Ease

Ease, as in, to be at ease. It is the supposed reason for most vacations and now at my time of life, retirements. Ease, just like the void or mindlessness of Zen, requires an awful lot of unease and mindfulness to accomplish. I suppose there is a deep thought somewhere in there, but in actuality, what there is is work: hours and hours of labor with no guarantee of success in sight.

I think of this as I kneel trying to make a bowl of matcha. Seems simple I know. As Rikyu wrote in his One Hundred Verses (here translated by Gretchen Mittwer), “Know that chanoyu is a matter of simply boiling water, making the tea, and drinking it.” He also wrote, “To become adept at something requires liking it, adroitness, and the accumulation of training. It is the person with all these three who will realize mastery.”

In fact, I often think of the former while entering into the process of making tea only to discover, about 5 minutes into the process, how wrong I am. It is then that the later aphorism starts to resonate in my mind.

But maybe effort is a better word than work. Work implies a reward. I do this for you and you pay me, whereas effort is devoid of the concept of pay or reward. Granted, you may be rewarded for your effort but that is not implicit in the doing.

Effort is an ethical construct. It is something you decided to do because you decide to do it. It provides an internal satisfaction despite the outcome. Effort is done because you want to put in the energy. We know from the laws of thermodynamics that energy is not lost it is just transformed. Though, on a frustrating day at work this is hard to accept. It is probably why the afternoon coffee break was invented. In the hope of using a little biologically active molecule to kick start your brain and body to give a bit more effort towards the cause.

As we are told, the Buddhist priests that brought tea back from China to Japan in the 8th century, 120 miles across the Korean Strait, in fact, used tea for just this purpose. And this purpose provides such an important function that an elaborate culture developed around it. Thus, chanoyu has evolved over at least a half-century.

I think that success in tea, if such a concept exists, is measured in seconds. In the correct placement of the chawan and natsume; in the folding of the fukusa to cleanse the chashaku; in the whisking of matcha into a perfectly foamy lake; in the handling of the hishaku . . .

With all the above performed as the guest looks on resting on the firm foundation of the unseen labor in the mizuja. And that is another aspect of effort. It need not be recognized. When I was young, I wrongly assumed that my contemporaries who were surpassing me academically were somehow more gifted than I. That they possessed an inner trait — in the genes, though who knew about genes back then — that allow them to perform at a higher level. It took me many years to discover that effort was the key to success and that my genes were certainly up to the challenge.

Effort can transform into ease. How will you know, you will know by not knowing. The entire concept will no longer matter. Tea, or whatever pursues you have put your efforts into, will just happen, and seem to the outside world like you were born to do it. I think it is then that you can become a drunken bodhisattvas and wander in the mountains, from hut to hut . . . at ease!

October 2014

Rhythm

Chanoyu, the tea ceremony, is slow and methodical but once matcha is made and served, it is time to quicken the pace. This change of tempo is easy to overlook. A student of tea can spend years on technique before the need for rhythm becomes apparent.

It is akin to learning to play a musical instrument. For me at least, after playing the same folk tunes on my shakuhachi for years I am finally able to think about the time signatures. I cannot quite tap my foot and play but I am improving. This lack of rhythm is the reason, when I think back, that I did not exceled at sports that required coordination.

I have found that part of aging is the ability to look back at the zenith and the nadir of my life. It is a thought provoking exercise to see why some things worked and others did not. Of course, what is done is done, but what was done lives on in memories and an their analysis can help explain a lifetime of decisions. There is value in this.

I try to pass on these revelations but to do this is awkward. It is rare for people not to make their own mistakes. How else would they learn from them? History is full of instances where the past was relived because the past was ignored.

As often happens about three hundred words into my commentaries I begin to wonder where am I going with this. After all, I started with chanoyu. Chanoyu is a dance, a dance with a beginning but no end. This also took time to appreciate.

I watched a fellow student make tea recently and thought of a real world example of chanoyu’s tempo. In the Canadian waterways that Charlotte and I have traversed over the last several summers, we traveled up to travel down. Our goal was to descend from Lake Michigan and Lake Huron’s 560 feet to sea level on the St. Lawrence River. As with many things in life, this was not a straightforward proposition. Several waterways took us up to 900 feet (and over a thousand miles) before sea level was reached east of Montreal.

We wrestled gravity and currents climbing through the lock systems. Once on the top, we flowed with it. It was not effortless. It still required skill and attention but as in chanoyu, informality accompanied the descent. The nights passed leisurely with the realization that the morning’s passage would be easier.

The journey down was more social, and similarly in chanoyu once the matcha is made and served the mood relaxes. It is time to converse and talk of utensils, flowers, ceramics, and poetry. Time to catch up with your guest and enjoy the moment.

So this is the rhythm of chanoyu, the waterways, and I think, life. This insight is an accomplishment to cherish.

September 2014

Geology

Geology was one of those subjects that failed to grab my attention as a youngster. Not that many subjects did. In college, they tried to hide it under the rubric of Earth Science but nobody was fooled. Same old boring rocks with unpronounceable names and worse yet, eons of dates to remember. Now sixty years mature and cruising in geographically interesting regions, I am finally attentive to my rocky surroundings.

There is nothing like being anchored in a secluded cove surrounded by the signs of obvious terrestrial upheaval etched in the rocks, even if it occurred a billion years ago, to start me wondering about what caused it. As Carrie Rose, our 32’ Nordic Tug, has cruised from Chicago south to north, west to east and now north to south she has traversed a flattened landscape the result of recent glaciers, then through one to two billion year old rock in Canada and New York, interspersed with 150 million year old sedimentary rock, and now sits in a marina which was once a slate quarry that dates to 450 million years ago.

I am not sure why the rocks have called out to me. Maybe it is because of the leisurely pace we cruise by them: 6 to 10 mph as opposed to 60 to 70 mph. Maybe because on the boat we live among them. It is easy to tell when we passed from the hard dustless environment of the granite of the Canadian Shield to the muddy rubble of the friable rock laid down layer by layer in an ancient river bottom.

Now we are mingling with rock midway between the two above extremes. It is layered in many places but much less prone to disintegrating into dust and mud. It crushes under foot like a hard cracker. And here and there, there are intrusions of smooth or volcanic rock that slid over the top or penetrated from deep below. Here on the Lake Champlain islands we can see how the rock bent and twisted in respond to the stress placed on it.

The owner of the marina informed me that the lake’s bottom around these parts is tricky to anchor on. That I will think the anchor has a good hold on the bottom but if the wind picks up it may not. It seems the mud and weed that the anchor grabs onto is only a shallow layer resting on smooth shale. The moral of the story is to anchor in a bay protected from the wind, and if the wind picks up or changes direction keep a close watch on the anchor. This I promised to do.

Soon we will leave Carrie Rose in Vermont for the winter and before venturing home spend a few days amongst the granite outcrops in NYC’s Central Park, and amid the canyons of buildings constructed of sand and limestone, and marble and granite brought in from as close as Vermont and as far a Carrera and beyond. The rock walls and floors in NYC have been selected, polished, and laid before me. It is like geology on the hoof and it cannot help but grab my attention.

August 2014

Locks

I will try my best to describe a lock for those that have never guided a boat through one. Most folks from Chicago have been through a lock if they have been on a river cruise and I imagine many others have had similar experiences. But here I will talk about the type of manual locks we have passed through on the waterways of Canada.

Yes, I said manual. Except for a few locks, the Trent-Severn and the Rideau Waterway’s locking systems are manually operated. These waterways were built in response to our (meaning the good old USA) aggression and visa-versa for the English during the formation of our republic and their Canadian Commonwealth. The waterways were built to get men and materials into the continent after the War of 1812. I might have the history a little off but that is the gist of it.

The British government reactivated Royal Engineer lieutenant colonel John By and sent him to the New World with orders to complete the Rideau and the Trent-Severn out of the wilderness of what is now northern Canada. Though from my reading of it, this area was not completely wild. Many people had already settled here. There were enough skilled workers that he was able with varying degrees of success to hire contractors to do the job.

He brought with him a small contingent of miners and sappers, the equivalent of the Army Corp of Engineers and the Sea Bees. The land was surveyed and plans drawn up to create a navigable waterway through a series of dammed river, existing and created lakes, dug and blasted canals, and interconnected rivers. And sure enough in the end, he did it.

Of course, it was over budget and time. He returned to England in disgrace and died a few years later. So much for creating four hundred miles of passable water and close to 100 locks out of granite, mud, malaria-ridden marshes, and rapids!

