BREATHING IN GREEN WOODEN SHEEP IN BANGALORE

When last year made its entrance anthropomorphised as a Horse, I felt excited by the prospect of movement and energy, but the year proved exhausting for me. This year, I read, is the Year of the Sheep, the Green Wooden Sheep, more specifically... and I do like the sound of gentle sheep, inching forward, munching greens, restfully engaging with trees... I am doing much the same in Bangalore - watching children swing and slide down tunnels in sandpits about as heart racing as I am able for...

The other day, sitting outside on the balcony, I observed two boys playing with a balloon. It doesn't get much simpler than that, I thought. And then the balloon popped with all that enthusiasm - I couldn't help laughing when I heard one of the boys bemoan their fate, blaming the other boy naturally. 'What did you do?!' he wailed. I was reminded of Pooh and Piglet fully intending to give Eeyore a plump red balloon (I think it was red...) but finally handing him a sad shrunken rag of rubber to put in and take out of his empty honey pot... (Pooh having helplessly eaten all the honey)...

It's a quiet, peaceful life here, with the colours changing from morning to afternoon...

A few days ago we heard the news that our beloved monk Thich Nhat Hanh is no longer in a coma. He has opened his eyes, is responding with chuckles to humorous stories, is breathing. I have been re-reading the memoir he wrote in his 36th year, Fragrant Palm Leaves, almost sixty years ago. He is a very easy monk to love! Meanwhile I make the most of the quiet hour, trying to conquer the fear and anxieties that gather about my troubled physical form...