Of Mice and Mockingbirds

A Twitter posting this morning reminded me of an occurrence. Years ago I built computers for a Texas company. My office had a back door opening on a side road. Our salesman used to toss all the wrappers from the many candy bars he ate daily into my trash can. At night, mice climbed into the can seeking the wrappers and could not get back out. In the morning I would pick up the can, walk across the street, and dump the mice in a field. One day I had barely returned when one of the mice came high-tailing it back across the street headed straight for my office. Down from the sky swooped a mockingbird. Bam, he hit mouse, swept up the sky with it, flew over to the field and hung the carcass from one of the barbs on top of a fence. I always thought there should be a moral to this story, but what?

Smoke

Last week I was diagnosed with COPD, which stands for Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease. Last week I had an incident. Some sort of trigger set it off. In this case it was probably a bacterial infection.

COPD is almost always related to smoking. Other types of fume inhalation may cause it, but most of the time it comes from smoking. Did I smoke? Yes, definitely.

You could say I began smoking the day the sperm livened the egg. I was conceived in 1948 and my mother was a smoker…and a drinker. And no one knew in those days that smoking and drinking caused in-the-uterus damage. Mother was exactly 40 when she became pregnant with me, which adds another health risk. I was dreadfully premature and had to be kept at the hospital for a while before coming home.

Dad smoked too. I cannot say how much my parents smoked, but it was considerable. Several packs a day, I would guess. So premature and exposed to cigarette smoke and alcohol whilst in utero, I came home to a household full of second hand smoke. Who knew?

Really, literally, in those benighted days just after World War II, no one thought much about exposure to smoke. As a child, it seemed like everyone smoked. I know almost everyone in my family did.

In 1959 we moved from Houston, Texas to Stockton, California. It was in the summertime, and we ran the air conditioner in our brand new second hand Ford station wagon all the way. I was ten and had been fortified with boxes full of comic books to read. I remember sitting in the backseat. My parents sat up front taking turns driving. And they smoked. And they smoked. And they smoked! My eyes would almost swell shut from the pain of all of that smoke. I complained and they would roll down the windows for a while, but we were crossing New Mexico, Arizona, and the high desert of Eastern California. It was hot.

There might have been interstate then, but I mainly remember two lane roads where traffic would back up on hills. We had a burlap water bag in case the car overheated. It had a rope handle that we slung over the hood ornament to let the air cool the water. And we had to use it several times.

So, whenever possible, the windows were rolled up and there was smoke. And, as a youth, I had respiratory problems. I guess that would include the constant tonsillitis I had. At age three I remember us pulling up at the doctor’s office and I started to scream. I tried to crawl under the driver’s seat. I clutched at the springs underneath the seat of that 1950 Buick.

But it was all for naught and soon I was inside in the cool air. It was summer and I had chronic tonsillitis but everyone was afraid of polio, so instead of removing my tonsils, I went to the doctor every other day for weeks for a penicillin shot. I feared needles until about the time I got to college.

Sinisitis, bronchitis, I was always fighting those “itises” and always losing. I got a lot of penicillin injections throughout my childhood. Smoke, I remember the smoke.

Finally 1967 came and I was off to college. The first semester I commuted but after that I lived in apartments and most of us either already had the habit, or we began to…smoke. I have always supposed that I didn’t really need the smoke until I left home and no longer had my parent’s second hand smoke to keep me going.

And this was during the revolutionary days when us teenagers decided we knew a whole hell of a lot more about everything than our parents ever had so we rebelled and not only did we smoke cigarettes, but we smoked pot. Marijuana, weed, stuff that was good for a 20 year prison term in Texas in those days, we smoked.

But what the heck. We were young and healthy, we were invulnerable. We were Achilles without the bum heel. And throughout everything we did, we…smoked.

By the time smoking was starting to be understood, most of the smokers my age were absolutely and dreadfully hooked on tobacco. Then they took the ads off of TV. Well that was a shock. For years television had been telling me how good cigarettes were for me and how much fun they were. Every game show contestant went home with a couple cartons and they soothed my T-Zone for god’s sake! I wanted a soothed T-Zone. And doctors smoked. How can there be anything wrong with them if doctor’s smoked them? And more doctors smoked Camels.

But there were those who would rather fight than switch and Women’s Lib, man, almost from the beginning the big tobacco companies were there to support all you bra-burning liberated chicks. “You’ve come a long way baby!”

And so we all…smoked.