Carrie Rose is docked to the “up” side of Davis lock #38. It is by all accounts the most remote lock on the Rideau. Though as I look around there are five boats tied to various docks and one canoe with its inhabitants tucked away in their tent. The lockmasters house is in front of me and the shoreline has several small rustic cottages attached to it. I can see the lock gates 50 yards to my right and about a half a block away to the left is the weir. Bridging the two is the arch of the original earthen dam that the colonel built.

The lock, dam, and weir are a compact grouping built to circumvent the rapids that once raged here. The lock is fed from the lake that the dam created and the weir is like a safety valve. It is either opened to allow the abundance of spring water to flow downstream or closed to keep the lake full as the summer drought progresses. Of course, this is not an all or nothing proposition. Depending on the need the flow is regulated with large timbers that are either pull or lowered into the weir’s gate.

Yesterday as we approached the opened lower lock gates, I could feel the effects of the fast running downstream water. I am still getting used to dealing with flow and eddy of currents after spending most of my boating career in, for all practical purposes, current less Lake Michigan. This has been a particularly wet year in Canada and the current is strong. Carrie Rose is heading into it for now until we reach the zenith of the Rideau system at Newboro Lock #36 and then the flow will be behind us, pushing us towards Ottawa.

The Davis Lock gates were open because we were travelling fourth of four boats from the last locks at Jones Falls. Locks come in all sizes, though on the Rideau they are standardized. What is not standard though is how many in a row there are. Jones Falls is a series of four locks: three in a row, a turning basin, and then one more. It raised us approximately 60 feet in the hour and a half it took to negotiate it.

As I turned Carrie Rose away from the raging torrent of water coming from the lake above, there was the lock. It is often the case that locks, for being such an imposing structure, are demurely hid away around a bend. The other three boats were almost secured to its walls, so I slowed and glided in using my bow-thruster to steer.

The lock walls were dripping and covered with moss and tiny plants. They are dark with over 150 years of use but the limestone blocks still show the signs of the artisanship that went in their formation. I can see the marks of the various chisels and hear ping as the metal hit the stone.

The lockmasters have made the process of locking easier by the use of black rubberized cable attached to the top and bottom of the wall. I get Carrie Rose close enough to the wall so that Charlotte can grab onto the aft cable then I stop and step out from the pilothouse to grab a forward cable. We wrap a dock line around them and back to the boat’s cleats. This is not a time for contemplation. The lines need to be adjusted as the boat rises to meet the water level above.

The lockmaster and an assistant close the gate behind us. They crank open valves at the bottom of the lock which open to let the water flow in. There is quite a bit of turbulence when rising, so the staff lets the water in slowly at first. Once we are level with the water above, the gates are opened. We may head off to the next lock or tie up here to spend a night or two. We will do this forty-nine times on the Rideau and be lifted a total of 464 feet.

Not bad for a system completed in 1832. Alas, it was never used for military purposes and its commercial usefulness was short lived. But as a source of recreation, it is incomparable.

July 2014

Absence

The absence of something is something. And that something is sometimes felt more acutely than if that thing were here. I think of my long departed parents. When they were alive and in front of me they did not often enter into my consciousness but now that they are dead they often sneak in.

I admit that my mother’s does most often. Every time I cook, which is every day, she makes her presence known. My father is not around as much. I do not know if this is because he has been gone longer or if he was not as forceful a presence. Both are true. But that said my father surfaces more while I am on the boat or in the basement working on a project. I suppose this is not surprising. They continue to affect me the way they did when they were alive.

And their dead presence, for lack of a better phrase, is more of a gap or chasm. They still offer suggestions. I can see the expressions on their faces. I can just pick out the hint of my father’s sarcasm and the I-don’t-know-what of my mother’s voice. She was more definitive in her speech, but then my home was matriarchal.

I find myself responding to them. Don’t worry; I do not do this aloud. It is more of an internal dialog. There is also nothing surprising in this. At least I do not think so. It makes me wonder about friends that have lost infants and children or lost their parents at a young age. The chasm is there but there is no voice to fill it. This must be painful in its inability to be resolved.

My profession leads to similar musings. In decades of practice many patients have died. Some of them after a fleeting encounter, but many after a decade long relationship. I learned early on to discount this least I go crazy. But forensic questioning starts on my part even if the reason for their death is obvious. And as I do this, a parade of deceased patients passes before my eyes. I try not to hinder their passage. They flow by one-by-one. It seems the only healthy thing to do.

In the millisecond they are once again in my consciousness it is odd that the entire experience is relived. The mind is an amazing chunk of protoplasm. I have heard it said that the brain is the most complex construct in the universe and that is probably true. All this happens in an instant and at this stage in my career I barely take notice.

This reliving is also a repository of knowledge. It is my biologically limited search engine. I think of a word or a set of symptoms, and let it free to roam through my interconnected neurons. I need some peace to do this. It does not have to be long but needs to be undisturbed. I have never had a phone in my exam rooms because of this. I turn my ringer/buzzer off now that we live in a world of constant distractions.

But I ramble. My conjecture is that absence is not the lack of something but is something. It is where everything we know comes from for if we began life filled up there would never be room to fit “us” in. Each of us is one-off and custom-made. And as we go through life we fill up the space that we are allotted and then in the end it is wipe clean. It may have helped fill another’s or it may not have, but that is the luck of the draw.

I have drawn parents and patients into my available space. It has created who I am for better or worse. It effects how I process every experience. It makes each day different and welcoming. Even in my sleep I hope that the sun will hurry up and rise, so I can get up and start trying to fill the finite space left in my mind. I try to fill the absence that I know will never be filled. I try to get something out of nothing. It is quite miraculous that in the end all we leave is absence.

June 2014

Purity

Let’s face it, in chanoyu things — and by that I mean people, places, utensils and everything else — are clean. And I mean clean, in obsessively clean. Of the four tenants of chanoyu the third, Sei, focuses on cleanliness or so I thought. It really translates as purity but I think, as is usual, that I may have missed something in the translation. I wonder if cleanliness is more a part of the second tenet, Kei/Respect.

We clean out of respect for our guests, for the makers of the utensils and for the memory of all that have come before us in the four hundred year history of chanoyu.

Hands, natsume, chaire, chawan, chashaku….all are ritually cleansed. There I said it again. Before they are used they are cleaned. So once in the chashitsu it is not necessary to clean them, but it is necessary to purify them. Of course, I cannot take credit for this intuition just for realizing it after many years of study. Making tea is the tip of an iceberg of such depth that a lifetime of study barely suffices to understand all there is to learn.

But let’s get back to Sei/Purity. There is the outward manifestation and then there is the internal dialog it engenders. When preparing koicha/thick tea the chaire/thick-tea container is purified in an intricate way. I am not sure I have the skill to describe this but I will try. The purification is performed with a fukusa. A fukusa is a square silk cloth about 11” on a side. It spends most of its life folded into 16ths tucked away in an inner fold of a kimono.

Men’s fukusa are usually a deep purple. Women have more choice when it comes to color. Once taken out in public it needs to be carefully inspected. Held at each corner it inhales and exhales slowly as we do. This is called, yoyo-sabaki or four-sided folding. When I do this it seems as if the earth is slowing on its axis. I breathe four even abdominal breaths, and begin a process of transforming it into a shape more conducive to purifying the small ceramic tea container and its lid.

What was once an eleven-inch square of 2-ply silk is now a little packet of energy. Silk is inherently springy and if it gets away from me this golf ball size bundle will open like a parachute. It focuses my attention. First the far side of the lid is wiped then the near in two straight horizontal motions. Next in a fluid motion one fold is allowed to open against the side of the chaire. The chaire is now turned — not too fast — counterclockwise for three revolutions.

A simple thing to describe on paper is a devilish thing to do in reality. But chanoyu is a culture of doing. We make tea for our guest. We do not film a perfect performance and show it to them. And as with any human endeavors, whether it be as simple as tying our shoelaces or as complicated as space flight there is always the risk of failure. To be human is to learn by our mistakes and even if we do not, well that is a lesson in itself.

The utensils in chanoyu are carefully, specifically chosen for the guest. In the USA it is true that we do not always have access to a multitude of choices but nonetheless the spirit exists. And because of the above, once tea has been served it is appropriate for the guest to ask to see certain of the utensils. So once again the chaire will be purified.

This is not a chore. It internalizes Sei/Purity. The process brings order to my psyche. It allows me to appreciate where I stand in this world of contradictions. For only then can I be aware of my inner nature and only then can I truly offer purity to my guest.

