Part 2 (1/2)

I had about twenty minutes to kill before everybody started pulling in, so I swayed back and forth until I was comfortable like the Sitting Zen Sitting Zen book said you're supposed to. Then I tried to breathe deeply and evenly until I forgot about breathing. Do you know how hard that is? I tried counting breaths, then I tried NOT counting breaths. But when you're purposely NOT counting, your brain wants to count. book said you're supposed to. Then I tried to breathe deeply and evenly until I forgot about breathing. Do you know how hard that is? I tried counting breaths, then I tried NOT counting breaths. But when you're purposely NOT counting, your brain wants to count.

It crossed my mind that if the goal of sitting zazen was to forget about all conscious thought and just be, counting and purposely not counting were equally counterproductive. It also crossed my mind that the followers of Zen might not be enlightened; maybe they were just really, really sleepy.

After a while I did manage to stop thinking about breathing by a clever trick: I concentrated on feeling all the individual molecules of my b.u.t.t freezing solid, one by one. When my whole b.u.t.t was completely numb-and I mean novocaine numb-I focused on the numbness. But numbness isn't the same as not thinking; it's just thinking about how you have no feeling in your tushy.

Just when I thought my whole backside might actually crack off and tumble away from my body in a solid block, Woody popped into my peripheral vision. She was getting out of a minivan in front of the school. Jones popped out right behind her. She must have seen me, although I couldn't turn my neck to look without blowing the whole pose. Then she started walking my way. So did Jones. Yikes!

Wait. I was way too Zen-or at least too numb-to say ”Yikes!” I was in the zone, or at least I was supposed to be. Let the boy-mountain come to me.

Woody stepped right in front of me, guitar case in one gloved hand. Jones was wearing gloves too. Ha! I spit on gloves. Gloves are for those who have not mastered their inner soul force. Or for those whose moms have money-one or the other. Woody gently laid the case down on the ice-crusted gra.s.s, and said, ”Good morning, San! How are you today? You were amazing in cla.s.s yesterday. I can't believe how much you know about Buddhism!”

”Neither can I,” I replied.

She giggled, and Jones grimaced. ”So, uh, Peter and I were wondering: What are you doing?”

Ah, it was time for the Zen Show. ”Sitting.”

”But why?”

”The sun is up.”

”What?”

Half grin maneuver: activated. ”I like the morning.”

Jones-Peter Jones-said, ”I like the morning too, but you don't see me squatting on a rock. I mean, no offense, but what's the point?” Jones-said, ”I like the morning too, but you don't see me squatting on a rock. I mean, no offense, but what's the point?”

”Sitting.”

Jones was getting frustrated. Goo-ood. ”Well, what were you thinking about?”

”I was thinking about not thinking.”

I smiled warmly-well, frozenly, but with happy emotion-at Woody. She blew her bangs away from her face-I loved that-and said, ”How do you think about not thinking?”

”Without thinking.”

Peter Jones rolled his eyes behind Woody's back, and said to her, ”Come on, we don't have time for this. We're going to be late. Are you coming, Buddha?”

Woody said, ”We'll be in in a minute, Peter. I want to talk with San for a minute.”

Peter didn't move, although I think his jaw clenched up.

Woody looked at him with slight scorn: ”Alone, Peter.” Oh, yeah, baby. That's what I'm talking about. Go, Buddha Boy!

Peter stomped away, kicking up little puffs of sparkling frost. Woody locked eyes with me. ”You're so...different from everybody else here.”

”How do you know? We've only known each other for a day.”

She nodded her head toward the crowd that was slowly filtering its way into the two main doors of the building. ”Look at them. They're sheep. Small-town sheep!”

Bitterness was not the way to enlightenment. I think I had heard that on a beer commercial once. It was a pretty clever commercial. ”Woody, I have only one answer to that.”

”What?”

”Baaaaaaaa!”

She looked puzzled, then smiled. ”See? You're just so-I don't know-real. Now let's go to school!” Now let's go to school!”

I tried to get up, but my b.u.t.t was both frozen and asleep. I was thinking, If it's frozen, how can I tell it's asleep? And yet, if it's asleep, how can I tell it's frozen? Hey, that's a Zen riddle! I am getting GOOD! But seriously, I think I am stuck here. I cannot move! If it's frozen, how can I tell it's asleep? And yet, if it's asleep, how can I tell it's frozen? Hey, that's a Zen riddle! I am getting GOOD! But seriously, I think I am stuck here. I cannot move! I half smiled half-dazzlingly at Woody and said, ”Woody, would you mind helping me up?” I half smiled half-dazzlingly at Woody and said, ”Woody, would you mind helping me up?”

”Sure,” she said. ”Why else are we put here on this miserable spinning mudball if not to help each other up?”

See why I loved her? See?

She grabbed my right hand and pulled me gently, yet with some oomph, down from the rock. I slid forward and somehow managed to unfold my legs just enough to get them under me so that I only crashed into her a little. ”Zen,” I gasped through the riot of pins and needles that was suddenly wreaking havoc throughout my lower body, ”is not for the faint of heart.”

”Neither am I,” she purred, and into the school we went. Not a bad start for Day Three, right?

the right path

In English cla.s.s, the teacher put this quote on the board for journal time: PARENTS CAN ONLY GIVE GOOD ADVICE OR PUT THEM ON THE RIGHT PATH, BUT THE FINAL FORMING OF A PERSON'S CHARACTER LIES IN THEIR OWN HANDS.-ANNE FRANK. As usual, we were supposed to spend fifteen minutes jotting down our deep and cosmic thoughts about the quote while the teacher checked her deep and cosmic e-mail.