Well come about the year 2000 and my lungs were giving up the ghost. I had the proverbial “smoker’s cough.” I coughed at work and in the car and in bed at night. All of those cigarettes over all of those years all that smoke passing across my little baby pink lungs burning away cillia and depositing ugly black masses of tar, and my lungs were just flat giving out.

So I came down with my first big time case of acute bronchitis. I couldn’t breathe. I could not breathe for crying out loud. And the cough was loud and painful and as unproductive as could be and I couldn’t breathe! Don’t you hear me? I CAN NOT BREATHE!

And I got scared and I got paranoid and remember standing up in the middle of my bedroom in the middle of the coal-black night and I had gathered every lamp in the house into my bedroom which blazed with light. But it didn’t help me breathe.

I called a cab and went to the emergency room. “Nothing wrong with you now Mr. Watters, your lungs are clear.”

“But I can’t breathe!”

“Sorry, nothing we can do about it.”

Several nights later I went to another emergency room but they couldn’t help me either.

Spirometer

A couple of months later, after I had stopped smoking, my family physician ran some breathing tests on me. Spirometer it is called. Now the average American breathes with the thorax the chest and that alone. According to my reading, that uses about 70% of your lungs. However, since 1983 I had been studying breath techniques with my Internal Martial Arts Master. I had learned to breathe with my diaphragm and I did it naturally and automatically.

So we began the Spirometer test and I began blowing 90%, 95%, 115% on different sections of the test. So I asked, “Uh, excuse me, but I breathe with my diaphragm which is a more efficient method of breathing. Won’t that affect my test scores?”

“Huh?” The breath folks did not understand breathing with the diaphragm and so a score was a score and my lungs were fine, go away now Mister.

I remembered my brother and me taking our mother to a specialist in Long Beach, California. Oh yeah, Mother died of Emphysema in 1979. And this specialist tried to teach Mother to breathe with her diaphragm, but she had not used it for so long that it no longer functioned. The muscle had just atrophied  away.

Well, I have had this suspicion for years that my lungs were not as good as the test showed. And I battled infections, mainly sinus infections but I didn’t get real sick too often, until last winter. Then I had a little bacterial infection that was gone in a week but it left behind a cough that lasted almost three months. Finally, we were able to get it under control with the help of inhalers.

So, I’ve been kind of afraid for about a year and then this thing just rears up out of nowhere and bites me in a tender place and I go from well one day (okay, sort of well) to zero to sixty flat on my back sick the next.

I began looking around the internet ’cause I couldn’t lie down and sleep anyway. And I discovered the dreaded acronym COPD. And I have it. I think I have the chronic bronchitis kind not the emphysema kind so it will kill me slower. But here I am at 4 am writing because I cannot sleep without coughing even with a belly full of meds. And if I live long enough, COPD will kill me.

If you don’t smoke, don’t start. Seek clean air. If you smoke, do everything in your power to quit. And if you cannot quit, pray that you do not get COPD, or lung cancer…

[Note: Tex Williams The "Smoke! Smoke! Smoke" singer passed away from lung cancer at his home in Newhall, California on October 11, 1985.]

World COPD Day November 18, 2009

Wither Goest I?

Why don't you do right...

I had a long talk with my doctor today about taking responsibility for myself and for my health, kind of the medical version of the song “Why Don’t You Do Right?” And so I have given this some thought.
Now usually when I pound out a blog it’s like “…the kid that handles the music box…” I’m hitting a jag-time tune. Typing to hear my head rattle. But this time I would appreciate some feedback.
The first “modern” television show ever to enrapture me was “The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis” based on stories by Max Schulman and starring Dwayne Hickman and Bob Denver. In this case I am going to assume that memory serves me correctly and if it doesn’t, well, it’s close enough to make my point.

Mr. Pomfritt

I seem to recall some 50 years ago or so, an episode of Dobie Gillis wherein the quintessential teacher, Mr. Leander Pomfritt played by William Schallert, assigns a paper to his students, giving them the title “Wither Goest I?”
And the plot of that episode revolved around Dobie Gillis and his good buddy Maynard G. Krebs (the “G” stood for “Walter”) and perhaps the brainy Zelda Gilroy, (she scrunches up her nose, Dobie responds reflexively, he can’t help himself, and then he shouts at Zelda “Now cut that out!”) trying to figure out where they were going in life. Only for Maynard was it easy. He would listen to Thelonius Monk and keep going back to the movie theatre to see, again and again, “The Monster Who Devoured Cleveland.”
It seems a bit of a stretch to be asking the same question at age 60, but so be it. And the real question is plural. Wither goest I? Wither goest thou? I guess it comes back around to raison d’etre. Why am I here and what am I supposed to do? How do I know when to applaud and when to get up and go home?
These questions or perhaps reiterations of the same basic question, scare me. But just a little. I also find it difficult taking it too seriously.
If a colony of ants were to produce an animated film about homo sapiens, called, maybe, “Humanz” the voice over would still have to be Woody Allen.
Humanz are inherently ridiculous. We carry on in the most asinine way, killing each other and putting up buildings, flying through the air in big tin cans, and eating stuff called Twinkies and Gogurt. Well, how can one take any of this seriously? That grain of salt better be pretty damned big.
So I ask you, what is my purpose here on this little bit of god-forsaken dirt? For that matter, what is yours? Let us leave out the “god” part though. It will just make you crazy.

