Gingerpig

In the short time since I have started this blog, I have said very little about my wife other than providing a link to her own blog. I haven't made a conscious decision to omit her although there is a sort of a reason for not saying much about her.

Understand that I love my wife very much and our lives overlap considerably as you would expect with any married couple. The thing is that I intend this blog to be a record of my training, or at least that part of it that I want to make public. Gingerpig's blog is likewise a record of hers. And of course, part of that training is living with Gingerpig and with her practice.

We are both Buddhists but in different traditions. We have "compared notes" on numerous occasions and the fundamentals of our practice are very similar. I don't have any issue with the form of Buddhism that she practices and I don't see it as inferior or superior to my own. What I do see is that Soto Zen suits the kind of person I am and I'm sure that Gingerpigs practice suits her. We have both also been blessed to find the right teacher to suit us.

When we got married, we saw the wedding ceremony as a vow to train together. In fact, that is part of the wording of the ceremony itself. However, we also recognised that while we are training together, we can't walk the path for the other person. Nobody can do that as much as we may want to or try to. So we each practice in our own way and with the support of the other.

For this reason only, Gingerpig doesn't play as big a part in my blog as she does in my life. Maybe that will change, just as all things do, and our path of training will overlap more strongly in the future. In the meantime, I am grateful to her for being my wife, my friend and my companion.

In Gassho.