Patience, Again

Tonight, some Dharma flitted across my mind while I was holding William and looking at the soup that Fiona had made me, and knowing that it was growing cold. I felt a certain pang, and aware enough of some level of attachment going on, I remembered the meaning of the lines, from the Patience chapter of The Way of the Bodhisattva, "We must at once cast off / Our mind's attachments / Tender to the fiery flames of hate." William had struggled on his bed and needed to be held, and Fiona had just gotten out of the bathroom and was blow-drying her hair on the couch, so I was pacing back and forth just to calm him down and perhaps put him in the mood for sleeping. So I had the opportunity to think: "so attachment leads to hatred? Really--is that really true?" I couldn't really remember where or how Shantideva particularly links them, so, since I didn't particularly feel like I was angry because the soup was getting cold, I guess I forgot about the whole thing altogether.

Finally Fiona finished blow-drying her hair and got out the box where it lives to put it away. Then she put the hair dryer back on her lap to collect the cord, shirking it back into the original peanut-shaped bunch that the cord has had since its manufacturing. Not once but, since she first did it incorrectly, twice she collected the cord to put a rubber-band about it so that it might fit neatly, and snugly into its original packaging. And there it was: anger. Anger--due to simple inconvenience, of having expectations denied (Fiona would hold William so I could finish my long-delayed dinner). Every capacity of reason tells me that my anger is foolish, unfounded, exactly: insane. So why did it arise? And it did arise, clearly and pointedly, in a way that vague frustration never does. Perhaps if I hadn't "caught" myself, my crazy brain, I certainly wouldn't have continued being angry. In the next second anyway, Fiona took the baby. But that's sort of the scary part: how many times have we been angry and forgotten about it? Most likely, some echo of discontent would linger, giving rise to more chances of anger and/or harsh words in an otherwise peaceful moment, with the consequence of not having any idea, upon the fortune of reflection, why such anger was there. It goes a long way back.

Where does this lead me back to? At that time, I also remembered another part of the chapter:

Some do evil things because of ignorance
Some respond with anger being ignorant.
Which of them is faultless in such acts?
To whom shall error be ascribed?

Although Fiona couldn't be said, in any way, to have been doing evil, I felt pretty close to that second line. Ignorance is strong; attachment and anger are always at elbow's length. As warriors, our imperative is to arm ourselves with the Dharma and, to mix a metaphor, take refuge in it. And yet if you allow me that strained metaphor you might find something dynamic and true about it as well: by seeking refuge and immersing ourselves in the Dharma, the Dharma becomes a powerful weapon.