Zat So?

I'm taking this (all from memory) from Zen Flesh Zen Bones, a copy of which I haven't seen since about – well never mind my age – but it was by Sensaki Roshi and Paul Reps, at least one of whom I had the honor of meeting and knowing as a guest in our house back in – I said never mind my age. A certain monk, let's just call 'im Zenmeh-ka-nik, does it matter - I don't remember his name, it's been at least 35 years.

 

Zenmeh lived alone in a little hut not far from a village, chopped wood, carried water, that sort of thing. He was like a mechanic of sorts. One day out of the blue a family came to his door, in a fury and a huff. A father and his young daughter, along with everyone else who came to add weight. In his hands was a newborn infant. "You lousy bastard," he greeted Zenmeh, "you pose as a lone monk and go and knock up my daughter, now this! Here, you take the baby, she claims it's your kid, you raise it, you lousy goddam shit, and leave my daughter here and the rest of the family in peace!" Zenmeh, when he finally could get a word in, merely received the baby and replied, "Oh, is that so?"

They left and that was that. Zenmeh figured a way to nurse the baby, cared for it, loved it and gave it love, saw to its every need, began raising it, included its growth and development and sustenance in his normal daily routine – that is, suddenly being a "dad" was just part of chopping wood and carrying water.

One day some weeks or months later, maybe even a year – the same family trooped up to his door and knocked again, this time to a different tune: the father apologized profusely, with lots of bowing, explaining that the matter had gotten cleared up, the daughter admitted the real dad was a local fisher's son in the village, and could they please have the baby back now – that was it, out of the blue. Zenmeh merely replied, "Oh, is that so?" and returned the child into the family's keeping, and they returned to their village without even a thank-you. Zenmeh returned to what he was already doing, chopping wood and carrying water.

 

Now having just told this, I'm reminded of the est-training seminar (2 weekends, who remembers these, anyone out there?), where first you learned to grasp "what's so," and by the end, having grokked that, you learned to relate it to "so what?"

So I'm 58.