One of American Hardcore author Steven Bush's favorite hardcore bands is Zero Defex from Akron, Ohio! Click on the sentence to go read him say it!
Also I now have a French author page. So go see that if you're French or Canadian or Ghanian or wherever else-ian where they speak French.
Also part two of my interview on Dr. Dick's Sex Advise is up. So you can go listen to that.
Yesterday I went to the John Lennon memorial in Central Park on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of Lennon's death. I didn't shoot this video. But this is pretty much a visual account of what I experienced when I was there (you just don't get a sense of how frikkin' COLD it was):
I think I must have gotten there a few hours after whoever shot this video. But it was basically the same scene. And I stayed for just about as long as this video runs. I think I heard three or four songs. I couldn't see the musicians, just like whoever took this video couldn't. I think they were in the center of the circle somewhere. There was a trumpet player joining in by the time I got there. I don't know how anyone could play guitar in that cold. Then again, it was freezing cold on the roof of the Apple offices when The Beatles played their final concert (the one filmed for Let It Be).
When I posted some of this same stuff on Facebook, some people there marveled at the fact that I would post about John Lennon's death rather than about Bodhi Day, the supposed day of Buddha's enlightenment, which also is commemorated on December 8th.
But Bodhi Day never meant all that much to me. None of the teachers I sat with ever made a big deal out of it or held Rohatsu Sesshins, which is the common practice in a lot of Zen centers this time of year. Nishijima Roshi was always a bit of a curmudgeon about anything that seemed the least bit ceremonial or superstitious. I think the idea of doing a special sesshin on a day when Buddha probably didn't even actually get enlightened seemed pretty ridiculous to him.
I don't feel like it maters much. Sometimes you just pick an arbitrary time to do a thing, and doing a sesshin around December 8th is as good as any other day. So why not? I'm planning on attending a rohatsu sesshin this weekend here in New York.
But I do tend to agree with Nishijima's feelings about making certain days more "holy" than other ones. I mean, I love Christmas even though I'm not a Christian. But it's no more or less holy than any other day.
The idea of things like a Christmas ceasefire in a war always baffled me. I mean if you can have a ceasefire on December 25th, why not just stop firing at each other all together? Makes no sense to me.
I sit zazen every single day unless some really difficult circumstance prevents it. That's the most essential part of Buddhist practice. Saving all your zazen up for a sesshin in early December makes no more sense to me than calling a ceasefire on Christmas. It's sort of the same attitude, really. Of course it's a less violent expression of that attitude. But it's still pretty much coming from the same place.
