magnets in my butt

sitting feels different here. it's like there are magnets in my butt. and spine. helping keep me grounded and aligned. good stuff. thought it was a fluke at first. no, Muki. it's not. i feel solid. immovable, yet flexible. at rest. at peace. could sit all day. tangaryo, yaza (yowza!)--not a problem.

so very glad i brought a cranberry zabuton and zafu. tribe, i'm sitting with you! oh, and low smoke cedar incense, too.

showed the girls my rakusu the other day. they were so cute (ang kyut!), gathering round and were so careful with how they touched it. like a treasure, which it is.

they were curious about sitting. sarita could do full lotus, no problem. rian and her six year old body were confused as to what crossed over what. (join my club...)

they were tickled to see me bow to my cushion, then out to the world.
"bakit ganun? (why is it like that?)," they asked. i bow to acknowledge how grateful i am to my practice and this world to practice in," sabi ko (i said). they were even more tickled after that, clapping and beaming.

they helped brush off the zabuton and fluff the zafu, sarita scolding rian for putting her knees down on the mat. a riot, i tell you. took everything not to bust out laughing. hugged and kissed them both over and over again instead.

helped buy another house yesterday. not mine and i'm responsible. and it's for another Center. instead of 1.25 million dollars, it was 125,000 pesos. used my seeds of justice money. it's not a New Dharma Center for Urban Peace. but, really, maybe it is, at the very core. it is also a place where miracles happen and empowerment and community is cultivated. this parallel existence thing is really something.

on the surface, the madapdap Center, is a clinic that provides free physical therapy twice a week to kids who are victims of toxic waste. on the real, it is another intersection between spirituality and social justice, in service to social transformation.

this Center provides a livelihood program (beading!) for the mothers while their kids undergo therapy. it's a place where the community can meet and learn about nutrition, natural remedies, and other health topics. where volunteer natural health care folk can come and share their medicine. where teenage siblings can babysit younger ones while their siblings get therapy and their mothers bead. it's a place where this historically disenfranchised, low-income resettlement community can find their own agency, find their own sustainability, find their own freedom. and they are doing it in a good way, an organic way, a cooperative way.

we are small now, but soon, we will be involving the entire community. it will be a model, an example for a different way.

sounds familiar, doesn't it?