Yipes!!! Whoosh...

That was the sound of Dennett and I taking a walk yesterday. By late morning my work was done and there was the old man, hopeful that leash and boots would come out for a stroll.

I just couldn't disappoint. It's not like his jog is fast any more and the pace is slow enough to enjoy both checking messages and leaving them. There are very few trees along our routes that don't have some sort of pithy remark.

So off across the road we went, up a little trail that runs parallel to it.

All kinds of nifty tracks,some maybe a big dog, some fox, some I could speculate could be a large cat. But none of it concerned me much until I saw some very fresh little fox tracks. Fresh as in the snow that was kicked up was just put there as it ran off. Maybe we are the ones that startled it? As I'm looking I see another set of tracks and they too are very fresh. They even have dirt from their paw sitting in the print and it is still loose and has no frost on it, even though the sun has not hit this part of the trail.

Bear tracks, again and here we are on foot, and this has probably passed this area recently. My bet is our little fox friend tracks him hoping for left overs. So it brings us to the yipes and whoosh portion of this post. Even though Dennett was having a field day with all the good scents, we turned tail and returned to our long and safer driveway. I am much braver on horseback and without an old dog to protect. I keep wondering if this bear is ever going to find someplace to bed down for the winter. I'm curious enough to contact Fish and Wildlife and see if this might be normal early winter behavior.

So, the prayer flags are hemmed, knotted, with bells, prayer rings and tags ready to go.

Here is a few of them.

Some of you asked about prayer flags and what they are and their meaning. While a commercial site, this has a great informative piece about prayer flags here.

Come the new year I will be making some changes to the flags themselves. Watching mine weather I've decided that the silk holds up better than the cotton so instead of a silk and cotton mix in the weft, I am going to go to all silk. If I can find a well priced heavy silk blend for the warp I will go to that too. While time consuming writing all the prayers out, it is also relaxing now that I have an easy way to hold the fabric. I can enjoy the beauty of the prayers themselves. I get a lot out of making these. I'm not a religious person, but the simplicity that written thoughts and good wishes, spread by the wind to rest upon the people and things it touches seems just about perfect to me.

I'll leave you with the Metta Sutta that is written into each of the flags.

Metta Sutta

In safety and in bliss

May all creatures be of a blissful heart.

Whatever breathing beings there may be,

No matter whether they are frail or firm,

With none excepted, be they long or big

Or middle-sized, or be they short or small

Or thick, as well as those seen or unseen,

Or whether they are far or near,

Existing or yet seeking to exist,

May all creatures be of a blissful heart.

Let no one work another’s undoing

Or even slight him at all anywhere;

And never let them wish another ill

Through provocation or resentful thought.

And just as might a mother with her life

Protect the son that was her only child,

So let him then for every living thing

Maintain unbounded consciousness in being,

And let him too with love for all the world

Maintain unbounded consciousness in being

Above, below, and all round in between,

Untroubled, with no enemy or foe.

And while he stands or walks, or while he sits

Or while he lies down, free from drowsiness,

Let him resolve upon this mindfulness.

This is Divine Abiding here, they say.

That goes for bears too! ;-)