BODY Chapter 13.0

  Monday 6/17, 5:30am

Jack showed up very early long before Zazen was set to begin. He was uncertain if the Roshi would be there. But after his problem last week, it seemed likely that he would be careful to be on time. The gate to the back garden was open. He sat in the garden while the sun brightened the sky, looking at the sand, which was covered with leaves. The wind had been high enough last night to bring even small branches down on the sand from the neighboring yards, the one with the large oak or elm or whatever it was responsible for most of the trash. It was very old, maybe the oldest resident of the neighborhood, Jack thought. But it was dying. It was dumping branches that were already dried out and the rest of the branches, the ones that were still attached, stretched like deformed arms and evil magician fingers upward, dry, cracked, gray, and almost leafless.

            The night had been sleepless. Jack had tossed for a while then he had given up. It was Keiko’s advice. If you cannot go to sleep in fifteen minutes, She had said, then get up until you feel tired. Don’t fight it. He had taken the Trazodone. It didn’t help. He was going to take more but got scared of overdosing himself or something. So he just sat in the dark for a long time. It was the dinner. It had been a disaster. He did not know why he had gone. He should have known better. He knew it wasn’t time for this. He had just started stalking to Noor. Now to be where she lived was just too much. He knew it as soon as the door opened and he saw Noor’s face.

Maryam had invited him. When he arrived he could tell it was almost as if she had played a trick on her friends. She was punking them and Jack was the nasty trap they had fallen into.  Noor did not know what to say. She tried to be nice. Clearly, Maryam had not told Sameer either. He was pissed. That was all there was to it. He hardly said a word. He ate nothing, but just glared at Jack the whole time he was there.

            Maryam introduced him. This is Jack. He rides with us to work everyday. I think we should get to know each other better. I want you to meet Sameer, my distant cousin and our landlord. Sameer did not even look at him. The landlord remark seemed to be a dig at him. And you know Noor, our cook for this evening. Sameer was silent and so was Noor. So Maryam was forced to provide the commentary and the entertainment. She became a talk show host. So Jack? What do you do? Where were you born? What is your favorite color? Any silly question she could think of. Then they started to talk about movies. Have you seen the newest superman movie? Maryam asked. I don’t get to go to many movies. Jack said. So what was the last movie you saw? Maryam asked pointlessly. It was in school. I was taking a class in film. It was monster movie. It was class on Horror movies. I think the last one was a couple of mummy movies. The old one from the black and white days and then the one with Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weitz. So what is that about? It is about, well, …  the curse of the mummy’s tomb where the scientists that dug up King Tut’s tomb are hunted down by the mummy who guards it and kills them. But they get away from the mummy by well confusing him: he thinks that Rachel Weitz is his queen or something. So she is able to save them by getting him mixed up. Something like that. I also saw the other one so I get the plots kind of mixed up.

But, if I may be so bold, Maryam became a kind of lecturer, in a sense it is the confusion of love that saves the mummy stealers. I did go to college myself, in spite of the fact that I cannot get a job other than cleaning up after other people’s shit. Maryam said. It sounds like a good movie. I did see the Brendan Fraser thing, but I did not really pay attention to what was happening. I was too busy with my date as I recall. Well, Maryam said after a pause. And how did you do in the class? I dropped out. Jack said. I dropped out in the last week because I could not write the final paper. Maryam added. Well, when I was in school, I did write all the papers and I cannot tell you what good that did me. But yes, you should finish school. I must say you are older than I thought a college student might usually be. Well, Jack said with trepidation and with a determination. I was in the Air Force for a few years. He looked at the group to see what impression they might get from this. Did you bomb people in Iraq? Sameer said with some edge to his voice. I did not go to Iraq. Jack said. I worked on computers at an air base, paperwork mostly. I was a clerk. Sameer did not follow up on this. Noor was too tense to say anything. Maryam said That’s enough of old times. We live where nothing from the past can be allowed to diddle with the present. We must be new creatures! Maryam announced this. We are the new creatures. She said. There rest of the evening seemed to drag on until Jack finally thought it was okay to leave. On his way out he apologized quietly to Noor for coming at all.

