shit magnet

.
Once upon a time -- and perhaps still -- there was an expression, "babe magnet." A babe magnet was a car that would assure the flocking of docile and delicious young women and other awe-struck attention. A "babe magnet" was a guy thing, I think... another, among many, masculine hopes.

I remembered the "babe magnet" this morning when I received yet another reference/blog/paean to the self-centered behavior of some Buddhist teachers. Since I had indulged in such conversation in the past, there was no way I could expect not to be made part of present and future conversations. And yet, receiving it, I felt there really ought to be a phrase, "shit magnet." That's how it made me feel -- like a shit magnet. On the one hand, I really didn't want to be part of it. On the other hand, there was no escaping being part of it.

Others will have fluffy disquisitions on this subject -- anger, sorrow, love, righteousness, vituperation, helplessness ... the list goes on and on -- but what struck me this morning together with seeming to be a shit magnet was this: There simply is no subject -- none -- to which the old axiom does not apply: Don't do the crime if you can't do the time. The devil is always in the details and those who skip over the details or try to bury them under an avalanche of virtue or goodness or straight-spined disdain ... well, it's a great way to short-circuit a half-decent practice and a halfway happy life.

It really is the shit that grows the flowers and so -- even when kicking or screaming or patting ourselves on the back for an outsized righteousness -- well, flowers are nice, I think.

Which is not to say a shower wouldn't help after a bit of gardening.
.