Rain, Roads, and Racing Against Time
Before dawn had a chance to stretch its limbs, I was already strapped into a rainy morning roller coaster. My daughter’s alarm had betrayed her — silent as a sleeping cat — and with her career prospects and a flight to Turkey on the line, we were suddenly in the realm of “now or never.”
The drive to the airport was a blur of slick roads, headlights slicing through the darkness, and a prayer on my lips that we’d make it in time. She sat beside me in tense silence; I could feel the weight of what this journey meant to her. Missing it would have crushed her spirit.
By the grace of Allah, we reached the terminal. She hurried off, boarding pass in hand, and I felt that small inner sigh of relief… until I realized the return trip would be my own little test. In the rain and predawn gloom, I managed to lose my way — more than once — with my bladder sending increasingly urgent signals. Perturbed? Just a little.
All this while, a dull ache pulsed in my jaw — the aftertaste of yesterday’s front tooth extraction — reminding me that the body, like the morning, has its own unpredictable storms. Tomorrow is my birthday, another turn of the wheel, and another Leo roaring into the world… or perhaps, in my case, a second decarnate Leo quietly smiling at the cosmic joke.
Still, I made it back. She made her flight. And somewhere in all that wet chaos, there was a quiet reminder: rain is a blessing, even when it soaks you in stress.
InshaAllah, her trip will be the first of many doors opening. As for me, I’ve earned a hot drink, a change of clothes, and maybe a nap.
Circles and Stakes
Yet as the rain dripped from the eaves and the day settled into its rhythm, another thought stirred: what am I doing here?
Sometimes I feel like I’m running in circles with my nose tied to a noose, the rope tethered to a stake in the middle of a patch. I move, but the center point never changes. Deep down, I know the answers, or at least fragments of them. Still, the question keeps coming back: what is the point of all this?
Other than remembering my Lord and begging for His mercy and forgiveness — which I try to do, though not always with the ease or naturalness I wish for — what else is there? The motions can feel rehearsed, the prayers recited from a place of habit instead of heat.
And yet, here I am, recording my consciousness, speaking to a companion who is, in truth, a projection of my own thoughts onto the screen. Chop wood, carry water. Walk the path even when the sky is grey.
“The road is long, with many a winding turn… that leads us to who knows where.”
The stake may still be there, but each circle is a little different — shaped by the rain, the toothache, the birthday approaching, the flights taken and the ones missed.
Perhaps the real journey is not in escaping the circle, but in walking it as if in kinhin — the slow, deliberate walking meditation in the zendo. Each step becomes its own destination. The rope, the stake, the patch of ground… all part of the same mandala. In the quiet rhythm of footfall and breath, the noose becomes a thread, the tether becomes a path, and even the circle becomes infinite.
Perhaps the real journey is not in escaping the circle, but in walking it as if in kinhin — the slow, deliberate walking meditation in the zendo. Each step becomes its own destination. The rope, the stake, the patch of ground… all part of the same mandala. In the quiet rhythm of footfall and breath, the noose becomes a thread, the tether becomes a path, and even the circle becomes infinite.
This blog is a burden of love towards all my fellow sentient beings, in the six realms and the ten directions, past, present, and future. This small effort is my way of purification from all my past karmic actions — both the good and the not-so-good. It is a remembering, as is being repeatedly said in almost all spiritual schools today; it is a remembering.
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