Category: Stories

• The Buddha on the Dung Heap

  or, A Tale of Two Buddhas

  

  The young Buddha sat in the shadow of the Triplets for a few years. He was nearly two feet tall, a composite cast statue of the Buddha, a present from M to replace the old Buddha garden statue we previously had for about 20 years, whose head had separated from his body. This old Buddha, which I believe I purchased at Target around 2003 and was made from some kind of dense rubber-like material, sat for many years first on the deck, then at the front door of our home in Nashville, and for a few years on the deck in Midlothian before finally succumbing to the rigors of a life spent outdoors. One afternoon as I was cleaning the deck and picked up the old Buddha to move him, his head came off in my hand. The body of that Buddha was long gone but in a bodyless afterlife, for a few years his old head sat vigil in a mossy crook of the Triplets’ roots on the other side of the three trees, back to back with this Buddha, as it were.

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  July 4, 2025

  buddha, buddhism

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• The Bamboo Thicket

  

  It’s a rainy October Saturday. This week under the pandemic has been insufferably dystopian, with all kinds of preposterous news. After slowly making my way through Saturday morning I manage to drag myself out of the post-workweek daze for a walk under the trees, despite the rain.

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  June 30, 2024

  adventure, bamboo, hiking, nature, outdoors, Richmond, train, travel

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• The Japanese Garden

  

  I came to the Japanese Garden because I thought it would be serene here. I’m having a bad day, and spending some quiet time alone in the peaceful environment of manicured footpaths and miniature bridges, gentle streams, colorful fish and artfully arranged rocks will help me to feel better. I’ll sit quietly in the bosom of nature like a Buddha. Everything will be ok.

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  June 28, 2024

  flowers, Garden, gardening, Japanese, nature, Richmond, serenity, travel, Virginia

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• Walter’s Caesar Salad

  

  This article is about the noble Caesar Salad, and how to make it my way. If you like romaine, garlic, and lemon, read on.

  Caesar Salad has been around nearly a hundred years now. It was invented by an Italian chef named Caesar Cardini although if and when he did so is has been the subject of argument among his family and those who worked in his restaurants. Many have said it dates back to the 1920s.

  I don’t remember exactly when I first started making it at home, but it was sometime in the 1990s. It was around that time that I came across my grandfather’s recipe for “Walt’s Caesar Salad” in the Bitner family cookbook.

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  June 23, 2024

  Caesar Salad, dinner, family, food, recipe, recipes, salad

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• Peaking at Totality

  

  It’s a once in a lifetime event. A total solar eclipse passed over Nashville today, and the city’s population reportedly doubled briefly as approximately a million people arrived in the area from out of town to witness it. Parties were scheduled all over town, with commercial opportunities galore as eager consumers snapped up eclipse glasses, eclipse t-shirts, beer brewed especially for the eclipse, cocktails crafted for the eclipse, eclipse mugs and growlers and tote bags and ball caps and smart phone apps. Experts across the country shared astronomic data and compiled essential playlists. The Atlantic reprinted Annie Dillard’s superlative 1982 essay Total Eclipse.

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  June 21, 2024

  astronomy, Cheekwood, Christopher Columbus, eclipse, fiction, H. Warner Munn, Mark Twain, Nashville, Solar Eclipse, sun

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• Flying

  

  I am sitting in Seat 14D, a window seat on a medium size passenger airplane. In the economy class section of the plane where I am seated there are four seats across the width of the giant metal tube – two seats on each side with an aisle down the middle between them. Other passengers are filing down the aisle as I sit here typing on my laptop and the plane’s public address system is playing country music songs. I’ve been sitting here for about five minutes as the rest of the passengers board the plane.

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  June 18, 2024

  airplane, Essays, flying, travel, writing

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• Meditation 101

  

  Meditation has been a big part of my life for my entire adulthood, like a personal mountain I have been climbing a step at a time, nearly every day, for forty years.

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  June 17, 2024

  buddhism, meditation, mindfulness, spirituality, Zen

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