I said that yesterday for an assignment that I had to look at this issue once again after I had the staff upside down, forgot important information upon returning the kit to the office. I noticed that I ran the risk of becoming more self aware when I was putting in this kit. I also wanted to acknowledge the time that it took to release some of the lines of the

[01:23]

kit. I also wanted to acknowledge the time that it took to release some of the lines of the kit. I also wanted to acknowledge the time that it took to release some of the lines of the kit. I also wanted to acknowledge the time that it took to release some of the lines of the I also wanted to acknowledge the time that it took to release some of the lines of the

[02:41]

kit. I also wanted to acknowledge the time that it took to release some of the lines of the I also wanted to acknowledge the time that it took to release some of the lines of the kit. I also wanted to acknowledge the time that it took to release some of the lines of the I also wanted to acknowledge the time that it took to release some of the lines of the I also wanted to acknowledge the time that it took to release some of the lines of the

[03:51]

kit. I also wanted to acknowledge the time that it took to release some of the lines of the kit. In fact, I think we were rather fortunate in that we got there in time to be in the woods, mostly alone, but then as we were leaving, the tour buses had arrived, so we had that wonderful experience of this influx of very large numbers of people all speaking many different languages, and I was struck by the scent in the wood, and then a little while later as we were passing, five buses full of people, all those scents which came

[04:59]

with all those people, which became a kind of barrier to the scent in the woods. People with cameras and cigarettes and tape recorders and video machines and all this stuff, and I found myself wondering if they would be able to see the flowers that we saw floating and hear the sound of the water as it does that wonderful deep bass gurgle as it goes over the rocks, and the crash of the limbs of the trees as they hurtled down, and just missing Mark and Lucia, particularly the big gust of wind came around. And I was particularly struck by two people who came into the woods talking, and a man

[06:03]

was saying something very enthusiastic about some place he had been sometime in the past with the children, busily recounting past, didn't seem like he was particularly present, but where he was at that moment, and I thought, how often it is that that's what happens to us in the woods. We're either busily reviewing or recounting our past experience or worrying about or thinking about what's going to happen in the future. Anyway, this morning it was a chance for us to go for a quiet walk together in the woods and enjoy that beautiful spot and each other's company. Yesterday, the first question which Martha asked came up, and we had a little private

[07:14]

conversation, and with Martha's permission, I'd like to talk about that a little bit, because it's a wonderful instance of a kind of sense of what's present that also includes everything that's happened before. As some of you know, Martha and I have known each other for a long time. We were both freshmen in the same hall of a dormitory at Stanford, a stunningly large number of years ago, at which point Martha was known as Mousy. Some years ago, I don't even remember now when, but a few years ago anyway, she and Bill

[08:15]

and I were all on our way to some hearing about something. Remember what it was? It had to do with some good cause for the environment. Kent Canyon. Right, having a youth hostel in Kent Canyon, which is a small canyon off of the Franks Valley Canyon, just in the next valley over. And I remember riding in the car together afterwards, the three of us feeling full of ourselves and mischief. Am I making some crack to Martha with respect to her being Mousy Thunderbolt? And she reported back to me that I was Water Runs Uphill, and those became our names for a while. Thunderbolt and Water Runs Uphill.

[09:16]

You know, those wonderful secret languages that people have when they live together, the kinds of things that happen when you are close friends or when you're married to somebody or in families between parents and children. One of those delightful moments which comes up whenever I think about Mousy Thunderbolt or Water Runs Uphill. So from out of, you know, who knows where, yesterday, what I was aware of was water running deeply out to the ocean. And last night, just before I went to sleep, I realized that that was a much more accurate description for me of how I'm feeling these days in much the way that Martha's observation

[10:21]

a few years ago that my name was Water Runs Uphill was also an accurate kind of designation. And I was really struck by the kind of wisdom of that exchange which was not carefully thought about but just came from some deeper place between us where we know each other. And I felt quite touched that I could recognize that I'm not pushing against the current of the water in quite the way that I was a few years ago. I think there's something very powerful about sitting together in that wonderful big room

[11:22]

which we have to sit in. Basically sitting down quietly, breathing together as often as we do. And doing the other things that we do in the course of the day. Working together, eating meals together. Sitting and listening to teachings. Conversations with each other. Finding our way through one moment after another and finding out how to know ourselves and consequently how to know each other. It always seems so simple when we talk about this kind of thing.

[12:23]

And yet for most of us, repeatedly we bump into the difficulty we have in being present with ourselves and with each other. Some years ago when the great and famous Edward Kunze, as he used to refer to himself, the famous Buddhist scholar, was teaching at Berkeley, at the University of California at Berkeley. And the particular time that I'm thinking of, he gave a lecture class which met three times a week. A rather large class. He was lecturing usually to 300 or so people. And then alternating Tuesdays and Thursdays, he was doing a seminar on the Heart Sutra.

