Strawberry Creek, UC Berkeley campus northside
By Chris Keyser
Continued from Protecting the earth discussion page
The English ivy vines that cover the banks may have been planted by the early campus landscapers - or they may have grown naturally as part of the watershed. Ivy is a natural foe of coastal redwoods and can suffocate and strangle them if it entangles them in its pincer vine grip. The bay laurel branches that lean gracefully over the creek are native to the redwood ecosystem. Their pungent smell wafts through the glen when unleashed by a fresh rainfall like this morning's showers.
On both sides of the creek where I'm sitting and reflecting science buildings - grayish white cement walls with rust-colored roofs - house classrooms and research labs. These are among the oldest and more tasteful buildings on campus, having been constructed years before the recent building boom that has rapidly filled up the precious open space of this once park-like campus: the flagship of the UC system, California's crown jewel of public education.
How many stately old-growth redwoods were felled to clear the landscape for the university's first buildings? Did anyone envision back then more resplendent classrooms under the redwood canopy where students could observe the wonders of nature directly rather than peering at cellular organisms from behind the prism of a microscope or Petri dish?
On an overcast damp Sunday afternoon a week before the Vernal Equinox the campus is unusually quiet - an immense blessing for seekers of solitude and peace. The gurgling creek's music dominates the soundscape, punctuated by chirping songbirds and the distant murmur of a passing plane or car, and a yapping dog.
 I have always felt a kindred spirit and profoundly at home in a redwood grove or glen since I first visited the giant redwoods on California's North Coast as a six-year-old child on a family vacation long ago. This is the deepest peace and sense of interconnection with the natural world I know - like the redwood roots that fan out horizontally over the landscape, connecting the entire spectrum of forest life.
The Campanile Tower's bell tolls twice from the center of campus, echoing throughout the city below. It's two o'clock. Now the chimes are playing in time with the creek's music - a symphony under the redwoods.
The redwoods are my true friends and teachers. They teach the rest of us in this tentative world how to stand straight and tall, strong and proud, our feet planted firmly on this gentle earth. How to survive the shifting seasons and adversities of our lives, and renew our spirits to thrive and flourish again. How to truly inhabit our beings, embrace our lives, and express our genuine nature and resplendent joyful spirits.
In deep gratitude, I bow beneath this streamside temple.
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The Gradual Path of Raising Buddhist Children:
Inner Chronicles:
Work Sex Money: Seminar Three,
Ocean of Dharma: A Shambhala Sun feature on Chögyam Trungpa by Barry Boyce
Tribute to Arbie Thalacker
Chronicles Highlights 2011
Chronicles Holiday Sampler
Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse on the passing of his father, Thinley Norbu Rinpoche
SMR joins Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche and Rabjam Rinpoche [Video 11:35]
Tribute to Thinley Norbu Rinpoche
Qualities
Traleg Kyabgon Rinpoche on Distinguishing Ordinary Consciousness from Wisdom
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Tribute to Fabrice Champion
Crazy Wisdom, a review by Victress Hitchcock
Tribute to Michal Friedman
Radio interview with Chogyam Trungpa in 1971;
Mingyur Rinpoche: The essence of meditation
Julia Sagebien talks with Thrangu Rinpoche about fulfilling the aspirations of the Vidyadhara
Gold Lake Oil, by Tom Bell
THE BIG NO
Thrangu Rinpoche talks about Trungpa Rinpoche and his students [Audio 48:54]
In appreciation of the Very Venerable 9th Khenchen Thrangu Rinpoche
Teaching Stories: Never Give Up, told by Jim Lowrey
Memorial to Mary Smith, by Lee Weingrad
Conversation with Elizabeth Mattis-Namgyel: Part Three
Khyentse Foundation: Ten Years of Giving
What Made Him Tick: a Review of Crazy Wisdom by Suzanne Duarte
Teaching Stories:
Tribute to Mary Smith