Today is Friday – my most favorite day of the week. My friend Elizabeth went home with me after school to play. From the mail box, there was a flyer about someone who lost a dog, a German Shepherd. It said the dog have a tattoo on the inside of its rear leg. This is the first time I heard of dog with a tattoo. Poor dog! He must have been in pain to have this tattoo done.

Last Sunday, Mom took us to the temple with the picky Monk because we had not been there for some time. This monk will chew you up for the whole sermon if you don’t put the shoes at the door in place. He will only talk about shoes and nothing else. You won’t hear about Buddha but shoes and shoes only. I think Mom taking us here so we can learn how to line up shoes nicely.

This Sunday was also the absolution day (Buddha will forgive you your sins if you bow to him 100 times). These are very deep bows to the floor, then raise your body up to the standing position, then lower your body down all the way to the floor again, then you have to kiss the mat on the floor. I guess after doing this, any aggressive person has to be humble and nice because he’s so tired, no more strength to fuss.

After about 10 bows Kevin quit! I heard him huff and puff for about five minutes – then completely out of air, then cold quit. Scott followed suit immediately; no more bows. Scott isn’t a patient kid especially when it comes to hard work. That was it ! Only Mom and I were left. We just kept going on and on to make a good example for my brothers; but I think they didn’t care anyway.

The 2 boys just rested on the chairs like other senior citizens being excused and sat on the chairs watching the sinners huffed and puffed their sins away.

I kept looking at Kevin and Scott but they tried to ignore my eyes anyway. The chief monk also gave them some look that wasn’t very friendly .

Finally Kevin took off going outside; so did Scott. Seeing them flee, I didn’t feel too good about bowing anymore. So I stopped and quietly sneaked outside when the monk was kissing the ground. Mom kept on till the finishing line. The first time I saw Mom kept up her commitment. She probably had lots of sins to ask for forgiveness.

Coming home after this bowing session, she wrote some poem about absolution. After doing something so stressful, the poet can produce some really nice work.