Sunday

So what's it like on a Sunday to be a 50-something self-proclaimed lay Zen monk living in Atlanta, Georgia?

Well, first of all, the cat wakes you up way too early because it wants to be let out. But you let it out despite the early hour, partly out of compassion for its craving and suffering, and partly because you want to go back to sleep. But then the cat realizes how early it is and sits outside the french doors in your bedroom meowing until you let it back in, and since you're both up now, you put on a pot of coffee and start your day.

You think about going to the zendo for the morning service (you really ought to go - you always enjoy it when you do and it's been a while), but you decide that you need sleep and relaxation more than you need another service, so you sit in bed catching up on back issues of The New Yorker while nodding in and out of consciousness.

Meanwhile, the cat is playing "mouse" with your feet under the sheets, so you put him back outside and in the ensuing peace and quiet find some time for doing zazen at home. Refreshed, you take a shower afterwards and start your day.

But by 11:00 am, the temperatures are already up in the 90s and the humidity is in the same range as well, and as soon as you step outside the air sticks to your skin and you feel like you need another shower all over again. So you retreat inside and finish the pot of coffee and, surfing the net, are glad to see that the House passed the climate change bill yesterday, and even though you know the difference between the weather outside this morning and climate, you can't help but feel that there's just a tad bit more CO2 in the air today than necessary (ozone, too).

Somehow, you wind up spending most of the day repairing the toilet off the bedroom. For some reason, the water won't stop running after it's flushed, so you go to the local neighborhood hardware store (driving past the Walmart because you refuse to shop there) and buy a new valve assembly. But the whole job takes longer than it should because you're not exactly a handyman and because two other problems complicate the matter. First, the water won't shut off because the valve is old and won't turn and you're afraid that if you force it with a pair of channel locks it will break off completely. But you take your chances and force it anyway and it works, but then, second, after you install the new valve assembly it leaks because the toilet tank is old and the seal provided with the valve kit doesn't fit. It eventually occurs to you to retrieve the old seal from the garbage and replace it in the tank and finally everything's working again and the water even turns back on without the valve breaking, but now you need a nap because you're old and not used to banging your head underneath a toilet for two hours or so.

You make dinner (pasta alfredo) and allow yourself a glass of wine. You watch "True Blood" on television wishing that "Six Feet Under" or "The Sopranos" were still on the air, but take that as a lesson in impermanence and the clinging nature of our desires, and then, after posting an account of your banal day on the web, call it a night.

Of course, that's just me. Your results might differ.