Back From the Non-Brink

"The new phone books are here!  The new phone books are here!" - Steve Martin in "The Jerk."

I'm Baaaaaack!  Substitute "lap top" for "phone books" in the above quote, and you can guess why!  Ta-da!  I am now the proud owner of a kickass Toshiba laptop.  Her complexion reminds me of Darth Vader.  Her memory is vast, extending to a galaxy far, far away (mixed metaphor intended).  I am certain that the "intel" within greatly exceeds the "intel" without (at least, when I am the person at the keyboard).   Most of her bells and whistles (bleeps and blurps?) are utterly lost on me.  I worry not.  I simply grin like a maniac when she cheerfully starts up the moment I open her pretty chrome lid.  No coaxing.  No crashing.  No neurotic mood swings and erratic compliance with my demands (still referencing the old computer -- not my former partner).  The dinosaur gathers dust in the corner of the sophomore-turned-junior's vacated bedroom.  Plans for a suitable dedication and memorial are in process. The Smithsonian has been notified.

I no longer get my butt on a lumpy sofa cushion, for I am also the proud owner of a forest green, buckwheat hull-stuffed, officially-ordered-from-Dharma Crafts, genuine Zafu!  Ta-Da Number Two! I thought for sure I would be instantly enlightened thirty or so seconds into my first zazen session on the spiffy new cushion.   Alas!  It was not to be.  The Monkeys went ape crazy with chatter about the new zafu.  My back stiffened and withered as I tried not to wriggle on the strange new texture.  My legs couldn't assume their familiar position on the cushy matching zabuton (tempting to define, but Hey!  You are on a computer -- look it up!)  Needless to say, I continue to disembark a few stops shy of Nirvana.  That's okay.  As Buddhas go, I am still only a glimmer in the galaxy's eye!

I could write volumes about my almost four-month absence from the blog.  Really, though, what is there to say?  I either post a blog or not.  Get my butt on my cushion or not.  For days that turned into weeks that blurred into months, I went to bed at night feeling astonished that I had actually completed my commitment to sit and blog every day for a year.  I cannot fathom how I did that.  Truly, I can't.  I slammed into a wall of inertia so tall I could barely wash a cup.  For real.  I have been chanting a lot, sitting a little, writing not at all! Recently, however, the Monkeys mounted an unprecedented Chatter Campaign regarding a need to resume writing.  I grudgingly succumbed to a compromise in which I would at least log on to the blog and read a couple of posts.

Voila!  I am a killer writer!  I mean Bad Ass!  I never read a post once it was published (the time and effort to keep those dogs barking day after day was enough!)  Tonight I read "The Middle One" from September, then I took a look at "Roy and Dale."  The wall of inertia came tumbling down.  It is time to write again.  Time to get my butt on my zafu more consistently.  Time to resume the extraordinarily good thing I began over a year ago.

No promises for daily posting.  No commitment to grammatically correct sentences (yeah, right, like my OCD is going to remotely permit that!)  Hell, I may abandon this blog and launch off into something entirely different -- one of those fancy, ego-driven, multi-colored, picture-plastered, capitalistic-questing endeavors that every other blogger in the universe seems to be pursuing.

We'll see.  I just know I need to start stringing words together again.  Kate Hudson isn't getting any younger.

Gassho,
CycleBuddhaDoc