Week 13a: Flags Out

The morning was cool and crisp.  There had been a storm the night before, and clouds still hung low along the slopes east of town.  Wet red clay earth slopped under my tires as I maneuvered up the driveway and on to the road.  It was the Friday before Memorial Day.

You have probably seen a photo, most likely taken in our nation’s capitol, a field filled with hundreds (or thousands) of white marble stones, an American flag fluttering before each one.  These photos always bring a tear to my eye, with the two times I have been there in person were almost overwhelming.  Back in March, while warming up in Arlington’s museum after my tour, I read that the flags are  placed by volunteers.  I remembered from a flash of green grass, white stones and flowering trees as I drove through years ago that Santa Fe was home to a national cemetery.  Aware I would be in the area over Memorial Day weekend, I had added ‘Flags Out’ to my dharma schedule.

DSCN2422DSCN2424Mine was the fifth car to arrive.  We huddled in our vehicles, three trucks, a rental sedan, and me in my SUV, clutching warm coffee, our breath misting in the thin mountain air.  Slowly the lot filled, until new arrivals had to park along the cemetery lanes.  As the sun emerged above the cloud layer we did too, and drifted to the parade grounds, towards the rangers and their flatbed ATVs  filled with bundled flags. Folks formed natural clusters: vets in their leathers, each jacket telling a story; a local women’s group in cheerful colors, their male counterparts in white polos; a cluster of tan and blue cub scouts; local ranchers in dress plaid and jeans.  There was even a group of local teens sporting inventive hair, make-up and piercings.   Most of the faces belied Conquistador or First Nations heritage, and the voices lilted with Spanish, Pueblo and Navajo influence.  I was quickly welcomed in, the camaraderie of shared sacrifice, instantly part of the tender club of veterans and those who honor them.

DSCN2428 DSCN2444There were close to a hundred of us by the time we got started.  After a few opening words, a reminder we were on hallowed ground, and instructions for placement (front, center, one foot forward) we were off.  We fanned out from our starting point, self organizing amongst the rows.  Flags in arm (four batches, twenty-five each, much heavier than you would think) I began on the nearest unoccupied row.  The soil was wet from the night before and the flags were easy to plant.  I would read the name on the marker, say a blessing, plant the flag, step to the next… name, blessing, flag… over and over… one row complete, the another… It was surprisingly quiet work given our number: taps of wood flag stems, fluttering cloth as the wind picked up, chattering birds in the nearby trees.  Equally quiet were the Park Rangers and Marines who appeared alongside with more flags whenever my stash ran low.

DSCN2460DSCN2462DSCN2463The sun rose above the clouds shortly after we began, and soon it was bright and blazing.  As I work I am approached by a white-haired woman looking for her brother’s grave.  By chance I see it one row over (and the date, Korean era), and hand her a flag.  Her breath catches as she turns away.  Soon after I engulfed by a group of children, chattering gleefully as they leapfrog from grave to grave.  They are not yet school-age; some graves get two flags (front and back) and some graves none.  Their mom and I follow behind quietly making necessary adjustments, as their grandpa, his cap proudly attesting his Vietnam service, smiles at them through misty eyes.  The cemetery is filling out now, not just us with the flags but also families placing bouquets at loved-ones graves.  I am towards the top of the main hill when an brown SUV passes then stops ahead of me.  Two women, Latinas in their mid 20’s, emerge with an arrangement of flowers, balloons, and a bow-adorned cross.  It is a Marine’s widow and her sister, the home-made cross carrying messages to daddy from his two young sons.  Back at the Zendo they will tell me, in a self righteous tone, that the plots are the true cost of war.  I know better.  For me, the true cost is not borne by those in the ground.  Rather, the true cost is borne by those left behind, men and women physically or psychologically damaged by their service, grieving platoon mates, children growing up without mommies and daddies, parents growing old without their children, society who will never know the gifts these men and women might have shared.  It is my eyes that are now misty as I continue on.

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As I crest the hill, the solemn mood is broken by a pair of jolly men in a pick-up bearing much-needed water and (less needed) donuts, children streaming behind them between stops like a comet’s tail.  Refreshed, I continue on to the back sections of the property.  This section has markers instead of stones, so the flags appear a forest in the fresh spring grass.  Here I help with a columbarium, the flags more challenging to plant with its gravel border instead of grass.  Half way down we run out of flags, and my buddy heads out on a quest for more.  I stop and look around, and find myself in a sea of red, white and blue.  By the time we finish our row, we are the last ones on the hill.  Together we placed 46,000 flags in ninety minutes.

If you ever have the opportunity to participate, I encourage you to do it.  Not only is it a great experience, but it means a lot to the families and friends of the fallen.  Flags Out is normally the Friday before, and Flags In (much more sparsely attended, but the gave us popsicles) the Tuesday after.  You can locate the National Cemetery closest to you here:  http://www.va.gov/directory/guide/division.asp?dnum=4&isflsh=0  and they can provide info on how to volunteer.  Some also have a Bows Out/Bows In over the winter holidays.

Week 13: Muroc Field

I learned to fly at a small airport in a small town.  This was in 1988, four years after the release of Phillip Kaufman’s movie The Right Stuff, and it’s beautifully-filmed telling of (among other things) hypersonic flight test operations in the Mojave desert during the 1950s.  I was the lone female in a loose cohort of six, the other five high school friends the same age as me who had been smitten to some degree with the film.  We all wanted to fly professionally, one the new F-16 for the Air Force, another F-18s for the Marines, some for the airlines, and I wanted to be a bush pilot, flying across Africa like Beryl Markham.  Our instructor, rumored to have been an Air America pilot who had spent the year I was born landing Caribous up the sides of hills in Southeast Asia before returning to instruct F4 pilots headed to war.  He was a real stick and rudder man, and was more than happy to indulge us with his wisdom: our lessons included not only aerobatics and operations at unimproved fields (no kidding, sometimes they were pastures or the levee roads between crops) but also the three simulated in-flight emergencies per flight that were the hallmark of military training during his era.

Best of all were the weekends, when we would rent every craft we could get our hands on for a ‘road trip’.  Usually it would be out to Soda Lake, where we would land on a dirt road and the guys would take turns practicing aerobatics over the alkali flat before we headed over to California Valley for burgers and curly fries.  But sometimes when we were flush we would depart – from the hangar used to launch Lindberg for Paris in the film the Spirit of Saint Louis no less – and fly due east to Mojave Valley, the end-of-the-earth site of so much aviation history: Chuck Yeager breaking the sound barrier in the X-1; flights in the X-15 that Bob White (and eight others) piloted past Mach 6 to fifty miles above the earth; and the landing trials of it’s descendant, the Space Shuttle program.  It was a heady time to be in aviation: the Rutan brothers were pioneering the modern ‘homebuilt’ moment with their swept-wing rear-propeller VariEze; the Reno Air Races were still small enough that you could participate without major sponsors; and America’s manned space flight program was ‘back in business’ after a two-year hiatus.  This energy, both military and civilian, seemed focussed in this hot and dusty valley between Bakersfield and Barstow, and we were always eager to take a drink.

We would leave early in the morning, flying in loose formation, the green of the coast range, Central Valley and lower Sierras sharply transitioning to desert austerity just east of Tehachapi.  The budding fighter pilots among us would descend, the rest of us close behind, and we would spend the next half an hour or so exploring the hills and alluvial fans that bordered the Most Holy of Airspace in as close to nap-of-the-earth flying as regulations would allow.  Miles of tan sand, mottled grey with dried sagebrush, passed below our wings as we explored the long valleys, all the time maintaining the mandated five hundred feet from any person or man-made object, and with our throttles at red line to trade airspeed for altitude in the event of an unexpected downdraft or taller-than-usual joshua tree.  During these flights it was easy for us to imagine being part of aviation history, the boys as test pilots born to push the envelope, me in the footsteps of air race pilot Jackie Cochran or adventurer Pancho Barnes.  Once low on fuel we would head west to Rosamond or Mojave for a top-off and lunch before heading west back to the coast.  It was this enthusiasm I had caught a whiff of two weeks before, and I was eager for another dose.

