Burning Electrons

I ride a customized cruiser style motorcycle, it’s the only Buddhist bike I’ve seen, with Acala Varochana (Fudo Myo_o) on the tank, and Avalokiteshvara‘s Mantra on the sides, its an interesting machine, but selling  it will be a problem; I haven’t met too many other Buddhist Bikers out there.

I used to sail, and thought I would sail around the world on my 47 foot Skookum ketch, but a loss of balance from a progressive neurological disease made that impractical.

I used to be a river guide on both coasts, but I’m not going to get into which coast is better.

I used to be a radical politico, associated with the Weatherman faction of the SDS.  We tried to make a new world from the ashes of the old, but that was a pipe dream that had been tried before, with people just as committed as we were and they didn’t do it either. But… we did make a difference and can see the changes is Women’s rights and civil rights and the election of a black man to the presidency of the USA, and I know that it was the changes that people like me fought for that made that possible.  We changed the world, but the neocons screwed it up, and continue to screw it up because of their deluded ideas, but it has to be other people who take over making a good  society that is fair to all and gives support to those who need it, I don’t have the energy to do it again.  That is what youth is for.

I was also a scientist with a decent record of getting funded and publishing papers.  I was lucky to work with some of the smartest people in the world, always feeling that everybody in the room was smarter than I, but I think the others felt that  way too.  I got my PhD at the time when Molecular biology was just being discovered and was active in the development of techniques that led to Biology becoming a data rich science, which in turn led to the development of Systems BIology.  Again, I was lucky to have been Lee Hood’s lab manager while this way of integrating data was being developed. It was quite a ride, but my neurological problems took me out of the picture before I would have liked. But is was quite a ride while it lasted.

Now I am learning to be a buddhist because I think that studying the science of our minds can lead one to happines and ease the transition that takes place when we die.  I look forward to being reborn in Amitabha‘s pure land, Dewachen, where I can reach nirvana in one lifetime and return as a bodhisattva so I can  help end the suffering of other sentient beings.  That would be cool.

I think the only thing that I would have done differently in this life was to get a MD/PHD instead of just a PhD. That way I could have retired from basic research and joined the Doctor’s Without Borders. That way  I could be treating people who currently have no access to even basic medicine.

That’s what I would like to be doing, however, not being able to do that, I am going on a pilgrimage in the footsteps of the Buddha. We will spend nearly 20 days touring the places where the Buddha taught people path to enlightenment.  When I am done with that, I am going to South Africa, to Knysna, on the southern tip of South Africa, about 600 Km east of Cape Town, where I will spend time visiting the Vermak’s, who are some of the nicest people I have ever met.  Hopefully I will be able to sit and meditate on a cliff  where the Indian and Atlantic oceans meet.  Maybe the whales will be migrating, but just sitting will be good enough for me.

Now that I am coming to the end of this road, I feel like I have led a decent life. I have done a lot of things that others only dreamed of doing.  I have acted, when others stood to the side, and fought for civil and personal rights and a just society. I have walked across the Sierra Madre moutains, rafted down wild rivers, and sailed in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. I surfed before it became crowded,  I smoked dope and expanded my mind with LSD and Mescaline,  and I tried to treat people based on what they did rather than what they looked like,  Of course I could have been better, made fewer mistakes, hurt fewer people, been hurt by fewer people, but I’m hoping that the next time around will be even better.

I got one of my helmets set up with bluetooth communications between nt Zumo GPS and my Iphone, and the built in fm radio, and my MP3 player with 30 gb of mp3s.  I figure I won’t have to just listen to my motor and the wind anymore.

First thing I had to do, though, was to pick which helmet I wanted to set up.  For a guy who never liked helmets I’ve got a bunch of them… I’ve got about 7 helmets.

You would think that someone with that many helmets would wear one of them.  Well, in Wyoming they don’t require a helmet, so of course I had my helmet on the back of my bike, not on my head, when I laid it down going into a corner too hot.  I landed on my face and then my bike landed on me.

I remember trying to get off behind my bike after I layed it down (really quickly), but then I got flipped over the bike and landed in front of it, on my face.  I remember my face hitting the pavement.  It didn’t really hurt, or, it didn’t hurt as much as the bike landing on me hurt.

After that  I didn’t feel a thing.  I don’t remember anything until I woke up with some guy holding my neck in a vice grip so I couldn’t move it.  Of course, I was bleeding into my eyes, so I couldn’t see anything until the EMTs showed up.  It didn’t seem to take too long, but I am not sure at what rate time was moving right then.  It didn’t seem too long.

I got out of the hospital the next day.  I guess my face looked pretty bad  based on the look people gave me when they saw me.  It did ring  my bell, though.  I now know how you can get stupid from having a bike crash.

But I was lucky… again.  It only took a couple of months to shake off the stupid state.  This crash convinced me that wearing a helmet is a good idea.  I still think that helmet laws suck, the choice ought to be the riders, but I am going to wear a helmet from now on, and I will actually wear a real dot approved helmet, not one of those fake things, and if anyone asks, I will tell them that helmets are a good thing.  Everybody ought to wear one.