May 2014

Snowstorm

Heavy and wet the snowflakes drift down from the sky like they have their own parachutes. The snow started around twilight, so I spent the night wondering just how much of it would stick. I woke to find a white layer an inch thick on the grass and the garage roof. The sidewalk must have retained enough heat to melt the snow but then before the sun rose the resultant water froze. It was cold with sun streaming crisply through the clean morning air.

Cold but not so cold as a month ago because this cold was ephemeral, after all it was April 15th. No matter how cantankerous the weather gets this is only a temporary set back. Maybe setback is too pessimistic a notion even after an intense winter of unrelenting ice, snow, north winds and darkness. This snow was the icing on the cake of spring. It means we made it through another winter.

This morning the tulip’s greens are 6” tall. The delicate Japanese maple by the looks of it made it through its first winter in our backyard. We feared for its life having not seen it for months buried under three feet of snow. Robins with bright orange chests call and spar on our power line, and the next door neighbors roof. And on my way to work I saw several snow covered boats in the harbor.

The local birds have gotten feisty. I miss the goldfinches. Sparrows have displaced their sweet song and golden transformation. But the sparrows in their own way are endearing. They have tenacity and heaven knows they are social to a fault. At the top of their lungs they congregate to gossip in the bramble between our northern neighbor and us. The dog two yards south is kept off balance, rushing to the shrub the sparrows inhabit when not at our house whenever let out of his house.

It was easy to keep track of the local mammals this winter. Their tracks littered the white wasteland of our 20 by 30 foot back forty. I was prescient last September when I bought a new snow blower and insulated the back stair’s storm door. That door was meant as a temporary fix until one day I came home from work to see that a new concrete patio engulfed the doors. I had forgot to remove them before the concrete was poured and so they were made permanent.

The doors have quite a few gaps and each time I opened the basement door to the crawl space I expected to be surprised but I was not. No creature sought refuge in the relative warmth of this dark subterranean space. I am not sure if that disappointed me or not.

The day wore on and snow lingered on the roof. The clouds went from blanketing to almost cumulus. Grass looked a little greener and the tulip’s buds sneakily appeared deep within their green leaves. In the few hours I had been to the office and visited the dentist to have yet another crown-replaced nature had been at work. This amount of growth is a far cry from peak growing season when a zucchini can grow a foot in an afternoon but I will take what I can get.

I suppose that’s what April is all about: spring clouds, green grass, budding tulips and birds singing their hearts out. It just took an April snowstorm to get me out of my funk.

April 2014

Simply

A common refrain is K.I.S.S. — Keep it simple stupid. It is a noble pursuit, probably one powerful enough to devote a life too. But as with many an aphorism its brevity betrays its complexity. A common saying in chanoyu, the tea ceremony, is Ichigo, ichie — One time, one meeting. These statements come close to summing up the entire philosophical foundation of chado and maybe even Zen Buddhism on the unsophisticated level of my understanding.

That a lifetime of study is needed to realize the above principles does not belie the fact that unpretentious simplicity does exist and is attainable.

I have observed many people prepare tea in thirty years of studying tea; from two grand tea masters, many full tea professors and teachers, advanced students, mid level adherences such as myself and rank beginners. Once the fumbling stage has been overcome it seems the flourish stage begins. There is something of the ballroom dance in tea. The basic steps are mastered and then Fred Astaire starts to be channeled. Teachers are usually quick to squash this tendency.

My first teacher — bless her — was a wonderfully ebullient person. My tea began to look like a fencing match in a French B-movie. What did I know? Then because of her death I moved on to another teacher; I was nervous but smug in my abilities. My first lesson was a lesson in humility. My new teacher parried every flourish of mine with her hishaku handle (the cup had fallen off many years ago).

I came away from that first lesson dazed and confused. How could I make tea in the rigid fashion I was being asked, really commanded, too? There was no a place for my style, my interpretation in this ascetic style of tea. I floundered at first. I cannot put a time on it but it took years to relearn tea and that is a lot of knee time!

Slowly, painfully it occurred to me that my version of the practice of tea was hindering my further growth. I was too wrapped up in my performance to comprehend the nature of tea. Tea, as is nature, is simply there. The ospreys I watched hunting at the Canaveral Seashore in Florida a few weeks ago were not performing for me, they were putting food in the nest. Their shaking as they emerged from the water with a fish was not part of a dance routine. The way they turned the fish head in their claws was not part of an artistic statement. It is just what they do. No one had to choreograph it. We are not so lucky.

In 2010 a senior teacher from Kyoto came to instruct us and as I watched him I saw that he just made tea. If some matcha fell he cleaned it up. If a utensil slipped out of place he straightened it. If one fell he picked it up. When he noticed that some of the students had trouble standing he had the tea taken to them. To use an overworked word, at least for me it was enlightening.

So with amazement I watched him this one time keep it simple, and then understood that chanoyu is simply to make a bowl of tea and serve it with humility.

March 2014

Bleak

Twilight comes later these days but is still gone before I arrive home from the office. The alley is the last stretch of road before I reach my garage. Some years ago the city installed new lights. They changed from the sickly warm salmon color of mercury vapor to the cool white of LEDs. So now when I turn into the alley it is brightly illuminated and I find I miss the warm — sickly or not — light of yesteryears. Even the illusion of warmth is welcomed in February.

Since mid November the alley has been paved with snow, snow that is slowly turning salt and pepper with pepper predominating. It presents a bleak landscape with weathered utility poles, disarrayed blue and black garbage receptacles and the vagaries of neglected structures.

2013 was my year — the year of the snake. I came full circle and so did many of my friends. One day we were gainfully employed and the next gainfully retired, that is except for me. They slowly wander south to Florida and west to Arizona, and I think of this each time I turn down my decrepit alley.

Chicago has many strong points but February is not one of them. In my teens and twenties I bitterly complained about Chicago’s weather to my mother. I dreamed of warmer, more exotic climes. In rebuttal she would cite a long list of calamities Chicago does not concern with: hurricanes, tornados, earthquakes, floods (for the most part), tsunamis, and her most dreaded nemesis, the ubiquitous crabgrass and alligators of Florida. I appreciate her point of view now that I am a property owner and a witness to many devastating natural disasters. But that said February is still a bit much.

Of course in a city chockfull of culture — if lethargy can be overcome — there are no end of distractions. Charlotte and I recently enjoyed the CSO with Maestro Muti and Yo-Yo Ma, celebrated Urasenke Chicago Association’s 54th tatezome, had a bowl of minestrone at Eataly, listened to an organ trio at The Green Mill, perused the Hiroshige Winter prints at the Art Institute and attended a friend’s cello recital followed up with a deep dish pizza.

I do not begrudge any of the above. I am privileged to live in a city that affords so many opportunities, but right about now I would trade any of them for green grass and an ice-free lakeshore.

In an odd dichotomy February’s harshness countermands the increasing light. I envy our Northern neighbors. As we (or at least me) sit here and snivel, they revel in the ice and snow. Friends in Door County bemoan the fact that in the recent past there was not enough snow, forcing them to curtail their winter pastimes. After all what would Wisconsin and Michigan be without cross-country and downhill skiing, snowmobiles, ice fishing and the artic like conditions at Lambeau Field.


Bleak could be a state of mind, an illusion. But try to tell yourself that when the cold seeps in despite thermal underwear, wool sweaters and down coats. I am a more introspective person because of February. Baking bread warms the house, books and magazines ignored all summer get read, the blues and classical music downloaded to the computer is listened to and I am writing this. So who’s to say that I will not emerge a better person for having lived through another 28.25 days of February.

Bleak February —
Lively sparrows and rabbits
Track in the snow.

February 2014

Isolated

Isolated by the extremes of snow and cold I adapted. The heavy coat saved for just such conditions gets dragged out of the front closet, as does my wool scarf and hat. The tall-insulated boots that spend most of their life in a basement corner are dusted off and treated with water proofing cream. Next I searched for my flannel lined blue jeans. And oh, did I forget to mention the new high tech Japanese heat retaining underwear.

The house also got the once over. Insulating shades were drawn. Clear plastic was taped around leaky windows and blow-dried taut. The snow blower’s fuel was topped off, and shovels strategically placed at the front, back and garage doors. The Subaru’s oil was checked and windshield washer fluid added. I made sure there were shovels and scrapers in each car.

The larder was inventoried. If deficient the staples were quickly acquired before the storms onset. After all this preparation my hands began to dry out, and fingertips and lips commenced to crack. Many different creams and emollients were used to prevent this painful consequence of a cold dry environment.

The onset of bitter cold began with snow as the high-pressure system from the north over powered the precipitating low. When two to three inches of snow accumulated, the snow blower catapulted it onto the frozen lawn or out into the street. This process was repeated eight to ten times before the storm ended. At first the snow was dry and crystalline. It offered no resistance to the puny machine. But the longer the snow fell the heavier it became until the snow blower’s few horsepower barely sufficed.