Han Shan Hermit

Well then, procreation comes to mind. No matter what else we do, the urge to procreate is up there near the top. Huh, I have no children and will have no children. I guess the closest I ever got was either the Chinese orphans I send money to, or my various tai chi students over the years. Ha, I suppose the very, very closest would be my retired lady students. So all of my children are at least twenty years older than me. Oy, technically, I have failed to procreate.
Then how about the old saw, “Leave something to posterity?” Naw, that doesn’t work so good. One hundred years from now anything I left would be gone. Besides, I’ll be gone, so what do I care?
“Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow you will die.” Okay, I kind of like that as a rationale. I certainly like to eat, I definitely love to drink, and the two together makes me kind of merry. Only problem is, go back to sentence one, nu? I was talking to my DOCTOR! Already I am eating and drinking and making merry enough to kill me sooner than later. So that’s-a-no-good.
There is a certain appeal to asceticism, the lean old monk makes his way down the street, begging bowl in hand, hoping for a handful of rice…no, wait, he sits on top of the mountain communing with nature or you-know-who whilst thinking monkly thoughts or even better, not thinking at all, just being, one with the universe. Ai-ya, methinks this would get old pretty quick.
All right, let us assume that yours truly will live at least to the age of 80. If I find some golden mean between eating and drinking and that making merry stuff, and sitting on a mountain contemplating my navel, what else do I do? Why am I here?
Ha, I told my doctor I would like to take up ballroom dancing, but I didn’t have the fifty bucks for a pair of shoes and I wasn’t sure my car would make it to North Seattle. Is that some great ethereal goal, learning to tango?
A great deal of my cultural background comes from Puritanism. Our ancestors all loaded onto a ship and sailed across the second biggest ocean in the world fleeing religious persecution so they could find a new land and persecute each other for not being ascetic enough and while they were at it, do their best to wipe out a bunch of natives who had been happily killing one another until we came along and gave them new diseases to worry about.
And guilt, the Puritans brought along enough guilt to choke a dozen Jewish grandmothers and all that pent up everything built like winding an enormous clock which produced so much guilty energy we unwound our way across the face of the earth spreading our beliefs like mayonnaise on white bread and doing our best to make everyone else feel as guilty and miserable as us. Ha! No wonder we drink. And right, sex is just for procreation. If it didn’t feel good we wouldn’t do it and there would be no new generations for us to nudge.
I remember from English History class, I had a wonderful professor, Wendell Knox. He told us a little story about an English saint, I think he was another St. Augustine, who was a hermit and he kept having visions of naked women, so he would throw himself into thorn bushes. Well, it kept him busy, and idle hands ARE the devil’s playground.

Maynard, Dobie, Zelda

So, back to the original question. Wither goest I? Do I eat drink and make merry like crazy until I die? Do I sit up on a mountain thinking of nothing and being eaten by ferocious little bugs and maybe big brown bears? Do I exercise and restrict my diet and get all healthy so I can be fit as a fiddle when I drop over dead at the age of 88 or 130?
I truly want to know what you think and I cannot answer Mr. Pomfritt’s question all by myself. Why are we here and what do we do until bedtime?

The Soul of the Old Machine

Forty years ago, as my formal matriculation was nearing its final stages, the formula signaling the end of civilization as we know it became clear. Sophistication equals fragility. I do not remember now, but this was probably prompted by reading how an electromagnetic pulse such as one generated by a nuclear explosion in the atmosphere over the central United States would destroy all of those new-fangled electronic devices such as automobile ignitions and computers.

As our world progressed scientifically feeding on all of the discoveries generated by World War II, the Cold War, and the Space Race, we were putting more and more of our increasingly sophisticated eggs into an alarmingly fragile basket.

Forty years later, my thoughts on this have not changed as we become even more dependent on sophisticated technology. I am not a scientist, but I suspect, or at least hope, nanotechnology or something that comes out of nanotechnology might pull our fat out of the fire.

