Ten-second Rant/Dharma: Contemplating the Holiness of Gross Things

This is what I was contemplating this morning, before I took Scooby to the park:

My faults are as large as a mountain, but I conceal them within me.
Others’ faults are as minute as a sesame seed, but I proclaim and condemn them.
I boast about my virtues, though I don’t even have a few.*

Then Scoob and I went for a walk, and I immediately got tweaked because a runner blew his nose onto the road right in front of me. I thought, “You wouldn’t do that while you were carrying your briefcase down Madison Avenue in your Barney’s suit—why here?” And, really, why do people blow their nose in the street while they run? Is it, like, a biological thing? Because it looks more like a macho thing—like you’re in your running bubble, all high and self-righteous, and you think, “I’m such a healthy stud that I’m sure this dog-woman wouldn’t mind a little of my snot on her clog.”

It was like the one on the left

So, anyway, others’ faults are as minute as a sesame seed. Trying to get back to that, I thought back on past times when people did gross things in the street, and, because of the benefits of hindsight, I can see that they were just things—not good, not bad. Like, one time I saw a homeless man rummaging through a garbage can with one hand, and with the other hand, holding a Dixie Cup around his dick so that he could pee.** That doesn’t bother me now. (Actually, it didn’t bother me then, either).

Anyway, the point is 1) my faults are as large as a mountain, but I conceal them within me; others’ faults are as minute as a sesame seed, 2) I have a real hard time not judging people based on my own likes and dislikes, 3) wouldn’t it be great if no one blew their nose onto the street?, and 4) either way, our lives are dreams that pass quickly, so whatever it is, maybe it’s just a little bit sacred.

*From Jamgon Kongtrul Lodro Thaye’s “Crying to the Guru’s From Afar.”

**This was in the old days, before Giuliani took all the homeless people and turned them into dog food.

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