ruminations

On Community

Since I’ve volunteered to produce The Drinking Gourd Podcast for the Toledo Zen Center, Aaron has been reminding me not to let myself be used, or to get too much work on my plate again. It’s a valid argument, and one that has helped me avoid trouble in the past. Right now, though, I only feel positive vibes about this project, and I think I know why.

Community.

It’s been a long time since I really felt like part of a community. Work isn’t really a community — I’m talking about someplace outside of the work and family environments, where people with a common thread in their lives meet regularly and talk frankly and feel comfortable with one another. I suppose this would normally manifest as a church group, or a support group, or even a user group. For me, the sangha (zen community) has been emerging as a community of which I feel I am a part.

Going back to religion: in the Mormon tradition in which I was raised, any member of the congregation can be “called” to a particular position in the church, be it Sunday School teacher, pianist, clerk, or bishop (head of a congregation). It is generally understood that, if you are called to serve, you don’t turn down that calling. Some people do, sure, but it’s generally frowned upon. Even if it’s too much for you to handle, you trust that God (and the local Priesthood authorities) gave you the task for a reason, and that you will grow spiritually because of your calling, and you will receive blessings in Heaven.

In retrospect, I can see how serving a calling in the church can increase the feeling of community from each of its members. That’s sort of how I feel now. I feel like I’m contributing to the community by doing my part, and I don’t feel like the sangha is taking undue advantage of my skills.

It also doesn’t hurt that, almost any night of the week, I can drive just over five minutes to the dojo/zendo and drop off CD-Rs, or pick up the digital recorder, or just talk with Sensei, and then drive home — and only have used up 20 minutes of my night. As cool as the internet is, I’m coming to appreciate human contact more and more. You don’t get the same energy by reading someone’s words as you do from hearing them spoken, not to mention the fact that some people don’t have a proper mastery of the written English language.

So, even though I’m having to be reimbursed for the $30 I spent today on printable CD-Rs and printer ink, and even though I spend about two hours editing each podcast, and will probably spend another hour burning and printing CDs of each… I think it’s worth it.

japan trip 2007

Japan Trip, Day 2, Part 5: Asakusa, Ginza, and Akiba

Diana and Aaron at the Kaminarimon Gate, Asakusa

When we last left the Dynamic Tokyo Tour, we had just arrived by boat in Asakusa.

Along with the rest of the tour group, we walked to the Kaminarimon Gate (“Thunder Gate”), the entrance to the Nakamise Dori, the shopping avenue which runs from the gate up to the Sensoji Temple. Historically, shopkeepers would sell their wares to pilgrims traveling to the temple. In modern times, they’re mainly selling to tourists, pilgrims of a different type.

A Japanese couple who wasn’t part of our tour group approached us and asked us to take a photo of them in front of the gate — a standard tourist picture. Then, as appears to be polite among tourists, they asked if they could take our photo for us. It hadn’t been a photo I would have sought out or asked a stranger to take, but I’m glad they offered, because this is now one of my favorite “Us in Japan” photos, just because it’s so obvious where we are.

For more Japan travelogue, read on…

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health & fitness 1 Comment

Turn The Beat Around

Now that I have a new job (OMG!), I think it’s about time to start turning over a new leaf in a few other areas of my life. Namely, fitness — both physical and mental.

I’ve been trying to eat better this week. Not necessarily go back on a diet, but do the things I know I should be doing, but haven’t been. Avoiding sugar and high fructose corn syrup, eating only whole grains, drinking more water, getting more protein, stuff like that. It feels like I’m running in place, though, or doing a one-step-forward, one-step-back sort of dance.

For instance: dinner was steamed cauliflower, homemade cheese sauce, and frozen salmon. When I checked the package of salmon, the fourth ingredient was sugar. Farther down was MSG. And I think I saw high fructose corn syrup in there, too. And here’s another one: we decided to splurge on graham cracker crusts for a couple of cheesecakes I want to try to make (that’s another mildly amusing story). When I checked the ingredients on those, not only did they contain HFCS, but they also have some kind of partially hydrogenated vegetable oil. Trans fats. *sigh* Of course, I’m still going to use them, and eat the yummy cheesecake I’ll be making.