First another stop.  I drove south through the Salinas Valley, windows down so I could bask in the 90-ish degree air, the cement highway resonating a reassuring tha-thunk tha-thunk as miles of cultivated crops, vineyards, oilfields and the dried open grasslands of military reservations passed around me.  I met  my college friend Esther* at her house, and we went out to get me a much-needed mani-pedi.  Somehow, as we relaxed in the salon chairs, conversation turned to our experiences as military wives, something we had never really talked about before.  Her husband had been a reservist based out of the Army Camp just north of her town, and had been called up during the surge.  It had been a hardship for them in many ways.  First, his active-duty allowance, even with hazardous-duty pay, was nowhere near his civilian salary.  With two young boys and one caregiver away, she had to reduce her work hours, further adding to the financial hardship.  Her children missed their father horribly and would sometimes act out as a result; military communities recognize this and have created programs to help children during deployments, but her civilian community did not provide the same support.  They barely made it through his fifteen-month deployment and what was to come.

Shortly after arriving in-country, her husband had begun experiencing strong headaches.  Visits to the doc did not help, while they did provide pain meds they were unable to determine the cause.  Shortly after his return a vessel burst near his brain stem.  In a few short hours Esther went from happy spouse adjusting to her husbands return to a late night airlift to a San Fransisco trauma center,  agonizing days outside the ER, OR and ICU waiting as top neurosurgeons worked to stabilize him, and the dreaded ‘you may have to make a decision’ conversation while critical X-rays were being examined.  I have often thought I had it ‘easy’, no wartime deployments, no communications blackouts after something had ‘gone wrong’, no guys coming home broken or worse.  As awful as it was, mine was an unexpected knock on the door in the middle of the night, and her tale of navigating civilian and VA medical care and reimbursement systems have only reaffirmed this perception.  Fortunately they were able to contain and repair the damage, her insurance was able to cover his care, and after months of treatment and a year of rehab he was home and back to work, though slightly different than before.

DSCN2361After a nice lunch and picking up her boys at school, I was back on the road, this time east on Highway 46.  This road is known (at least locally) as a great place for scoping out folds, fissures, and other visible evidence of the San Andreas fault.  It is also  the road on which James Dean met his demise.  So off I went, with a plan to get photos of both. But I had forgotten it had been a while since I had been to the area.  My favorite gully was now fenced off (with cattle grinning from it’s banks), and my favorite crest of road, in the past lumpy with repairs due to the constant movement of the earth, was now the cleanly paved-over entryway to a hazardous waste facility. (Seriously.)  I did snap a pic at the marker near the intersection where James Dean’s speeding Spyder collided with Donald Turnupseed’s sedan as the latter attempted a turn.  I smiled as I drove through the next range, remembering the conspiracy theories that arose in the early 1980s when a mysterious object** was swarmed by DOD personnel who cordoned off the area within minutes of it’s collision with a local rancher’s fields. (One rumor was that when said rancher asked after his cattle, a suit wrote him a check for the entire herd on the spot and advised that any who wandered back were his to keep.)

DSCN2372 DSCN2375 DSCN2377The next day began at Mojave airport.  I was not the only one caught in her web; I shared the restaurant with a family from Poland, the father and daughter clearly enthralled with the flightily and artifacts adorning the diner’s walls.  During our late breakfast we were treated to the departure of a large Voyager-like glider with an impressive climb ratio.  After the meal, I crossed the parking lot to read three lonely plaques.  Much to my surprise, just past the stand of thirsty pink oleander behind them there was a small memorial park.  One side was well-groomed, with cement walkways lined with desert stones, a green lawn, a ramped portico with markers commemorating significant milestones (and also those lost) during recent commercial space flight efforts, and a windowed display containing one-fifth-scale replicas of Voyager and Space Ship One.  The other half of the space was… a community garden!  I counted seventeen four-by-eight plots in varying stages of cultivation, a surveyors stick with a name in loopy cursive at one corner of each, a handful sparsely sheltered by young fruit trees.  What a beautiful tribute, I thought, bringing the community together to cultivate flowers, tomatoes, peppers, squash and could that be… butter lettuce? in an area set aside to remember the fallen.  I wandered through the rows, alternating my attention between the earth and the little blue plane practicing a routine in the aerobatic box above me.

DSCN2382Then the promised land: Edwards Air Force Base.  There is a low hill a few miles inside the north gate where you can see for miles.  I pulled off, a worn track in the dirt clear evidence I was not the first with this idea, and took it all in.  Miles of dirty cream lakebed stretched before me, in a crescent to the east and south lined with low buildings and an air of secrecy.  There was the compass rose, four thousand feet wide, it’s elongated loop visible over NASA’s test flight facility (if you look closely in the photo you can see it).  And past it, the long straight scratch of runway, thirty-nine thousand feet of it, where the Space Shuttles alighted after more than half their flights to space.  Down at the paved runways, what looks like Hornets, Eagles and Raptors scream into the sky, perhaps on patrol or perhaps to support training up in the ranges.  Jet fuel, desert dust and wide blue sky, nothing smells like it.  Being here, with this hallowed dirt under my feet, it was easy to remember the innocence, the joy, the camaraderie, back when flying was fresh, and new, and fun; how it opened up the world for me, made it seem like anything was possible.  Somehow over the last few years, with the habits of daily routine, this had been lost and my world had gotten smaller.

DSCN2390 DSCN2394 - Version 2 DSCN2385DSCN2401 - Version 2DSCN2399DSCN2398 - Version 2After a quick stop at the Base Exchange (when did airmen get so young???) it was Air Museum Time.  The museum at Edwards is smaller than you would expect, but oh! So Much History!  Inside there are actual prototypes (and some replicas) of both well-know and obscure aerodynamic test programs, mock-ups of historical cockpits (soooo analog!), and the standard suits (flight and space) and other memorabilia you normally see in these places.  They also have some great displays and dioramas explaining the lake’s geology, topography, flora and fauna, and honoring specific historic flights.  And on the wall just before the exit there are framed handprints from many famous pilots and ‘star voyagers’ that helped create aviation as we know it today.  Outside, standing proud in wind so strong it causes bent over weeds to wear an arc in the earth, are a dozen or so planes: an A-10, an SR-71, a P-51 replica, an A-7 and others.  They even have helicopters, a Sea King done up in Navy livery, and a H-34 (military version of the -58) that, when I looked at the markings closely, had blades that were manufactured before I was born!  If I was a dog, my tail would have be wagging big time!

By then it was afternoon, and a scorcher.  It was back on the road for me, to Flagstaff, Albuquerque and Santa Fe.  More soon!

Week 12: More Marin

Did I mention it was cold? Yup, during that first week at the farm it never got above sixty-five, with at grand total of two, yup, two sunny afternoons. I would huddle in my room, one of two in the dorm with no direct sunlight, hiding from the fog under layers of clothes and blankets, ruminating that it was So Wrong to be This Cold during the month of May. On the bright side (?), the grounds and people were beautiful. If you had to be stuck in the fog, Green Gulch was the place to be.