However, this is all prelude. My real purpose being a short paean to homo sapiens and especially to parents. Consider the human being as an ultra-sophisticated machine. Look at it folks! It is self-replicating, self-repairing, and self-programming. It can turn all sorts of organic matter into fuel, and it can even chemically alter this matter to create super fuels such as sugar and white bread.

Okay, so maybe that mostly describes ants, too, but humans are probably the pinnacle of Earthly super-machine development. Let us say we are  at the top of the organic machine chain when it comes to sophistication, neh?

Now, as stated above, this sophistication comes at a price, namely, fragility. We are cantankerous little creatures. As machines, I am tempted to call homo sapiens a prototype. I mean look at us. We were not built to stand upright, but our survival programming pushed us that way anyway, perhaps so we could look out across the drought-ridden plains of millions of years ago, watching for danger or food or love. But the original specifications did not allow for this, so today, back problems are legion and for back doctors the living is easy.

I have read that the human head of an unborn baby is too large for the birth canal which cause all kinds of birthing problems and lots of pain for the delivery mechanism: mothers. But we needed more computing power so the brain grew. Sigh, I guess we can fix that problem in the next iteration. Nuff said.

So here comes a brand new machine, fresh off of the…well assembly line isn’t quite right, unless there are twins or better, but here comes the new machine and the specialist technician: doctor, midwife, or what-have-you picks up this new device still slick with protective packing fluids and pushes the start button. For dramatic purposes we shall designate the old tradition of a slap on the butt as said start button.

Awww

Once the technician has ascertained that the new machine is running properly–let’s call this new machine a “baby,” the baby is sent home with parents, who, in the best of all possible worlds Dr. Pangloss, are also given an operator’s manual, which, like all good humans they will not read unless something goes wrong.

But here is some of the really cool stuff about the new machines. The old machines, the parents, are pre-programmed with operating instructions. It’s kind of like coming home with a brand new plasma TV and having the genetic in-born ability to hook it up and turn it on. Wow! We are pretty cool.

There are genetic triggers like neoteny-ha, Merriam-Webster.com calls neoteny “larval characteristics.” Anyway, big eyes, big head, it sets off parenting instincts…I mean it launches the parenting program. In fact it does it so well, neoteny in other species sets it off too. “Oh, look at the cute little kittens, aren’t they adorable?” Many, many years ago Natural History magazine ran a swell article on the neotenous evolution of Mickey Mouse. Oh, and there are many other triggers, like the smell of a baby’s breath. “Read the manual, ma!”

Puppies are so-o-o cute.

So the proud new mother unit and father unit have launched their parenting software and taken the baby unit home. Let us revisit the original premise, sophistication=fragility.

When one brings home a new computer and turns it on for the first time, most likely the Operating System is launched, and this could take a few minutes, or longer, and the computer asks for additional programing and we provide it. Although, some computer owners are more saavy than others and some do not provide the additional programming properly, and, well…they screw up the computer and either continue on like that, or bring in an expert to fix things.

And babies get colds, other “viruses,” but the human being is a damned sophisticated machine and its anti-virus software and hardware–ha, ha antiviral hardware, too, white blood cells moving around wiping out viruses–is pretty darned incredible and with a little TLC from the parent units, most babies survive the constant assault from viruses and other program and machine contaminants.

Well, our sophisticated little machines do survive at an incredibly high rate, considering how many things are after them. Not only microbes, but other organic machines are just waiting to gobble them up. Lions, and tigers, and bears, oh my!

Being sophisticated, our babies are incredibly fragile and require constant attention and protection if they are to develop into the next generation of self-replicating devices. Remember, these are prototypes, so parent units and technicians: doctors, teachers, and clergy, have to continually tweak the little critters. An unsupervised baby can get into all sorts of trouble. And once they begin growing and develop independent motility, ai-ya, nothing but problems.

The parent-units must spend at least 20 years correcting glitches and faulty programming, not to mention hardware repairs. But they do. And our little baby units wobble and grow and stumble off into the sunrise of a new generation to produce their very own baby units. Remarkably, humans continue to learn and while each individual unit is still fragile, the basic machine model, for all the problems inherent in a Beta product, does pretty darned well, not only pumping out new baby units by the billions but also extending its own life span.

Sophisticated we might be, fragile we are, but we are also a tested and trusty design.

