Preparation @ MindSay

Hands down Dharma Trading is your best for dyes for protein fibers. You can buy almost every conceivable color but I stick to buying the primaries and always mix my own colors. Now this  is where measuring and note taking become important... and that is something I am notoriously bad about.  I don't have to replicate colors in large batches  and each piece often gets colors dyed as I go along so making sure I get another batch exactly the same is not important.  As my dear friend- ubu- says- sell the art you make; don't make art to sell.

I have been assigned a mentor for the remainder of my training at the Chinese Gardens. She is knowledgeable, elegant and very judgmental. My fellow mentoreeeeeeee is a guy named Les who is going to have a hellava time getting certified.  Right now the process involves shadowing experienced guides in order to see their techniques, reading the manual, and the book published about the garden's poetry.


I, of course, did all of these my first month as a greeter in addition to:
two books on Chinese history including the Imperial Dynasties,
two on Chinese Architecture,
two on art motifs and symbols,
a rare book I forked out $60 for on the actual construction of Chinese Scholar Gardens,
books on Ming furniture as a metaphor for Mind life.
Today on Amazon I ordered a Max Weber anthropological treatment of Confucianism and Taoism in Ming China and a revisionist visit to the practice foot binding.

I have also at any opportunity grabbed people I know to give them tours of the garden and volunteered as a floating docent (no I was not high) at specific locations during free events. I think the volunteer coordinator knows I am working hard. I even gave a whole tour when a guide failed to show up for a private tour.

Meanwhile Les says he "hasn't actually had time to wrap his mind around the tour thing yet".  Les has missed two sessions and told me yesterday that he wants the theme of his tour not to be fact based but a multi sensory experience.  I was told that my challenge for assembling a tour would be staying within the 45 minute time frame and Les needed to get a tour together. I prefer the challenge I have been given.

Next week we get another horticultural tour - I carry Bailey's manual of cultivated plants with me in case the gardeners get something wrong which they did with a relative of citrus. And then a pronunciation session with a mandarin scholar. After that we have private sessions with our mentor doing our entire tour and present it to the other docents  for certification :  pass or fail. If this sounds like the chinese civil service system developed in Tang China it would be a fair analogy as there are so many  elements to the garden: cultural historical practical horticultural symbolic factual and metaphorical that  it takes much research and passion to do it justice and any tour will only be skimming the surface. Luckily for me I love the process of learning something inside and out, meeting people within a framework of expectations and sharing that passion. And in college I worked my ass off too and was good at setting goals for myself and meeting them.


I assume I will be certified and giving independent tours by early November.... just in time for the Camellias and Wintersweet to be blooming. My other challenge (personally) will be to avoid "the know it all thing" with my mentor as she has already made three not very important errors of fact and I do not intend to point that out to her.  Her penchant for correcting every little thing I say tickles that tendency in me and I have to continually resist it within. When I was an undergrad and graduate student too ..duh... I didn't hesitate to correct the teacher but now i see no value in it as they are small points anyway. Relationships are more important that correctness. And humility kinder to oneself and others than being right and letting all know. But geez. I AM writing this blog. ok I am not perfect. oy. Happy Sukkot Havarim.

School seriously needs to start.  With each day that goes by, I think about more and more things that I need to buy for my classroom.  And of course, I buy them.  Thankfully I get a pay check on Thursday.  If school started any later than tomorrow, I think I'd have to start hiding my wallet.

Speaking of tomorrow, I'm pretty much ready.  I just have to put together a getting to know you-type survey for the kids, and I'll be good to go.  For Monday, anyway.  The rest of the week is a whole other story.  Don't get me wrong, I know exactly what I'm doing.  I just don't have any of it ready.  The following week is beyond me, though.  I have no idea what I'll be doing.  At least we (and I use the "royal we" here, it was really just the teacher next door to me) planned a year-overview, broken down by semester, quarter, and month.  I felt like such a slacker.  Oh well, now I just really need to come through for her with the lessons for Arabian Nights and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, so that's what I'm going to do right now.  It should be interesting, since I haven't read either.  I guess that's step number one.

In a completely unrelated side note, FOX's game of the week yesterday was either the Tigers and Yankees or Cubs and Cardinals.  Every time time the Tigers are scheduled to play on FOX, they always show the alternate game down here, so I didn't really think about it.  Naturally, they showed the Tigers...the one time I didn't think to check!  Sometimes I swear there's a conspiracy against me.

The line between faith and preparation is rather blurry, in my mind. I have always held that regardless what each day brings, if I am faithful to my Father, he'll "tend" to my needs as he always has, i.e. perfectly! Maybe it goes back to the "attitude" or "focus" that I've shared previously.

 

When looking down into a situation, it is the lack I focus on;

but when looking up at it, it is the substance that is most evident.

 

I have friends who have replenished their old "bomb shelters" from the 60's into make shift survival capsules, complete with canned goods, staples, and water jugs. My brother has basically buried a fortune in his backyard in case of hard times. I met and chatted with another man last night, a very wealthy man, who keeps 15 / 5 gal gas cans filled at all times for his back-up generator, $700 cash minimum on his person at all times, none of his vehicles are ever below 3/4 full of fuel, emergency first-aid kits in each vehicle including blanket, flashlight, and automotive needs ... his list goes on. I was rather dumb-founded. To me, that sounds like fear, not just wise planning, but maybe that's just me?  Balance, anyone?

 

What about savings accounts? Aren't they the same thing? Perhaps, just perhaps, we each have a different sense about what life requires? Obviously, for me to carry $700 in cash would be virtually impossible, though ... a nice idea! lol

 

So my question is, especially for people of faith ... What part does faith play in "emergency preparation" ... ?

 

~ B

 

 

Otakon is tomorrow. Well, technically it's actually Friday, but we're heading down to Baltimore tomorrow. I'm cosplaying as Squall, and my outfit goes as follows:

• Coat - The last part of the collar needs to be sewn down, and the whole thing vacuumed off since the fake white fur used on the color got everywhere.
  
• Pants - All belts are arranged and attacked, only needs a stitching on the middle belt of the right leg, since it's a bit droopy.
  
• Boots - Check.
  
• Gloves - Check
  
• Shirt - Check
  
• Necklace - Check
  
• Lionheart Gunblade - It's cut, it has been sanded and painted with both Silver and bright Caribbean Blue, and only needs a small amount of white sprayed on, and once dried, the golden Griever insignia needs to be painted on both sides of the sword. The handle either needs to be left alone or something black painted or taped on for use as the 'grip' of the handle.

Whew. It's been an interesting last few days. But I'll be done soon. I also need to get all my clothes and such ready that I'll be taking down to Otakon.

Yay!