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So here are questions from ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ladystarlightsj and my answers:
1. How/why did you become interested in Eastern philosophy?
It was so long ago that it took me a few minutes to recall. Predictably, it was in California in the 1960’s, but maybe not by the predictable route (well, there may have been a little taste of that…). I was working with non-traditional students entering UC, and spent a lot of time tutoring a Chinese woman in English. She taught me a good bit about Chinese culture—she played pipa, a Chinese lute-like instrument, semi-professionally. I read the literature that I could find: Dream of the Red Chamber, etc. After that, I began reading Buddhism and Taoism—first Alan Watts, then DK Suzuki, and then whatever I could find. Tassajara and the SF Zen Center were getting started then, and there was a lot of it floating around the Bay Area. Flash forward fifteen years and I’m living in SC, coming upon a hard stretch in my life—my father’s sick, dying, my husband’s gone back to California and left me suddenly a single mother of two children. I need something to help me get through life, and Buddhist meditation seems to be the way. What’s now the Shambala Center is teaching Buddhism in Columbia, so I study and practice with them for a few years, but that group is not quite a fit with me, though I know Buddhism is the path I want to follow. Meanwhile, I’m beginning to read more Chinese and Japanese literature—and meet the man who’s now my husband, who’s very interested in Taoism. We get a chance to teach in China in 1994, and I spend 6 months there, but find that Taoism and Buddhism have just about been eradicated in the PRC. Back in SC, a Tibetan monk comes to Charleston, then begins coming to Columbia. So now I’m studying with him. I’ll take refuge, actually, on Oct. 16.
2. Where and when was your best vacation?
Wow, what a hard choice. I guess right now I’d say Christmas 2002 in Oaxaca, Mexico. It’s a beautiful and fascinating place, with lots to discover that’s still authentically Mexican, but the circumstances are reasonably comfortable. I’m with my two sons, my older son’s partner, and his mother—a great group that travels together well, and we’re staying in a family-owned posada with lots of nice Mexicans and Americans. We take day trips to the Indian villages and the old ruins in the mountains on buses that are just scarey enough. The food is incredibly good and nobody gets sick. The climate is perfect—dry, warm, clear. Beautiful mountains, great Christmas festivals (the Night of the Radishes! Really—they carve radishes to look like all kinds of things http://www.planeta.com/ecotravel/mexico/oaxaca/rabanos2.html )
3. Recommend a poet to me.
Right now it would have to be Sharon Olds (http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/m_r/olds/olds.htm) although you may already know her—she’s not really obscure. Here’s one sample:
Sex Without Love
How do they do it, the ones who make love
without love? Beautiful as dancers,
gliding over each other like ice-skaters
over the ice, fingers hooked
inside each other's bodies, faces
red as steak, wine, wet as the
children at birth whose mothers are going to
give them away. How do they come to the
come to the come to the God come to the
still waters, and not love
the one who came there with them, light
rising slowly as steam off their joined
skin? These are the true religious,
the purists, the pros, the ones who will not
accept a false Messiah, love the
priest instead of the God. They do not
mistake the lover for their own pleasure,
they are like great runners: they know they are alone
with the road surface, the cold, the wind,
the fit of their shoes, their over-all cardio-
vascular health--just factors, like the partner
in the bed, and not the truth, which is the
single body alone in the universe
against its own best time.
4. What's the one thing you've always wanted to do, but haven't yet?
I was thinking there should be a whole meme about this. Here were my life goals in my twenties:
Get a Ph. D.
Live and work in another country
Have a baby
Write a novel and get it published.
So I’ve done three out of four. Actually half of the fourth: I’ve written a novel, and I’ve published a book that’s not a novel. So now I’m working on that last piece, probably the hardest: get a novel published. But I’ve still got some time…
5. Cats, dogs or neither? Or both?
Absolutely cats. But just last night I was threatening to kidnap a dog (mixed Jack Russell and Yorkie, I think. Too cute!), so they’re not far down the list. I love my sister’s dog Magic (minature Schnauzer), and I had a very dear one (toy Boston) when I was a child. But I can’t live for long without a cat in my life. In strange places I’m always seeking out cats and taking pictures of cats. Currently I share outdoor cats with the next door neighbors, because I wanted a period of freedom to travel, but they are very fine cats: Orange is an old sort of arthritic fixed male, with a very serious and affectionate personality. He reminds me of the dog Satchel in Get Fuzzy. The other, BC, is a smaller, younger tabby and white blotched fixed female with lovely green eyes, who won’t ever come inside, but purrs and nuzzles extravagantly outside. Oddly, neither is a hunter.
6. Modern art? Good, bad or indifferent?
I like any art that's good. However, one place I never miss in Chicago is the Museum of Contemporary Art (only stuff since 1950), so I guess I'm coming down in favor of modern art. Actually I like conceptual art, which is what I see a lot of at MOCA, better than the Abstract Expressionism of the mid-twentieth century. I find that kind of boring, usually, and I also generally find 18th century portraits and landscapes equally dull as a class. But other than that, I like any kind of art. Favorites include Duchamps (the Bride Stripped Bare by her Bachelors, Even--see http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/surrealism/room1.htm ) and early twentieth century Fauves and Nabis like Matisse, Vuillard, and Bonnard (see http://www.metmuseum.org/special/Levin/1.L.htm)
So let me know if you--anyone--want questions from me.
ladystarlightsj and my answers:1. How/why did you become interested in Eastern philosophy?
