I suppose it’s so long since I’ve writen you thought this blog had died, but no! Just sleeping. I’ve been very busy at work… And I know, that’s no excuse.
I guess with recent events, this post seams rather appropriate, but the main reason I am writing this is due to a rather more personal reason: A couple of weeks ago, I went to London for a check up on my heart (when I was eight months old, I had open heart surgery to correct a minor yet potentialy life threatning defect). It made me realise that time realy is finite.
I started to read the Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, a book that instructs you on the stages of dying. I was reading the book this morning, when sudently we heard a loud crack, creek and a crash. We all rushed outside to see that one of the trees in my parents garden had ‘died’. we wondered down to look at it; it was still creeking as it gently settled on top of two other trees. The fallen tree must have been at least 100 feet hight, and possibly a century old. It would have stood there long before the house was built, survived the fire forty years ago, and housed many a bird and tiny mamal, and within an instant, it had disapeared from the forrest canopy. As I approached, you could still smell the sweet smell of pine, the sap still sticky and the shards still sarp. It now lies proped up by two of it’s smaller companions, not a 100 yards from the house. It felt quite fitting that I was reading the book of living and dying at the moment of it’s death. I showed it to our gardner this evening, his reaction was simple, if not a little impressed: “Yet another mighty one has fallen”. It re-inforced the feeling that we only have a limited amount of time in this life. It has spurred me to follow this path to it’s completion. Tomorrow, I shall (attempt) to rise with the sun, and pray forthose who lost their lives in the recent Earthquakes in Peru, a country that I have visited and have great respect for.
I hope that you all make the same effort in your lives… Good luck
This is the tree that fell… not so mighty anymore.
Release from the dark side: a trek into Buddhism 