Letting Go

濘道 Muddy Road

Zen Monks on pilgrimage - art by Sato Zenchu

  Tanzan and Ekido were once travelling together down a muddy road. A heavy rain was still falling.
 Coming around a bend, they met a lovely girl in a silk kimono and sash, unable to cross the intersection.
  “Come on girl,” said Tanzan at once. Lifting her in his arms, he carried her over the mud.
  Ekido did not speak again until that night when they reached a lodging temple. Then he no longer could restrain himself. “We monks don’t go near females,” he told Tanzan, “especially not young and lovely ones. It is dangerous. Why did you do that?”
“I left the girl there,” said Tanzan. “Are you still carrying her?”
from Zen Flesh, Zen Bones complied by Paul Reps

I recently began studying tai chi with a new teacher after 12 years at the previous school. My former teacher is world class in forms competition, and was very precise in correcting us.

My new teacher is…different. His postures are not the same even if the form is one I have studied for years. I spent a long time making my postures and movements as precise as my old 60-years-plus body would allow me.

Now things are not the same. The sword may be held at a different level or the footwork is slightly changed. In the most difficult instances, the transition from one movement to the next is different.

No, the hardest thing is letting go. I firmly believe that what goes around comes around. Over the years, every sin I have ever committed against someone else has, in turn, been committed against me.

When teaching taijiquan, some of the most difficult students are those who have studied a different martial art. You show them a movement and their brain relates it to something they have learned in this other art and makes an often incorrect connection. Brains are funny that way.

“No,” I say, “that move looks the same but it is not, and the intent is different as well.”

So, here I am trying to equate what I have learned with what I am trying to learn. Fortunately, I am old enough to keep my mouth shut…well, at least some of the time. I am also lucky to have read Zen Flesh, Zen Bones umpty-gazillion times, and I give thanks that “Muddy Road” is one of my very favorites from that excellent book.

Actually, letting go of the old tai chi chuan forms is good practice for life. As we progress from birth to death we must let go of many things, more, I suspect, than all of the newer things we grasp.

To paraphrase a Harlan Ellison story, “Sometimes you have to let-be, a little.”

Zhang San Feng

On top of all the good I get out of playing tai chi I am also playing at letting go. But, ai-ya, it is not easy.

Note: the Chinese characters for Muddy Road at the beginning of this are not the same as those used in the Tuttle edition of Zen Flesh, Zen Bones. If my grammar creates some enormous faux pas, blame me.

意 Yi–Intent

Pushing Hands tow.com

This was originally going to be called “moving” or “movement.” After a long period of sloth, continuing to play the tai chi chuan forms but lazily, not pushing myself, I have entered a new era of physical activity. It gets harder as one ages but easier, at the same time because the muscles are there, they just need to be reminded of their purpose.

This morning I arrived at tai chi class and my teacher, Dr. Wang, was standing by himself. He lifted his right hand in invitation and we began to play at pushing hands. Very quickly, my legs started to burn and my shoulder ached. He is a doctor, and he sensed this and we changed sides. Then we began the two handed pushing hands and I was clumsy and somewhat confused, but good old memory came through again and soon we were playing pretty smoothly, considering my under-used muscles.

Pushing Hands from Levande Stillhet

Then into the class itself with the 42 Standard International Competition Form with shaking legs, I had to rest, often, and finally the 42 Standard International Competition Sword Form. Trying to stand on one leg with the other knee raised, pointing a sword, well I was pretty pathetic. But in the end I felt really good, more lively. I knew that more oxygen was entering my muscles and my qi was flowing better.

Driving home in the mid-morning coolness, enjoying the late-summer blue skies, I almost glowed with happiness. It feels so good to move and with purpose, and to accomplish goals–we take the glory of our bodies for granted far too often.

Taiji Jian Tai Chi Sword

功夫 Gongfu (Kungfu), to achieve, to acquire skill through hard work, what a splendid concept. So, I was moving again and it felt good. Then why Yi, intent? In Chinese martial arts Yi is a primary concept. Simply put, without intent nothing can be accomplished. If you want a drink of water, your intention to pick up a glass must come first before your hand reaches for it. Before we acquire skill at tai chi chuan, we must begin with intent. I have a friend who “intended” on taking this class, but he said he was afraid, it had been so long and now new students and a new teacher…he did not come today. Did he have Yi? Probably not.

Driving home today I passed a young woman. She was clad in comfortable but very nice clothing and she was walking on the sidewalk. The way she carried herself, her stride her posture, her Yi and its culmination told me she was comfortable with physical activity and with her body.

