Meditators

"Jack, at the Thai temple, we meditators use a big empty hall with a hardwood floor. At night, we use candlelight." "What a romantic setting, Sam!"

At the Wat Yanviriya, a Thai temple in Vancouver, there was a girl named Nicole in my meditation class. She had long blonde hair. She showed me and other meditators a photograph of her with a bunch of orange-robed Thai monks all bathing in a river during her visit in Thailand.

The interior of Wat Yanviriya, my Thai temple in Vancouver, was a spacious hall with hardwood flooring, where meditators would sit. A Buddha shrine was in front.

Don and I discussed religion on many occasions. We both generally agreed that neither of us really liked what we called "shrink-wrapped" religions. Those religions were packaged deals created by other humans. Those religions came right "off the shelf" in the Religion Store. We both thought that religion should be a very dynamic and individualistic pursuit. Hong Kong-born Don had some past ephemeral experience with a Christian sect, probably Fundamentalist, which irked him. He knew that I was exploring Buddhism, but he found it too difficult to gulp down when I tried to explain it to him. I showed him to my temple where my fellow meditators sat on a hardwood floor and meditated in the dark spacious hall with only candlelight. He was a bit scared. At the restaurant, he wanted me to explain the different branches or types of Christianity. And so I did. But Don still preferred, I thought, Star Trekky freedom over religion.