DSCN2240DSCN2236DSCN2235The student schedule was the same as the previous week, but knowing the flow provided a freedom to explore both the mental and physical environments. First were the sounds of the morning: the gong in the garden, rung eighteen times in the early part of the service, its low rumble resonating through or swallowed by the fog, depending on its density. Then waking birds, expected finch chirps, pigeon coos, and blackbird chatter joined by the loud, tropical-sounding call of the state bird, the California Quail, joined by the creak of the barn floor during kinhin (walking), and the crack of the building as the day began to warm. On the way to breakfast, the thick morning fog softening the edges of anything more than a few feet away, I observed my playing tricks with me: as I approach a hedge of green becomes an intricate bed of ferns, what at first glance had been a white bird transforms to a lily, with a uniformly brown redwood trunk unveils itself as the intricate ridges and valleys of bark and twined vines.  My afternoon walks gained depth as well, no longer orienting myself to the valley but really seeing the details of the landscape: the careful training of the fruit trees in the garden, a birdhouse in a field of poppies, each of the flowers alone, but also as a member of a bed, and the mindful play of the gardeners who planned the groupings.

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DSCN2227DSCN2196One of my favorite places (if Zen allows one to play favorites) came to be the farm shed and the surrounding furrows. As a reader, I was first attracted to the farmers’ expressions of the teachings, handwritten notes placed loosely in frames or burnt in wood, a friendly welcome back in to human fold towards the end of my afternoon strolls*. With each passing I came to appreciate the quiet details of the that had been collected over time: Buddha balanced on two red pavers and flanked by fresh wildflowers; a horseshoe arranged to catch good luck; a shelf of pinecones and stones; almost all found objects from the nearby earth. The crops were beautiful too: bouquets of lettuce, chard, and broccoli, their green rows dancing across the narrow valley. The garden housed a cornucopia of characters as well; two juvenile deer who connived their way through the fence (and had to be shooed out) every morning, the six-foot rat snake who lazed across the main path in late afternoon, the Great Blue Heron who kept the gophers and other rodents in check, not to mention the quirky and wise human gardeners, some novices and other who had been working this land for decades.

DSCN2209My favorite meditation was also on the farm. Every Wednesday, instead of a second interval of zazen, we would hoe the fields as a group. (This was known as Community Hoe, not to be confused with First-Time Hoe, Student Hoe or Group Hoe, three until now unmentioned activities during the previous week.) We would file out of the zendo two by two and, after the quick donning of warmies, trundle down the morning-muddy path to the farm shed for our tools and instructions. After a short blessing we would choose our rows, one of us on each side, and with fogged breath, mindfully tease new weeds from the earth, careful to avoid the crops. It was a beautiful practice: the blessing of physical activity and quiet attention to the task, the sounds of metal in earth under the lightening fog, with all members of the sangha, from the newest student to the senior teachers to the Abiding Abbess working side-by-side for the good of the community.

Wednesday nights were dharma talk nights. The first week the talk was by a former head gardener. It began with thoughts on the word vagabond, and spoke to the unease people have to the outsider, the traveller, the one who has chosen not to stray from the straight path society has drawn for us, and reflected on the root of the word, vagus, which is also the name of the nerve that transmits ‘gut feelings’ between the GI system and the brain. (I had viewed this first-hand the week before,when a pair of older travelers, a husband and his ailing wife, had been provided provided shelter and healthy food for several days until they were strong enough to continue.) She then reflected that Green Gulch had been designed as a refuge for those who wanted to step away from the world, and finished by recounting a recent meander through the Muir Woods with a noted arborist. The second week’s lecture was a bit different. One of the Zen Center’s senior teachers had passed three weeks before my arrival, and another the previous fall. In this lecture the head of the Zen Center advised that since it had been almost a generation since a senior teacher had passed they had found themselves unprepared, not only with respect to the effects of the loss would have on the community but also the physical arrangements of the viewing, funeral and internment. She then reported on a recent leaders meeting where they realized they themselves had not done this type of planning (at least to the extent that was needed), and their efforts to develop and codify formal processes, practices and rituals that could be used in the future. As prior military, I am always surprised to hear people have not done this type of planning (we used to update our ‘survivor plans’ every year) so a bit of a PSA here – if you have not had these conversations with your loved ones I encourage you to do so. Trust me, it makes things much easier if/when you ever need to use them.

The second week also brought another cast of fellow students: a quant from Mexico, a recent Berkely grad, one of the gardeners consorts, and a visiting priest from a related tradition. During dishes one morning (when we were supposed to be in functional silence), it came out that the fifth new arrival, a young man from Germany who had just graduated business school, dreamed of working for Tesla. It was not just the product, electric automobiles, but also the founder, one of the PayPal geniuses who has chosen to spend his money on projects that both interest him and improve life on the planet. One day this student was dropped at the nearby mall for the afternoon (to pick up some gardening shoes) where, it turns out, they have a Tesla store. He spent over an hour checking out the cars and in conversation with the sales advisors, and so impressed the manager he was invited back the next day for a test-drive. When he returned he was grinning ear-to-ear; he had been able to test the acceleration on a nearby freeway, then had driven the car back to the farm along the PCH. Best of all, they had requested his resume and a description of the type of work he was interested in. I love stories like this, where passion overcomes odds to rule the day.

DSCN2228Fridays were our day off, so I spent my last full day on trail, this time camera charged and memory empty, hoping for another hawk (alas this was not to be). My choice was ambitious: the Green Gulch Trail to Coyote Ridge Trail. Trail was a bit of a misnomer, it was actually the dirt road to Hope Cottage, a one-room artists lodge that hung on the highest point above Muir Beach. I tucked my sandwich in my pocket and headed off. My first waypoint was the Yurt. A group of artists had been staying in the Guest House for the previous few days, appearing in the garden like chimera, here, then there, then somewhere else. The Yurt was their base, and their work was laid out for display, watercolors of golden poppies or the shore (two that even matched photos I had taken), abstracts of the hills and farm, and sketches and color swatches to continue home. After a half hour of questions and sharing, I was off to trail, up through the mist, past a pair of extreme A-frame wood-built hide-aways, each with a side of floor-to-ceiling windows (one surrounded by young plants in pots), then a stand of young redwood, around a 180 turn, the water tank nestled within, to the open road, a thin ribbon cut in to the side of the hill mirroring the PCH on the opposite side of the valley. The deeply rutted grey track was alternately bordered by thick foliage (berry brambles, low trees) and open areas (grasses low sage), with an occasional wind-bent cyprus or juniper clinging to the side of the hill accenting the view. One turn nestled an abandoned stable, two stalls with small paddocks, the wood grey and cracked with age overcome by vides and wild grasses; another a chicken coop, gaps in the rusted wire providing shelter to new residents. DSCN2255DSCN2258Then, the trail shifted from west to south and I could see the ocean, the darker grey of water slowly blending with the fog along the horizon. It was windy, with gusts strong enough to lean in to; I sat down next to a patch of wild orchids and took it all in. Out came my sandwich, and over the next half hour or so, took in it and all that surrounded me.

The next afternoon it was back on the road, south and east for another stay in New Mexico (and possibly warmer weather). More next time.

Week 11: Marin County

So yes, I’ll admit, my past few posts have been a bit introspective and gloomy.  This one will have gloomy bits as well, but for a different reason.  But I am getting ahead of myself.
The week started on a bright note, lunch with a new friend.  Several years ago I came across an article celebrating the 50th anniversary of the San Fransisco Zen Center.  This article included a section on Green Gulch Farm, the organic farm the center runs in Marin County, and a told of a new program, Honoring the Path of the Warrior, where mindfulness practice, including work on the farm, was helping returning OEF and OIF veterans come to terms with their experiences overseas.  I have been following their programs, which have expanded to include wall climbing, day hikes and week-long rafting and writing retreats, and they recently published a guide for other retreat centers who wish to develop similar programs.  Over lunch, their Operations and Development Manager updated me on recent changes to their programs, and since we are both female veterans (her Army and me Air Force), we had a nice conversation sharing our time in the service.