Chapter 13.1

Hi! David said with unusual brightness. He had been there all along. Jack was startled out of his skin. David propped open the wooden door to the Center. I saw you here. I was not sure you wanted to see me. You should have knocked. Jack then answered,I was thinking. Yes you were. David said with some kind of energy that did not seem to match the morning. The session does not start for another half hour; maybe we have twenty minutes before the first people arrive. George will be here pretty soon to rake the garden. Do you want to be left alone? No. Jack said rather quickly. Okay. Do you want to go inside and talk in the interview room. David looked at him. Then we won’t be disturbed. Maybe that’s best.

The interview room was the small bare room where the Roshi spoke with each devotee, often during Zazen, bringing in one person at a time, to give them some kind of personal encouragement, sometimes a koan, sometimes a short lecture on their process. It was a familiar place for Jack. He had been there many times. Usually the Roshi seemed to be a little perplexed at him. Jack always felt he was not succeeding at getting even the most basic things right, the breathing, the concentration, nothing seemed to go right for him. Roshi had tried many practices. Counting, visualizing the body of the Buddha, colors, objects. It was a personal search each person must make individually, with their own personality and their preferences, he said, to try to find the process, the motives, the things that would bring about this focus. The first goal however, Roshi always said, is he not to fight it. Don’t let distraction become the enemy. It is not that important. It does not deserve the status of a real. Jack was fighting it much harder than most. He was too angry about not getting it. Roshi told him often. You do not fight your distraction; you watch your distraction. It is not something you cast out. This is not an exorcism. It is a witnessing.

David sat in his usual place and waited for a long while. He thought that this impromptu meeting might be about him, about this failure. His weakness might have been damaging to Jack; he could see that. He was sorry about that. David was ready to talk about that or anything else. But he let the silence fill the room first. Then he began. I am sorry. David said with a directness, a matter of fact openness. I want to tell you that. You did not deserve to be a part of that mess. It was my mess. I am sorry that George brought you into it. I fell apart or I have been falling apart for a long time I guess and that was when it hit the hardest and all the wires got crossed. You were there. You did not have that responsibility and I am sorry. David took a deep breath to punctuate the statement and waited again.

Jack hardly looked up at him.  He was staring into his own lap. Then he looked at David with a clear-eyed stare: I killed someone. Jack waited along beat for any response but hearing nothing continued. I don’t know who it was. It was a man with a face. I killed him with a gun. He left large gaps between the words while he thought. But the message was delivered with a noticeable lack of overt emotion. It could even seem at times to be a puzzled tone. It was in war. I was maybe in danger, but maybe I was not. Probably I was not. I might have killed someone who was innocent, just in the wrong place.

David looked at him for a moment. He was thinking of the proper way to respond. It was not an ordinary moment when a Zen response some kind of pushing toward act and away from conception might be important. Was it time to say something that might rearrange his thinking? If you see the Buddha, kill him! David felt somewhat too exhausted to be incisive.  He spoke with a calm manner: I think that you see a counselor. Is that right? David asked. Yes. Sometimes. I missed a few sessions. But yes. Jack said. Well, maybe you should be talking with that person about this. David looked at him with intensity. He purposely did not look away or veer at all from the direct gaze. The room was silent for a full minute before Jack continued. I know. I know. But I wanted to tell you that I think I know why I am so confused and distracted and such a failure at this. I have not been honest with you—or with anyone. I don’t think I can escape from the clutches of this confusion. It dogs me. And I know that Buddhism is about non-violence and about compassion. You talk about compassion a lot. I think that I am guilty of something that makes it impossible for me to rise above this mess and to be whatever it is I am supposed to be. Jack breathed heavily glad to be done with this confession.