It was so long ago that it took me a few minutes to recall. Predictably, it was in California in the 1960’s, but maybe not by the predictable route (well, there may have been a little taste of that…). I was working with non-traditional students entering UC, and spent a lot of time tutoring a Chinese woman in English. She taught me a good bit about Chinese culture—she played pipa, a Chinese lute-like instrument, semi-professionally. I read the literature that I could find: Dream of the Red Chamber, etc. After that, I began reading Buddhism and Taoism—first Alan Watts, then DK Suzuki, and then whatever I could find. Tassajara and the SF Zen Center were getting started then, and there was a lot of it floating around the Bay Area. Flash forward fifteen years and I’m living in SC, coming upon a hard stretch in my life—my father’s sick, dying, my husband’s gone back to California and left me suddenly a single mother of two children. I need something to help me get through life, and Buddhist meditation seems to be the way. What’s now the Shambala Center is teaching Buddhism in Columbia, so I study and practice with them for a few years, but that group is not quite a fit with me, though I know Buddhism is the path I want to follow. Meanwhile, I’m beginning to read more Chinese and Japanese literature—and meet the man who’s now my husband, who’s very interested in Taoism. We get a chance to teach in China in 1994, and I spend 6 months there, but find that Taoism and Buddhism have just about been eradicated in the PRC. Back in SC, a Tibetan monk comes to Charleston, then begins coming to Columbia. So now I’m studying with him. I’ll take refuge, actually, on Oct. 16.
2. Where and when was your best vacation?
Wow, what a hard choice. I guess right now I’d say Christmas 2002 in Oaxaca, Mexico. It’s a beautiful and fascinating place, with lots to discover that’s still authentically Mexican, but the circumstances are reasonably comfortable. I’m with my two sons, my older son’s partner, and his mother—a great group that travels together well, and we’re staying in a family-owned posada with lots of nice Mexicans and Americans. We take day trips to the Indian villages and the old ruins in the mountains on buses that are just scarey enough. The food is incredibly good and nobody gets sick. The climate is perfect—dry, warm, clear. Beautiful mountains, great Christmas festivals (the Night of the Radishes! Really—they carve radishes to look like all kinds of things http://www.planeta.com/ecotravel/mexico/oaxaca/rabanos2.html )
3. Recommend a poet to me.
Right now it would have to be Sharon Olds (http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/m_r/olds/olds.htm) although you may already know her—she’s not really obscure. Here’s one sample:
Sex Without Love
How do they do it, the ones who make love
without love? Beautiful as dancers,
gliding over each other like ice-skaters
over the ice, fingers hooked
inside each other's bodies, faces
red as steak, wine, wet as the
children at birth whose mothers are going to
give them away. How do they come to the
come to the come to the God come to the
still waters, and not love
the one who came there with them, light
rising slowly as steam off their joined
skin? These are the true religious,
the purists, the pros, the ones who will not
accept a false Messiah, love the
priest instead of the God. They do not
mistake the lover for their own pleasure,
they are like great runners: they know they are alone
with the road surface, the cold, the wind,
the fit of their shoes, their over-all cardio-
vascular health--just factors, like the partner
in the bed, and not the truth, which is the
single body alone in the universe
against its own best time.
4. What's the one thing you've always wanted to do, but haven't yet?
I was thinking there should be a whole meme about this. Here were my life goals in my twenties:
Get a Ph. D.
Live and work in another country
Have a baby
Write a novel and get it published.
So I’ve done three out of four. Actually half of the fourth: I’ve written a novel, and I’ve published a book that’s not a novel. So now I’m working on that last piece, probably the hardest: get a novel published. But I’ve still got some time…
5. Cats, dogs or neither? Or both?
Absolutely cats. But just last night I was threatening to kidnap a dog (mixed Jack Russell and Yorkie, I think. Too cute!), so they’re not far down the list. I love my sister’s dog Magic (minature Schnauzer), and I had a very dear one (toy Boston) when I was a child. But I can’t live for long without a cat in my life. In strange places I’m always seeking out cats and taking pictures of cats. Currently I share outdoor cats with the next door neighbors, because I wanted a period of freedom to travel, but they are very fine cats: Orange is an old sort of arthritic fixed male, with a very serious and affectionate personality. He reminds me of the dog Satchel in Get Fuzzy. The other, BC, is a smaller, younger tabby and white blotched fixed female with lovely green eyes, who won’t ever come inside, but purrs and nuzzles extravagantly outside. Oddly, neither is a hunter.