[13:26]

And there were a number of us who basically commuted from Zen Center in San Francisco over to Berkeley to hear his lectures and to go to his seminar. Fairly consistently for that entire academic year. He was a rather troublesome, fiery, stimulating, interesting man. And I remember sometime during that time, I'm not even sure exactly when, he was talking about these stories, these teaching stories that we read and reference, which appear in the various collections of koans. And the whole language of exchange in Buddhism, which arises out of a kind of intimacy which

[14:31]

is very hard to talk about, where people develop a particular kind of language which they can use to reference a shared experience. And his example, which I remember still quite vividly, was of an old married couple who would have the habit in the late afternoon or early evening of going for a walk through the meadows in that part of England near the ocean. And they would, every evening as they walked, see the seagulls pushed in by the wind, flying and carrying on in the open meadows where they were walking. And how at any given time and in any given circumstance, the husband or wife could call

[15:33]

up that circumstance of walks through a particular landscape by looking at the other and saying seagulls, and could completely call up everything they associated in their relationship with each other, particularly from those walks. And he said, you know, that's a lot of what these old stories are conjuring up. The shared experience among practitioners, between teacher and student, in that profound heart-to-heart meeting that happens, and which can be referenced by a word or phrase where both parties know completely what's going on.

[16:33]

But to someone who's not initiated in that particular circumstance, they have no idea what's going on. And I'm struck by how we read some of these old stories or we listen to the telling of them in various Dharma talks, and I find myself wondering about those kinds of circumstances, those kinds of meetings that we have with each other each day in this situation. And I guess my hope is that we can treasure those moments when they occur in the way we

[17:36]

treasure the stories about such meetings from a long time ago. I'd like to read a little bit more commentary on the case that I read at the beginning of the ceremony yesterday. This is Case 42 from the Roman Khan or Gateless Gate. My bookmark is my friend's parrot's tail feather.

[18:43]

In this particular translation, which is the one that was done by Yamada Konroshi, after the case itself is Mo Man's commentary and the verse and lecture on the case. And what I'd like to read to you is the verse and the closing commentary. One can awaken the woman, the other cannot. Both have their own freedom. On one occasion, a god mask appears, on another, a devil mask. Even in failure, an elegant performance. Both Manjusri and Momyo have their respective freedoms. When Manjusri failed to awaken the woman, he was free not to awaken her.

[19:54]

When Momyo succeeded in waking her, he was free to wake her. For a horse, it is freedom to gallop. For a snake, it is freedom to crawl, not gallop. But it is still freedom for a snake not to be able to gallop. Failure to gallop is an elegant performance for a snake. Take the example of a jet plane about to take off. A hundred thousand Manjusris might not be able to get it started, but a jet pilot could do it very easily. Sometimes we're millionaires, sometimes paupers. Still, our essential nature does not change at all. We are always in the center of perfect freedom. For more information on Gautam, the Gautam Seekers and His Teachings,

[21:47]

For some of us we have had this time set aside which we have been calling a practice period which, if we include this session that we are going to begin on Friday night, is some eight weeks which we have set aside for ourselves with some intention to practice with as much wholeheartedness as we can and some flickering over the past week of it's over too soon or something like that, but what's over and is there any reason why tomorrow or the next day or the day after or March 7th or 8th need be any different or less of an opportunity

[23:23]

to practice wholeheartedly in whatever way we can with ourselves and with each other so that we can continue to find ways of meeting when we sit together in the zen zone or on the path or wherever it happens to be. After we came back from your woods this morning I took Koichi into the city and as we were driving up the road up through this valley he rolled down the window and peered out. I thought for a while

[24:29]

that maybe he was going to take off over the edge of the road. He was trying to see everything. And as we got to the top of the hill he said in his still and careful and halting English, this place beautiful, very beautiful. And then all of a sudden he saw the car that some of you probably know that resides in the upper reaches of this valley which has been there at least as far as I know for at least 15 years, maybe longer. He got all excited. There's a car down there. So I said I think there are dragons that live in this valley and some of them eat cars and people.

[25:36]

And he started to laugh and then he said people too? We were just at that point passing the rock cairn that is on the side of the road where a young boy was killed. Was it last year or two years ago? Last year. Last year there was a young man who with his friend went over the side of a bank in his truck and he was thrown from the truck and then I think basically the truck landed on him. And not very long after that particular accident there was another accident closer to where we are now where a rather elderly woman was killed in the car accident. So suddenly Hoichi's demeanor went

[26:39]

from this kind of brightness and playing around about the dragon that eats cars thinking about the same dragon that eats people. Sort of nodded. Noticed the pile of rocks where Billy's friends made a kind of reminder of his life and importance to them and his passing. Which to this day is tended and cared for by some of them. So anyways we got to the top of the hill. We slowed down a little bit and he turned around wanted to

[27:44]

look back at the last glimpse of the ocean before we went over into Mill Valley and onto the freeway. And he nodded and talked about how much he would look forward to coming to see us again. And hope that some of us would come and visit him in Japan and so on. Built at the base of a grass mountain. A wonderful exchange of playing with each other and enjoying the beauty of this valley and

[28:49]

a kind of shift in our breathing together when I told them that the dragon also had eaten some people. And a little, you know, gusho on his part. So for me the experience of connectedness with each of you and with myself is very much a part of this

[29:52]

poking around with what it means to make mistakes and to be willing to let others see them and to not try to hide or be anyone different from who I am at any given time. And the kind of belief that comes with being able to be together in that way. So

[31:20]

for us, who has no faults but to err and to be able to correct them. This is best of all. Each moment being able to refine our capacity to pay attention to things as they are. So our intention

[32:56]

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