Shortly thereafter, several blocks behind, along came another woman. She was decked out in what I assume is the latest jogging gear, headband, iPod strapped to her bicep, and her shoulders were lifted and tense and her elbows were thrust out and up and her body parts did not work in unison. Each section of her body was singing its own song and it was not harmonious when played together. This woman was obviously not comfortable with her body.

So we have to have the intent and then we must follow through. Just thinking about that drink of water is not enough. Intent and then the appropriate action. Two sayings come to mind: Yi 意, Chi 氣, Li 力. Intent then Internal Energy then strength or power. It all starts with intent.
Dr. John Painter, my Grand Shifu–teacher–says “The mind commands, the body moves, qi (chi) flows.” This makes the most sense to me. Intent then movement and movement produces energy. Of course this means proper movement like the young woman walking.
When I began studying the Yijing (I Ching) many, many years ago, it spoke often of the “Superior Man.” For modern times I change that, and my favorite passage is “The Superior Person stakes the force of life on following the force of will.” Ha! I tried to follow this and was knocked on my ass so many times…I did not understand the most important part, “Superior.” This didn’t work if one was not superior meaning upstanding, honest, gentle, strong…following the four virtues–Honesty, Humility, Patience, Sincerity. So equate “proper” movement with the “superior” person.
This was going to be about the glory of movement, and it still is, but first we must have Yi. Then go forward with the four virtues and celebrate your body and movement. Taijiquan is sometimes called “The Dance of Life.” Regardless of how you move, make it a dance, relax and enjoy yourself.

Dr. Painter on Yi: http://seattlesilverdragon.wordpress.com/2009/02/01/yi-intention-a-key-to-chinese-internal-martial-arts/

Heat Wave

Things are heating up in Seattle again. Time for some more hot music. If you don’t have Kinks you gotta have Who covering a Martha and the Vandellas classic.

Speaking of Heat Waves, if you can’t get Fred Astaire and Marilyn Monroe, try Miss Piggy and Kermit.

But this is the Emerald City. It could rain. Caught up in a summer shower…and Johnny B. Sebastian playing the harp.

Tea by any other name…a rant.

 Tea refers to the agricultural products of the leaves, leaf buds, and internodes of the Camellia sinensis plant, prepared and cured by various methods. “Tea” also refers to the aromatic beverage prepared from the cured leaves by combination with hot or boiling water, and is the colloquial name for the Camellia sinensis plant itself.  After water, tea is the most widely-consumed beverage in the world. It has a cooling, slightly bitter,  flavour. Wikipedia

(Note: the sections following referring to brewing and enjoying tea apply to Chinese tea, meaning tea grown in China or Taiwan.)

Sniffing Cups Photo: Craig Gibson

Of late, I have had a number of discussions on tea that did not include a discourse on variety and flavor. Sooner or later, in conversation, the fact arises that I am training with a Chinese Tea Master. Someone will say, “Oh, I had a lovely rooibos tea this morning.” I no longer argue. But, folks, if the beverage is not based on the plant camellia sinensis, it is not tea!

Blame the early importers of tea. Someone asked a Chinese local, “What do you call that stuff?” The reply, “Té.” Welcome to the slippery slope. This was a local colloquial nickname for tea. The Chinese word for tea is “Cha.” 茶 The Japanese word for tea is “Cha.” Or if it is a particularly good tea, “O Cha.” But we had to go and screw things up and call it “tea.”

What about herbal teas? No, sorry, that is not a tea. Rooibos is not a tea. There is a nice French word for almost anything brewed in hot water: “Tisane.” You had a lovely rooibos tisane this morning. “How was your chamomile tisane?”

Listen, unless camellia sinensis is present, you are not drinking tea! Interestingly, when I have the audacity to correct slurpers of various concoctions, they either grow angry or refuse to hear me. I am not speaking ill of any of the beverages, I am merely giving them their correct names.

Cha

So, as of today, I am undertaking two missions. 1. I shall do my utmost to never ever remark on the name of someone’s drink. Don’t even get me started on Martinis and the sludge that bears that once noble name. 2. I am beginning a campaign to change the English language name for the camellia sinensis plant and any beverage brewed from it to “Cha.” Now wouldn’t that be simple? We give the tree and drink its true name back, and that leaves “tea” to everyone else in the world.

When I was little and sick I was given a beef “tea.” My organic gardening guru brews up all sorts of “teas” to encourage plant growth. Yes! Take it, take the word, keep it, call cats “tea” and dogs “coffee” for all I care. Just refer to the plant and drink as “Cha.” Isn’t that a nice sounding word?

