breakingsod.com

The Root of Suffering

What keeps us unhappy and stuck in a limited view of reality is our tendency to seek pleasure and avoid pain, to seek security and avoid groundlessness, to seek comfort and avoid discomfort. This is how we keep ourselves enclosed in a cocoon. Out there are the planets and all the galaxies and vast space, but we are stuck here in this cocoon. Moment after moment, we’re deciding that we would rather stay in that cocoon than step out into that big space. Life in our cocoon is cozy and secure. We’ve gotten it all together. It’s safe, it’s predictable, it’s convenient and it’s trustworthy. If we feel ill at ease, we just fill in those gaps.
Our mind is always seeking zones of safety. We’re in this zone of safety and that’s what we consider life, getting it all together, security. Death is losing that. We fear losing our illusion of security-that’s what makes us anxious. We fear being confused and not knowing which way to turn. We want to know what’s happening. The mind is always seeking zones of safety, and these zones of safety are always falling apart. Then we scramble to get another zone of safety together again. We spend all our energy and creativity and waste our lives trying to recreate these zones of safety, which are always falling apart. That’s the essence of samsara-the cycle of suffering that comes from continuing to seek happiness in all the wrong places.

‘Comfortable with uncertainty’ Pema Chodron

Samwise the Fuzzy.

I’m one tired, dirty puppy tonight.

My sweet friend Cara(professional ’scaper) is generously helping me landscape the front beds at my son’s school. The dumptruck plopped down 6 tons of soil this afternoon and we shoveled and shoveled and shoveled and hauled and hauled and hauled wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow up to the cement wall, where it took both of us to heft the thing up over the edge and dump. It wouldn’t have been quite so much work if the silly ass bed wasn’t brimfull of hard-packed ‘beauty’ bark, for some misbegotten reason deposited on top of plastic, laid on top of a nasty mixture of clay, rocks and concrete chunks-I guess they really didn’t want ANYTHING to grow in the bed, including the poor, pathetic, half-dead boxwoods we had to dig out. So, first we filled the upper bed with soil, then started excavating the beauty bark from the lower bed and breaking the rocklike chunks into spreadable mulch for the upper.

We got about halfway through the mountain when it got dark on us… Sigh. Another 3 tons to schlump tomorrow.

But it’s gonna be purty when ’tis done!

on the twelfth day of chistmas my toad blob gave to me…
twelve lemmings leaping,
eleven lizards creeping,
ten timebombs ticking,
nine babies blasting,
eight brains-a-splatting,
seven swamis sinning,
six gourds-a-glorping,
five moooooooooldy kings,
four stinking turds,
three broken pens,
two dirty gloves,
and a porcupine in a cemetary!

I painted an homage to Picasso on the fabulous Miss Nan at the Little Red Studio’s Gold Show friday. She wore it all night as we danced and reveled and feasted the evening away.

I love the way the back turned out! More Nantastic pics here.

I think the old man would have approved.

My mom’s movie debut was a grand success-all two glorious, fishy seconds of it.

Krogstad movies are megaweird. We had a blast at the SAM and then B&O’d the evening away with yummy food and drinks-I had my first brandy alexander ever, which was yummy, though I don’t think I’m quite as taken by it as Feist-and excellent artistic conversation.

A few more pics here.

I spent the almostsunny afternoon meandering happily all over Discovery Park again… What a park! You can loop around all over the place and still have more uncharted ground to cover. I wandered the trails from the north beach to the south beach(almost got my ass blown away-it’s hella windy as you come around the lighthouse point) and back again. Happy tired legs tonight.

Found a shortcut(well, it’s a bit shorter, OK?) to the North Beach, which is a blissful little bite of Zanheaven-a labyrinthine tangle of gorgeous, snaggly, driftwood logs, beautiful, stackable rocks, sand and CLAY! The cliffs of gooey grey clay avalanche down in glorpy glomphs and it’s all so nice and sculptable. I thoroughly enjoyed myself, though I must admit I got some interesting looks from the grocery store patrons as I stopped by for collards and fresh turmeric root on my way home. I must have made an interesting fashion statement with clay all over my hands, glorped up my jacket and mucky shoes. Sigh, dryads-can’t take us anywhere, least not without a trail of twigs and squelchy footprints…

Sometimes nature makes it’s own art. I wanted to bring this lovely rooty rocktangle home to add to my bedroom forest, but it was too damn big an’ heavy and besides, it really belongs where it is, where everyone can enjoy it. Grumble.

So beautiful.

It’s perfect for hanging laundry on.

My kid,

my kid,

My kid is…

TEN!!!

Met a forest Monarch new year’s day in Seattle’s gorgeous, wild, Discovery Park.

We(Sophie and her mens, Sam and I) discovered, rambling about hopefully, searching for the beach trails, that the parking lots are miles away from anywhere that even resembles a trailhead.

We did find an absolutely stunning big leaf maple tree and lots of lovely mossy roots and rocks and finally, a beach stairway that led us to a marvelous beach.

I could have spent all day playing with the sand and clay and stones and driftwood gnarls, but we only had a smidgeon of daylight left, so I threw up a quick trick rock stack

and Sam went for a ride in a giant driftwood starship and we scrambled back up and up and up…

Pics, pics, pics.

Happy new year, all!