Then the sky cleared. Stars were visible for the first time in weeks. I sat in the kitchen and watched the external thermometer plummet degree by degree. It was a count down in reverse: 0, -1, -2, . . . -16 before stopping. The world was hushed. Everything outside, including the air, was on the verge of cracking.

I wondered about the creatures that inhabit the backyard. No birds’ chirped. No rabbits left their tracks in the snow. No skunks, possums or cats were seen. Everyone and everything hunkered down, and waited for the jet stream to push the artic vortex further east.

On the coldest morning the traffic was light. I drove to work thinking that smarter people than me had elected to stay home. Lake Michigan was phantasmagoric. Layers of steam and fog wafted unaffected by the near gale force winds. I wished for a camera. No matter, it would take more skill than I possessed to capture the lake’s image, but the image has stayed in my mind’s eye.

The clinic began slowly and gained momentum as the day drew on. At times like this the practice is transformed from primary to urgent care. It is a welcome change. Neuronal connections long unused get a workout. My brain struggles to perform. It can be exhilarating and tiring. My brain gobbled whatever glucose was available. I wished I had eaten a hardier breakfast.

This is happening in a cocoon. I was not alone, just isolated in full view of the world, or at least of Chicago. The first few days were acceptable. I worked, read, baked bread and made a dent in the pile of unpaid bills. But then cabin fever knocked on the door. “Come out and play.” it whispered, and I saw how our ancestors could have walked out of their cave and disappear into the snow.

I knew the worst of the weather would end soon. And sure enough, while still frigid, the next day was ten degrees warmer. A great weight was lifted from my shoulders even dressed in as many layers as the day before. Mother Earth had heard our pleas and relented. Isolated no more I rejoined the world but not without keeping one eye over my shoulder — watchfully waiting . . .

January 2014

Napping

I find myself nodding off these days. If I am sitting in any one place for too long it is bound to happen. Never one to relish sleep, I find I get about the same amount as I always have — 6 hours. It seems a waste of time, but now at the beginning of my seventh decade it is probably not enough. I try to adapt by sleeping longer but my body is not cooperating.

The earlier to sleep the sooner to wake; I lie in the dark and wait for the first glimmer of light to appear. Of course this works better in the summer. Now in December it can be a long wait and when it does come it is not the joyous light of summer but the subdued light of a sun hugging the horizon.

Once up the morning ritual begins: a shower, breakfast, email and weather checks, and then depending on the day a commute or not. I look forward to breakfast. I have always looked forward to breakfast and so do my caffeine receptors. It has been the same for years, a couple of pieces of whole grain bread with peanut butter and jelly, and if I really splurge some yogurt and a banana.

Certain things, trivial as they may be, have become ritualized. I am loath to change. I can’t deal with brunch — too much and too late. Like sleep it seems a colossal waste of time. Flexibility is harder to accommodate these days. I will if need be, but with loathing!

It may be time to consider napping. Several days ago in the middle of the afternoon I felt wasted, so with Charlotte’s urging I curled up on the couch under a down comforter and napped. Twenty or was it forty minutes later I awoke and shook off the drowsiness. The afternoon was more productive. It was better than nodding at the kitchen table and waking up with a stiff neck.

It is possibly time to adapt, even if in reverse. I watched my mother do this. In her seventies she methodically curtailed activities and responsibilities. We all chided her for it, but she paid us no mind. She was not sentimental about such things. Life moves on, has a certain rhythm. She’d taken care of enough ageing relatives to understand this.

And deep inside so did I. After all it is part of my calling as a family practitioner. Patients who were once engaging and independent sit napping in a chair as their son or daughter speak for them. It is the way of the world. Best not to fight just find a warm sunny spot, curl up and snooze.

Warm sunlight streams
Through the southern window,
A winter’s nap.

December 2013

Sunken

Winter to spring; spring to summer; summer to fall; fall to winter, and again and again the cycle repeats. From warmth to cold, furo to ro. Furo, the brazier, sits coolly upon a tatami mat between May and October. Ro, the sunken hearth, lies below the central tatami from November to April. In the chashitsu (tea hut) the source of heat is brought from the periphery to the middle. This is robiraki. It is what makes chanoyu (tea ceremony) eternal, relevant.

The ro’s heat is welcomed now not shunned. And along with heat it brings the introspection of winter. We are drawn to a deeper study. The frivolity of summer is gone, just in time before the warm breezes that rustle the greenery are taken for granted. We relaxed in its caress but knew it was foolish too. Nature reminds us, gently at first and then with strong northwest winds that bring the first hard frost.

Hats and gloves are dug out of their summer hiding places. Wool and down become intimate acquaintances once again. Walk out of work into snow and ice, and wonder why the snowbrush was ever taken out of the trunk. The ice encrusted windshield seemed so remote only a few days before. For whatever reason this naivety recurs yearly.

It is time to substitute polenta for angel hair pasta, a rich marinara sauce for pesto. A fragrant Barolo supplants a cool crisp Riesling. Chestnuts are roasted and tomato plants pulled out of the garden. The hope for one more ripe tomato is futile. They gave what they could given the circumstances. Grass is sheared one last time. Lawn furniture is tightly packed into the crawl space. The snow blower’s fuel is topped off and it is tested in the hope that it will start when the blizzards come.

In chanoyu the chawan (tea bowl) become thicker, its side’s steeper the better to hold in the heat. Chabana (flowers for tea) go from brightly colored blossoms and wild grasses to leaves ablaze with yellow and reds.

Haiku change from Bashô’s The melons look cool/flecked with mud/from the morning dew to Buson’s Blowing from the west/fallen leaves gather/in the east (Haiku Volumes 3 and 4, R.H. Blyth).

Panes of glass replace screens. Air conditioners are covered. Boiler pumps are oiled and radiators are purged of air. And in Chicago we are waylaid by bridges forced to rise for boats coursing down the Chicago River to their winter homes.

It is both a glorious and frustrating time of year. Thoughts wander to warmer climes. Will it be Florida, the Caribbean, or further south to geography with no chance of an encroaching frigid Canadian high.

The wind becomes a bully. Pushing us around until intimidated, we give up and stay indoors. Of course this is not universal. For the coordinated, skating and skiing are relished pastimes. Children rejoice in the snow, sliding down any hill that presents itself. Fireplaces are lite and huddled around. Hot toddies are drunk. Trees are decorated. Gifts are purchased. Christmas is anticipated and flys by leaving January and February to be dealt with.

The night is dense. Sounds are as crisp as the air. Snow muffles the city’s din. It is the time of the ro, the sunken hearth. A respite from a cold world that resides just inches away.

November 2013

Claustrophobia

Japanese Ukiyo-e (floating world) prints have begun to make me feel claustrophobic. The more I see and study, the more rational this view seems to me. It was a time and place where the Tokugawa shogunate formulated strict controls over society and instituted seclusion from the rest of the world.

Tokugawa Iemitsu, shogun of Japan, issued the Sakoku-rei in 1635. It formalized Japan isolation spelling disaster for the Japanese Catholic community, preventing Japanese from leaving and Europeans from coming under penalty of death, and imposing severe trade restrictions.

It was a time (17th to 20th century) and a place (Edo), and many of the prints depict the Yoshiwara (the pleasure quarter) district’s inhabitants and the environs surrounding Mt. Fuji. It was also a time of despondent samurai and of a newly minted merchant class, of peace and at least for the samurai, boredom. And it was a time of royal hostages in Edo and distant Daimyo with their armies in the home provinces shaking down the peasantry to fund their forced dual lifestyle.

Many prints are of courtesans and actors, both of such low stature that the shogun edicts bypass them. At least in the prints, many of the faces are known by name. They are the cultural icons of their day and their images were collected like baseball cards by their fan clubs. It is an interesting mix of voyeurism and mass culture. A courtesan is most likely unattainable, whereas an actor can be seen for the price of a ticket at the local kabuki theatre.

Other prints are more geographical, like postcards with a theme. These are populated with common folk: carpenters, fishermen, merchants, porters, children, dogs, and fellow highway travellers. And to my point of isolation, multiple environs are depicted but all whirl around Mt. Fuji. It is as if nothing exists beyond its reach. It would be as if our lives vanished once the Wilson (Sears) Tower is no longer visible on the horizon.

I trust you understand that I am ignoring the whole and concentrating on my prejudices while gazing deep into the prints and in that way I am being selfish, but so be it. If you strongly disagree with me then I am elated. Elated that you care enough about these overused images — to the point where they have almost become invisible — to fight for your opinion.