DSCN2199  My heart and belly full, I headed north on the Pacific Coast Highway to Green Gulch Farm, where, inspired by my interest in Honoring the Path, I would be spending the next two weeks as a Guest Student.  Cresting the coastal range, I was treated to a sign normally seen from the air: a blanket of fog covering the valley below.  Slowly I descended the twisty road, going ‘IFR’ shortly before I reached farm’s driveway.  The dirt track wound through an eucalyptus grove, the dark green leaves hanging from white and tan smottled trunks cloaking my arrival as the sky darkened and the air took on a chill.  Little did I know that I would not see the sun again for three days.

DSCN2240Green Gulch Farm was founded in 1972 at the direction of Shunryu Suzuki, the spiritual founder of San Fransisco Zen Center, as a place where lay practitioners could live and practice together. Located on a former working ranch in Muir Valley, the property includes family housing, several dormitories, a tea house, and the Green Dragon Temple. Over the years many notable gardeners have lived and practiced here including Alan Chadwick, who helped spread organic and biodynamic farming techniques in the US, and Wendy Johnson, the lead gardener for over ten years who now mentors aspiring farmers through the Edible Schoolyard program and the local community college. The farm’s grounds now include eight acres split between a fruit, herb and flower garden, and the vegetable farm.

The schedule Green Gulch focusses on work practice.  We would wake at four thirty and sleepily make our way to zazen at five.  The zendo, located in a converted barn modified to incorporate traditional Japanese design principles and temple features, is beautiful.  The original wood beams and support structures, now sanded to a shine, rise two stories above a recovered plank floor.  The early hour was dark, the temple lit only by the candles on the two altars, one to Manjushri (wisdom) and one to Tara (compassion), that sandwiched rows of black cushions from opposite ends of the temple.  We would enter one by one, stepping in with the foot closest to the door, two steps, bow, then down a short staircase to find our cushions.  It was cold, and as the service proceeded, it would soak though my sweater and chill my toes. The sitting intervals here were longer than I am used to, forty minutes.  The first would include elements of the service, lighting the altar and ringing of bells.  My mind would settle quickly but after an interval my legs would numb and then begin to ache.  Slow walking would clear the kinks and slightly warmed by the movement, I would settle back on the cushion to watch the pine

DSCN2279 - Version 2After breakfast was work practice. Each work location had a small altar, and samu would begin with incense, a reading from Zen teachings, and a bow. As guest students, we would begin with dishes, then rotate through the different departments: chopping veg in the kitchen, pulling weeds on the grounds, cleaning the guest house, thinning and planting seedlings for the farm, and cleaning flower beds in the garden. We would break for lunch, vegetarian and prepared with produce from the garden, then continue for another three hours. In the late afternoon we would to clean our tools and close the practice. After this, we had free time for the remainder of the day.

DSCN2202The farm, located adjacent to the Muir Woods National Monument, is surrounded by miles of glorious trails.  On the first few days, drained by the physical work, I ventured only as far as the beach at the bottom of the valley.  It was so foggy and cold I would wear my winter parka, a bright of magenta in the sage and grey, returning from trail with mist dripping from my nose.  On Tuesday there was a break in the clouds, with actual sunshine on Wednesday (the sky seems to be broken), and I took the opportunity to hike the coastal trail.  Accustomed to the sheltered bay of my childhood, I was surprised when I looked south, where I could see past the mouth of the bay to Half-Moon and beyond.  To the west was a line of ships on approach, dashes of reds and oranges on heir hulls and deck, distance belying their size.

Friday was our day off. After sleeping in (until a late six thirty) I spent the morning on a trail that wound up the hills on the south side of the farm.  The trail head was sheltered by yew, pine, and juniper that slowly gave way to wild flowers, berry brambles and coastal sage.  As I approached the top I looked down, and my eye was caught by movement, a smudge of rust above the green of the valley.  It was a red-tailed hawk, making lazy circles in the thermals.  As I watched, he slowly rode one, then another, higher and higher: first below me, then abeam me, then above me.  I was familiar with this from flying, at one airport it was not unusual for a hawk or crow to fly off our wing as we taxied or departed, but watching him from above, adjusting his light feathers to better capture the wind, was a first.  This will be one of the memories from this adventure I will treasure most.
Another treasure from this adventure were my fellow guest students.  Green Gulch is also a monastery, with students committing to study for residence intervals of three months, six-months, or longer.  The entry path to these residencies was the two-week guest student program, which we completed as a group.  The first week there were six of us, and we would tend to drift to each other.  Over the course of the week, one, calm and confident, came to stand out.  Though I have to admit, what first caught my eye was that he was a total hottie, in an Orange County punk scene lead singer kind of way.  Over time, I was pleased to learn he was also a learned practitioner with deep knowledge across a wide range of Buddhist practices and other spiritual traditions.  His favorite teaching was the Platform Sutra, the foundation of Chan Buddhism. Meals with him were a joy; he openly and humbly shared the wisdom he had gained at various practice centers and during a thirty-day silent retreat.  He also really helped me with my sitting (“Master Chan says make friends with the pain”) and how to approach practice (Rules for walking the spiritual path: Accept what is given; Do the right thing; Make nothing of it.)  He also brought a relaxed, playful approach to practice that seemed to infect our group as the week progressed.  
 
More on the others, and the second week of my stay next time.  🙂

Week 10: The Way-Back Machine

Leaving Santa Fe, the weather matched my mood.  The Sandia mountains to the east were capped with fierce clouds, white blooms erupting from a steel base, the fog below dusting their steel and rust-colored slopes white with spring snow, the air as cold and turbulent as my thoughts had been the past few days.  But then, on the other side of the highway, bright desert sun filled a blue sky.  As I turned west on to Interstate 40, my mood began to lighten as well.

The next two days would be some of the best of the trip, and I almost missed them.

Heading west, I vacillated whether to go through with my next stop.  It was with an old friend, the ‘P’ from KPM racing, and the plan was to stay two nights.  I had not spent more than an hour with him since 1999, during my angry phase, and the second night it would be just me and his wife, who I had met over breakfast the month before.  Our friendship seemed tenuous, and as I drove through the desert, spring sun warming the car after a month in the mountains, I went back and forth between whether I should visit or not.  I had forecast a dinnertime arrival, but the drive took longer than I thought, and as my arrival time slipped from six to seven to nine, I considered calling off the visit.  In the end, his big black dog Guinness met me at the door with a deep woof and a stream of drool.

Over a dinner of mac n cheese we began catching up: where we had been, what we had been up to.  This soon expanded to our friends: marriages, divorces, who was still in the Air Force or the work they were doing now they were out.  Some  have been radicalized against ‘brown people’ over the previous decade and we speculated on the cause (their work? the media they attend to?).  Then it was reminiscing old times, Saturday nights at the short track north of town, missions they had flown together, and even things that had happened the year I was in Korea (the Air Force’s 50th Anniversary Air Show) that I had never heard before.  We swapped stories late into the night like two old coots down at the VFW.  His wife wisely nodded off early on.

