My father was a colonel in the Army while I was in high school. Thus, I was able to spend a large portion of my youth traveling around the world. One of the cultures that I least understood, but enjoyed the most, was that of Japan. My mother, being open to all things, including different cultures, quickly adapted to the Japanese way of life and was able to blend in pretty seamlessly. I, on the other hand, found that rebellion was the best solution to not understanding what was going on around me.
My mother did her best to help us appreciate other cultures where we were stationed. One of the places she took us in Japan was a rock garden. There were lovely men and women dressed in kimonos walking around the garden. The garden itself was filled with large rocks of all sizes – from large boulders to small pebbled sized rocks.
There was one section of the rock garden that had rakes. There was sand that people were pushing around with the rakes. My mother explained that the practice of pushing sand around with rakes was considered to be relaxing.
In another portion of the garden, people were stacking rocks and arranging them on the ground. They weren’t really doing anything else. My mother explained that stacking and arranging rocks was also considered to be relaxing – even an art. People would create beautiful designs with the rocks and the dispose of the design. Buddhists believe in dedicating their time to a simple task and then destroying it, as all life on Earth is only temporary.
Now, I am an older businessman and have found that finding time to meditate and spend time relaxing has been very difficult. A recent visit to a docot revelived that I have a high blood pressure rating. In order to get healthy, my doctor recommended that I find some activities to reduce my level of stress.
From out of nowhere, the memories of my youth in Japan came to the fore in my mind. I spoke with my wife about the potential to develop a rock garden on our property. She agreed that the idea seem intruiging, yet fun.
Together, we researched some rock garden options that would suit our area. There were so many options to choose from. The simplest idea was a small garden with a collection of variously sized pebbles. We could build a rock garden as large as the ones I had visited in Japan by purchasing huge boulders and filling some of the area with sand.
If we also decided to have a sand garden, we would also need to construct a covering to keep the sand safe from the wind and rain. Ultimately, my wife and I decided to partition off a part of our yard near the house. We filled it with very small pebbles and placed some rocks of varying sizes around the garden. In all, it was about 10 feet y 10 feet.
I purchased a flat rake to move the pebbles about. Together my wife and I now enjoy spending time developing patterns in the rock garden. The more time I spend in the garden, I find the more I feel closer to my mother and the culture than I spent so much time in when I was younger. While I may not understand it all, at least for those moments that I spend thinking about relaxing in my garden, I feel the stress of my day melt away. Now, the biggest obstacle in my evening has more to do with the pattern I create than budgets. After all, it’s healthier that way.