As I look into and between the lines so carefully carved by unknown craftsmen, I see both a sequestered and an absolute world unto itself. It is hard to co-mingle the restricted with the expansive. That is one of the charms of these prints. This dichotomy keeps me coming back again and again. The uncertainty lends an air of universality, of mischievousness, of depth and of frivolity.

America is beautiful because of a lack of boundaries. For the price of gas I can get in my car and drive thousands of unhindered miles from shore to shore both east and west, and north and south. Japan is beautiful because of its confines: a central spine of mountains and an archipelago of islands. Both our geographies make us unique.

So, I will continue to gaze into Japan’s claustrophobic floating world with hesitancy and with longing. Ah, to be a fly on a shoji screen. To be able to linger and depart at will.

Narrows

Georgian Bay in Lake Huron has peculiar charts called strip charts. These are used to navigate its Small Craft Route. Actually not just Georgian Bay but the Trent Severn and Rideau waterways also have them. And I probably shouldn’t say peculiar. The U.S. Army Corp of Engineers has similar charts of our river systems. These charts are in a ring leaf binder and the pages are flipped as you travel.

Of course depicting the river is simple compared to Canada’s Small Craft Route. It winds itself through 10,000 Islands, which is also the name for this area of granite islands and pine forests. I have had quite a time familiarizing myself the geography. Somewhat disconcertingly it has taken being in the midst of it to finally grasps its intricacies.

Strip charts come in separate packets with varying numbers of sheets in each packet. For example I am at presently using sheet 3 of 5 of the Port Severn to Parry Sound packet #2202. Each sheet covers about 10 statue miles.

This brings up another peculiarity. When on the big water of the Great Lakes we navigate in knots and nautical miles. In more confined regions the units change to statue miles and the Small Craft Route is numbered thus. But here is the kicker; the speed limit (not that anyone follows it) is posted kilometers per hour. So I have one GPS set for kilometers, the computer is in nautical miles and the paper charts are statue miles!

But back to the sheet charts and as I said one chart follows the next. This sounds simple enough until you try to match them together. A thick red line traverses the chart when it is time to move on to the next. This red line shows the number of the next sheet and a letter (upper or lower case) in a white square box to further define where on the next chart to look. It could be anywhere. Let’s just say it is not a linear process and neither are the Narrows.

Tuesday we left Parry Sound heading east to Echo Bay and a rendezvous with the famous fish restaurant called Henry’s on Frying Pan Island. To get there we needed to negotiate several tight passages. They all were within the first few miles south of Parry Sound. The first was not really a passage but a very narrow canal under the bridge that connects Parry Island with the mainland. No problem here once I stopped aiming for the beach just to the right of it.

Canada does a good job of marking the path with many different types of navigational aids, the most common being the buoy. One of the rules of the road is Red, Right, Returning. This means that when heading into port from the sea the red is always on the right. In this labyrinth we find ourselves in it is a very fluid (pardon the pun) concept. So to add to the confusion, since we are heading for Georgian Bay the green buoys are on the right. To help me stay in the channel I made a wooden replica of a green can and a red nun that can be easily reversed. I have looked to it for guidance many times this year.

When the Narrows started in earnest we were fast approaching Two Mile Narrows. I had been lead to believe that the worst of the Narrows was to be further down but here was an impossibly skinny passage blasted out of pure granite. It also happens to be the first of many a blind curve. Suddenly multiple speedboats materialize coming full speed straight at us without the slightest effort to slow. I understand that I am the interloper. They have seen many like us pass through their territory, so I keep my course and hope for their better judgment.

Next is a no name pinch between Isabella Island and Channel Island. This leads to Three Mile Gap and then to the mercifully wide Five Mile Bay. Three miles into the trip I am finally getting orientated to my environment.

Ahead we picked out the gap between Gell Pt. and Leisur Lee Pt. While slowly cruising down Five Mile Bay both Sir Tugley Blue and a small boat towing a big inflatable dinghy pass us. One piece of advice veteran Canadian cruisers gave us was to stop or slow down if not sure of your location or are uncomfortable with the situation, so we did.

In my beloved Chicago there would be bravado of horn blowing and finger pointing. But this is Canada and even though it seems like they are trying to run us on the rocks everyone smiles and waves as they speed by. Only one rather large boat purposely plays chicken until I turn slightly away. He went by too fast to see if any gesture was directed towards us.

Hawkins Point comes in view and the uneventful Five Miles Narrows, but the worst is yet to come. We have been told to announce our approach to the next narrows. In boating radio lingo this is called “securite”. On channel 16 you say, “Securite, securite, securite, this is the southbound 32 foot motor vehicle Carrie Rose transiting Seven Mile Narrows in 3 minutes.” Of course we also listen for traffic coming the other way. Instead Sir Tugely Blue call on channel 16 that it is a zoo in the narrows with 4, 5, no 6 speeding boats coming our way.

The entrance to Seven Mile Narrows is truly narrow and to add to the excitement has a blind curve to the right. Anticipating a melee I slowed and then stopped dead as six hurtling speedboats pop out the entrance like the corks from so many champagne bottles. I was thinking if I do not make my move I will never get through, so like merging left onto the Dan Ryan expressway I start to move forward. The last boat coming out sees me, decides it will lose in a confrontation and waves me through.

A half-mile, and thirteen buoys and day markers later it is past history. I take a deep abdominal breath and smile. Right about then with buoy 201 ahead marking another blind curve Sir Tugley Blue calls to inform us that he has just passed a 100 foot tug and barge coming our way. Not hearing a securite from the barge I keep moving and we exchange greetings in a spot that passes for wide in this part of the world.

Today it has been decided to stay snug in Echo Bay as our path east will be exposed to Georgian Bay’s 25 knot SW winds and waves. At anchor we sway between 240° and 310°. It is another day in the life of Carrie Rose.

September 2013

Bugs

I went to clean up in the Big Sound Marina’s showers on the morning of July 8, 2013. The door had been open all night with the light on and there to greet me were multiple types of moths. They were mainly ensconced around the light fixture but there was a fair representation of them scattered around the small concrete block room.

Other bugs had also been attracted to the light. There were those big mosquitos like non-mosquitos hovering about (I can never bring myself to squash them, they look so helpless). There were a few of the real thing. There were the ubiquitous gnats, some biting, others not. A few well-fed spiders lurked in the corners and several flies of varying sizes flew in but did not stick around.

Some of the moths fluttered but most had their wings held out flat against the wall. They were small: the biggest being less than an inch wide. I wished I had my camera. These wings of brown and black were symmetrical as far as I could tell. One was a mirror image of the other. They reminded me of the perfectly reflected shorelines I have seen in the silent coves of the North Channel.

But I was there to take a shower before the trip to Echo Bay that morning. As I lathered up I tried not to disturb the moths, imagining that none of these beautiful diverse creatures had long to live.

There is another side to bugs. One that is not so benevolent. These are the flying creatures that inhabit the isolated anchorages we frequent when not tied to a slip in a marina. The days belong to the midges or flies. Here too there is much diversity but not much other than that to commend them. The two most troublesome are the bee-sized horseflies, and the smaller and more ferocious spotted delta winged fiends.

Your average horsefly is so large and cumbersome that they are easy to avoid. Not so the delta wings. They are stealthy, lurching in corners before the attack. If I get a good bead on one they are usually easy to dispatch but often they beat me to the punch. A nickel size red swelling quickly appears at the bite and lingers for days.

None of these hold a candle to the North Country mosquito. This is obviously an understatement. I think the dread of mosquitos is part of the collective consciousness that Dr. Jung wrote so eloquently about. Charlotte and I have developed a strategy to keep them out of Carrie Rose. Each year we have to be reminded of its importance by a sleepless night of dive-bombing buzzing-in-the-ear mosquito assaults. They are relentless and more than ready to sacrifice themselves for one tank full of blood.

It starts before the light is doused. Some announce themselves with that characteristic buzz and other by the bite they leave. We start to kill them one by one. It is a war of attrition like the Russians and the Germans had in WWII.

If we have followed our mosquito abatement policies the few that get in are dealt with. If not it is a long night. Restless sleep eventually wins out even if we lose that nights battle. When nature calls requiring a trip to the head the process begins again. I lie in bed and hope for the first light of dawn to lift the curse. It is then that I try to regain the sleep that is forever lost.

