Satori in the Slipstream: My Short Story Collection
Anything Not Worth Doing is Worth Doing Not Well, as they say. Another Don Quiotxe Steemit post.
Satori in the Slipstream is a collection of dark stories that will take you to those places where the brutal clarity of truth is sometimes revealed. Follow the tales of a young woman in Japan trying to escape her past in a Buddhist temple; a junkie street artist trying to draw away his demons with his art; a Japanese soldier confronting the horrific destruction and death in Hiroshima; a young hustler on the streets saying goodbye to his dead friend; and an office lady in Japan contemplating a fatal leap from the eighteenth story of her apartment building. All these stories and more.
https://www.books2read.com/b/mZP7ap
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07HLWJ88L
EXCERPT From Slipping Satori
Hurry Up and Wait:
As the plane lifts off the tarmac, you regret that you won’t have a chance to see that conical shaped volcano one last time: so iconic to Japan. “Maybe it’s best this way,” you think, but it doesn’t still the eruptions in your heart. The plane flies west towards Incheon Airport and the last you see of the archipelago is a black sliver of seismic-shaped coastline jutting out into the rough gray Sea of Japan.
The layover in the massive airport is three hours. The spicy smells of Bibimbap hangs over the food court. You watch the reenactment of a 16th century traditional Korean wedding that’s nearly drowned out by the K-Pop playing over the airport sound system. Abandoning the food court, you make your way to the Yoga room upstairs on the third tier, thinking you can do some zazen before the long flight. Inside there is a young dreadlocked and man-bunned Yogi in the full lotus position. You rub the stubble on your head and remember your own dreads before the nuns shaved them off into a tangled blond pile on the dark hardwood floor of the temple. Shobuji had been strange and unique — nuns and monks, lay foreigners, and a massive wood statue of Kannon in the main temple — unusual for Soto Zen.
It had been optional for a novice, the head shaving, and you had hesitated, vowing to keep your dreads. But on that first day, as the spring rains lashed the roof of the old temple, you sat in the small five-tatami conference room. The head nun sat on a small red dais. You were on the floor next to a French nun who interpreted the rules into her strange-sounding English as the head nun spoke them in Japanese. Their glances at your dreads and a final, “Bohemian, yes so bohemian.” in English from the head nun, followed by a soft chuckle buckled your resolve. “Two years as bald as Sinead O’Connor and then three years to grow them back,” you thought. You glared at a small stone Buddha just above the nun’s head and set your jaw, and you heard yourself say, “Shaved pleased,” before leaving the conference room.
The dull buzz of the electric razor was not quite as cutting as the old barber’s “tsk”. You cried as the nun led you to your tiny three-tatami cell in the square, white, concrete building that sat far back from the main temple.
Above the Pacific:
LA is a solid nine hours away and none of the in-flight movies catch your attention. You flip through Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind again, but nothing from the book sticks. Instead, you pull out your journal, intending to add a long overdue entry, but end up re-reading several entries about your first days in Tokyo.
Journal entry 2/18/2015:
Oh fuck, nearly died last night; can’t believe it. Way too much Molly and no water. And so many lemon Jello shots. WTF was I thinking? I’m still jet lagged and go clubbing in Roppongi anyway? Should have crashed one more night at the youth hostel. Thank God for Sayaka.