Remembering

One of the most common experiences of traveling to other countries and experiencing other cultures is to see that the practice of honoring those who came before us is a universal one.  I'm not sure in The States that we are quite as engaged in communing with people beyond the grave.  In my Quiet Time I spend a minute imagining all my predecessors sitting around a table which is nestled in the clouds, everyone relaxed and smiling, unhurried, bemused and tolerant, not doing anything in particular beyond sitting quietly together, enjoying the minute.  It has helped me immensely over the years to lose any resentments that linger over how crappy a job they did in raising me.  They did not, of course, do a crappy job - it's more that I'm a negative son of a bitch who likes to concentrate on defects and shortcomings instead of strengths and attributes.  Moreover, as we say, no baby comes into the world with a personalized instruction manual and I was a complicated, defective model from the git-go.

In Vietnam I took a walk one morning on the raised paths that separate flooded rice paddies.  Every so often there would be a small shrine at an intersection that would have a burning candle, some food treats, fresh flowers, little gifts and mementoes inside, and the villagers would stop for a brief moment and remember their forebears.  I liked this a lot.  Not flashy or complicated, not time-consuming, not a big public display, more of a "Hey, howya doin' this morning?  I remember you.  The good you.  The best you."  For me this remembering is a very centering thing to do.  It helps my perspective on life, on how it comes and goes until eventually it all goes, and I'm just the spirit in that shrine.