August 2013

Mañana

We woke up to the pitter-patter of rainfall on Carrie Rose’s front hatch. It is directly above us. When there is nowhere to travel due to rain and thunder at the beginning of the cruise it is concerning. Later in the cruise, when more relaxed the sound of thunder will be comforting, but today it is annoying. A decision will have to be made, go or not.

I reach for my phone and summon up the radar app. Telecommunications is slow in the Upper Peninsula, MI, so the wisp of red, yellow and green reflections off of rain and clouds appears in a pixelated mass at first and then more defined. A narrow band of red dots is making its way across our location. One after another appear. As I write this we sit in a lull between red radar dots.

Red, as you can imagine, denotes the worst clouds that are dense with moisture and reach high into the sky. Red is to be avoided if possible and that is one of the rules I try to live by. Conditions can deteriorate quickly on the lake. Within minutes it can go from a calm to a Turner painting.

Then there is a knock on the door and Bill from Dolly appears. We are leaving correct and I know more than to question his fifty years of experience. Quickly the boat is readied to leave. It is important not to rush. To rush is usually to slow down. Twenty minutes and we are at the dock pumping the head. I ask the young kid if this is a great summer job and he affirms that it is.

Then we are out cruising. It has taken a long time to get out on the water this year, but as this day on the water goes by — 7 hours and 37 minutes to be exact — it all comes together. Carrie Rose has passed through these waters before and it makes all the difference. As they say I can relax a bit and smell the roses.

My other cruising partner Dave on Sir Tugley Blue is ripe with technology. He radios to inform me that a 700-foot bulk carrier will be passing in front of me in twenty minutes. I turn to look and sure enough there it is. I had my radar set to only a 2-mile range and so I missed him. After some discussion with the John L. Block I slowed down and do a 360-degree turn. He thanks me and I wished him a great trip.

Now I have to catch up with Dolly and Sir Tugley Blue, and manage too right before Detour Passage. A thousand footer to my right, a seven hundred footer ahead and to the right two other behemoths in line to transit the passage like the airplanes in the sky over our house following each other to O’Hare airport. My compatriots make it across the passage but I decide to let the tug-barge combo pass in front of me. Another couple of 360’s and then I am behind him in his prop wash.

We head north into the calm beautifully wooded island territory of the North Channel and I have to pinch myself. Once across the North Channel and docked at Thessalon, Ontario with the sun high in the sky, the crystal clean air and the light, oh the light! Then I realize that there is no manana, there is only today . . . and today we saw a single loon off St. Martin’s lighthouse and what could be better than that.

July 2013

Spheres

It is important to know your place. I know mine; it is the north side of Chicago on a street lined with bungalows. Its recently trimmed trees give it the look of a cathedral. The neighborhood is diversity personified. A Saturday in the neighborhood out running errands makes me curious if any one speaks English. Of course they do. I am the one deficient in languages.

I am also curious who will be the next group of immigrants to grace my hood. Today, after spending a cold day on the lake delivering a friends boat to Montrose harbor, I saw a group of cheerful children and their parents exit the Church of East Africa based in a storefront on Western Avenue.

But this speculation is not my purpose here. I wish to speak of the night before, a cold one for this time of year. A high-pressure system from Canada brought in cold crisp clear air that extended out into space. No warm weather convection currents disturbed this air. Through it a full moon rose above Lincoln Ave. There it stood, hovering in the sky unmolested by clouds.

The moon lite up as if by some inner light; even my aging eyes could make out many smaller details. I clearly saw the hare pounding mochie and the man in the moon. The white was brilliant and the greys were like the grays in an Ansel Adams photograph.

Chicago is a hard place to see the horizon that is unless you venture to the lakeside or ride up to the 95th floor of the Hancock Building. Whenever I fly into O’Hare I break with convention and take as many photographs as I can of the skyline. It sits bunched up against the lake with the earth’s curvature beyond. It gives me a palpable feel that I live on a sphere. Whether we understand it or not our lives are spent on an iteration of the infinitely long number Pi, 3.14….

The moon coursing above the lights on Lincoln and California got me thinking. How could I have forgotten the physical limits, vast as the earth may be, of where I live? At that moment, while waiting for the traffic arrow to let me turn left onto California Ave. I realized, if only for a second, that everything in front of me, except the moon, was — is — an illusion.

It’s taken me 60 years to appreciate this. The fact that it occurred while driving home from Home Depot, on a Thursday night, in a place where I have spent most of my life is bizarre. I was brought up to think this kind of thing only happens in some exotic realm high in the solitary mountains, and not in a Subaru Outback with Charlotte sitting next to me. Go figure.

So now that I can feel the earth rotating under me what do I do; nothing of course. I will do what I do. It got me to this point. I will keep this little secret in the back of my mind and hope that I do not get vertigo.

July 2013

Continuum

Half of my life was spent in school (27 out of 60 years) much of it in the pursuit of various healthcare degrees. To this end many were the species I dissected. Worms, frogs, salamanders, fetal pigs, cats and dogs were but a few. It was a progression leading to the piece de resistance, the human cadaver.

Anatomy, usually paired with physiology in undergraduate education, is one of the more stringent classes. Along with chemistry it is an infamous flunk out class. Combined, these weed out many an aspiring physician. To excel I spent an inordinate amount of time in the lab. There by careful study the secrets buried within the various creatures were revealed to me. This pattern repeated itself many times as I progressed through my training.

In the early 80's and 90's I spent two years at different institution's human anatomy labs. I doubt there are many people that have lived amongst the dead for so long. And though I do not recommend this as a reasonable use of your time, I am eternally grateful to those that donated their persons so that I might have a better understanding of what makes us tick.

Add to this, years of practicing and teaching musculoskeletal medicine and I bring people watching to a new level. I have a cartoon-like x-ray vision! It is something I have grown use to. I can discern much about a person by the way they carry themselves, but I had never thought about doing this with dinosaurs.

On a recent visit to Chicago's Field Museum to see the Lascaux cave drawings I sat amidst the hullabaloo in the Great Hall. I looked up and suddenly was transfixed by Sue, the menacing Tyrannosaurus Rex. Methodically I surveyed the skeleton. Never having picked apart a bird put me at a disadvantage when trying to decipher dinosaur bones, but there are enough cross-specie similarities to make it a useful lesson.

That I seemed to enjoy this detailed study surprised me. Anatomy is rigorous. It requires stamina, brute brainpower and imagination. Not skills usually called upon for a lazy afternoon out wandering in the city.

I familiarized myself with the skeleton, naming most of the bones and appendages. Once that was done my mind began to add in ligaments, tendons and muscles. The internal organs were just beginning to appear when the shape of the skin imposed itself. At first it was an overlying veil and then it solidified. I suppose this is how a forensic artist works.

The thought entered my mind that this gigantic beast from tens of millions of years ago has the same basic structure as the Homo sapiens looking up at it in amazement. My sense is that its now long decomposed tissues are not separate structures but a continuum of sorts, with one type morphing into the next and not separate entities. This seems obvious but of course that is not how I was taught.

Histology is the study of different tissue types and it is part of the core curriculum during the first two years of medical school. We stared for hours into the eyepieces of microscopes at slides of every conceivable cell structure: muscle, bone and sinew. Only their differences mattered for the practical. How they relate to the whole was never addressed. But sitting there looking at Sue pulled it together for me.

I have read that we are made of aggregates of stardust that developed structure, function and consciousness over billions of years. It is how the universe organizes itself. Inorganic elements transition into organic constructs of carbon, oxygen and hydrogen, and suddenly we appeared to try and make sense of it.

The universe continues to evolve but now we have skin in the game. Our future once depended on the whims of nature—no longer. Chemical engines churn out DNA and RNA. Viruses are packed with it and sent into cells to alter their expression, and therefore the proteins we are made up of.

The future will be interesting. I figure I have at least twenty more years to observe the outcome of this fiddling with nature. Knock on wood!

May 2013

Flow

I never appreciated the flowing lines of the earliest ukiyo-e prints until I saw them in person. I admit to being seduced by the later multicolor ones. It is rare to see the early prints exhibited and most reproductions tend to highlight their flaws. So, after a lifetime of admiring Japanese prints it is as if I am seeing them for the first time.

In the earlier prints the figures move off the page. I only just grasp their fleeting image. My eyes follow each loving curve, never resting in one place, never taking in the whole. This is the magic: the image constantly reinvents itself, always fresh, always awaiting a new interpretation, a new appreciation.

The lines begin at the top, and flow downward and outward as silken curtains blow in a mid summer breeze. The simple entangling folds of Moronobu’s lovers, Torii Kiyonobu’s gesturing actors and Kaigetsudō Doshin’s determined courtesans move across the page. They reveal the truth of their circumstances despite their naive expressions.

