Dharma and the Wheels of Life, a Buddhist thought. (hardcover)

The shelves were lighted up with bulbs all over the roof, polished wooden slabs and all non fiction titles classified together on the author’s name. I stood there and read the names of the books and Cathy, whom I went out with for the first date, looked outside the window while she played with my hair. She had done that three times since morning. I guess it was her habit. I didn’t mind it so I let her roll her fingers in my hair. I looked at the Dharma and the Wheels of Life, a Buddhist thought, hardcover with a very attractive front photo.

“Looks interesting” I said while flipping the pages.

“I think its all fake” she said quickly from back and kept looking outside.

“What makes you think that” I continued reading the about the author page.

“I know it, I have seen it” she said busily.

She had stopped rolling her fingers in my hair and walked close to the window. I noticed the book was written by a Buddhist monk who had also done some post graduate work at Harvard. His photo was very deceiving. He had an orange robe on with no shoes, but under his name I could see three different degrees and a fellowship of many societies which I had only read and seen in the news. I wondered how Cathy knew about this author and why she said he was fake. I felt like buying the book and also get more information about the author.

I called Cathy and asked “What makes you think it is fake”

“You will have to see it for yourself” she said while looking outside. I looked at her. She was just nineteen. I saw the exuberance and the enthusiasm I had when I was nineteen. She wore blue jeans and colorful shirt, with a bandana and the necklace of wood and plastic turtles. I smiled at her colors. She did not at all looked like someone who would read Dharma and the Wheels of Life, a Buddhist thought.

I read the introduction of the book, and the last two pages of the first chapter, something I always do before buying an unrecommended book. I walked to the cashier to check out and looked for Cathy. She was nowhere near that window. I called her on her cell phone. She hung up. I called her again to find a busy signal.

I was a little surprised with her disappearance and hanging up the phone. I came out of the shop and saw there was a security guard sitting there. I asked him if he saw a girl wearing that colorful shirt walked out of the store.

He said “Yeah, that kid ran after the limping beggar. She said the beggar was faking a broken leg and she wanted to take a picture of him. She told me that she saw the beggar walk straight from inside the store. She went that way” he laughed and I looked at the security guard wondering what was outside the window.

Runner

Bang! He didn't have to think. Putting all the strength he had in his right leg he leaped forward. The timing was perfect to gain the balance and pull the left leg ahead. He stared down but didn’t see anything because all his mind was focused at something important. There was no need to see. Three years of early morning three hour and evening two hour practice had made his body so used to the sprint as an old lady knitting her sweater while doing a morning walk.
I have to beat the last time. His coach said a million times “Don’t worry about the darn medal, you run for yourself. Beat yourself to win yourself” The drops of the salty sweat didn’t fall down, the wind of his speed touched his face and took the sweat away along with it giving him the encouragement to beat himself. I have to beat the last time.

He looked ahead and ran. Jo and Alex were drunk when they came to visit him a night two weeks ago. They knew their best friend would be traveling away to run. They had brought him a medal saying “Run Runner”. Run runner he heard in his ears. “Yeah” his jaws were closed tighter than a crocodile’s whenever he had run along with other men on the striped ground. Run runner “yeah”. With his steps counting yards by the seconds he thought I have to beat the last time.

He saw the Italian wearing green and red was nearing by with the corner of his eye. He is fast. His nerves erected, and he showed his teeth. He had forgot his body. With all his power and strength he was in tune with a harmony of speed and the wind kissing his body. He remembered the last time he had finally ran with all his power and life. He smiled within himself. He is fast... but I have to beat my time.

All the shouting faces, the screaming throats and the bulging eyes were looking at the men who had lived for this run. They say the men on the ground running towards the line. But the men running on the tracks saw nothing but the line. He knew he was not alone. There were eight runners who were running behind him. He didn’t know what they were running for, but he knew they saw the same that he had been seeing all these years.
He didn’t care of what they saw or what they heard, he smiled I have to beat the last time.

Herenow

She looked at the road outside. Dark, still and patient. It lied there without caring who was passing. Knowing no direction, it did not care guide the travellers if they were going in the wrong or right direction... since it was their own choice maybe.

She saw people walking in different directions, with different speeds, different moods and different thaughts running in their minds. She saw the road, existing alone without knowing anybody. She wondered who the first person would have been to walk on it. Was the road made first, or the traveller walked through the ground and made it before its existence? Was the road a plan or was it an accident? But she thought the road would never ask this.

