Lessons of a Zen Sand Garden

At the entrance to the gallery is a small Zen-style sand garden, which I rake faithfully-----well, OK, at least after each rainfall or after Cherub, the marmalade cat, has rolled and scratched his back in the warm sand. 


No, it's not what you think---he never messes, for he has great respect for things Zen. No, he rolls in my beautiful sand design when he is pissed off at me.  For example, when I won't let him into the gallery despite his plaintive cries at the glass door.

So he goes right to the Zen garden and rearranges things. 


The Buddha of Zen laughs and laughs. He likes all manner of feisty 'cats' of this world who challenge belief systems and do it with humour and without desecration. 

This garden is a faint reflection of my memory of the famous "dry" garden at Ryoan-ji (Peaceful Dragon Temple)  in Kyoto which is, yes, definitely raked daily by the monks.

Recently a lady stopped in to visit the gallery for the first time.  She has never traveled outside of the Province of Nova Scotia. This would be her first experience to visit an truly oriental environment and she was quite thrilled.  


As she entered, she pointed behind her to the Zen sand garden and said, "Your garden is coming along..."   


Being puzzled at her meaning, I answered in a typically polite and evasive Japanese fashion and agreed with her and thanked her for what obviously was a compliment. 


Inside the gallery, she was like a young  girl back in school on a field trip, marvelling at the beauty of objects and architecture alike.  And the kimonos!  She was overcome with excitement  to experience a taste of such an exotic culture, one that only in her dreams would she ever actually visit.


Finishing her green tea and wishing to express her joy and appreciation as she left, she commented once again on my sand garden.

Pointing to the carefully created, narrow rows in the sandy gravel, she left me a final compliment---- " Your garden will be  awfully lovely when your plants  begin coming up."

I thanked her kindly and sincerely for her visit----naive, uninformed, but a very pleasant person.


But then my mind began to churn. And in the background I could hear the Buddha of Zen laughing louder than ever---at me---his belly shaking.  


The question arose--- is there any room in the gardens of my preconceptions for more than just a rigid formula of sand and 5 stones? 


Like vegetables? 


Or humour?


How about a geisha napping? 

Of course, that must be done only with an authentic Zen meditation pillow...

(laughter...)

PS:  Seconds before I took this second image, a gentle wind blew the right sleeve of her kimono across her in a more feminine gesture.

This bunraku geisha definitely did not like the first poise...

TEA--a peace potion?

      Here is a quote and  a few thoughts that came to mind after friends and long-time customers  mentioned during a visit to the gallery this week that their son hopes to go into the tea business in their  country of Dubai United Arab Emirates.   

      "The most important pottery of the Cha-no-yu (tea-ceremony)  is first the Cha-ire (other name for tea-caddy) and then the Cha-wan (tea-bowl). It is said that among the military class the most precious possessions were first Tea-caddies, second writings and third swords. For this was the order in which they were presented by the Shogun to one he desired to honour."

-- A.L. Sadler.^[4]

16th cen. Japanese Momoyama-Era 'Cha-ire' (tea-caddy)

Chinese tea pot 1700s; 'Cha-ire' for coarse tea; modern 'Natsume' tea-caddy; 21st cen. tea pot. 

    Knowing that Japan, like my previous country the US, has had a history full of warfare, this statement is rather surprising, that a nation that lived by bushido  ('the way of the warrior') would have prized tea implements more highly than the symbol of their identity, the Japanese sword.  

    A grand old Japanese martial arts master, complete with wispy beard,  came to my gallery a few years ago. We sat in tea and conversation looking out over the ocean. He too surprised me when he said that within 50 years, martial arts would be no more, gone, no longer needed.  

  Times are a-changing.  I believe we are moving inextricably into an age of peace, beyond war-economics and the globe's control by shadowy power-brokering secret societies, into an Age where tea will be one of the compelling symbols of the dominance of civil society with its respect for diversity,  its celebration of commonality and its essential commitment to the principles of Gaia.  

   Perhaps tea is a Divine channel for a growing consciousness of Gaia in the minds of humanity? 

Tea, a peace potion?    

In the meantime, I know that it is delicious, and that Genmaicha, green tea with roasted rice, aka 'Popcorn Tea' is my favourite. So I serve it at the gallery every day....

ENJOYING JAPAN IN NOVA SCOTIA

Ohayo-gozaimasu!  

The easiest Japanese word to learn is "Ohayo",  'Good morning!'-- just like 'Ohio'.  (You can forget the 'gozaimasu' if you wish--it is technically required only if you are speaking to someone older than you.) 














And what a beautiful June morning it is here in Canada!--- bright warm sun, a slight crispness in the air and flowers in my Japanese gardens going crazy. 

I hope you don't mind if I slip  a few Japanese words into this blog. Most of the Canadian kids who live here along Nova Scotia's St. Mary's Bay---aka 'the French Shore'---are fluent both in French and English or are studying both, so they absorb languages like sponges.  I envy them.... 

  That 12th cen. Japanese garden we walked through earlier had a 'bakemono'----a

 popular term for 'monster' that you kids into anime and manga know well.

  My gardens here have visiting bees, their buzzing the single sweet sound on this quiet breeze except for the 'shakuhachi' (bamboo flute) music coming from the gallery.  

...ah, life is good....