At least I’m making a conscious effort to monitor what I eat again. These several weeks I’ve been unemployed have helped me pack on several pounds.

One big part of that increase is my abrupt change in activity level; I don’t walk at lunch anymore. I see that my new office building has a fitness center on the first floor, though, so I plan to see how I can take advantage of that over my lunch breaks or before work. Plus, we’re right across from Promenade Park, so I can go walking by the river or something, too.

Also, I had a discussion with Sensei this evening about my stamina. I brought up the fact that I can’t really go all-out for an entire 90 minute session, but I can do an hour. He said that it’s OK if I show up and only do an hour, then excuse myself. That seems like a pretty obvious solution, but I wasn’t sure if that would be acceptable form. So, I’m going to make a concerted effort to go to aikido twice a week, instead of just once. And if I have to either sit on the back wall for 15 minutes or excuse myself entirely, so be it.

On top of all this, I should really be practicing zazen daily, instead of once a week with the sangha. It’s so hard to make myself stop everything — literally everything — for at least ten or fifteen minutes so I can meditate. It feels like everything else is happening without me, and I’m getting behind. But those ten of fifteen minutes a day can make a world of difference to my mood and my physical bearing.

All this is a matter of convincing myself to do these little things one at a time, even if I don’t feel like it. Eventually, I’ll realize that they all make me feel better, and I’ll look forward to doing them.

jobhunt 8 Comments

New Job Happy Dance

It’s true: after being unemployed for almost six weeks, I have accepted a job offer!

I’ll be working in downtown Toledo, on the 12th floor of a corporate office building across from Promenade Park. I will also be making more than twice what I made in my previous job: an increase in salary of 114%, to be exact. Aaron and I will be on equal financial footing — actually, I’ll be making just a little more than he makes, to tell the truth.

The main thing, though, is that I’ll be working in the Information Services department, in Data Warehousing. The change of industry has to be the biggest benefit of this entire severance situation.

My start date is one week from today, at which time I get to report to Orientation at 8:30am. On Aaron’s birthday. Which he requested off from work. But it’s all good, since we’ll get to go to dinner together on his birthday. Yay!

So, when’s a good time for the Diana Got A Job Party that I promised you all…? I’m thinking Saturday the 17th, evening? Who’s in?

music 4 Comments

Rediscovery

Since I fussed with my iTunes library earlier this week, I’ve been rediscovering some of the music I’ve downloaded and ripped over the years. Until Aaron got me my 30GB iPod, I didn’t have enough room on my 8GB iPod mini to just add my entire mp3s folder. After he got me the new iPod, I didn’t really think about it. Actually, I didn’t think about it until I started running out of room on my C: drive, and needed to finally move all my music to my external USB drive.

The result is that I’ve been listening to songs I haven’t touched in years. Remember the days of Scour, around the year 2000 or so? When you could think, “I’d really like to hear this song I haven’t heard in years,” then you could go online and download the mp3 from Scour, over the web, with no fuss? I still have so many songs from those days.

The RIAA’s gonna come and get me. Probably shouldn’t blog about how many mp3s I have on my computer, eh?

Anyway, I have my iPod/iTunes set up with Smart Playlists, so I can listen to either my favorite songs or songs that I’ve just put in my library and have only listened to once or twice. My “New / Unloved” playlist has suddenly ballooned from about 600 songs to over 1400. Hell, my old mini could only hold 600 songs total! Damn. But I’ve been listening to that playlist for the last couple of days, and have been rediscovering songs I hadn’t realized I’d missed. Lots of Folk Implosion, some Catherine Wheel B-sides, pretty much my entire collection of awesome ’60s and ’70s songs (Strawberry Alarm Clock, Chicago, The Association, et al.), plus a bunch of albums I’d forgotten about, like Dashboard Confessional and Chris Botti and Dream Theater.

This is fantastic. Great background music for writing.