For me, as the prints became more detailed the fluid line diminished. This is not meant as a criticism, the later prints are gorgeous. In One Hundred Views of Famous Places in Edo, Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji and Fifty-stations on the Tōkaidō rain pours down in torrents, massive waves threaten to engulf ships, mountain villages are buried in snow, and diminutive figures hunker down and are allowed to pass through the landscape by the grace of nature. They are technologically superior to the earlier prints and remarkable in their own right, but sometimes a bit like postcards. I suppose in some respects this is what they were meant to be.

My renewed interest in Japanese prints came after an unforeseen acquisition of a modern print. I noticed it from across the room at a friend’s home. It was obscured by a collection of hibernating bonsai. Interested, I asked about it and the next thing I knew it was hanging on my bedroom wall.

The poster size print is an odd combination of embossed gears and printed wood grain. It is surrounded by loosely woven burlap and set into a dark wood frame outlined with gold. The artist Gen Yamaguchi titled it Encounter. It is the 31st impression in a series of fifty. Its colors are earth tones of ash and pale dried earth with a smudge of black grease around the interlocking gears. This print has no flowing lines; it is without movement, it is a statement rather than a poem.

I searched for information about the artist on Google without much success, so I went to the library. There on 8th floor of the Chicago Public Library’s main branch I found a shelf and a half of books on Japanese prints. As I looked through their tattered pages the chronology of the Japanese print was revealed.

I had thought these prints were timeless but it turns out they began in the mid to late 17th century. Their lineage stems from the Buddhist prints of the Heian (794-1185) period. As with most things in the East the earliest images are from India, then into China and Korea, and finally Japan. Many of the artists were trained in the Kano and Tosa schools of painting. Their art rose to a crescendo through the entire Edo Art Period (1615-1868).

It was a time of peace and consolidation ruled by the Tokugawa shoguns. Daimyo and their samurai were held at bay, while a merchant class, though of lower rank, flourished. There were restrictions in place for most members of society and this was true of the merchants. Their outward lives needed to be subdued, but their inner lives were flamboyant. This extravagance played out behind the closed doors of the floating-world quarter inhabited by courtesans and kabuki actors, and the ukiyo-e artists documented it.

The technology moved on from the single color prints (sumizuri-e) of Masanobu to the full colors prints (nishiki-e) of Hiroshige. The first images are presented on a flat plane. Perspective is only added later.

The portraits are intimate. It feels impolite to stare, but we are distant enough that the characters are not aware of our presence. They do not beckon us into their world. We share in it as outsiders. But if we empty the mind and allow our eyes to flow through the 17th, 18th and 19th century we may just be able to capture their essence.

April 2013

insignificant

Astronomy Picture of the Day: 1/18/2013 (http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html)

Most mornings I awake to the Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD). It is a constructive way to greet the world. My morning ritual, before I jump in the shower, is to put the kettle on the stove so I am ready to make tea as soon as I dress. Breakfast consist of tea and two pieces of toast with peanut butter and jam. Once seated, I raise the lid of my elegant little computer and instantly the screen brightens.

What initially occupies its desktop is NOAA’S 7-Day Forecast for Latitude 41.84°N and Longitude 87.68°W. Depending on the weather and my plans for the day I may or may not explore deeper into NOAA’s maze of web pages. There is radar, both regional and national. There are the GOES satellite images from 25,000 miles out in space—I favor the infrared. Next, it is the National Forecast Charts and if I will be on the water, there are a plethora of marine sites to explore.

Once satisfied that I have a understanding of the weather I move to APOD. Well, not so fast. I admit to the occasional glance at WOOT while I sip my tea, and of course by now the email program has beeped to inform me of a few contacts since last night. Now, through with these distractions I click on my APOD bookmark (PIC) to see what wonder will present itself this morning.

I am not sure when I first stumbled upon APOD but I have frequented it for years. It rarely fails to start my day with a WOW! I use it as the foundation for the day to come. This said, I suppose you are wondering why I titled this commentary “insignificant”. In my way of thinking we are not that significant. What would it matter to another inhabited planet light years away if we ceased to exist?

Humans have gone from the pre-15th century earth centric view to Copernicus’s heretical heliocentric and now to Hubble’s Extreme Deep Field. It shows thousands of galaxies dating back 13 billion years. We can almost see the beginning of time. These distant images are garnered from a tiny sliver of dark sky in the constellation of Ursa Major. There are spiral, elliptical and irregular galaxies. As you pan the image galaxies crash into one another. It is so spectacular that the universe seems without a center, without definition. Looking at it I mystify at Earth’s place in the firmament.

But there are more local concerns. There are the “little” rocky bits whizzing past us at tens of thousands of mph. While we had our eyes 17,000 miles away on asteroid DA14 another rock crashed into Russia. NASA is searching for them. There are to date 9714 NEA’s (Near Earth Asteroids). Of which 861 are considered PHA’s (Potentially Hazardous Asteroids). And I do not think that there has been much effort to search the southern hemisphere’s sky for possible intruders.

Prating on about this makes me think of the oft-quoted tea phrase: ichigo, ichie (one time, one meeting). One meeting with any of these objects could ruin our comfortable lives. It is remarkable what thoughts can come from looking through a telescope, no matter the wavelength. An archaic Japanese aphorism is brought to life by the most advanced technology.

Having said this—understanding our insignificance in the time and distance scale of the universe—I come back to the importance of what has been given us: the opportunity for self-consciousness.

So I do not despair. Each day I search for something significant even if in the long, long run it turns out to be insignificant!

March 2013

Drama

Once while walking down a narrow street in Florence, hemmed in by the ubiquitous 5 and 6 story buildings, I glanced down a dusky cross street and there highlighted by a dim light a beautifully dressed—as they can only be in Florence—young woman stood engrossed in a conversation on her phone.

It was a fleeting moment but in that moment I sensed a complex interaction being played out. I sensed drama. Back then cell phones were still a novelty in Chicago. We had neither the habit nor the connectivity for such a scene. I thought how do the Italians do it; how do they live with such intensity.

Of course, I grew up in an Italian household. My father’s family came from a small town in central Italy called Collodi; a hamlet that climbs up a crevice carved in a steep hill by a fast flowing river. And even though he had a nervous stomach he was calm and gregarious.

My mother’s clan was from another small town, Aragona, which overlooks the Mediterranean from its southern roost in Sicily. She was the antonym of my father. Suspicious, superstitious and quick to anger, she was a loner who dealt with the world on her terms. She brought a dramatic flair to our household. I loved my mother, but I learned early to be wary around her. One false step—and I made many—and there would be hell to pay.

She had what I like to call situational memory. A slight, whether real or perceived, would be remembered for decades. Things gone wrong did not have to be acted on quickly. They could be left to ripen. As a rich red Brunello di Montalcino wine becomes better with age, the wrong became more complex, something to cherish. I cannot tell you how many times I was blindsided by a long forgotten misstep. Once confronted, I would respond with bafflement. This only added fuel to the fire.

How could I have been so callous to forget, or worse yet not even realized the issue existed? For mom there was a balance to the universe. If it tilted one way or the other it was unbearable and needed to be righted. I know now that not every wrong can be addressed. Time and energy run out, people die, circumstances change. I think this is why, like the Hatfield’s and McCoy’s, battles become generational. If grand parents and parents fail to reek vengeance then it falls to the next generation.

This is a long introduction to my way of thinking. After a tumultuous teenager-hood I determined to keep my drama quotient to a minimum. I have had a measure of success in this, though on occasion when in the middle of one of the rowdy Great Lakes I wonder if I need to rethink my approach to recreation.

And now that I think of it, my career in medicine has lead to many dramatic moments. In the last few years I have minimize my exposure to stress by extricating myself from hospital work. The office has just enough pizazz to keep things interesting. But I am afraid that even this is becoming less tolerable.

I often think of the young woman I glanced in the shadows of that ancient city and wonder who she was talking to. I believe if I found out I would be disappointed, so I am glad not to know. It is a novel I will never finish.

For all my calm and collectiveness, deep down I know my mother was onto something. It is the spark of life: indefinable and unknowable. It is the sound of one hand clapping or of a tree falling in an empty wood. It is the ripple in the ancient pond that Basho’s frog made, it is drama!

January 2013

Cheers!

Cheers!

I think it is time to cheer. Time to revel in the season. Time to plan a rebirth. It is just time. The earth has been unraveling while we squabble over what, I am not sure. So, this year let us have a pre New Year’s resolution: let’s stop fighting and get on with the process of living.

