The Miracle of Mindlfulness - Thich Nhat Hanh
Crossfire Trail - Louis Lamour
A person may wonder what a Vietnamese monk and a Texas drifter have in common. A person might also wonder what kind of person has these two titles on her audio listen app. Me.
I must confess that I didn't listen to all of The Miracle of Mindfulness. I began to get the gist. Be present, be present, be mindful. Granted, he had lots of tips especially pertinent to westerners like myself who are like a bunch of bulls in a china shop. I don't mean westerners as in cowgirls or people who read westerns silly - although appropo.
The best part was the sonorous deep voice of the reader. He spoke slowly and had this archaic English accent with perhaps an Indian influence. He rolled his rrrrs and when he said mindfulness it came out like miiiiiindfulness. "Wash the dishes to wash the dishes." He had an entire chapter on "Washing the dishes to wash the dishes." This is perfect for me because I do "wash the dishes." I have a dishwasher that I only use for storage and now I know how to "wash the dishes." Don't hurry through the project so you can sit down and savor your tea. (I hate tea though - that's one complaint I have about this book.) If you do, you will not savor your tea, but will be thinking about the next thing that you are going to do. Ultimately, each act will not be lived, but merely completed in order to rush on to the next thing. The next word most often used in the text is "breath." I have to admit, it has made me more aware of breathing, deeply. Exhale all the air out of your lungs btw. Oh, and brush your teeth before you deep breathe near others. (He didn't say that, I do.) But "brush your teeth to brush your teeth."
Ironically, while I was listening to this audio book, I missed my freeway connection in rush hour in the heart of Los Angeles. I was contemplating mindfulness and I failed to be mindful. This led to an extremely stressful rerouting route and I ended up being late to pick someone up at the airport. sigh.
Perhaps that is why I abandoned it in order to listen to Crossfire Trail. At least I knew in this book that the hero would at some point engage in a fist fight with someone who is forty pounds heavier than himself. (This happens in almost every Louis Lamour.) It's so comforting because the hero is always beat up badly but eventually wins. He would also perform a "rolling hip lock." I wish I knew what that was. I asked my brother and he said it probably would be considered sexual assault.
The hero in this story is shanghaied in San Francisco and forced to serve on a merchant vessel of some sort. Now, who doesn't love the word shanghaied. I wish I had more occasions to use it, but I just don't. "I'll have that latte shanghaied please." "Kids stop your shanghaied nonsense." Fortunately, he happens to be shanghaied with a dying rancher who has been tricked out of his land. The rancher bequeaths him half of his ranch on his deathbed and entrusts him to return and take care of his wife and daughter in Wyoming.
I won't summarize because I hate doing that. Suffice it to say, our forty pounds underweight hero escapes, and goes to Wyoming with some of his boat cronies who will follow him to the death because of his incredible charisma. The mother has conveniently died, but the daughter is as homely as can be. JUST KIDDING. She happens to be exceptionally beautiful. I always love it when male readers do the female voices. They always sound so funny. A range war ensues. Rafe (said hero) kicks out the bad corrupt guys in a series of unprecedented acts of sheer manliness (perhaps only rivaled by Richard the Lion hearted, Tariq bin Ziyad, or Attila the Hun.
There is one unique scene in this story. Rafe is arrested and tried by a corrupt judge and court. He proceeds to defend himself savvily humiliating the underhanded bully who is engaged to non homely dead rancher's daughter. She begins to see Rafe in a new more honorable light.
