#not showing it but i did wear a dharma shirt when i met him

[stripesysheaven]

anyway to celebrate my rewatch of lost being complete, have a zoomed in picture of a selfie i took with mr emerson <3

[translations-by-aiimee]

Dig a Grave to Dig Out a Ghost - Chapter 8

Original Title: 挖坟挖出鬼

Genres: Drama, Horror, Mystery, Supernatural, Yaoi

This translation is based on multiple MTLs and my own limited knowledge of Chinese characters. If I have made any egregious mistakes, please let me know.

Chapter Index

Chapter 8 - Drive Away the Ghost

If a city had existed for thousands of years, no matter how prosperous it looks on the surface, some people still believe in legends and some corners of the city still retained the oldest mysterious customs. Once Lin Yan had left the police station, he drove northwest. The surrounding people were gradually thinning out, and the mountains were foggy at dusk. When the entire trail was almost enveloped by the dense fog, Lin Yan finally found his destination at the foot of the Xishan Mountain.

Lin Yan stopped the car and compared the photos he found on the Internet with the scenery in front of him. This was it. A small temple without a name was built on the side of the mountain. Two white lanterns in front of the door and the candles had been replaced with electric lights. It looked very ominous in the night. By the well in the yard, there was a holy spirit banner hanging on a jujube tree with a crooked trunk next to it, the strands of cloth fluttering in the wind.

Although the appearance of the small temple was fairly inconspicuous, it was quite famous among supernatural enthusiasts. It was different from ordinary Buddhist temples for worshipping gods and praying for blessings. This ancient temple had only one purpose, and that was to exorcise ghosts. Most people always thought that where there was a temple, there was a spiritual aura. It is true for an ancient temple on the mountain, but this temple was built on flat ground. From the perspective of feng shui, the mountain belonged to the light Yang energy. The temple was built in the middle of the mountain to connect with the clear and righteousness, and was more accessible to the gods; the depression in the earth gathers the dark Yin energy. This temple was built in a low-lying place in front of the mountain to attract the lonely spirits and wild ghosts, and they won't disturb anyone in the area. Because of this, there was a saying that the temple should not be demolished. Xishan Temple was a mass grave in ancient times, and it experienced lots of grievances. This small temple had been preserved to this day because of its special function.

Lin Yan glanced at the rustling banner hanging at the door and silently turned his car off.

This was the riskiest thing he could try according to the information he had found on the internet.

Having called in advance, the master of the temple had been waiting outside. When Lin Yan approached, he greeted him with a smile: "Sit down, do you want to pray for peace or do dharma ceremonies?"

The man wore an earth-yellow robe. He didn't shave his hair, keeping it buzzed down instead; he looked 70% like a monk and 30% like a Daoist priest. Lin Yan looked at the furnishings in the temple; the limestone walls, the concrete floor, and an old wooden table with faded clothes on it with incense burners and fruit offerings. There was a strong scent of sandalwood that lingered in the room. Lin Yan took out a lighter and gestured to it. Seeing that the master had no objection, he took out a cigarette and lit it. After taking a drag, he said in a deep voice, "Neither, I want to kill a ghost."

He didn't know if it was a psychological effect, but Lin Yan felt that as soon as he spoke, cool air washed over him. The temple master was taken aback, and quickly said: "You can't talk nonsense here, they'll hear you." After speaking, he looked back at the door for a long time, and couldn't help but frown. "What a heavy hostility. This man died violently and he's been dead for a while."

Lin Yan glanced in the direction indicated by the master. It was an empty space and he couldn't see anything.

"I'll say it outright. Guest, you have less than three months left to live."

"Master, you must be joking." Lin Yan tried to keep his voice calm, but his fingers trembling unconsciously.

"A-Yan, pour a glass of water for the guest." The temple master shouted into the back hall, then turned to Lin Yan and said, "Since you came all the way to my small temple, it must have taken a lot of effort, but let’s talk not beat around the bush and get to the point. How did you provoke such a life-threatening ghost?"

Lin Yan didn't know what to say.

The host said indifferently: "I'm used to seeing these silk clothes. I think this Ming Dynasty shirt is a bit cordial."

Ming Dynasty shirt. . . The familiar words evoked something in Lin Yan's memories. He couldn't keep in his gasp. Did the strange man really see ghosts? He couldn't help but think of the archaeological practice he had mentioned to Yin Zhou. He was responsible for the cleaning of the main room of Pit No.16. He kept turning over the materials every night for a week with just the light of a miner's lamp. Next, they excavated a camphor coffin sealed with 64 copper nails. The coffin was covered in thick, black lacquer. He leaned over the coffin and used a soft brush to clean the corpse. He peeled off nine sets of mouldy and decayed mortuary clothes layer by layer and patted the body for the funeral objects scattered in the gap between the bones. . .