To start with let us have a decent diet: fresh fruits and vegetables, lean meat and fish, low fat dairy and whole grains. A little exercise will not hurt either; a good walk three times a week to get our hearts pumping for thirty minutes or so. It will clear the mind. We will sleep better. Food will taste better.

And how about a glass of wine—or sake—with dinner, it stimulates conversation and lowers blood pressure. Another thing I am fond of is a shot of espresso—or matcha— around 2:30 in the afternoon. It is a great motivator.

Since we are on the topic of living, let’s have some fun. Get together with friends and family. Go see some art or create it. Watch a movie. I recently enjoy the new James Bond film. Try something different. We live in a metropolis that is known throughout the world for its culture. Blues, jazz, classical music, opera, architecture, theatre and to sum it up, we are known for our soul.

And what displays our spirit more than the Cubs, Bears, White Sox, Blackhawks and the Bulls. My father lived and die by the Cubs and Bears. Shouts of joy and pain would emanate from the TV room where he sat. I only wish I had his zeal.

Sailing and boating in general has been my outlet since I was eleven. Lake Michigan and the Chicago River take me out of the city while in the center of it. For some it is running, biking, bird watching, fishing, softball and/or golf. The point is, go do something and then tell the world about it.

Maybe you will not have to tell a soul. They will see it in your face and in the spring of your step. So let’s cheer up and take each moment for what it is—irreplaceable!

December 2012

Robiraki

In the change of seasons I am lucky to have chanoyu, the tea ceremony in my life. Chanoyu is remarkable and lovely in the transition from spring-summer to fall-winter. Of course there are the flowers, flowers arranged as they are in the fields. There is the change from making tea at 90 degrees to your guest, to an obtuse angle drawing you closer to them. There is the use of chawan, tea bowls with shear sides that preserve the heat as opposed to the wide-open basins that cool the tea in the summer.

Chanoyu migrates to the heart of the chashitsu (tearoom) in the fall. It is a geometric transition anticipating the change from airy and light to dark and hearty. The driving force in this is robiraki, the opening of the sunken hearth (ro) located in the center of the tearoom. The brazier that is proudly displayed all summer on its cast iron perch now resides and simmers in a subterranean nest. Warmth and steam emanate from it and cling to the walls.

We do tea in a Chicago bungalow’s retrofitted bedroom. There is no way—save for cutting a hole in the floor—to bury the ro, so it inhabits a wooden box called okiro. The okiro literally means “in the place of the ro”. It rises out of the flat landscape of tatami mats like a Native American or Norwegian Viking King’s burial mounds. It draws attention to itself.

This is a compromise of doing tea in the real world. As timeless as tea appears it accommodates itself to changing times. Gengensai Seichū, the eleventh-generation grand tea master of the Urasenke tradition of tea, created a tabletop tea service knows as ryūrei. This was done in response to Westernization of Japan during the Meiji era (1868-1912). In the 1950’s Tantansai, the fourteenth generation tea master, constructed the Yūshin, New Again, tearoom specifically designed for ryūrei using a black lacquered table called misonodana.

I have been twice a guest at Konnichian, the Urasenke estate of tearooms nestled in its garden. It is truly a study in contrasts to come from the somber traditional tearoom Totsutotsusai built by Gengensai in 1839 into Yushin with its golden hue woods and well lite interior. It is only now that I begin to understand the significance of the journey and wish to return one day to better appreciate the glorious details.

But enough of history, I want to share my robiraki experience this year. My first inclination was to walk through the event and describe it in detail. I think not. I think if I can express the feeling in the following three examples my purpose will be better served. Many tea things have poetic names associated with them and one of the joys of tea is to share this provenance with your guest. It is what the talk is made up of in the chashitsu.

When you slide into the tearoom the first place one approaches is the alcove known as the tokonoma. In here reside several objects. One is the flower arrangement (chabana). Another, the one I am interested in now, is the scroll.

This robiraki’s scroll was most auspicious having been written by the 15th generation grand tea master, Sōshitsu Sen XV. It read Sho Kiku Man Nen Yorokobi. It translates into Pine-Crysantimum-10, 000 years-Joy. I wondered what this meant and asked the hostess. My linear western mind could not fathom the imagery. The pine speaks of long life. It is evergreen after all. The chrysanthemum the same and of course 10,000 years need no explanation as does joy. So, forever and forever and forever joy! How splendid a wish to bestow on anyone.

These three poetic symbols add up to eternity. This esthetic sense was lost on me. I could not comprehend the incongruousness of the words until it was explained. This is what comes from living with a language where words are also pictures. How jealous I am.

My next encounter was with the chawan (teabowl). In tea, after drinking, it is polite to admire the bowl. To take the time to stop and gaze at its shape and color; to turn it over in your hands and appreciate the potter’s deft fingers as they worked the bowl into its present form. This bowl, not made by but fired in the famous Raku kiln, is named Hatsu Warai—First Laughter. Completed in December it is meant to commemorate New Years and all the first that it entails.

And third, the diminutive chashaku (tea scoop), a mere wisp of bamboo that is easily overlooked but often holds the most esteemed place of all the utensils. And so it was that day. The chashaku’s poetic name is Kanza—Sitting Quietly. Again it was made by the then Sōshitsu Sen XV.

So, these three objects viewed in a Chicago bungalow embody the essence of Japanese culture: the appreciation of nature’s rhythm, the vivid imagery of the hand written scroll, the appreciation of traditional crafts and the importance placed on everyday things . . . sitting quietly poetic.

November 2012

O-Tsukimi

One night while anchored in the Narrows of Baie Finn a waxing gibbous moon displayed itself above a line of silhouetted conifers. The Sinus Iridium in the upper left corner of the Mare Imbrium cracked with detail in Canada’s clean stable air. Montes Jura, the mountain range that defines the sinus, is tall—some 12,000 feet. To see just what I am writing about go to: http://the-moon.wikispaces.com/Sinus+Iridum.

It is remarkable that we have been to the moon. I recall watching the first steps on the moon on my Aunt Sarah’s tiny black and white TV. The square screen bulged out of the large ornate wooden cabinet it occupied. It was 1969 and since then I have never tired of observing the moon, especially the harvest moon

Months get confused when we talk about the harvest moon (tsuki). It is defined as the closest full moon to the autumnal equinox. In the Gregorian calendar it can be in September or October, but in the lunar calendar it occurs on the fifteen day of the eight-month, August the month of leaves. Japan keeps the construct of the lunar year alive.

Chanoyu, the tea ceremony, has a long history of marking the harvest moon with a tsuki no cha, a harvest moon tea. I have been blessed to attend several of these. One in an ornate apartment looking out over Lincoln Park and the lake: another in a miniature Japanese garden recreated in a bungalow’s backyard not 100 feet from the North Branch of the Chicago River. Tsuki no cha is difficult to coordinate. In Chicago doing the tea ceremony outside is always fraught with peril as is trying to synchronize the serving of tea with moonrise.

This year’s tea was impromptu. My wife Charlotte and I were invited to partake the night before. The world famous Magic Hedge at Montrose Harbor was to be the venue. My contribution was to discern the time the moon would rise out of Lake Michigan. I found the answer on the U.S. Naval Observatory’s website: 6:07 PM.

It was decided to meet at the lakefront at 5:30 and we were not alone. Many folks preceded us. They carried satchels containing everything from wine to babies. But I am sure we were the only ones carrying matcha (powered green tea), chawan (tea bowls), chashaku (tea scoop), all in a venerated old wooden chabako (box) that belonged to my second sensei, Minnie Kubose.

The temperature fell as we settled onto the newly constructed terrace next to the lake. There is a splendid view of the central city when looking south. Navy Pier’s Ferris wheel and the Hancock Building define it. The thin haze on the horizon changed from off-white, to grey, to purple with a touch of green as the sun set in the west. 6:07 came and went but the moon failed to appear. Though its presence eluded us we started. Omogashi (tea sweets) was served, and then as one bowl of tea and then another was drunk the moon appeared a hands breath above and to the south of the Wilson Avenue crib. Shrouded behind a thin silk curtain it seemed to hover.

A few sailboats putt-putted by as the wind died with the coming of twilight. Downtown twinkle like so many stars and the now quiet seagulls were reduced to silhouettes. We gazed at the orbs transformation from silky white to silver. Some of us saw the man-in-the-moon and others a hare pounding mochi. What did it matter.

Chado—The Way of Tea by Sasaki Sanmi suggest this poem for the scroll to hang in the chashitsu (tea room) for a moon viewing tea:

Tsuki mizu ni inshi Mizu tsuki o insu/The moon is reflected in the water and the water reflects the moon.

I could not agree more . . .

October 2012