The next day, after lunch, I went for a hike in one of my favorite spots.  Mount Potosi is part of a range to the west of town, south of the dramatic cliffs of Red Rock National Conservation Area.  This particular peak has the dubious claim to fame as the location of the CFIT accident that killed actress Carole Lombard as she returned from her War Bonds tour.  This had been a favorite spot for Land Cruising (Kevin had a 1968 FJ40 and I drove a 1986 FJ60 Wagon).  The area is criss-crossed by well-developed series of vehicle tracks and the slopes provide dramatic views of the city.  Kevin and I had always talked about combining a harrier and a Land Cruiser event, with both groups meeting up at a vantage point just before sunset to watch the Strip light up as we had a potluck.  The day’s hike did not disappoint: high-elevation wildflowers were blooming, and I was happy to find the trail structure had been expanded to include hiking and mountain biking options.  Later, Ahab’s Hot Blonde Wife and I had a pleasant evening of Thai take-out and an ANTM episodes.

DSCN2187The next scheduled stop was my mom’s place on the coast.  The route took me through Mojave, and feeling nostalgic I stopped at the Air and Space Port for lunch.  I pulled in to the airport, expecting it to be Virgin Galactic-ville (which it was not) and there it is, the restaurant where we used to stop at for burgers after we’d done our little ‘airshows’ down the road at Rosamond Lake (we being me and the five college-age guys I learned to fly with).  It brought back a lot of memories, my time as the airport coffee shop waitress and the excitement of visiting Mojave, the test flight epicenter of the world (well nearby Edwards AFB/Muroc Lake was, but this was as close as we could get).  The restaurant is named after the (then) Rutan Aircraft Voyager, the first aircraft to fly non-stop (and without refueling) around the world, and is an unofficial museum of the flight, with photos, maps, and commemorative materials covering the walls.  (Exciting for me as Jeanna Yeager had been one of my role models when I was learning to fly).  After lunch I poked around a bit on the ramp, smelled the jet fuel, watched a King Air start up and taxi off, took a few photos of the aircraft in dry storage (quite a few Atlas Air and Southern Air Transport, both DOD long-haul contractors), and along the way got to remembering how much fun we had back in the day.  I returned to the road with a light heart.

DSCN2288After a quick stop to visit my mom, I headed north up the coast for a few nights at Land of Medicine Buddha, a Tibetan monastery and retreat center nestled in the Santa Cruz foothills.  Here you have the option of staying in a room or a yurt, and I elected for a yurt.  It was early in the season, so the yurt village (where I had stayed two summers before) was not yet open, and I was placed in the handi-accessable one (read: adjacent parking!) on the road to the Wish Fulfilling Temple. This center was founded by Lama Zopa Rinpoche, who’s teachings focus on kindness to all living beings, and is home to a project to build the largest stupa in North America.

DSCN2303DSCN2307The center is located next to the Nisene Marks State Forest, a 10,000 acre secondary forest (it had been clear cut over 40 years during the late 19th and early 20th centuries) with over 40 miles of trails through towering redwoods.  This area is known (in addition to the awesome hiking) for being the epicenter of the Loma Prieta quake, and damage (including a seam in the earth) is still visible along one of the trails.  I quickly changed clothes and got to walking.  After a slog up a steep fire road, pausing every twenty steps or so to catch my breath, I reached a fork in the path.  I chose east, downhill, along the three-mile loop.  Despite the day’s heat it was cool under the canopy, fallen needles dampening my footsteps.  The trail, also wide enough for vehicles, gently sloped along the steep hillsides, with coast redwoods towering from below to above.  Towards the bottom there is a turnoff to the Enchanted Forest, a local gathering spot with fallen logs to sit on, hollow stumps to shelter in, and a large peace sign constructed with sticks on an open area of earth.   There is also a makeshift memorial where people leave photos and mementos honoring loved ones passed.  After this the road merges with the Eight Verses Trail, a one-mile loop through meadow and forest with verses and benches spaced along the way to allow reflection on the Buddha’s teachings.

DSCN1106One of the other nice things about LoMB is the meals: vegetarian, organic, and locally sourced to the greatest extent possible, eaten communally in the dining room with the senior lamas and nuns mixing with the guests.  I had timed my walk to finish at dinnertime by the dining room.  It was packed with two yoga retreats, so I sat off to the side with two nuns, one a resident teacher and the other a visiting scholar from Australia who is active in the Prison Dharma program.  Over the next few days we had several fascinating conversations about international politics, the prison-industrial complex, mass surveillance, and avenues to walk the teachings in the world.  After dinner the first night was a dharma talk by Rene Feusi, a lively and quite funny French monk.  He quickly dispensed with the advertised topic (they asked me to speak on the fifth chapter of the Bodhisattva Way of Life, but…) to tell tales about his Tibetan teachers, provide the reasoning behind several Tibetan meditations, and share a lovingkindness meditation (we do this practice for others so it becomes easier to do it for ourselves).  In the morning I did prayer wheel practice with the nuns, 104 turns in a clockwise direction while chanting Oh Mane Padme Om.

After another day spent hiking, eating more great food, and spinning the dharma wheel, I was back on the road, off to the next leg of my adventure: Green Gulch Farm.

Week 9: Sit, Walk, Write

“Make positive effort for good, continue under all circumstances, and don’t be thrown away.”   ~ Katagiri Roshi to Natalie Goldberg