"Last month, I did enter an ancient tomb from the Ming Dynasty in Shanxi. . ." Lin Yan said in shock.

"Like the sutras say: everything has a consequence." The temple master smiled and asked for Lin Yan's birth date. He made some calculations and said strangely: "The four pillars are interspersed in Yin. The Four Pillars of Destiny has roots in the gateway of the universe. Based on the universal retrograde, this person has heavy Yin energy. No wonder he found you."

"This person died in a terrible accident, with resentment born in his heart from it. His spirit has felt like this for too long. A lonely soul becomes an evil spirit no better than a beast. I am afraid it will be difficult to survive this spirit."

Lin Yan interrupted him: "Can you do something about it?"

The temple master replied: "I can only disperse his spirit which means that he would no longer be able to enter the cycle of reincarnation."

Lin Yan lowered his head and squeezed his hands together softly. He thought of the madness and aggravation of the things in the elevator, the shameful memories in the living room, and the face of the grandmother in the morgue. He clenched his fists and said fiercely: "He killed someone. I don't know when the second or even the third victim might be. Why should I be kind and save his soul? He forfeited his life with murder; he deserves this."

"I don't care who he is, I just want him to go back to wherever he came from." Lin Yan said coldly: "Send him away, I'll pay whatever you want."

The host sighed, and took out a stack of yellow paper from under the table: "Whoever says that ghosts can be cruel; people are just as cruel."

While they talked, the little disciple sped out from the back hall carrying the tea tray and respectfully handed the tea to Lin Yan. He put the remaining cup in the tea tray next to the fruit tray on the incense table. He lowered his head and said, "You are a guest, you must be thirsty too. Please drink."

Lin Yan was taken aback, wondering why this voice was so familiar. The little disciple met Lin Yan's gaze. He was taken aback, and then smiled: "It's you."

With a lean figure, pale and slender face, and wearing a nondescript blue earthen cloth robe, it turned out to be the strange Daoist priest he had run into during the day.

Lin Yan's mind was confused, wondering whether this was a Buddhist temple or not. Why did a Daoist priest show up?

"This-, this is my master." He turned his face to the temple master and bowed his head: "Lin Yan is my university classmate."

Lin Yan vaguely remembered this Daoist with the last name Yan. When they were in their undergrad, the two were in the same department and their dormitory was on the same floor. Normally, Lin Yan was looking down in class so he didn't see him. However, he was introverted, uncomfortable in social settings and had stuttering problems. He was never seen at school-organized activities. He never participated, so his classmate Lin Yan couldn't even remember his real name for four years. The title of Daoist priest was as impactful as thunder. At that time, the freshmen had just moved into the dormitory of the school. Within a few days, there were rumours that there was a weird man on the same floor who was burning paper while muttering to the air in the dormitory. He also liked to make some ghost-like talismans and stick them everywhere. After a while, the guys in the dormitory couldn't bear it anymore, so they forced him out. They changed the locks on the doors to keep him out all night, threw his things out of the windows in the dormitory. He lasted half a semester before they drove him out of the dorms.

This story was told as a joke in the department for a long time. The most troublesome thing for Lin Yan as the dorm supervisor at the time was the issues with this Daoist priest. No matter how hard he tried to force the strange Daoist priest to stand up for himself, he would never fight back. He lowered his head and dealt with whatever happened after that. Later, when his course got more intense, Lin Yan couldn't take care of him, and slowly forgot about the whole thing.

"You-, you just call me A-Yan," The Daoist priest whispered. "I don't mind."

After concluding on a price, A-Yan brought out a red lacquer box from the back hall. The temple master ordered the contents to be laid out one by one; yellow paper, sacrificial incense, cinnabar, a short knife that seems to be several years old, and some bottles and jars with unknown contents.

"After everything is done like how I say, this wicked creature will have cultivated a physical body. Now is not a good time, and I'm not completely sure about this. If something goes wrong, we may have to deal with it here." The temple master faintly commanded: "Set the array."

