is called Wesak and is celebrated as the birthday, the enlightenment day, and the death day of the Buddha. The Buddha was born in Nepal, very near the border with India, where he spent his adult life.

My friend, Florence, from Burma was here this past week. She says that she celebrates her birthday by making donations to monks and other programs she particularly likes.

I'm celebrating the birthday of the Buddha by making a generous donation to my favorite program in Nepal, Nepal Youth Foundation. One of their programs rescues daughters from very poor families who are sold into slavery at the age of 5 or 7.

Generosity is the very first practice recommended by the Buddha. Open your hand, and open your heart. Let go.

Green-Up Day

The first Saturday in May is Green-Up Day in Vermont. All over the state, volunteers gather at 9 a.m. to receive a batch of green trash bags and their road assignments. They walk along the roadside and pick up the accumulated winter's trash. It's a family event with lots of kids and parents. I drove the length of Vermont today (read: winding 2-lane roads through the mountains), and saw dozens of full green trash bags sitting beside the road, waiting for pick-up on Monday.

Vermont passed a "bottle bill" decades ago, requiring a 5-cent deposit on many (but not all) bottles and cans. It's meant to make people think twice before tossing a nickel out the car window. Still, there are a surprising number of bottles in the greening grass.

Where do we throw our own inner trash? Do we throw it into the public right-of-way by getting mad about a delay at the airport, cutting off a rude driver on the highway, or talking loudly on our cell phone in public places? Do we say cute, rude things about people we know? Do we indulge in a bit of back-biting about co-workers when they aren't present?

The guidelines for Wise Speech include speaking kindly, saying what is useful and beneficial, and speaking in a timely manner. We are both straight-forward and gentle in our speech.

Let's clean up the edges of our own spiritual path by speaking green-ly and cleanly.

Clippers with a Broken Hip

My clippers broke their hip while doing an ordinary chore around the home flowerbeds.

Unfortunately, there are no hip replacements for clippers, so farewell dear clippers. Into the grave of the landfill you go.

I won't grieve long however, because i'll replace you with some bright, shiny, new clippers, and then i'll fall in love with them.