So, looking back, following sesshin with a writing retreat may not have been the best idea.
I had enthusiastically signed up for the retreat when it was announced three months before.  I had been to a a similar class with the same teacher in the fall and had loved it, seventy-six women and four really brave men, all writing our hearts out.  The snapshots of life that emerged had been so touching: a first dance or first kiss, the travails and unravellings of marriage, a near drowning, a newborn that would not survive the day, glimpses of children told with great humor, and I was eager to repeat the experience.  The one thing I had not anticipated was how raw I would feel after sesshin.
The group for this retreat was smaller than the previous class, about sixty of us including eight men.  The teachers, a female writing coach famous for spreading writing as Zen practice and a male creative writing professor from a nearby uni, had been working together for many years.  The retreat began Wednesday night with a dharma talk, or, in this case, a dharma slide show.  The female teacher also paints, and as we went through the slides of her work she encouraged us to focus on the details of a scene: light as it fell on a chair, the different colors of a tile roof, the elements of a backyard afternoon.  The author had painted her father over the years, and it was interesting to watch  the shift in both her painting style and their relationship over time as the years passed.As the talk progressed, these reflections transitioned in to a conversation between the two, banter back and forth about art as a form of mindfulness, and the importance of closely attending to what is in front of you.
The next morning we were back in the zendo for lecture, the female instructor taking the lead.  We went around the room, giving our name and where we were from (the Netherlands, Spain, Australia, Brazil, various places in Canada and the States, and my bravely offered ‘dharma hobo’).  The rules would be simple: keep your pen moving, no crossing out, say what you Want To Say rather than what you Think You Should Say.  An hour in we were given our first topic ‘write what is in front of you’ and we were off.  After more lecture (how does it feel, where did your mind go, is your hand sore?) we split in to small groups and did a series of topics, ten minute sprints followed with reading aloud to each other, then lunch and a break.  In late afternoon we met in smaller groups for more writing sprints***, zazen, dinner, and a lazy lecture peppered with volunteers reading aloud to the larger group.  The evening would close with listening meditation, in the form of a song sung by one of the attendees.  This was our schedule for the next few days.
We had been assigned two books to read for the retreat: one fiction (or as the teacher called it, “Li-ter-a-tyoore”) and the other an anthology of American Zen teachings and anecdotes.  The second day’s lecture was on the work of fiction: decomposing the structure, analyzing the characters and their arcs, placing the story in the greater cultural context.  I was a fish out of water for this one: I had not made it through the book.   The novel was set in New England, focussed around a hate crime eerily similar to actual events, with the descriptions, people and their actions cold and sharp.  I had abandoned it a hundred or so pages in, the chilly feel too much for me after the frigid February  I had fled two months before. Prompts for five words to describe each of the characters drew a blank, and to fill the space my mind began to drift: What makes something literature as opposed to fiction? Why was this gloomy story somehow more ’substantial’ or worthy than humorous fiction?  Why is a family falling apart more ‘credible’ than a young couple finding each other?  In the end, I listed random descriptors during the exercises and went with the flow.
The Zen anthology was the work of the male teacher, so the third morning’s lecture was fascinating: how he came to meet the masters (driving them to lectures while he was a student at the Jack Kerouak School of Disembodied Poetics), how he came to the idea of the book (there was something similar in other Zen traditions but not Western Buddhism), his writing practice (while he was the primary teacher’s assistant during a series of retreats), the actual process of interviewing his subjects (which never went as planned), and the publishing process (he also writes fiction and his editor re-sequenced his book releases to optimize audience draw).  He admitted how he had stumbled during the writing process; his first book (a fictionalized telling of a coast-to-coast peace walk) was written while crashing in a friends garage, the bulk of it written during the last month of the four-month invite.  He also described how he came to be a creating writing professor, and how this informed (and deepened) his own writing and his voice.
During the previous retreat I had been surprised to discover how much I enjoyed writing sprints.  The shortness of the intervals made it seem deceptively possible and I would jump in, but then my mind would ‘run out’ at six minutes and the pen would need to keep moving.  It turns out this is when the magic happens, when you run out of what you have planned to write and just write, sometimes junk but more often what you really want or need to say.  The reading aloud had been a challenge at first, mostly from insecurity, but also because I found myself writing things I had never told anyone, sometimes even myself.  With the reading aloud we found each other had the same reticence, and speaking the words helped us find the rhythm of our writing voices.  During this retreat, the writing sprints were again my favorite part.
We would meet to write in late afternoon, as the sun lazed towards the horizon, the brightness belying the high desert chill.  My group was in the kitchen, in the corners while we wrote and coming together at the butchers block to read aloud.  The silence (or near silence) of the previous weeks had had me drifting to the edge of the group during the workshop and meals, and I found my self writing from the edges as well.  “What will you have to say goodbye to when you die?” Two birds pulling dandelion fluff outside my window, the grey bird that sings from the top branch of the pine after breakfast, the new friend with a big hug out of the blue that makes me feel so safe.  “Something lost forever” Nights spent at the short track, dreams of our own team, KPM Racing: K now in a box, M lost in Afghanistan during a civil rescue flight, photos of his flag-draped coffin a favorite among the hawks calling for increased hostilities, and P, still with us, but damaged from his service.  “A secret I’ve never told anyone” Dancing around life in a secure environment, at the time it seemed cool but as the years pass you grow weary and distanced from those you love for reasons you cannot share.
More interesting was the work of the other writers.  “Your mother’s hands” A gentleman described hers caring for him as a child, playing the piano as she grew older, wrinkled and weak in her later years, and how much he will miss them when she is gone.  Another woman described her grandmother, holding her close to her Singapore roots while supporting her as she found her way in a new land. ‘Music you love” The same man admits Dylan, his creaky voice now obscuring his lyrics, has been replaced by Brittney (Spears), her new album filled with strong songs sung in a clear voice, and isn’t she making something of herself these days?   “Red, without blood, cherries or apples” A sunset in Mozambique mixed with the passion of protest anthems, from a relief worker weary from taming an epidemic in a war zone far from home. “Something lost forever” A friend, an sister, the perfection of a supermodel- gorgeous socialite’s soft hands to third degree burns. “Who would you trade places with?  A recent widower challenged liver cancer to take him instead of his beloved, a mother offering to take the place of her recently lost adult child.  Each day brought new treasures, each more heartbreaking than the one before.  By Saturday night there was not a dry eye in the house.
By the end I was drained, and eager to hit the road.  Sunday evening I packed up the car, and Monday morning I drove out, my truck pointed west towards the California coast.
*** Some topics for writing sprints (if you’d like to try them)
Keep your hand moving, do not cross out, ten minutes, GO!
What did you not pack?
What you are thinking of/not thinking of
Tell me about your mothers hands
Tell me about red (no blood, cherries, apples)
Describe a meal you have loved
Something that has made you laugh
Where do words come from?
What you are looking at/not looking at
What you want to hear/don’t want to hear
What is your original face?

