From the Silversmith's Bench:

There is slush where the snow used to be. The workshop is freezing and the tools are too cold for my delicate digits. (Never could work in gloves!). As a result, the jewellery bench in the front room is busy. Got to do something for god's sake.

I've been hacking 'OM' symbols out of lumps of pure silver. Every time I make one I give it away. It just doesn't feel right to make 'Oms' for money. You can't give a silver 'Om' to anyone. They've got to be ready for it. The timing has to be right. So far, each recipient has been really jazzed. I always supply the right sized silver chain so it can go to work right away.

I use silver for it's white purity and because it's not so intrinsically valuable. Somehow, 'Oms' shouldn't be flash.

I know that Will, my dearest younger Son, is getting engaged in many meaningful conversations springing from the big one he wears, as he travels throughout the East. The Orientals see that about his neck and ask him:

" Do you know what that is? Do you know what it means?"

I think, at first, they take a little offence, thinking they are seeing a tourist wearing a bauble they don't comprehend. I can understand that. Will does know what he's wearing and why. I'm sure it's opened a few human intercultural doors.

What is the 'Om'?

On a musical instrument, there is one note from which all others are generated by the physics of harmonics. This note is called 'the Fundamental'.
It's the lowest and strongest note the instrument can produce. 'Om' is the fundamental note of the universe. The cosmic vibration from which all arises.

In Western cosmology we have come to understand that once these was a tiny tiny thing called a 'Singularity', which expanded around 13 billion years ago and spawned our universe. In eastern philosophy there is the central 'Witness'; the singularity at the centre of consciousness. To the oriental mind, this is also a creator. The creator of our inner universe.

'Om', the fundamental note, is the sound of those singularities. The basic vibration from which all things spring. Everything else, inside or out, is a harmonic vibration arising from the 'Om'. It is the symbol of our oneness with the universe.

"I am that- That I am " is a literal verbal translation of So'ham - Ham'sah.

Listen!

'Om' the primal sound.

“In the beginning there was the Word"

I wonder who's going to get the next one off the bench?