6. Modern art? Good, bad or indifferent?
I like any art that's good. However, one place I never miss in Chicago is the Museum of Contemporary Art (only stuff since 1950), so I guess I'm coming down in favor of modern art. Actually I like conceptual art, which is what I see a lot of at MOCA, better than the Abstract Expressionism of the mid-twentieth century. I find that kind of boring, usually, and I also generally find 18th century portraits and landscapes equally dull as a class. But other than that, I like any kind of art. Favorites include Duchamps (the Bride Stripped Bare by her Bachelors, Even--see http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/surrealism/room1.htm ) and early twentieth century Fauves and Nabis like Matisse, Vuillard, and Bonnard (see http://www.metmuseum.org/special/Levin/1.L.htm)
So let me know if you--anyone--want questions from me.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
From:
no subject
And yes, I'd like questions!
From:
no subject
1. What's it like, having a hunter in the family?
2. Which of your children (I think you have more than one) is most like you (but if you only have one, is that one like you?_
3. If you could change the work you do, how would you change it?
4. What's a book you recall strongly from your teenaged years? Have you ever reread it, and if so, how did it hold up?
5.Did you finish that wonderful thing you were making in Chicago? How did it turn out?
From:
no subject
So let me know if you--anyone--want questions from me.
Okay, okay! Everybody's doing it, and I'm gonna be the lemming that says I want to play too! Ask me some questions, mamcu? That'd be much appreciated. *g*
From:
no subject
1. Is there any conflict between your religious views and your love of vampire and slash fiction and media?
2. What is the absolute best episode of any of your favorite series?
3.To what extent do you still identify with traditional Chinese culture, and to what extent are you purely Canadian?
4. Do you mostly pursue your fandoms online, or are there some live resources where you are?
5.What makes fanfic work and what makes it bad?
6. What would be your dream crossover movie?
From:
no subject
I was very interested in Eastern Philosophy when I was in my twenties, back in the sixties and early seventies. During my hippy days I spent a lot of time reading Alan Watts, and others, like him, who were interested in learning more about Buddhism and Taoism. That never developed as yours did, but I am still drawn to the Taoist way of seeing the world. Incidentally, one of my favourite "little" books on Taoism is The Tao of Pooh. :)
Oaxaca is one of my own favourite places in Mexico. It is a wonderful place.
I'm a cat person too. I do like dogs, but don't want one of my own. My best friend has a charming miniature Schnauzer, so I get to be his auntie.
Really interesting to read this, Mamcu! You have a wonderful serenity about you. I enjoy reading your posts a lot.
I'm up for any questions! This is addicting. It also makes me really think about things I usually take for granted.
From:
no subject
1. How does Canada seem to suit you better than the US, assuming you've seen anything of the US (if not, then change this to why not)?
2. What do you like about cats (and tell about one of them, at least)?
3. How long have you been riding, and what drew you to horses and especially dressage?
4. With such a high-stress job, how do you stay sane?
5. If your next travelling could take you anywhere, where would you go, and why?
optional 6. Do we ever really stop being hippies ;o>
Remember, you have to post answers in your LJ and offer to question others!
From:
no subject
Thanks! :)
From:
no subject
I started with Therevada. I still recommend Access to Insight (http://www.accesstoinsight.org/) as one of the best Buddhist sites out there, both in terms of the suttas/sutras and for online publications such as Wings to Awakening> by Thanissaro Bhikkhu.
It is so tempting to try to read my way to enlightenment. Sometimes I wonder what the Tathagata or any of the Patriarchs would think of the Buddhist sections at the bookstore, much in the same way what would Jesus do with the Evangelical preachers. For this reason, I stayed away from the so-called mahayana paths (like most Therevadins, I don't like that term, but it is just a term, empty like all others), including the Zen schools.
Then someone introduced me to Dogen and Lin-Chi/Rinzai. They aren't exactly easy to find, especially the better translations that aren't too Americanized. I felt comfortable enough with what I found to take refuge. I wasn't about to learn Chinese. Sanskrit and Pali were tough enough.
If asked what sort of Buddhist I am, after I say "bad," it would be Rinzai Zen. I really need to check out the Morgan Bay Zendo.
Now I'm more of an Existentialist than a Buddhist. I am glad I took refuge though. It was very important to me. (http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/modern/thanissaro/wings/index.html)
From:
no subject
I decided that I would do better with a real sangha and a real teacher in this school than just reading and practicing alone in some other. But that's just me, not suggesting others would want to choose that way.
From:
no subject
Having a teachers is great. They are hard to find and even harder to find one you are comfortable with. The physical side of Rinzai originally put me off. They'll beat the ego out of you if necessary. It isn't for everyone.
From:
no subject
But generally, yes, Tibetans do want closure, much more than Zen. Again, if I live in a big city I might have gone for Zen, but it wasn't an option here.
From:
no subject
From:
no subject
1. I know a lot about how you feel about your program and some of the problems, but I've never been sure I knew exactly what it is. And while you're at it, what worked for you in recruitment and growing the program generally? What didn't?
2. Do you ever plan to write any long fiction? If not, what will you write? Have you ever published?
3. What in your past made you love gardens?
4. How are you teaching your children about cooking?
5. How do you have time to do everything and do it well and still be online so much (this question is not optional!)