Essay
Conversations with a Zen Master
Modern Day Koan Musings #1
I am pretty sure I birthed a zen master.
I don’t recall the first moment I knew this. I just have a breadcrumb trail to go by.
He did not speak English until he was three. Rather, he spoke his own language. It was nothing anyone could decipher. If I had been more enlightened, I would have brought in someone experienced in Sanskrit to analyze. He had his own symbolic alphabet too, that he wrote in.
He seemed to understand English. He just couldn’t respond in it.
When asked his name, he would say, “TATA”. In my Buddhism studies, this sounds similar to some other really important Buddhist terms.
Otherwise, he continued to babble in a language that was clearly alien and not of this planet.
When he did finally decide to speak in English, he was three years old. Everything came out in fully formed perfect sentences. It was almost as if a translation chip had been placed in his head overnight. He didn’t go on to read English until the third grade.
There was a time when he was in elementary school, and we were traveling in a car, and he asked me, “Mom. What is ‘multi-player’?” That seemed so enlightened to me. I thought he had stumbled onto something that would unlock the mysteries of the universe. I didn’t realize at the time though, that it was a video game that inspired the question. But still……
Before my eyesight started to deteriorate, long before I was diagnosed with the beginnings of cataracts, he would appear seemingly by magic in the kitchen, after having just meditated for hours and hours in his bedroom, retrieve a snack, and whisper to me, “Audible”. Then he’d return to his meditative state. He did that repetitively for weeks. Until finally, I heard his call. And signed up for Audible. And eventually Hoopla. I’ve not picked up a physical book to read since. It’s been life changing. How did he know? It’s all very Merlin like.
So I told him recently that I would be starting a series of essays based on our conversations.
He was neither thrilled nor upset.
Like a true Zen master. He just kept on having conversations with me.
I think you might enjoy them too.
I’m looking forward to sharing them with you.
This is a series.
Time travel into the future.
© Susan Brearley, 2019 All Rights Reserved
Susan Brearley is a published book author, writer, editor, essayist and accidental poet. She has been writing her entire life. She is currently working on her second book, a murder mystery about an OCD detective, who’s been called a “young version of Monk”. She’s a retired systems engineer and salesperson from IBM, a serial entrepreneur, and a survivor of a stage 4 inflammatory breast cancer since 1995. She’s also working on her US Coast Guard Captain’s license, has her US Sailing keelboat certification, and is the creator and elder teacher of a new program, “VisionQuest” that mentors and teaches adults of all ages how to create the life they were born to live. She is currently based in the mid-Hudson Valley, New York.
