Roomin' House Blues

A few days ago I wrote a post that talked about various things I had done, primarily my time as a hermit. I cited a poem translated by J.P. Seaton in his "The Shambhala Anthology of Chinese Poetry, about the life or a hermit.  I found another poem by Shih Te, an 8th Century Chinese Zen monk that begins with "If you want to be happy, there is no way but to be a hermit," and a few lines later concludes, "And me? I ought to be at joyous ease, but I can't help thinking of the people in the world."    I thought about this poem, ironically, after I posted a couple of comments on my nephew Brenly's Facebook post. He commented on how people often feel more lonely after Facebook or social networking.  I wrote, "   Oh also, we always have a moving toward communion with someone and a move away into isolation. It just goes faster with the internet. But the real trick is interior change. To move from loneliness to solitude and from manipulat...