I think you misunderstand Zen Buddhism. You do know that it was closely attached to martial arts to war to the Samurai and to many of the arts of war. Archery and sword play. David felt more comfortable in this kind of words of wisdom from the Roshi mode. He thought all the time that what he was saying was kind of useless except that it broke the tension and filled the space. The room was heavy before and now it was light. It has to be said that Zen was born not far from blood. David said this with some sense of disgust. Well, compassion, Yes. The proper road to enlightenment begins with compassion. Yes. That is there in the beginning in the early manuals of Zen, though I think that it was expunged in some cases by the great saints of Zen, even Dogen himself. It was thought that Zen itself was getting bogged down in conceptions like peace and love or shall we call it harmlessness. Gandhiji’s Ahimsa. It was being poisoned by Indian philosophical obsessions. Things like that. The Chinese are pragmatists and the Japanese modeled their Zen on that kind of practical attitude free of the sticky emotions. Zen for many means indifference to these human paaions and obsessions, even love. For many Zen compassion only means that everyone needs to become equally detached. We care that everyone is suffering but we see no relief to that except to free them from their attachment to the things of this world—both good and bad. But maybe I am being unfair. Many of the practitioners are trying to make Zen differently and to modify the practice. It does change with the culture and with history and such things. But do not be deceived: This history of violence did not end hundreds of years ago. DT Suzuki himself our beloved Rinzai master and the voice of western Zen was deluded and dismissed the fascist violence of the Japanese militarists in the 1930’s. It is not easy to find a clear ethical code on Zen because of the confusion, the fear of being conceptual, theoretical, of making some absolutist statement. And this inherent relativism has made too many people very comfortable in Zen, especially in the West and especially in California, and they do not want to sacrifice that freedom from judgment to express horror at even the most egregious sins. There are no sins in some people’s Zen. There is only act or reflection and reflection is bad. The sword must be moved without thinking.

I thought you were going to tell me something else. You sound like you hate your religion. Jack said. No one should love religion. David answered. It is dangerous to love religion without a critical eye. If you do, you will be sucked into a trap. David looked at him. They say religion was invented to make bad people do good things. If we did not have religion, a guy named Weinberg said, if we did not have religion, good people would do good things and bad people would do bad things. And we think religion is supposed to make bad people do good things. But more often religion only succeeds in making good people do bad things. David smiled. I would not explore the logic of that quote too far, but it gets at the basic point. Zen is not to be trusted. A good Zen master would say that. If you practice Zen, it is not Zen. Any good Zen master would say that. And such a statement is not just an annoying, and strangely childish, paradox. It is the truth. Zen must itself be killed in order to be Zen.

Roshi, I need your help. Jack stopped him. I have this burden. It is making it impossible for me to move forward. I am stuck. I have met a woman that I care about and I think it is going to be an obstacle for that. The psych counselor is useless. The drugs are useless. And I had no belief that Zen meditation would help.in the first place. I was told to try. But Now I think it is a possible way out for me. I cannot get through the first door however.  I cannot even empty myself of these old memories, these things that haunt me. Jack paused then asked directly. But before I quit everything I need to know what you think. Should I quit?

David looked at him. You know the Zen answer would be that you have already stopped Zen. Or something like that. Maybe I should tell you again the story that the Buddha was hopelessly stalled for six years before he discovered the true path. You have been at this for a couple of years at most. But let me tell you a story. If the cart does not go fast enough do not beat the cart beat the ox. That was what Dogen said. Well, we do not believe in beating oxen anymore I hope. But he had a point. If your cart does not go fast enough, do you blame the cart or do you blame the horse? You are blaming the cart. You are saying my cart is too full of crap. But we are all dragging carts that are full of crap. You have to look elsewhere for the answer. You have to realize that if you ever get the cart moving, it will not be empty. Buddha left his family. I do not know who can do these things anymore and be free from the spectres. No matter how much you wish to throw everything and everyone overboard, it will never be truly empty, not in this lifetime. It will always be your cart with your burdens.