Why Snorlax Has the Right Idea

Traum

Exhaustion sweeps over me like a tidal wave of sleepy blue silk
The fluid, viscous substance slows me
I feel heavy, weighed down as though by drenched clothing
The tide comes in, and I hear the lullaby of ten thousand soft voices
My eyes close and I feel the waves wash over me, covering me, swaddling me
I slip across the barrier
Where it is only mine, mine and no one else's
A box of sand I sprinkle into my eyes
To bring good dreams, or blindness
Which may after all be one in the same.

I like sleeping. I do it a lot. I think the number one thing people my age don't do enough of is sleep. Well, that and drink enough water. But mainly sleep.

Sleep, and dreaming, have both always been a really strange phenomena to me. There is nothing quite like dreaming. I think of it as letting your brain and soul really go wild while your body takes a breather. Whenever a dream wakes me up, I always reach for a notebook and pen so I can write it down, as most dreams are completely forgotten during the course of the day. Reading through of them, I realize how truly foolish it is to let my brain idle. Note, some of the text is illegible because I can't write well in the dark after waking up in the middle of the night from a crazy dream.

"And took the....<illegible>... sword and stuck it into his gut, but he doesn't die. He stays there and stares at me, like 'what the hell, man' and gets up and walks away like I had just scuffed his shoes or something. Then I'm taken by a big burly guy to a... <illegible>... and said that I was under arrest for "Generally being a dick".

 Yeah, that happened just two nights ago. I definitely stabbed someone and was arrested for "Generally being a dick" which, I suppose, is a good way of putting it. Another:

"She was stuttering! She was freaking stuttering and telling me that it was ALL MY FAULT. She was saying something in Chinese, it sounded like song lyrics... Maybe 方大同的 music or something... <Illegible, I think I was trying to write Chinese here> So I was telling her to snap out of  it so I can at least understand her correctly and ... <illegible> I find a set of horse blinders and stick it on her face and tell her "Hi ho, Silver, Away!"

 Dream-David has a genius way of getting rid of annoying bitches.

Anyway, I think more people should sleep more. If not for the health, than for the sharing of fantastic crazy dream sequences.

We all can learn a great deal from this guy.

Happy Thanksgiving!

So, everyone knows what today is supposed to be about. I mean, really, they weren't very creative in designing the name of this holiday.

Today is the day to gather with your family in one of the most basic, ancient ways (around food) and remember what it is you're grateful for. Many of you have given this notion some thought, without doubt.

But, ask yourself-- Did you live it out?

The sermon of the Thanksgiving service at my family's church focused around the made-up word "ThanksLiving". As corny as it sounded, I ended up liking the idea. It reminded me of something I read in a book I've mentioned in an earlier post: Living Buddha, Living Christ by Thich Nhat Hanh, a Vietnamese Buddhist monk. Specifically, it reminded me of this section regarding what he calls "mindful eating":

"...We can look at the food deeply, in a way that allows it to become real. Contemplating our food before eating in mindfulness can be a real source of happiness. Every time I hold a bowl of rice, I know how fortunate I am. I know that forty thousand children die every day because of the lack of food and that many people are lonely, without friends or family."

How many of us thought about something along those lines as we ate our Thanksgiving dinner tonight? I won't lie, it was one of the farthest things from my own mind.

Let's take another look at that word "ThanksLiving". Being able to live out what we are thankful for, that is a form of being mindful in all we do. When we give thanks, it makes it sound temporary, almost forced. However, if we live thanks, we can understand everything that went into that bowl of rice-- The Earth, the Sky, and a lot of hard work. To give thanks is a momentary temporary thing, but to live thanks is ongoing and constant.

The Chinese word for Thanksgiving Day is 感恩节 (Gǎn​'ēn​jié)​.  Those first two words, 感恩,  mean "to feel kindness, mercy, and charity". Not "to feel gratefulness". Being ultimately grateful, I think, results in us showing those traits: kindness, mercy, and charity. We know what we have, and we are thankful for it, so we are moved to help others who could be less fortunate.

I really like the way these words are written. If you take a close look at the lowest parts of both of those words, you see a common pattern: the radical 心 (xīn), which means heart.

I know most of you will read this after Thanksgiving day, and that's my intention in posting this so late. I hope you remember even a few words of this post, and that it makes some impact (however small) so you can be thankful every day, not just one day out of the year. I hope we all can remember that giving thanks can be a way of life, and I hope it moves us to help others out of kindness, mercy, and charity.