Posts Tagged ‘Richard Chess’
Traveling Through These Days of Awe
October 17, 2016
I’m in a plane ascending to 37,000 feet. How restless have I been this year? How easily distractible? Already on this flight, from the time of boarding the plane until now, I’ve jumped from e-mail to Facebook to FiveThirtyEight to Jane Hirshfield on Basho to Mishkan Hanefesh, Sanctuary of the Soul, the Reform movement’s new…
Read MoreGetting Close to You, God: A Meditation During the Month of Elul
September 27, 2016
“You are my light and my help / Whom should I fear?” Thus begins Norman Fischer’s Zen-inspired translation of Psalm 27. Right now, at this very moment, Shabbat morning, the 14th of Elul, 5776; Sept. 17, 2016, these verses don’t resonate with me. Fear: yes, I am afraid, afraid, at the moment, that I won’t…
Read MoreOf Cookbooks and Lynchings
September 6, 2016
“Men and women in automobiles stood up to watch him die.” That’s the sentence one student recalled when I asked the class what was memorable in Eula Biss’s essay “Time and Distance Overcome.” The man who died was a black man “accused of attacking a white woman.” For his alleged behavior, he was “tied to…
Read MoreYou Must Be Present to Learn
August 10, 2016
For the past five years, I’ve been experimenting with the use of contemplative practices in the classes I teach at UNC Asheville. For a quick overview of the range of contemplative practices being used in higher education today, see The Center for Contemplative Mind in Society’s Tree of Contemplative Practices. On the eve of a…
Read MoreMy Money, My Life
July 21, 2016
My money is the Tao te Ching, translated and introduced by David Hinton. My $12.87 turned into this teaching: Once it’s full of jade and gold your house will never be safe. Proud of wealth and renown you bring on your own ruin. (#9) My money is a boarding pass for American Airlines flight 5469…
Read MoreThe Dragon and the Yahrzeit Candle: On Forgetting and Remembering, Part 3
June 30, 2016
Continued from yesterday and Tuesday. In Hunger Mountain: A Field Guide to Mind and Landscape, David Hinton observes, “We tend to ignore the disappearing, the forgetfulness, but all day long, day in and day out, forgetfulness keeps us woven into dragon’s traceless transformations.” The dragon, he explained earlier, is “China’s mythological embodiment of all creation…
Read MoreThe Dragon and the Yahrzeit Candle: On Forgetting and Remembering, Part 2
June 29, 2016
Continued from yesterday. I dive into the pool. My body remembers water. My body remembers how to swim. My arm swings overhead, my arm follows through, my hand plunges into the water, pushing water, propelling my body forward down the lane. It seems to happen naturally, automatically. I don’t need to think to swim. I…
Read MoreThe Dragon and the Yahrzeit Candle: On Forgetting and Remembering, Part 1
June 28, 2016
I remember my social security number. I remember the combination to a lock—13 right, 27 left, 5 right—that rusted beyond use some years ago. How many years? I don’t remember. But I remember this: it was two locks ago. I remember the name of the city in which I was born. I remember the name…
Read MoreThe Best Conditions for Work
June 9, 2016
For William Carlos Williams I work best alone. In an empty house. When I’m ready to work, I take down the sun-faded poster of the Miro museum from my Barcelona honeymoon twenty-six years ago. I pull the pilled sweaters down from the shelf in the closet—the sweater Nana Sarah knitted for me decades ago, the…
Read MoreMy Prayer Is Not Prayer
May 11, 2016
My prayer is not prayer, not exactly. It includes words. It may even begin with words: “Modeh ani l’fanecha / grateful am I in your presence; baruch atah Adonai, Eloheinu, Melech Haolam, hanotein laya-eif ko-ach / Praise to You, Adonai our God, Sovereign of the universe, who gives strength to the weary; ahavah rabbah ahavtanu…
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