Buddha’s Bones Intro

Buddha’s Bones

Life Lessons Learned Through Rice

“I hate to waste this rice.  Since it won’t keep, what if we made some more sushi and shared it with the neighbors?” she suggested.  “They would absolutely love it!”

I nodded approvingly, thinking that it was exactly this type of hospitality and thoughtfulness that I loved of Mississippi women. Despite the common thought that Mississippi was a place full of ignorance and lack of culture, I wanted desperately to tell the country that it was wrong. While the state did not enjoy a long history of cultural embracement, it certainly deserved some credit and respect for the simple fact that people were learning how to get past the past. People were too quick to give up on the state, but I was a proud native, especially in moments of irony. Where else in this country besides this pristine, immaculate showroom worthy kitchen in the heart of Mississippi could a black, Jewish, female sushi chef spend an evening sipping wine while sharing the secrets of sushi and discussing such varied topics as favorite New York restaurants to skinning deer?

“There are spiritual beliefs that tie in with rice. It is one of the reasons why rice is so important in Asian cultures,” I interjected casually. “The name sushi chefs use for rice, shari, means Buddha’s bones.”

And in the universal manner of the cultured, they listened with interest regardless of whether the idea was one they were willing to adopt as their own. They asked questions about Eastern religions, many of which I did not know the answer. But of all the questions they asked, I never expected “And what do you think? Do you respect the rice as if it were the bones of Buddha?”

With my Mother in the room, it was a question I didn’t want to answer. Religion had been a sticky subject with us at times. I grew up with that good old Southern religion; yet even in junior high school I found myself defending, in a serious sit down with her, my desire to become a vegetarian. Only after a promise that my choice was not influenced by my Buddhist or Hindi friends was the decision acceptable. The last thing I wanted was to give an answer that suggested that I had embraced Buddhism. The move to Judaism had been tough enough.

Inside I chuckled at the most light-hearted explanation of rice deities. “Seven gods in every grain” was how the author put it. It sounded like the back of a cereal box. It sounded like something that should be heart healthy, yet another example of a miraculous food full of moral fiber with the ability to flush out the less beneficial aspects of an otherwise unhealthy conscience.

And within that thought came the truth and my answer. It’s not that I believed in reincarnation or the idea that I was handling the bones of Buddha, but more or less that I couldn’t deny the importance of sushi rice as an ever present substance in my passage to adulthood.  Sushi rice had been an integral part of my transformation into a decent human being. It lured me into a world beyond my wildest dreams, helped me gained confidence, taught me the importance of patience, helped me find my voice and sustained me during times when both my body and mind needed nourishing. Somewhere along the way, deep inside those tiny grains of rice, there had been established a diet of ancient knowledge that was metabolizing for me into lessons learned on honesty, humility, and the importance of love.

“That is a good question,” I replied, leaving the complexities of the answer for me to ponder on my own.

After the class, I began to reflect. There had been a time when I looked back on my adventures in sushi as interesting life experiences. And they were. There had been (and still continued to be) seemingly good, bad, and even questionable events on my sushi life journey. But more importantly, I began to realize how the work of one’s hands influences one’s life. In my case, sticky rice had since the first moment I touched it left behind a residue of self actualization. Rather than the rice being molded under my hands, at my touch, perhaps just the opposite had occurred. Perhaps I was the one that had been molded and shaped.