While we’re at it. I no longer want to hear about any tea, any cha that anyone drinks and considers lovely that comes from a tea bag. Or any cha that is brewed in a tea ball. God save us from all of these devilish contraptions that get in the way of drinking a good cup of tea cha.

Silver Needle Single Bud, Awakened Photo: Craig Gibson

Briefly, the cha ball, when used with loose leaf tea, usually stops the tea leaves from properly rehydrating because they cannot expand completely as they absorb the water.  The Chinese call this initial reabsorbtion of water, “Awakening the Dragon.” What a lovely image. But, if you cruelly imprison your dragon, it will never lift its head up and spread its wings (If you are imagining a Western dragon), or stretch out its powerful limbs and give you the utmost and best cup of Cha. Instead you get a wimpy little chihuahua of a dragon and a poor cup of cha.

Now, consider the tea bag. First the bag. They range from unbleached to bleached cotton, to silk,to plastic. Plastic? And the contents–in the tea industry, the designation for the camellia sinensis that goes into tea bags is FNG. So, what does “FNG” mean? It is an abbreviation that became a sort of acronym. It is far enough removed from its source that we forget the origin. It’s kind of like not seeing the pig slaughtered. FNG is an abbreviation for “fannings.”

Hm-m-m. That’s a curious word. Why would that word be applied to tea? I’ll tell you why. Originally, the loose leaf tea, the good stuff, was fanned with a…well with a fan. And the dust that blew off, probably onto the floor, this dust was swept up and put in tea bags for the rubes. Yum!

Now, modern tea bags do not contain floor sweepings, I hope. In fact, some “premium”–I put premium in quotes because any tea bag tea being premium is doubtful, in my deranged mind–some premium tea bags contain high quality tea. During tea production a certain amount of the good stuff, the loose leaf tea, some of those leaves get too broken to sell as loose leaf and these get turned into FNG.

I occasionally drink tea bag tea. In the airport, what other choice is there? Tazo makes good tea bag tea and so does Stash. But at home? No thank you. Depending on the brand, you can wind up with more stems than leaves and no buds whatsoever. 

On the road, and I travel a lot–on the road I bring along my own loose leaf tea and some contraption or other for brewing it. I like the TeaMaster Brew-cup. It’s portable, easy to clean, has enough room for the Dragon to awaken, and makes a darned good cup of tea. That said, I use a polycarbonate cup. My family doctor, a fellow Tea-head, will only use the glass version.

West Lake Dragonwell Dry, Note: All buds Photo: Craig Gibson

Strange interlude: And what makes a good, dare I say “great” loose leaf tea cha? 1. Lineage. What varietal did the leaves come from? In what region of China is it grown? 2. Process. Organic or ”Organic Process” preferred. Good soil. Now the nitty gritty–3. Leaf style. Part of this is determined by the type of tea. Compare Mao Feng green with Dragonwell (Longjing) green. The best tea is all buds. In my opinion, the finest tea in the world is Yin Zhen Bai Hao from C.C. Fine Tea. This is usually called Silver Needle or Silver Needle white, and it is all buds. Oolong tea is traditionally one bud two leaves. Good to great tea is either all buds, one bud one leaf, one bud two leaves…and one bud three leaves is debatable. Anything past that: Phooey! 4. Freshness, includes storage methods.

So, in bagged tea you don’t know what you are getting. It may even be adulterated, cut with some kind of filler.

As to freshness, smell it. If it smells lovely and fragrant it will probably taste that way too. Which means you should purchase tea someplace that allows you to smell what you are buying. This eliminates the supermarket. I have seen tea shops that sold very nice high quality loose leaf tea, except they didn’t turn it fast enough and it became old and stale. It oxidized. It became dry and crumbly. No aroma, no Qi. 氣 Smell it. And if you buy it from a nice tea shop, you can probably buy a cup of it first and taste it.

To finish this rant, I recently heard “I drink a lot of tea every day. I can’t afford to buy good tea.” Westerners tend to brew their tea once, let the tea sit in the water forever until it is strong enough to repel sharks, and then discard the leaves. Proper Chinese brewing puts the water on the leaves for the minimum time required to extract that flavorful goodness (Awakening the Dragon can be used to get the leaves in the right mood to be drunk.). A good Chinese tea cha may be infused anywhere from 4-7 times. Notice and enjoy the differences each infusion offers. A GOOD Chinese Cha will still offer flavor even after the color of the liquor begins to fade.