The master and apprentice went to work. Lin Yan had never seen something like this before and felt like it was out of a movie. He saw the temple master lock the doors and windows and evenly sprinkled the incense ash on the window edges and the door cracks, placing a copper coin at various intervals. After that, the doors and windows were closed with red ropes. The whole room was connected by the ropes. Finally, a thin layer of cinnabar was spread on the floor, and the yellow paper and short knife were placed on the table for later use.

"The red rope wards off evil spirits and prevents anything outside from coming in, and anything inside from getting out." The temple owner said: "The negative atmosphere in the mountain at midnight is extremely strong, and the cinnabar brings light. After a while, the wild ghosts in the mountain will come running in anger to this conflicting energy."

Lin Yan suddenly became nervous: "What do you mean, 'wild ghost'?"

"Some are lone souls who don't believe that they are dead, some are poor people who had no one to collect their bodies, and some were killed and are waiting to get resurrected. It doesn't matter, the trouble is with the one following you." The temple master gestured towards the centre of the room. So far, the development of the matter had completely exceeded the limit of Lin Yan's imagination. He didn't know what to say, so he just nodded.

"This can isolate yin and yang energy, and ghosts will not be able to find you if you sprinkle it on your body. Remember that you will not be able to speak or breathe afterwards. No matter what happens, do as I say." The temple master picked up one of the jars from the table. He unscrewed the lid and sprinkled all the stone powder on Lin Yan's body. Seeing Lin Yan's nervousness, A-Yan gave a hesitant smile: "The temple is very dark, give it a minute and you'll be able to see. I was so scared the first time I saw it."

He took out a piece of cypress wood from the basket. He used the knife to engrave Lin Yan’s birthday characters and then cut out a small paper man to paste on it. His hand moved delicately. The little red paper man stretched in his hands, grinning. But there was an indescribable weirdness on the table.

As the night grew deeper, the mountain breeze blew the leaves of the jujube trees in the courtyard. There were no people in the area for dozens of miles. The ancient temple was lit with faint lights. Lin Yan thought, if someone passed by at this time and saw three people in the room sitting in a red line around an oil lamp, they would have to be extremely frightened.

Time passed by, and there was no change in the surroundings. Lin Yan took out his phone and checked the time. It was 11:30 and they had been waiting for almost two hours, but the temple master and A-Yan remained silent, as though they were meditating.

The flame on the table moved.

"It's here," A-Yan said, and then motioned Lin Yan to pay attention to what was behind him. Lin Yan turned around and saw that there was nothing unusual. Then he saw it.

There are obviously only three of them in the room, but there were four shadows on the wall.

[essford]

Together in Fear

On March 30th at approximately 4:21 PM, my father and I were officially checked in to room 149 at Motel 6 in Fife, Washington. Fife is a city of almost 10,000 people on the eastern end of Tacoma, existing as the gateway between King and Pierce Counties. It is the home of Emerald Queen Casino, where my father, Chris Ford, recently purchased tickets to see Blue Oyster Cult, the hard rock band that has gone on to create a profitable, if not ultimately predictable, touring career in the casino circuit over the past two decades. I always wondered what it would be like to wind up in that environment, as in, paying money to see a band with two surviving members play a small collection of hits compacted into an hour and a half set in the back of a crowded casino, where the combined odors of urine, sweat, and booze indebted belches are barely detectable inside the multipurpose showroom, just beyond the rows and rows of slot machines, black jack tables, stuffed shoulder to shoulder with salt of the earth workers, local natives, tourists, the sloshed and slobbering, the dismal and desperate, draining savings, collecting earnings. Everybody burning money together in the name of luck.

This show would mark Chris’s sixth time seeing Blue Oyster Cult, and for him, this was business as usual. BOC was coming to EQC, and it was my mission to join him on this quest. There was no one else I could imagine myself sitting next to as “Don’t Fear The Reaper” was performed with precision to an adoring audience before someone, like surviving members Buck Dharma (age 71, with vocal cords intact) and Eric Bloom, who perhaps feared reapers of their own, so to speak. I couldn’t help but think of young Chris, sitting around at age 16, puffing a joint listening to Agents of Fortune for the first time at my Nana’s house in West Seattle. We had to hit the casino. This was a good time to lose some money very quickly.

Room 149 was furnished with two twin beds that faced a modestly sized LG TV screen, set against the center of the wall. Underneath the screen was a bare desk. Before Chris placed down his bags, as well as his cooler, filled with 1 bottle Crown Royal (with bag intact) and somewhere around 9 (?) Budweiser 12 oz. cans, he picked up the television remote which was placed on a small nightstand between our beds. Less than one minute had passed before he turned on the TV, turning up the volume. I chose the bed closer to the bathroom. Out of some instinct, I pulled back the bedsheets, and noticed three thin, stranded hairs. I am fairly certain that one of them was pubic. For no discernible reason, I then turned on the bathroom light and wondered how many people, upon entering a new motel room, inspect the bathroom out of a similar instinct. It was then I realized I forgot to bring a toothbrush.