What was I supposed to write about this one? My dad didn't give good advice, he gave evil advice. And my mom gave good advice, but she had wound up as a poor single parent with a felon for a husband, so how much wisdom was I supposed to get from her? And finally, how was I going to form my own character when my role models were total cras.h.i.+ng failures? I remember this one time in Alabama, my dad and I were grocery shopping and the cas.h.i.+er was this really nice teenage girl that had always been kind to me. I used to steer our cart to her line every time, because she sometimes even gave me a lollipop. Anyway, my dad let me pay, and she accidentally gave me change for a twenty when I'd given her a five. I realized the mistake when I counted out the fifteen extra bucks in the parking lot, and asked my dad if I could run back in and give the money back. My dad said, ”Are you kidding me, Sanny? People are dishonest, and they'll screw you nine times out of ten. So when you get a break, you take it. You don't owe anybody anything.” I asked what would happen to the cas.h.i.+er when she didn't have the right amount of money at the end of the day. He said, ”What do we care? She was probably dipping into the till anyway. They all are. And if the boss does ask about it, she'll bat her pretty little eyelashes and they'll forgive her. Because people are chumps.” I thought about it all the way home, and turned to look out the window so my dad wouldn't see me cry. The next time we went to that store, there was a new cas.h.i.+er. And no lollipop.

”People are chumps. They'll screw you nine times out of ten.” My dad was like a satanic Doctor Phil. My mom was the warm one, like Oprah. She was always saying, ”You have to give people a chance.” When my dad first got busted, she was like, ”It's a mistake. Your father is innocent. You'll see. Your dad isn't the type of person who would cheat anybody. We'll get this cleared up in no time.” I was thinking, Mom, are you nuts? Dad is exactly the type of person who would cheat everybody. He lies just for fun. Mom, are you nuts? Dad is exactly the type of person who would cheat everybody. He lies just for fun. Throughout the horrible pretrial period, when Mom had to work double nursing s.h.i.+fts at the M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, and we still had to sell off almost everything we owned just to pay for the hotshot lawyer dad insisted on, Mom said it was all a mistake. When the trial began and witnesses started flying in from all the places we'd lived with hundreds of pages of evidence-that my dad had sold fake t.i.tle insurance in Alabama, performed home inspections without a license in California, sold spoiled meat to restaurants off the back of a truck in Dallas while he was supposed to be away for the weekend at a Bible retreat-Mom said it was just a series of misunderstandings. Until the police actually came and padlocked our apartment door shut Throughout the horrible pretrial period, when Mom had to work double nursing s.h.i.+fts at the M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, and we still had to sell off almost everything we owned just to pay for the hotshot lawyer dad insisted on, Mom said it was all a mistake. When the trial began and witnesses started flying in from all the places we'd lived with hundreds of pages of evidence-that my dad had sold fake t.i.tle insurance in Alabama, performed home inspections without a license in California, sold spoiled meat to restaurants off the back of a truck in Dallas while he was supposed to be away for the weekend at a Bible retreat-Mom said it was just a series of misunderstandings. Until the police actually came and padlocked our apartment door shut with my cat, Sparky, inside with my cat, Sparky, inside, Mom insisted everything would be OK. But we lost everything. Dad went to prison until at least my twentieth birthday, I never saw Sparky again, and Mom and I wound up in Nowheresville, Pennsylvania, for no apparent reason.

I guess I could have written all of that into journal form, but it might have cast some doubt on my whole Zen image. So instead I wrote:

This quote by Anne Frank is definitely true. According to the traditions of my heritage, karma, or the luck you put into the world through your own actions, is the only thing that determines your fate in this or future lifetimes. So even though my father, for example, might tell me to be kind to those who are less fortunate than I am, ultimately I can do whatever I want with that advice. And then I will have to carry around the results of my actions pretty much forever. Also, a great Zen thinker named Yamada Ros.h.i.+ said, ”The purpose of Zen is the perfection of character.” And if your parents' values just automatically made you a good person, n.o.body would need to meditate in order to perfect his own character. As Basho said, ”Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the masters. Seek what they sought.” You need to find your own way in the world. automatically made you a good person, n.o.body would need to meditate in order to perfect his own character. As Basho said, ”Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the masters. Seek what they sought.” You need to find your own way in the world.

English Teacher stood behind me for a while when I'd finished writing, then leaned across me and wrote, THOUGHTFUL ENTRY. KEEP IT UP! under my last sentence. I must say, you can learn a lot from a short little book. I was now looking smart in two different cla.s.ses. And I could even feel parts of my legs again.

At lunch, Woody only played one song on the guitar before packing up. Then she came over to sit with me at my little leper table. ”Hey, San. Are you defrosted yet?”

”I don't feel the cold when I'm meditating.” Yeah, right.

”Huh. Uhh, how was your morning? You have Starsky for English first period, right? I do too, third period. What did you write about that quote?”

So I told her the whole thing, and she looked at me all googly-eyed, like I was some kind of Zen master.

D'oh. I asked Woody what she'd written about, and she told me: ”I wrote about how my parents are greedy capitalists, and how I'm totally different from them. Like, we have all this money, and other people have so much less. It doesn't seem right that we don't do more to even things out. My dad...oh, never mind. You don't want to hear about this.”

I leaned toward her and said, ”Sure I do. I want to know all about you.”