Enlightenment BY DOG POOP

by Alan Steinborn

Dog Poop

The smelly stuff, humbler of masters, the stuff of legend.

I wish to admit something up front to you.

I adore dog poop.

For 2 reasons.

One reason is the look on a dog's face as he or she
witnesses the plastic baggy clad hand of its master carefully
scooping up the canine excrement--it is like a balancing of power.

Its like a hidden agreement: I will put up with your sh*t so long as you pick up mine!

This is a great and fair agreement.

But in some places, dog owners are slow to catch on.

Take Paris for instance.

In Paris, it is a well known among Parisians that they best check their shoes before going into a buidling--at all times!

A long time Parisian explained it to me once:

"Imagine if you don't check your shoes.

Let us say you have been invited to a dinner party.

Your hostess has taken every pain to prepare a great dinner and she has made the house
super clean and ready. Some of your best friends are coming.

On the night of the dinner party, you walk the streets with excitement. You bounce your way over to her flat.

You arrive.

You ring the bell.

You climb the stairs with a smile.

The door opens to reveal a gathering of warmly smiling faces, and the sounds of friendly laughter.

In the center facing you is your dear friend, the hostess.

You walk quickly in and exchange enthusiastic kisses and hellos.

And then it happens.

All at once, like a pouncing devil--the stink--yep!

Your heart sinks as the smell rises.

You look down and see that you have just added an evil brown stripe on her otherwise pristine Persian rug.

An uncomfortable quiet ensues. She tries to pass it off: "Oh, it will come out.", but she is no longer smiling.

Her evening is ruined and all because you didn't check your shoes."

When my friend finished this explanation, I was in tears! His logic was very good...but wow!

What absurdity, I said through tears!

But I digress.

The second reason I love dog poop, is because of a something that happened to me in Berlin in 1994.

Here is the story of how I became enlightened by dog poop!

It was spring in Berlin.

Saying the words: "Spring in Berlin" is like saying, silent gray stone suddenly explodes into lively
friendliness, sex, color, music dance, and maybe even a wild orgy.

The Berlin Spring is so utterly off the charts.

This is because the winter is so utterly brutal.

It is super cold, there is about 5 hours of sunlight pure day, and there is a dark
ice cloud that hangs over the city for 5 months.

The people survive it by stoically turning themselves into marble statues.

People not only don't talk to each other, but they deliberately ignore each other.

Being lonely and depressed are signs of life in a Berlin winter!

Then in late April, the explosion happens--all at once it seems.

Everyone is suddenly eager to meet each other, people are singing
and smiling to each other--there are parties everywhere, outdoor street
cafes sprout up out of the ground like mushrooms.

The general mood of delirium is so palpable that even the most professionally
depressed sponge fish can manage a smile and a laugh.

For me, late April in Berlin meant a return of my love too, but I am not
talking about the romance, sex and kinship of the average Berliner.

Spring delirium for me was the return of my ability to play my sax in the
great tunnels of that fair city without losing my fingers to frost bite.

One day in winter as we hunkered over our hot chocolate, I told my friend Stephan about how much I missed my sax tunnel adventures.

He was quick to offer up a particularly tasty tunnel in
an area of the city that was new to me.

So when spring finally arrived, I went there.

I got off the subway and left the station.

Across the street was the outdoor cafe Stephan had mentioned in his directions.

Just around the corner must be the tunnel!!!

But then a weird intuition came over me.

I felt pulled, like iron to a magnet, to go to that cafe and sit down.

I did so.

I sat down, ordered a Milch Kaffee, rolled up a cigarette and started smoking.

I sat there in utter confusion.

Just a moment before, I was eagerly going to this tunnel like a lover who hadn't seen his beloved in
6 long months and was about to meet those lips for the first time in oh so long!

And here I am keeping her waiting, just around the corner, and for no apparent reason beyond this strange pull.

So I just sat there, my irritation mounting. All I desired was to be in that tunnel--playing my horn.

But I couldn't get up. I was anchored to that chair by a flow that was beyond my control.

So I just sat there and watched the people around me talking, smiling, kissing, laughing, walking by.

For them, it was sex flowing like champaign--for me only more impatience and irritation.

Across the narrow street on the corner, a man with a black turtleneck and geeky glasses paused
and lit up a smoke while his German Schnitzel dog did its business.

When the dog was done, they both walked away casually--leaving a nice sized plie, I
noticed, for such a little dog.

I rolled up another smoke, smiled at the waitress, and closed my eyes for a moment.

This was getting to be too much!

25 more minutes of agony crawled by.

Then, all at once, it happened.

My heart began beating rapidly for no clear reason.

My mind became super quiet.

My body started to fill up with bright, sweet energy indescribable.

What was happening?

Suddenly my eyes were pulled to a man walking down the avenue, walking toward
the subway from 100 yards away.

He was bouncing along like a happy guy.

His head was slightly tilted upward as he whistled something pretty.

I couldn't take my eyes off him.

He had a radiant smile plastered on his face--he looked exactly how I felt.

In fact, he looked a little like me, I mused.

Just then, he did it.

He took a surprising silent step into the stink of the Schnitzel poop pile.

He walked a few more steps then slowed and then stopped.

His smiling face became saddened as he bent down to examine his soiled shoe.

He shook his head slowly and looked about helplessly.

I was completely over come by an odd mix of compassion and complete ecstasy and freedom.

In this way, I was enlightened.

I paid my bill, walked to my tunnel and had one of the best musical moments of my life!

Please email me at alan@speaknow.biz and tell me about a time when your seemingly
essential story evaporated in the face of a here and now which captivated you and catapulted
you into realm of joy and surrender.

Yours in Presence,

Alan Steinborn

Alan Steinborn, All Rights Reserved, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007