Feeding the white wolf

arma. I’m not at all religious, but I do believe in karma. While at Princeton University, a thorough familiarity with Buddhist principle was necessary in the research required to produce my thesis in East Asian Studies. Rendered to its simplest non-theological terms, karma is the law of cause and effect, of action and reaction.

Buddhism treats karma as an ethical principle and determines that actions affect consequences, but Buddhist doctrine is not at all aligned with the idea and common misconception that karma punishes those that commit wrong, rather, it is the focus on the primary impulse for one’s deeds ~ taking responsibility for one’s own actions and the relative good or evil intentions behind them. In fact, the nature of the karma that arises out of a deed has little to do with results generated, but more to do with the intention of the causation ~ the psychological impulse behind a deed governs the karmic response.

I’ve adopted this ethical precept throughout my life. Inspired essentially with doing the “right thing” despite pressure and opposition at times. The impetus for taking action based less upon a desired outcome or result, than on wishing to feed the “White Wolf”.

A young Cherokee is brought before the tribal elders, concerned with his aggressive tendencies. One elder takes the young man aside and tells him that his anger is understandable, since all humans have two wolves residing within them. One wolf is good and peaceable (the white wolf); the other is evil and angry (the black wolf).
The two wolves are in constant battle with one another, since neither is powerful enough to destroy the other. The young man asks the elder "But if the wolves are of equal power, which wolf will win?" The elder replies, "The one you feed the most."

The delay of my trip to the South was an uncontrollable turn of events. In September Doug had sent a brief email to me, stating that he was currently in Idaho Falls opening a new office for Reynolds, Smith & Hills. I presumed he’d be there for the rest of the month. Were it not for the various forces that delayed my trip, I might not have seen the official United States Citizenship & Immigration Service envelope in my mailbox in early September 2004. During the prior 12 months, I’d had reason to believe DF could be checking the mailbox, for one reason or another. A renewal form from the Secretary of State for my vehicle went missing in early 2004 (DF's birthday and mine were within days, and I suspect he confused it for his), there was the mystical appearance of my birth certificate in the mailbox in August and other similar incidents, so the thought was not at all far-fetched.

The envelope was addressed to DF at my home address, and I suspect it was either a notice of action or adjudication on the jointly filed I-751 petition that had been submitted in April 2003. Now by this time I had participated in enough online discussions on immigration message boards to realise that sometimes USCIS change of address forms do little to ensure that information is changed in the central immigration database.

Nevertheless, in feeding the white wolf, I followed the instructions that were printed on the upper left hand corner of the official envelope, and returned the letter to Lincoln Nebraska.