Hi Marissa, Hi Brown Bear. Hello Self. Hello houses.

I have been making 2 or 3 ink paintings each day. I really love working with ink. And then some houses I like. Last night I saved over seventy pictures of houses I liked. maybe i will post them slowly over time. or maybe I will post them all in one huge entry. I hope i don't do that. Then a picture from a tea ceremony. There is an old chicken coop in the back yard of this house and I have been converting it into a tea room for tea ceremonies. I will post some pictures of my progress. If any of you come visit me in Olympia we can have a tea ceremony together. Oh, Also posted is a screen shot of Marissa and I video chatting. Isn't her hair pretty?






Here is some zen wisdom I got from Vincent's excellent blog.

This piece comes from zen's Third Patriarch Seng Ts’an:

Let things take their own course,
Knowing the essence can neither go nor stay.

Obey the nature of things,
And you are in concord with the Way,
Calm and easy and free from care. *

Thoughts that are fettered turn from Truth,
Sink into the unwise habit of not liking.

Not liking brings weariness of spirit,
And aversion serves to no purpose.

If you want to follow the doctrine of the One,
Do not reject the world of the senses.

When you are not biased, the world of the senses
Is seen as one with enlightenment.
The wise practise non-interference.
. . . .

To trust in the heart is the not-two,
The not-two is to trust in the heart.

I have spoken - but in vain,
For what words can tell
Of things that have no yesterday,
Tomorrow or today?
. . . .

The whirligigs of Apparent and Void all come from mistaken views;



Or,

*Let your nature blend with the Way and wander in it free from care.