Week 8: Sesshin

I’ll admit it, I was scared.  That long, staring at a wall, no talking?  For all my talk of how wonderful it would be, when the time came I didn’t think I could do it.  No way, nuh-huh, not gonna happen. These folks are serious sitters; at this point I was still spending most of my time sitting zazen in a chair.  There was no way I could keep up with them.  Mulling it over the night before, I revised my ambitions down to “stick it out for as long as I can”.
Sesshin began late afternoon Tuesday with Oryoki training.  Oryoki is the ritualized way we would be taking our meals while in the zendo.  I’m not quite sure how to explain it to you.  The training began with each of us being given a bundle of cloths, nested bowls, and utensils.  The Ino (monk in charge of the temple) then gave precise instructions on how to unfold the bundles and lay out these objects: cloths on your left leg, under your napkin, bowls largest to smallest left to right, utensils just so.  Next: how to interact with our servers (no eye contact, when to bow, hand signals to use); the precise forms for eating (which to eat first, where to place our utensils as we shifted from bowl to bowl, and the different offerings during the different meals.  If I hadn’t been intimidated enough about sesshin before, I was now.  After dinner was the formal welcome, a review of the day-to-day schedule, and an opportunity for last minute questions.  At the end of the meeting we bowed and left for our rooms in silence.
This week’s schedule would also be more rigorous than the last two.  Zazen began an hour earlier; what had been heralded by the bell of a nearby church ringing dawn’s light during the previous weeks now unfolded in the silence of darkness.  I would sit, one of twenty-four, following my breath, eyes loosely focussed on a seam in the polished wood floor, and sense the light slowly shift from reflected candlelight to a hint of sun.  The bell would ring and we would kinhin, slow mindful walking (and washroom break), and I would slip to the enclosed walkway behind the zendo to walk in the unfolding dawn.  Another bell and we were back to the cushion for more sitting and the morning service.  But now, a change from previous weeks, a chime, and ‘Prepare for Oriyoki’.  We would scoot back our mats and the ritualized meal would begin.
DSCN2543After a short break, it was back in the zendo for the morning schedule.  We began with an hour of samu (work practice).  Then, in a slight deviation from a ‘normal’ sesshin: a ‘dharma hike’.  We met in the Buddha Garden, slowly circling around the fountain.  Then, still in silence, we snake out in a line to the top of the parking lot and east along the road to a local trail.  The trail wound up a dry canyon between two collections of homes, the runoff from yards (technically illegal in this dry climate) creating an occasional pocket of meadow grasses and reeds.  We would stop at an intersection halfway up the hill, circle and wait for the slower walkers (okay, the other folks would wait for me), and then walk back the way we came.  Over the days we self-organized, the faster walkers were up front and the slower straggling along behind like the ice tail of a comet.  We would meet folks along the way: trail runners, mountain bikers, dog walkers, and one lady, walking by herself the same time every day (as we were) with a sad lonely look on her face.  I would wonder what they thought of us, a long line of somewhat shabby people, walking in silence, hands clasped at our bellies, eyes slightly down.  After trail it was another hour in the zendo (sit, walk, sit) and lunch.  Afternoon was a similar schedule: samu, an hour of yoga instead of walking and more sitting.  After dinner we had one final sit, evening service, and then it was lights out.
I was horrible at all of it.
DSCN2157First, the sitting.  How hard could it be, you ask?  Didn’t you sit for hours at your desk, or curled up reading on the weekends?  You would be surprised.  For one, there is the physical posture.  There were four sitting options, three on a cushion (lotus, half-lotus and kneeling), and the chair.  It became obvious the first week that I should stick to the chair.  I had been fine doing this during the lectures, but it seemed a little lame to do an entire sesshin in a black folding chair. Fortunately, one of my fellow retreatants was a yoga teacher, and he encouraged me to try different sitting poses and heights (one cushion, two cushions, or sometimes three).  By the time sesshin came around I had found one that I could hold for most of a sit without my legs falling asleep.  But I still wasn’t up for a full day.
Then there was the mental posture.  The goal in zen is to watch your breath without attachment.  Of course the mind wanders, and the trick is to catch it an bring your attention back to your breath.  I am usually pretty good at the wandering part, it is the catching it part I was hoping to improve.  Lucky for me, with the five sits a day I had plenty of opportunities.  But with the expanded schedule, I encountered a new and unexpected challenge.  The Tibetans believe that monks who fall asleep during practice come back as a dog.  Lets just say that by the lunchtime on the second day it was clear I will be a dog in my next life.
The other challenge was oryoki.  I had done my best to follow the instructions during the training, but to be honest, with no prior exposure it was like drinking from a fire hose.  Normally this is accommodated by alternating novice and veteran on the seating chart, but somehow during meals I ended up on the end of my row paired with a novice.  Lets just say we did our best, and with the most sincerity we could muster.  But mistakes were made, and I was the frequent recipient of corrections from the Abbot.
My favorite part of sesshin by far was the yoga.  If you have seen me get up from a long stretch at my computer any time recently, you know I could use more of this.  I say ‘more’ as I have been doing yoga, either to a video or in a class on and off for about twenty years.  And late afternoon, after our third sit, was the perfect time for it.    I would get up from the cushion, lower legs half asleep (and despite this, sore!), hips slightly creaky, and after a quick break position my mat with the others to one side of the zendo.  Since this was silent yoga the two teachers worked in tandem, one at the front of the group alerting changes with a deep out-breath, while the other moved among the group providing adjustments.  Together they led us through a series of slow restorative poses designed to increase our energy and stretch us out from the hours on the cushion.  But I was out of practice, and huffed and puffed through the sequences, my body resisting every posture.
DSCN2147Then, on the third day, something shifted.  We filed in to the zendo, took our places on our cushions, and once the bell rang slipped in to silence.  As the minutes passed, it became a beautiful silence, a clear silence more silent than any I had heard before, the silence that arises from twenty-four people deliberately holding mind and body still.   Someone would cough, and instead of rippling through the room, we held each other in practice and silence would emerge again.  This synchronicity carried through the day: I was able to keep up during the walk; I noticed (and corrected) the visual illusion that was causing me to nod off; and at lunchtime our seats were rearranged so I was next to an experienced oryoki-er.  Even my yoga improved: muscle memory began to kick in and I was able to stretch in to the forms.
On the fourth day we awoke to a special treat.  Lying in bed, the world seemed stiller than usual, as if the resonant silence from the day before had carried through the night.  I stumbled bleary-eyed to the kitchen, and there, framed by the kitchen window and lit by the courtyard light: falling snow.  It must have started in the night; as I watched, the new flakes added to the thin blanket of snow that hovered above the grasses and and nestled in the leaves of sage.  The snow continued as we sat, and I got up during kinhin so I could watch it fall and then sit below the window as the sun rose behind the clouds.  But the fragile precip was no match for the thin dry high desert air.  The sun emerged from the clouds as we emerged from breakfast, it was melting steadily during our walk, and by lunchtime it was gone.
The fifth morning was our last together, and I was a bit nostalgic as I traipsed down the flagstones to our haven.  We took our seats, set our intentions, and then sat together one last time.  Breathing in, breathing out, the monk next to me a rock, an occasional cough on my other side, with muffled sobs and heavy breathing (or quiet snores ) from further down the row.  Then, too soon, the bell and we began our morning chants and bows.  Once finished, for the first time since we began “Good Morning” closed the service and we filed to the kitchen for breakfast.  After ten minutes the clackers clacked.  A ‘thank you’ and our quiet intimacy was over.
I had made it all the way through.  No one was more surprised than me.
Of course there was much more than I have included here, many stumbles and small kindnesses as we helped each other through the week, and watching spring unfold.  There was also the odd way silence can create relationships more intimate than words.  I may circle back at some point with more memories.  But for now, back to the world of spoken language.
🙂

Week 7: More Practice Period

The Evening Gatha is read at the end of the evening service, to close out the day.  We file in to the zendo an hour before, quiet conversations slowly drifting to silence as we gather.  We sit twenty-five minutes of zazen, do ten minutes of slow walking (kinhin), spend twenty-five more minutes on the cushion, then chant the four vows three times.  It is dark outside, with the light in the temple muted, giving the sit a hazy feeling.  This sit is quiet, but it is a different sort of quiet than other times of the day.  It’s not the crisp sort of sit we do first thing in the morning, everyone fresh from a good night’s sleep and clear with first light.  No, at this hour we are tired from the day, and the zendo seems to fill with a relaxed and subdued quiet.  Then, out of the fading of our last chants, the cantor’s voice fills the room:
Let me respectfully remind you…
Life and Death are of Supreme Importance…
Life is short,
Time passes quickly, 
Let us awaken, 
Awaken, 
Take heed…
Do not squander this life.
It is Saturday morning, the third day of retreat, and I am up early, my body not quite shifted to Mountain Time.  A knock on the door, it is my neighbor reminding me of the eclipse.  We stand in the yard, clay sand with sage and mesquite shrubs, and watch the white moon slowly thin as it hangs over the dimly lit town.  “This is why they used to sacrifice virgins” one of us mutters once only a thin sliver of red remains.  “Do not squander this life.”
DSCN2091Two days later we have the afternoon off.  I am curled up  in the courtyard, on a blanket in the grass, basking in the sun.  The wind rustles the leaves above me, finches chirp and flutter around, the occasional car drives past along the road on the other side of the house.  Then an odd noise, similar to the cell-phone water drop I would hear at work, but at short, steady intervals.  I look up to see a crow flapping deeply to gain speed and altitude, the wake of it’s wings creating the sound.  “Do not squander this life.”
Two days later we are again in the courtyard.  Nature Boy* (who bears an uncanny resemblance to Michelangelo’s David) is watering the trees.  “Want to see something beautiful?”  The next thing we know a brown garter snake is winding in his hands, its red tongue flicking at us with the same curiosity we have for it.  Then it is on the ground, almost levitating above the grass in perfect S-es as it seeks shelter in nearby rocks.  “Do not squander this life.”
The theme for the second week seemed to be practicing in the body.  Our morning schedule stayed relatively the same:  zazen, service, soji, breakfast, a short break, then samu, more sitting and lunch; but in the afternoon, instead of more samu as we had done the week before, we went on group walks along trails in the surrounding hills.  And when I say ‘hills’, I mean the foothills of the Sangre de Cristos, the southern stretch of the Rockies, that rise to nine-ish thousand feet just east of Santa Fe.  (The Zen Center is at 7,400 feet.)
DSCN1633The first day I went out with the ‘advanced’ group, mostly because I had done the ‘moderate’ group trail the day before.  We headed out along the river (six feet wide and two feet deep where we crossed), along Upper Canyon Road to a trail that wandered along a dry stream bed that wound between two hills.  Until this point I had kept the pack in sight, but with me huffing and puffing (already?) they were quickly out of sight.  Soon the trail wound sharply up the west face of the canyon.  Then, a flat open spot with a small stretch of the river and the houses along it were in clear view below.  After a short break I continue up.  I pace myself, still smarting from Tsankawi, and as the trail twists back towards the canyon I stop to catch my breath.  Suddenly, a flock of towhees erupt from a thicket of piñon and fly as one down the hill.  “Do not squander this life.”
DSCN2161The second day I do the ‘puppy’ trail (my word), along the well cultivated trails at the local Audubon Center.  (One of the center’s residents is Dutch; imagine his surprise when advised we would be walking at the ‘Auto-Bahn’.)  But the next I was back with the advanced group, this time to the east, along the trails towards Castle Rock.  This is the day I start to get my trail legs again; I huff and I puff up the steep inclines, stopping frequently to catch my breath (and take a good look at the beauty around me) but each time I am able to continue.  After an hour I reach a point that offers a clear view to the west: not only Santa Fe, but also the white hangars at Los Alamos and the fire scarred mountains along the western horizon.  “Do not squander this life.”
The speaker for the second weekend was John Dunne.  Small in stature, and likely to go unnoticed in a crowd, he is an incredibly intelligent man.  He spent close to ten years studying with lamas and Rinpoches both in the States and abroad, and is well versed in Tibetan culture and teachings.   He also has acquired many of their affects: rapid clipped speech interrupted by long pauses for consideration, a melodic cavorting tone, and the Yoda-like laugh I have found to be almost ubiquitous amongst Tibetan scholars.  His lectures speak to the dualistic nature of mind, the construction of I and another, us and the other, that there is an inner narrative but also an inner someone to hear it.  One segment focussed on our mental construction of the world (what he calls reification or ’storifying’), and all the biases (anchoring, confirmation bias, inattention blindness, bandwagon effect) that come with it.  I found this segment fascinating; I have spent my time during and since grad school studying these processes with respect to aircrew and maintenance decision-making, and while I have found dharma teachings useful when applied to these domains, I had not thought to explore them on the cushion.  “Do not squander this life.” The afternoon is spent on methods to deconstruct our constructions (de-reification).
On Sunday afternoon we had council, checking in one last time before the big event: sesshin, five days of silent practice.  Could I do it?  Or will I crack?  Stay Tuned for the next Episode of the Dharma Hobo….
🙂

