jpwii

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I was too young, or maybe just too immature, to have been Trungpa Rinpoche's student in this life. But somehow, even before Trungpa passed away, I was very fortunate in that I met Khyentse Rinpoche and spent many months in His presence. When the Vidyadhara passed away I dreamt I was in an a bedroom in the country with dormer windows. I imagined this was TR's retreat in in Massachussetts; he was giving an empowerment, it was just me and him. A few weeks later news of the cremation date got around, as well as Khyentse Rinpoche's itinerary to teach the Sangha. I made plans to go to Barnet with an acquaintance from Cambridge whose father was a diplomat in Asia that had been a friend of Khyentse Rinpoche for many years. To make a long story short, because of my friend's connection, I found myself sitting behind the Vajradhatu sangha during the cremation ceremonies, in the VIP tent -- quite unexpectedly of course. To tell the truth, I was having more fun in the enormous crowd, probably too much fun for such a solemn occasion. Front and cener was strange but beautiful -- right down to the civilized fashion in which the Vajradhatu sadhakas responded when their tent-awning caught fire. I stepped out of the VIP tent to take a few (forbidden) photos during the cremation. That was when I saw the rainbow in the blue sky. I pointed up and said, hey, a rainbow! Pretty soon lots of people there was looking up too -- Ginsburg, Daido Roshi, Glassman (then) Sensei, Dhyani Ywahoo, many of the Sangha. And then the whole crowd, it seemed. The Tibetan dignitaries -- too numerous to mention by name here -- seemed unconcerned, if they noticed at all. At the cremation of someone of Trungpa Rinpoche's stature -- America's Padmasambhava, Vimalamitra and Vairotsana all rolled into one -- a small rainbow in clear sky would be almost understated, if one thinks in the historical context. Since then I've seen many things more astonishing, but none whose memory lingers on as a pristine moment like this, one that defies concepts and never gets old, maybe because it almost never gets told. If not now, when? Now all these years (and many readings of many of TR's books) later, it's hard to believe I never met Rinpoche, because no Tibetan teacher I met in America stands out more vividly in my mind's eye. This really is amazing -- all the more so, considering that many others like me, who never met Rinpoche, feel the same way. --jpwii p.s. The dakinis confiscated my prints and negatives, mysteriously, except for the rainbow.
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