Greetings beautiful readers.
It’s me. A couple of posts ago I introduced you to my new buddy, Rocky the squirrel. Rocky is not today’s topic but he’s the inspiration for it. BTW, (s)he’s just fine, came for a visit today, and asked me to say hi to you. I noticed that (s)he seems a bit chubbier these days (maybe bulking up for winter I reckon, just when the weather’s getting colder). Rocky seems to know exactly what to do and when to do it. Makes me happy to be supporting that in my small way.
Anyway, as I said, this post not about Rocky exactly, but it is related in a way because of some words I used in that post:
“My teachers are everywhere, in every possible form – sentient or otherwise” (quoting Bullwinkle, AKA me). But, I’ve been thinking about my word “otherwise” which in this context obviously means “non-sentient”.
And truthfully, I’m not sure that I’m comfortable with the words “non-sentient”. Who’s to say for certain that that my one legged teachers don’t “feel” things in their way? Certainly not me.
So I was thinking about this stuff on my way to town yesterday. I was passing one of the many cornfields around here in VT, and as it’s September, the corn is now “as high as an elephant’s eye”.
I asked myself, “How do these guys, which are almost 7 feet tall, (really skinny, but loaded with heavy corn cobs), manage to stay vertical despite wind and rain? How do they do that?”
So I pulled over, went into a cornfield, got down on all fours, scraped away the dirt, and VOILA: an engineering, architectural and design marvel. I went and fetched my trusty iPhone and took these pics for you.
I challenge any “sentient” engineer / architect / designer to create a structure more elegant and successful for its purpose.
And then…there’s this:
This is “Millenium Tower”. It opened to residents in 2009, with 419 units, selling from $1.5MM (in the bleachers), to $13MM (for the Penthouses). It is San Francisco’s tallest residential building: 58-stories, 645 feet tall, at a cost of $350 Million.
The thing is though, it’s tilting, AND it’s sinking! The obviously very unhappy and nervous homeowners are suing the developers for $200MM to do the repairs and compensate for lost value.
But my corn stalk teacher tilts only on windy days & then pops right back up. It never sinks, only grows. That one tiny little niblet, full of the expertise and experience packed into it by its creator (yours and mine too, BTW), is doing a way better job than all those expert, prize winning humans in San Francisco.
Say hi now to two more of my unlikely, brainless teachers:
As many of you likely know, we spend our summer months here in Northeast Vermont, my favorite place on the planet. How lucky and grateful are we.
Actually, Gratitude is where I live. The designations, “CA” and “VT”, are my snail mail addresses. “Gratitude”, (says Norman Fischer, one of my most important human teachers) “is basic hygiene for the heart”.
Anyway, the house is a perfectly fine house, but the site is everything. We’re perched above a brook in which I often swim, in the forest where we often walk.
For years, while watching the brook flowing over or around the rocks, I would identify with the water, imagining what it might be like to actually be the water, having all the adventures in the places it was heading towards after it passed me by. But lately, I’ve started identifying with the rocks too. Crazy, huh? I mean the rocks KNOW they are toast, but they seem fine with it. I too know that someday I will be toast, but I’m still working on being fine with it.
But why toast? After all, water is “soft” and rocks are “hard”…right?
OF COURSE RIGHT! But water has one huge advantage: Water is PATIENT!
The Grand Canyon (277 miles long, 18 mile wide and 6000 feet deep) is indeed a very, VERY big hole in the ground. All created by a very patient body of water (now designated by us as the Colorado River). The “soft” overcomes the “hard”. BIG lesson, yes? Hmm…might these two teachers be inviting me to consider which are the “hard” things in my own life that a little more patience might overcome? Thanks, Water & Rocks!
BTW dear reader, water isn’t only patient. It’s humble! And what does it’s humility accomplish? Just ask LAO TZU:
“The sea willingly accepts
to be in the lowest position.
Thus, all streams come to it.
Its unequalled power,
– is a direct consequence
of its humility.”
Lao Tzu (Tao Te Ching
Beautiful reader, only if I haven’t abused YOUR patience yet, and if you are willing, meet just one more teacher:
When we are in CA., my sweet bride and I are blessed to live about 15 minutes away by car, from Muir Woods, the spectacular home of some of the (wayy too few) remaining old growth redwood trees in California. It is a stunning, emotional, and life changing privilege to visit there. Indeed, on religious and spiritual holidays, that’s where we hang out.
When I am hungry for a transcendent, sacred experience, and need to feel a close, palpable connection with my creator, (who actually built the place), I head for something in nature. What architect could possibly build a house of worship that could rival this one?
See what I mean?
When we humans describe what constitutes a “successful” life by our standards, two of the measures, which often come up near the top of the list, are “stature” – we call it fame, or maybe success – (BTW…”success”? What IS that exactly?) – and also, “longevity“.
Want to talk stature? At anywhere from 240-350 feet these are the tallest life forms on the planet.
And as for longevity? The lifespan of these spectacular redwoods can range from 1000 years to as much as 2000 years. Not a bad run, huh?
Have a peek at this photo I took at the entrance to Muir Woods National Forest. It’s of a crosscut of a tree born in 909 and which fell in 1939. See if you can read only 6 of the events that our one legged teacher observed during its lifetime.
But wait, there’s more!
They even grow in families! They support each other above and below ground, sharing the sun, the fog, and the nutrients. Seems to me, that any family unit that hangs together for a thousand years, (even if the teenagers roll their eyes), must get along pretty well, and have some wisdom to share – if we are listening.
And ALL of this, without benefit of a brain. Wow! I’m totally OK with calling this “success“. What about you?
My “brainless” teachers are asking me: “Why do you humans keep harming yourselves, all of the species, and our beautiful, fragile home, because you mistakenly (and arrogantly) believe that you “know better” than our (mutual) creator, who’s been working on all this stuff (by patient trial and error) for MILLIONS of years before you even appeared on the scene…Why?”
Asking me tough, important questions like these – isn’t that the job of great teachers? Everything is a potential teacher…everything! All that’s asked of this student is to pay attention and stay open.
And, revisiting for a moment the topic of humility – one final tidbit for you: The coast redwood genome has 6 sets of chromosomes, and 27 BILLION (that’s BILLION, with a “B”) base pairs of DNA. And us? The humans? A measly 3 Billion. So, the trees are 9 times more complicated and more prepared for survival than us. But, are you ready for this? The WORLD CHAMP in DNA is…guess what? The Axoloti salamander – at 28.4 billion. Yup! A SALAMANDER! It can regenerate limbs, and grow back internal organs. Feeling a bit humbler now? I sure am.
And finally, circling back to my words near the top of this post about me not being comfortable implying that “non- sentient” means “not feeling“, I invite you to listen to this very moving & fierce poem read to you by its author, WS Merwin. It’s only 3 minutes or so, & right on topic. You won’t soon forget it.
Bless you dear reader. Thx for reading this. Look for, and listen to your teachers. They’re all around you, really!
And please, don’t forget to take care of, and be kind to…yourself.
Metta,
Michael
“Everything comes and goes in awareness.
Awareness is the ground of who we are.”
Frank Ostaseski
