There is a story in the Buddhist mythology in which Siddartha Gautama, before his enlightment, spent years with 5 asthetics. During a particularly vociferous rainstorm, the asthetic Siddartha was sitting in meditation, getting soaked when a giant cobra, sensing that this being would become a buddha, came up behind him, rose to it's full height, spread out it's magnificent hood and sheltered the future Buddha from the rain. I awoke this morning to a snow shower and went into my backyard for this photo. You can't really see it from this angle, but the small tree here is leaning over like that cobra to shield the Buddha from the elements. If you click on the pic to see the fullsized version, you can sort of see how the trunk of the tree is in the back part of the circle rather than the middle, while the Buddha statue is in the front part of the circle. This is my way of honoring that story within my contemplative area.