After I moved here, I spent a lot of time that first fall and winter hunting rocks and adding to the stone wall. Almost daily in all sorts of weather I would leave the cabin and slowly wander through my fields and woods hunting for rocks. Some days the temperature was in the teens, and I was so bundled up that it was an effort to bend over when I found a rock.
I would place the rocks I found in small piles, and when I had enough piles scattered over the property I’d drive around in my tractor, load the rocks in the tractor bucket and dump them near the wall. Every few days I would use the rocks I had gathered to add another few feet to the wall.
After spending so much of my adult life in offices, deposition rooms and courtrooms wearing a suit, it was a genuine pleasure to put on an old pair of jeans (and about 35 other articles of clothing on the really cold days) and work outside. It was satisfying to see the wall slowly grow. In retrospect I realize that the rock hunting and stone wall building I did that first fall and winter was therapeutic. It occupied me while I was making the transition from work to retirement, and helped me shed the accumulate stress and pressure of 37 years working as a trial attorney.
I found it calming and relaxing to hunt rocks and building the stone wall. I had time to ponder and meditate on things while performing simple, non-demanding tasks—tasks which, over time, resulted in the creation of a sturdy rock wall that has become part of the landscape and represents some degree of permanency in a hectic and transitory world.
A few weeks ago I decided to extend the stone wall and that means I’m in the rock hunting and stone wall building business again. This time I have a companion—our new dog, Recon. As far as the vet can tell, Recon is a bull terrier and border collie mix. He is still young and untrained but he’s a great farm dog because he likes to be outside. What could be more relaxing and bucolic than ambling leisurely through the fields and woods hunting rocks with your trusty farm dog at your side? The stresses of the day slowly melt away to be replaced a calm acceptance of life and the eternal rhythm of the seasons. Inner peace pervades you, and you become one with the world.
So it was the other day—me, the dog, woods and fields, hunting rocks, inner harmony—the whole package of rural peace and tranquility. And then the Fed Ex truck came with a delivery to the cabin. You see, Recon has taken to running after vehicles as they leave our property. We’re working to break him of this habit but he is still young and strong willed.
Sure enough, as the Fed Ex truck drove away up the long gravel road that leads to our property Recon came streaking from the woods like a bat out of hell and ran after it. I called to him to come but I might as well have been talking to my stone wall.
This pissed me off because I’m getting tired of walking up that damn hill looking for the dog. I found myself—red-faced, spittle flying, veins bulging in my forehead—standing at the foot of the road shouting obscenities at the top of my lungs to the dog (who by now is 100 yards away and receding fast). So much for inner peace, harmony and tranquility. Dr. Jekyll, meet Mr. Hyde. Bruce Banner, meet the Incredible Hulk. Mr. Jim, meet Mr. Stroke.
There’s no moral to this story. But the episode did cause me to wonder: do Zen masters ever lose it now and then? Do swami masters of meditation pop a cork occasionally when things don’t go their way? I bet the Dali Llama can be a real asshole at times. For some reason I am comforted by these thoughts.
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