“Oh, I love this show,” My father said, sitting on his bed, Budweiser newly cracked and a healthy slug sat in his cup like a monument. He was wearing olive cargo shorts, nondescript sneakers with Nike socks, a Washington State Cougars shirt, and a hat with a camouflage bill (not intact), emblazoned with a Cougar logo. As his eyes began to glaze, I turned my attention to what he was watching. It was a show called Live P.D. The premise of the show was similar to that of Cops, in which camera crews across America follow police officers in the line of duty, dealing with the day in, day out mayhem that one has expected to come across as a citizen of the United States. It was a livestreamed television show, hosted by a cast of three commentators, all with backgrounds in law enforcement. One of the hosts looked a lot like Paul Ryan. After each corresponding clip of real time crime, the camera would cut back to the three men, nonchalantly giving analysis on what had unfolded. Car thieves in Ohio, domestic disputes in Florida, drunk and disorderly folks flinging themselves through the streets of Baton Rouge are caught, not only by the claws and sharpened talons of the law, but on camera, and after having their rights read by stern and foul mouthed officers, they are detained, and just as if they never existed before that moment in time, the scene CUTS to a slow fade, panning to the next adrenaline fueled saga of American Crime..

In 15 minutes, we made 200 dollars disappear. Each slot machine screamed and beeped, strobing bulbs of hot light reaching out from all angles to flood my visual and aural senses. Beckoning me closer, I indulged. The miniature luxury of smoking a cigarette indoors. A soft drink simply known as “Alert” was an available option at the complimentary soda fountain. Swiveling necks in every direction could observe the multiple chins of the aging average American male. Camo garb draped flabby bodies, scores of tricep meat and missing teeth. 50 hour work weeks. Weak knees and pension checks. God blessed every vet.

My father called me frantically from a Wheel of Fortune machine. “It’s almost time for the show!” He burped into his phone, one eye on the slot, one on his shot. I happened to notice one of his chins from where I was currently losing my money.

To my right was a Hispanic man, winning big at game called WILD WOLF. “Amigo, can I use your lighter?” He asked, staring straight ahead.

His body was almost motionless, eyes unblinking behind wire framed glasses in a frosted stasis. A light Marlboro cigarette barely stuck to the dry surface of his bottom lip. He had just won a “Mega Bonus”, and for a moment his hypnotic trance was broken, but quickly returned by the next spin. I could tell he was very pleased with his current earnings, even through his glazed veneer. Fishing for my lighter in between my own failed attempts at WILD WOLF, I couldn’t help but notice this man’s special ritual. The only bodily movements he was seemingly capable of making was when he pressed down on the SPIN button, which activated his next bet, but more hypnotizing was the moments after, as he pointed and drifted across the machine’s screen with his digits, like a painter casting brush to canvas, drifting in small circles with smooth and fluid strokes, until resting with a period like pressure from his index finger on one of the 20 digitized squares that made up the game. I lit his cigarette for him as the scrolling shapes of 7’s and words like SUNOB and EMAG EERF scrolled over his glasses, slot machines themselves, consuming his vision.

I made my way closer to the Cult, and further from the life of the WILD WOLF. I couldn’t help but think about the Reaper and what he meant to the ticketholders I was standing behind and in front of. Who was he, and who really feared him? Did my father ever truly fear the Reaper, after losing his father and friends? Death and loss are made familiar through experience, yet its aura lingers beyond the confines of each individual life, leading to big questions, grander than casino floors, blander than plug in and play rock bands. In this place, everyone is free to live in fear, together. Fear waits beyond the corner, after last call, and after the last drag. After the last hit. Fear is the in between moments. Between pulls from a heartless machine, between paychecks, between distraction and destiny. The fear that we will never accomplish goals held in our hearts. The fear of not following through on every dream left unrealized. We imagine ourselves in our final moments, cursing time wasted, action untaken. Admittedly, I spend too much time pondering on death. I miss my friends who have passed too soon. I miss people I’ve never met. Watching my dad sigh heavily with impatience in the bar line, which was tended by a hardened middle aged woman, sleep deprived and numb from the crying machines steps away, reminded me of what brought us together tonight. This was life.

