what is this? (zen frog)

 An old man was sitting in the courtyard of his house along with his son who had received a high education. Suddenly a crow perched on a wall of the house. The father asked the son: What is this? The son replied: It is a crow. After a little while the father again asked the son: What is this? The son said: It is a crow.

After a few minutes the father asked his son the third time: What is this? The son said: Father, I have just now told you that this is a crow. After a little while the old father again asked his son the fourth time: what is this? By this time some expression of irritation was felt in the son’s tone when he rebuffed his father: Father! It is a crow, a crow. A little after the father again asked his son: What is this? This time the son replied to his father with a vein of temper. Father: You are always repeating the same question, although I have told you so many times that it is a crow. Are you not able to understand this?

The father went to his room and came back with an old diary. Opening a page he asked his son to read what was written. What the son read were the following words written in the diary:

‘ Today my little son was sitting with me in the courtyard, when a crow came there. My son asked me twenty-five times what it was and I told him twenty-five times that it was a crow and I did not at all feel irritated. I rather felt affection for my innocent child. ‘

The father then explained to his son the difference between a father’s and a son’s attitude. While you were a little child you asked me this question twenty-five times and I felt no irritation in replying to the question twenty-five times and when today I asked you the same question only five times, you felt irritated, annoyed and impatient with me.

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What is it?

I happened to see this little frog,

I said, “What is this? This is cute.”

This is Zen Frog. This App can be downloaded and used as a screensaver. It states it has a setting for how often the eyes blink and a clock that can come and go by a touch.

Then as I was researching this little guy, I came across some ceramic zen frogs for the garden. (now that I might buy for my garden this year! )

Of course living on the river, we have more than enough frogs to go around. The dogs and cats stay busy chasing these little creatures around. On a still summer day you can not hear yourself think due to the toad serenade.

I come to a conclusion as to why frogs are rubber-y, going to work at 5 am, I see these guys hopping across the road in the head lights and it amazes me how high they jump and hit the ground and bounce into another leap.

There once was a curious frog
Who sat by a pond on a log
And, to see what resulted,
In the pond catapulted
With a water-noise heard round the bog.

Jang Ku-Song the hermit was busy sitting
when he heard frogs croaking. It made him
recite

The croaking of frogs on moonlit nights in early spring
pierces the world from end to end, makes us all
one family.

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There is zen in everything

zen is not about eliminating thoughts but about illuminating them

(~_~)