Re-united by Flickr

A few days ago I received a couple of comments under the following photos of one of my favorite designed classic cars, the Bristol. I photographed these when I was living in London back in the late 80's. I had forgotten the name of the car, but someone from Germany clued me in. If you read under these 2 pictures you will see what I mean by Re-united. Hanneke4 said:

Used to own this very car... FANTASTIC, not just in looks, went really well too :) I had wondered what had happened to it, so just googled it...

And this: Hanneke4 said:

My ex hb and I used to own this baby... God, I want it back now... It is the original Bristol 403 (1953) that went on a peace mission from Bristol to Bordeaux in 1954...

You ask how would she know this is the same Bristol, well I indicated where it was frequently parked in London, that would be off of New Bond Steet.

Dave K.'s garden slugs and the Buddha

Fellow tweeter and Flickr friend Dave K, tweeted this AM that slugs were out after the rain. From what I have seen on Flickr, Dave has a wonderful garden set against woodlands and near New England bogs. Another Flickr friend Cheryl the "Desert Diva" posted a lovely photo of the Buddha in the gardens of Upaya Zen Center, Santa Fe. This particular buddha was different from others since it does not have the Ushinisha, the bump representing his expanded wisdom. I also noticed the many hundreds of curls on the head of this Buddha.
My mind, at times spews disjointed thoughts and experiences, which I link to something I may have read or seen in the past. Here is that connection.
Dave's slugs reminded me of garden snails, Cheryl's photo of the Buddha was contrary to the legend of the Buddha's curls. As I remember, traditionally there were 108 "curls" on the Buddha's head and they were not curls at all, because he had a shaved head. The story goes that when Gautama was meditating in the intense heat, a line of snails were passing by. These snails proceeded to cover his shaved head, and their mucus and bodies protected him from the intense sun as he sat and so they became the snail martyrs, all 108 of them. There are many other explanations and legends about the Buddha's head, but I especially like this one.
Since no depiction of the Buddha in human form has been uncovered earlier than 500 years after his death, it is not important how he looked.
This is why my teacher, Jundo, has stated the following about a household Buddha statue,

Now, in my opinion, one may place within one's home altar whatever speaks to one. One should have a "Buddha Statue" (but please see my recent talk on what that means ... for it can be anything that seems right, such as a stone, a coke bottle, a flower, a coat hanger, an empty space ... ) ...