The road would never even think about this or anything else.

She kept on looking the road, thinking about it. A moment came when she lost her own thought. She got so lost in the road that she became the road herself. Her mind became the mind of a path, her mentality became the mentality of the direction, a viewpoint of the way, and her thought became the thought of the road.

She felt herself. She felt the calmness, the stillness she had never experienced before. She found herself everywhere. She was not existing between two ends. She had many ends and many beginings within herself. She found that she had not known anything simpler, so vast and quiet.

And when she closed her eyes she saw her own little face which was looking outside the window eye in eye with herself.

The visions and The sounds

Originally uploaded by aarthyr.

Rachel walked slowly in the door of the shop which read 'Montgomery Trading Co. Est. 1958' in red. Next to the door was a window with a few shelves and frames for eye opticals on them. Dusty and faded with the sunlight, the frames on the shelf gave the wrinkles to the old optician shop. She opened the door and stood there to be greeted. Where is the shopkeeper? she thought. She stepped in and felt the carpeted floor to find her way in the shop with her long plastic stick.
Rachel had not seen since she was five when she lost her eyesight completely without any reason that doctors could explain. Eventuallu she adapted and learned how to find her way. She was a good listener. I can listen my ways she had thought. Her ears were her best friend. She felt lucky that she was blind and not dumb and deaf How can they live.
The wall on the right side was having shelves having many frames of different sizes. She found the wall and like any other shop she located the shelves and started finding something she would wear. She touched almost every frame, but could not find the one she wanted. The shopkeeper was standing on the right side as she could hear him cleaning the shelves. “I want a rectangular frame, a little bigger than these ones here” she said loudly to get the shopkeeper’s attention. She heard the person standing right to her open a door and bring back something which was placed on the table loudly.
She moved towards the table and the shopkeeper held her hand and put the frame in her hand. A gentleman she thought. One by one he patiently handed her the frames. “Ah, I like this one”. She took her dark sunglasses off and while putting them on the table she dropped them. Oh no, I cannot afford that today. She was quick to place her stick against the table and bent down to find the fallen sunglasses. The shopkeeper, who was already there on his knees, placed the sunglasses in Rachel’s hand. “Thank you so much, … and thanks for the carpet as well”. She smiled and got up wondering how would he sound like.

“I think I like this one, what is the price?” She referred to the last frame she was shown.

The shopkeeper didn’t say anything.

“Sir?”

The shopkeeper held her hand and wrote ten dollars on Rachel’s arm.

Rachel stood there realizing that the shopkeeper was deaf and dumb.

Click!

click!
Originally uploaded by aarthyr.

He stared at me while I was focusing him on my camera. On a footpath, with white bandage on his left arm, and no finger longer than the knuckle except the thumb, he sat quietly. Click! His dark skin was dry and he had blisters on his neck and perhaps on his chest as well, he wore a grey robe. Click!. He smiled finally when he realized that I just captured him on my camera. He stood up. I saw he had trouble while standing up. His left leg was swollen. He was sitting on a bag which had everything he owned. Click!. He fetched a stick that stood against the wall he was sitting in front off. Click!. He bent down and took a cloth, tied a turban and looked at me. Click!. He looked around, perhaps he was looking for someone or something. Balancing on the stick, he moved fast towards his right. I was surprised where he was going. Click!. He shook a little boy sleeping on the pavement with his foot. ‘Camera, Camera’ he shouted. The little boy didn’t move, He came back where he was sitting. His movements showed excitement that he felt, he made a noise with every step he took. Click! He stood there like a military man standing. Attention. Click! I moved close to him, and felt that his smile was getting wider and wider. His lower lip trembled as his folded hands. Click! I forwarded my hand. He looked at my hand with a surprise, his smile started to disappear. He slowly looked me. Click! And finally at my camera. I kneeled and placed a ten rupees note in the dented aluminum bowl, which had a few coins of different value. Click!


I was sipping hot Darjeeling tea when I saw a tall dark shadow elongating in my direction. I turned back and saw the beggar coming to me. He handed me the money back I had dropped in his bowl and smiled. I never thanked him for posing and perhaps he came to thank me? He made a sound with his tongue ‘Click!’