The culmination of this week's activities was a jukai for four of Jana's students. We did things a little differently for this one, as we accommodated for Mira's wheelchair. The jundo of altars was all done on the ground floor, with the big Suzuki Roshi painting next to the stairs standing in for the kaisando, and two tatamis were removed in the Buddha Hall so she could drive straight in, as she has in the zendo. Everyone was in chairs, and the preceptor's table was on the other side of the altar from its usual position, but I think the only real consequence was that I was shooting against the light during the ceremony. There was a nice crowd from the greater sangha, with quite a few faces I recognised from Hartford Street.
It was Jana's first time as the lead preceptor, and she was closely involved in all the details, and came and had a silent lunch with the ordinands as well. Since Blanche was the other preceptor, I mostly let them organise the rehearsal while I got on with the things that I would usually leave to the head chiden, who is away at the moment.
Jana had also given a great
talk in the morning - a suitably rousing one for our new year crowd, which was certainly bigger than most Saturdays with a big overflow into the dining room. It may be the first time that broad Scots has been used as a way to get us to circumvent the thinking mind...
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| Albert |
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| Ben |
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| Mira |
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| Paul |
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| Shindo's feet |
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| Jana, Blanche and the new bodhisattvas |
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| The whole group |
4 comments:
...but if there's a better way to make sounds that are supposed to be English but are....something else, then it's got to be Broad Scots. Jana was wonderful...
Are they the same or different though?
The photo of Shindo's feet is BEAUTIFUL Shundo! Actually, I've been especially loving your black and white photos. I hope you post more.
Ah well, it depends on the subject. Black and white sunrises are not always so interesting.
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