My Favorite Yixing Pot

The easiest way to brew a good cup is with a French Press. Tea Masters often use a traditional Gaiwan for themselves. The Chinese Gongfu (Kungfu) method using an unglazed clay pot (Yixing Clay only! Otherwise beware of possible lead contamination in the clay.) may ultimately be the most satisfying. I have a tiny pot about the size of my fist. Two grams of cha suffice to provide me with a satisfying experience. There is available a porcelain brewer called the TeaMaster Automatic Tea Brewer, that emulates the Gongfu method and is a good way to start enjoying Chinese tea.

Gaiwan Photo: SJS Chen/Wikipedia

Name it right, brew it right, and as my Cha Shifu (Tea Master) says, “Tea makes a Happy Day.”

Rant addendum: 99% of all white tea sold in the US is not. At best it is green.

The following video advertising Japanese tea is hilarious, but note that they are only picking leaves, no buds. Third rate tea. It should be left to the bugs.

 

Zombies say…

Whoa. I thought it was hot a month ago. Today is Texas frying-pan hot. Time for some more seasonal music.

The Zombies say “It’s the time of the season for loving…”

Paul Robeson sings “…and the living is easy, fish are jumpin’…” but not when it’s this hot.

Cole Porter wrote and Stacey Kent sings,

“…when the thermometer goes way up
and the weather is sizzling hot
Mister Adam for his madam is not
cause it’s too darn hot, it’s too darn hot
It’s too darn hot.”

I agree with the latter, it is just too darned hot!

Moonlight and Hope

春江花月夜 “Moonlight on the Spring River”

Li Po (Li Bai)

I love Chinese characters. There is so much implicit meaning. Not long ago I was looking for characters for the concept “hope.” I discovered the character “wang4.” The number after the word is the tone, thus wang is pronounced with the fourth tone, even.

月 is “Yue4″ moon. This is the radical in wang4: 望. From the definitions, I infer a meaning of “to gaze in the distance at the full moon, with hope.” I love the idea of hope. For me, hope gives the world a certain solidity. Anything is possible.

Ha! An old gypsy saying goes, “You are never too old to get married, or jump off of a bridge.” Hope!

I love the moon and night, as certainly evidenced by the name of this blog. Tea by moonlight is an elegant concept, and both the Chinese and the Japanese drink tea whilst viewing the full moon. I recall stories of a famous Chinese poet, was it Li Po, who upon seeing the full moon leaped to his feet and wrote a poem on the ridgepole of the tea house? The next day, a carpenter carved the characters into the beam to immortalize them.

And legend says Li Po, in a drunken attempt to embrace the reflection of the moon, fell into the Yangtze river and drowned.

Cole Porter wrote: “In the still of the night, as I gaze out my window, at the moon in its flight, my thoughts all turn to you…” What thoughts the moon has inspired.

The famous Chinese poet, Zhang Ruoxu (c. 660-c.720) wrote:

Spring, River, and Flowers on a Moonlit Night

The tide in the Spring river meets the flat ocean.
On the sea a bright moon is born with the tide
And shimmers along the waves for thousands of miles.
Nowhere on the Spring river is without bright moon.

The river meanders through fragrant fields
And in the flowering woods moon makes everything snow,
Until even frost flowing in space is invisible
And on the shores white sands disappear in light.

River and sky merge in one dustless color.
Bright, bright sky, with only the moon’s wheel.
Who first saw the moon on this riverbank?
What year did this river moon first shine on men?

Generations keep passing without end,
But the river moon looks the same year after year.
I don’t know who the river moon is waiting for;
I only see the long river seeing off the flowing water.

One scarf of white cloud fades into distance,
Leaving unbearable sorrow in the estuary’s green maples.
Whose husband is drifting away in a flat boat tonight?
Who is missing her lover in a moonlit tower?

What a pity, the moon wandering through the tower;
It should light the mirror-stand of the traveler.
She cannot roll it up in the jade door’s blinds;
Or wipe it from the rock where she beats clothes clean.

At this moment, they see the same moon, but cannot hear each other,
She wishes she could flow with the moonlight onto him.
The wild goose flying off cannot escape this light,
When fish and dragons leap and dive I read patterns in the waves.

Last night she dreamed of fallen petals in a still pool.
What sorrow: with spring half over, the man hasn’t returned.
The current has almost washed the Spring away,
And the setting moon tilts west again in the river pool.

The slanting moon sinks deep, deep into the sea fog.
Between the Brown Rock and the Xiang River is a long way
And I don’t know how many people ride the moonlight home.
The setting moon fills the river trees with shivering emotion.

(Translated by Tony Barnstone and Chou Ping)

“…I gaze out my window at the moon in its flight…”

A most famous Chinese musical piece, “Moonlight on the Spring River”