Patti's journal

We drive to the foundation in a battered bus that looks like a relic from a Beetles movie. For a moment, as I climb aboard for the two hour drive to the foundation I am eighteen again and discovering life like the first peel unraveled from the onion. We file through the doorway of the Suan Kaew Foundation into an open pavilion where we are greeted by a wizened old man in tattered clothes. He hoses down the cement floor with the concentration of a surgeon about to operate. He glances up and I see his face, crooked and creased, his body slightly stooped, he smiles, and when he does it's as though he holds a secret. His eyes break into tiny creases, each telling it's own a story.

"Welcome to my garden" he says in perfect English, as he rubs out a spot on the immaculate cement floor and sweeps away the imaginary dust as though he is polishing the King's gold. And then he laughs and fills the courtyard with the national sound of Thailand ---- it's laughter. The sound is everywhere and soon becomes contagious. It comes from the polished faces of the young monks as they arrange and re-arrange their flowing saffron robes; it floats over the shy teen-aged girls daring to peek out at us through shiny inquisitive eyes; and crackles through an adjoining courtyard where a group of old crippled men and women huddle together peeling and separating scraps to fill the compost heaps.

Saturday was an Orientation sort of day for us at home and we were generally told what to expect in a very nicely prepared schedule for our week here. Mamee's daughters are great cooks and keep feeding us all sorts of great Thai food. Sunday we all piled into a truck and cruised the city of Ayuthaya checking out some spectacular temples and other shrines the King Summer Palace and the ancient capital ruins. Was incredibly hot and humid but we made through the day with out any casualties. Monday we got to to see our project area at the Suan Kean foundation which I will tell all more about later.

Was it only two days ago we came together? All of us for separate reasons, or are they the same? Why has our destiny taken us to find one another in this hot, humid, mosquito infested paradise? Is it the laughter we seek? Or is it the joy that winds its way through this oppressive heat and poverty? Do we come in search of our personal brands of enlightenment --- to escape, to discover, or maybe to learn the secret of the gatekeeper who tends his garden on the cement floor.

We are an unlikely group. A young girl on the threshold of discovery; a retired military officer, retracing old paths; a world traveler from Las Vegas who speaks of oil; an actor from Los Angeles who waits tables and a discouraged movie publicist. All of us a bit world weary we are eager to take what Thailand has to offer.

For me, I will take the sparkle in the baby's eyes, the one with no parents, only the home offered by the Foundation, and plant it in my heart where hopefully it will grow in Los Angeles to enlarge it's heart and soul. Maybe I shall remember the warmth of the woman's hand as she serves me iced coffee, only because I am an American and that is what I drink. Maybe someday I will remember and serve her distant cousin iced tea on a hot day on my beach. Maybe I will drive the extra mile for a friend when I remember the long trip taken by the Novices who came only to ask a few earnest questions of us.

We live in Mamee's house and become family. She takes us into her home and feeds us her delicious food from her warm kitchen, just as she does the weary souls who wander into her foundation kitchen. She pulls out the balm to sooth our pain --- just as she offers purpose and hope to others that the world may have forgotten. She reminds us that we are one, the same. She is Mamee to us all. The young Monks are her monkeys, the young women her daughters, the dogs and cats her pets. To live in Mamees house is to be nurtured and loved and reminded of our oneness.

We stand in front of the Buddha, large, gold benevolent and feel his power. For a moment we stand with God. No matter how or what we believe, God energy is everywhere, sweet, strong, pure and uncluttered. Intellect dissolves, only love remains. The Monks surround and protect us like God's sentries and for a time they hold our souls a little nearer to God, to Love. Today every moment is complete, like no other has been before or will be again.