(REDACTED: Please include any pertinent details readers may find desirable regarding the review portion of the concert)

The next day arriving home, in true 21st century fashion, before setting down my bag or acknowledging my surroundings, I found my laptop and logged onto one of three social media platforms that have succeeded in controlling the minds, moods, and attitudes of our generation. It was around then I learned a former classmate had died the previous night.

Moments such as this, to friends and family alike, anyone with two eyes, aren’t so much moments we experience consistently, but moments absorbed in random blasts, often with explosive impact. A moment of fear in the internet age, bringing individual worlds closer in some small way, every second of the day. A moment of silence, a helping hand, a loving comment, all facing us, but all too far away to try and explain. We are here to remember life itself, which dangles by an ankle, from a cliff called humanity. We can feel it. Somedays, we are engulfed in flames, dragged ashore, blue lips kissing, with two eyes smiling. Shreds of memory flicker, spraying tangerine sparks to the cold concrete of shop class, only shrapnels of memory to bind our souls together. Moments like this, we get used to this.

Together in fear.

We are here

To remember so much, just before the eclipse

Losing oxygen, wasting breath in equal measure

To fear the reaper,

Is to never have had the pleasure,

To face it himself

[kanghuteh]

the loneliness of the way

In many ways the beginning of 茶道, the way of tea, for me was in Manila. Living in Mabuhay Temple, the Chinese auntie who came in with her crystals and gold, silk shirts, antique yixing tea ware and delicate porcelains sat us down with 肉餅/hopia and proceeded to brew a Tie Guan Yin oolong for all 15 or so of us retreat members. She had her Filipino helpers set up a driftwood table with a built-in drain, her kettles, and a set of smelling cups and drinking cups. She told us about the story of the oolong, an Iron Guan Yin statue blessing a devotee with the tea leaves, as green as jade. Her yixing cups coated with glaze on the inside smelled fragrant as she showed us how to hold the cup gently, like the hand of a beloved, warming the walls of the clay to help the scent rise up into the air. She told us to take a bite of the hopia made of mung bean, and as we drank said to see if we could see how the flavor changed, how every brew was different, bringing out more and more notes. Could we be mindful of this?

Almost everyone didn’t seem to care much, the troublemakers making noise, the rest just grateful to be eating. It was later in the day and we were all starving from Kung Fu drills, cleaning the temple, and learning about Ch’an meditation and Mahayana Buddhist theory. But the way she returned again and again to show us how to hold the lid of the pot, how to hold the gaiwan, trying her best to stay calm in the face of students refusing to listen to her—it told me something about how the way of tea supported her Buddhist practice. She reminded us of the Guan Yin outside, holding her vase of holy water out into the world, blessing us with compassion over and over again, how the taste of oolong spread in our mouths much like this benediction.

The first person I drank tea in this way with again was a man I met in Kaohsiung, the last month of my stay with Fo Guang Shan. It was a budding romance as I balanced the decision to continue with this path or to return to the world. One day, he invited me to walk down from our mountaintop monastery to the visiting hall at the foot of the mountain to drink tea. We walked around and decided to try some tea. The lady offered us some oolong and we drank together, savoring the flavor, my heart turning towards the world again. He asked the tea host to snap a photo of us as we drank the tea, thanked her for her time, and left.

After that, tea was mostly a lonely affair for me. After having married him and moving to San Francisco, when I picked up the way of the tea, it was not something we would do much together, as I thought we would. The strain of our issues, our diverging paths slowly becoming evident. Once I cooked a Lunar New Year’s meal for us and prepared some tea and he refused to join, citing a moon day, wearing all white. I sat and finished the dumplings myself, brewed myself some tea for the night, the celadon cup clinking on the glass pitcher as I poured the tea, clear and hued. What was love like, I asked myself, what was partnership like. The tea splashed and looked, for a second like a quiet river being pooled into a vessel.

Of course, it wasn’t like we didn’t have tea together, but the times I sat down for tea and invited him to join were spurned too many times, in such violent ways, that perhaps it was wise that I acknowledged the beginning separation for what it was instead of hoping it would go away.

We shared many meals with tea together, but these times are always coupled with a memory of his impatience, his dislike of something or the other. I think in our marriage, he only sat down for tea with me alone twice. Near the end of our marriage, I took out jasmine mung bean cakes, some pastries, made some dumplings, brewed some jasmine pearls a Mandarin teacher gave us and invited him to sit. He grabbed a few dumplings and left the room.

Of course, other times he joined in when his friends or our friends would come, happily chatting. Those were good nights filled with soft music, small clouds of incense, and tea, late into the night.

After he announced he was leaving for an attempt at being a monk, I didn’t drink tea with anyone for a long time. I often brewed tea for myself in my room, at first meditating so hard at his urging, him asking me to follow him into his path. At night I would brew a bitter mix of chrysanthemum, chamomile, and valerian root in my gaiwan and gulp it down, praying for sleep to take over sooner so I would no longer have to cry. The first month of that separation, I would wake up and sit intently, brew a cup, praying for the same sense of renunciation to appear within me again. I wanted to follow him because I still loved him. And one day I found that I had to stop. It became clear: it was not my path now. I would brew tea for myself to wake up at first, and eventually stopped. It didn’t feel right to brew tea now, something I had hoped to keep doing with this man for the rest of my life. The way of tea, the way of Buddha Dharma felt so utterly lonely now. There was no one in the Bay I could sit with to explain my sadness to, no one in the Bay who could say: this was unfair but your acceptance of it is also virtuous, also good, also strong. Instead I dismantled my shrine, put away my gold statues, returned further into the world.

One of the last things we did together was to have tea. He insisted upon it and at the time I only obliged because I missed drinking tea with someone. I began brewing occasionally for myself at our NYC apartment, the one I asked him to join me in for my immigration’s sake and for his sake—he was falling in love with an ex and had hoped to pursue a life with him. I told him if he wanted to truly be a monk he should leave this man behind and begin pursuing his intention of renunciation more definitely.

This night that we drank tea, he was on his way to a meditation group that I had always wanted to attend, that I’d stayed with prior to our move to the city. I stayed away for his whole time here because I didn’t want for us to be associated together then, I wanted him to build his own way into the path. It didn’t feel right to stand by him as a companion in this way when he had stopped being mine, even as a friend. This night we drank together, I enjoyed the teas and for an hour we were back to being old friends. As we left the distance grew larger and larger. He asked me to join him for a sit, but it was much too painful. After all, how could I return to the faith that brought me this much pain?

Only when I look back now do I see the importance of this moment. He was asking me to relive the things we did together as a farewell. Tea was one of the things we did. But at that point, I didn’t need a farewell from him. I just needed him to be kind.

Our time together in New York has been perhaps one of the most painful ones in my life. After this tea session, he would call me an enemy who was forcing him to stay in the world. He was quite selfish in his method of renouncing. I couldn’t say it then, but now I can. I can acknowledge it now and begin to heal. Even though New York has opened many old scars, created dark times in my heart, it also reminded me of friends I could have outside of this, good friends who still stuck around after our marriage and friends I knew from back then, and friends I was about to make.

I slowly began to pick up the way of tea again. An old friend from our time in Kaohsiung, who knew us from the beginning of our relationship visited New York. She invited me to come try out tea houses with her, places I didn’t think I would ever go to. She sat down in a tea house and listened to my story, held space for me, and acknowledged the pain I had endured in that relationship: the racism, the privilege, the harshness of it all. For once, I was allowed to acknowledge the wholesome and the unwholesome in how he treated me. It felt that all our other Buddhist friends during our marriage had never once let me do that. The loneliness eased a little bit. I could begin to heal then. I didn’t have to revere him as a saint just because his actions now are purer: I could still say that in the past, he was unwholesome and he hurt me in many ways. I didn’t have to deny that that had happened just because he was a holy man now.

So now the way of tea has taught me, much as it did earlier on, that it was a way to hold space for myself and others. It could bring me peace again, much like how my return to the Dharma on my own terms, not one manipulated by my feelings for someone, brought me ease. So I begin opening my space, holding space for those who need this same healing. My friends in dharma and tea taught me these same things, reminding me that I am able to hold space for others to express their griefs and that I can trust others to hold space for me in this way. I’m always grateful for this lesson. The way of tea taught me that. There is still camaraderie and companionship in this world. Living and the way to enlightenment of any sort, for being useful to the world is inherently lonely, but what tea has shown me is that it can occasionally be a little less lonely.

Nowadays I begin picking up the gaiwan, pour tea in my own tea room, invite people to come. I want to be open again. I want to share grief and joy to those who want to. To acknowledge our hearts and to always, always be able to say hello anyway. A tea tray I have says that the fragrance of tea fills the room. I want to say: the fragrance of a listened heart also fills the room, and tea helps that happen.