Week 6: Spring Practice Period

Spring Practice Period began, for me, on a frantic note.  I had previously agreed to peer review some conference papers with a deadline well in to the agreed-to electronics ‘vacation’.   Somehow during the itinerant travels of previous weeks this had slipped my mind.  Wednesday, originally planned as a rest day, was spent reading and commenting on papers.  Fortunately the topics were interesting: physical markers of cognitive red line, man-machine trust during urban search and rescue, and the adaptation of task analysis tools for the design of semi-automated long-haul road transport vehicles.  (Okay, interesting to me.)  I finished with fifteen minutes to spare, and scurried to the zendo for the opening dharma talk. Not an auspicious beginning, I agree.
So what is a practice period?  Well, many faiths share the practice of withdrawal from the world.  This is true for Buddhism as well, most notably individuals who withdraw to study alone on a mountain or in a cave.  Practice period is similar, but done as a group, an extension of the tradition where an abbot gathers nomadic monks in one location during the rainy season for deeper study and to strengthen the ties within the community.  Some Zen Centers have adopted an austere model for practice period – long intervals of work or meditation to deepen practice.  I was fortunate, in this case the Zen Center was coming out of an intensive schedule of back-to-back retreats so the Vice-Abbot had designed the schedule to help the residents recuperate.  I was one of three guests who would be with the residents for the full nineteen day interval.
Our days began with the wake-up bell, one of the residents passing outside each door ringing a chime.  Then it was down to the temple for morning service.  The zendo is dark, barely lit, and after three bells, the vice-abbot circles the zendo.  We each do a bow as he passes us on our cushions, all while chanting the Verse of Atonement.  Then, forty minutes of zazen, a silent still meditation, followed by blessing of the altar, recitation of the Heart Sutra in Japanese and English, many bows, and the morning greeting.  After an interval of temple cleaning (to thank her for hosting us) it is off to breakfast.  If I have not mentioned it before, the food here is fabulous, lovingly crafted by the residents (with an assist from a local chef during larger groups) as part of their work practice.  Breakfast varies: some days granola, creamed coconut or pecans, with yogurts and jams; or eggs, scrambled, sometimes with peppers and herbs from the garden, with potatoes; one day a bagel bar; another build-your-own crepes.  The morning, through the end of breakfast (with the exception of your temple cleaning assignment), is in silence.
After a short break we return to the zendo for samu, or work practice.  In the Zen tradition, samu is an extension of meditation, taking the mindfulness you generate on the cushion out in to the world.  We received one of three assignments: kitchen, housekeeping, or grounds; and it is normal to cycle through each of the departments during a longer stay.  The week before I had been in the kitchen, where I learned the proper way to cut carrots and other veg.  For the first few days this interval I was outside, pulling weeds from the garden.  During the second week, I was re-assigned to housekeeping, where it was discovered I have a gift for vacuuming and detailing corners.  (Who knew?)  I have been in housekeeping ever since.  The practice during samu is to maintain functional silence, a silence broken only for necessary instructions or cautions.  If nothing else was scheduled, we would continue our samu practice after lunch.
Practice periods provide the opportunity to dwell on a single text, or sutra.  The sutra selected for this retreat was the Satipattana Sutra, translated as The Four Foundations of Mindfulness.  This text encourages you to increase your awareness observing the body in the body, the feelings in the feelings, the mind in the mind (how the mind works), and objects of mind in objects of mind (thoughts we attach to).  I normally read it during the late afternoon, in the sun, in the courtyard during personal practice time before heading in for a shower.  Before dinner there was more meditation, then dinner, then the evening service (even more meditation and the evening gatha).  Local sangha members would frequently join us for zazen, and it was interesting to feel how different energies affected a ‘sit’ – often when we were tired a visitor would settle us down, and vise versa.

During the first few days of the practice period we explored the text: with an opening dharma talk, a seminar the following morning for questions, and ‘council’, and roundtables to talk about our experiences working with the text.   On Friday we were joined by other guests for a weekend retreat.
DSCN2133DSCN2121The bulk of this retreat was a hike at Tsankawi, an abandoned first nations settlement that is the southern peninsula ‘living museum’ section of the Bandalier National Forest.  I would love to be able to tell you I had a fabulous time exploring the trails worn in the soft rock leading to and between the cave dwellings along the walls of the mesa.  Unfortunately this was the day altitude sickness kicked in, my usual happy-and-everything-sounds-like-a-good-idea reaction replaced with dizziness and narrowed vision, not the best combo on a trail with sections of sheer drop-off to one side.  I did manage the entire loop, including the cliff ladders up the south part of the trail (a feat in itself).  I also had fun exploring the plants, ruins, and pottery shards on the mesa.  On the bright side, when I got back and checked my camera I was encouraged to find that despite my discomfort I’d captured some fabulous images of the day.
The first Monday and Tuesday were rest days, and rest I did.  On Monday it was warm; I curled up on a blanket in the sun, ‘studying’ the sutra (if absorbing it while using it as a pillow counts) and watching the birds.  On Tuesday I rested some more, and also went for a slow mosey along the Two Dams reservoir trail.  Rest turned out to be a good choice: the second segment of the practice period was focussed on physical activity.  More on that next time.
As always, photos and back issues are available at www.hollybrunelle.com. A copy of the sutra (if you are interested) is available here:  http://www.wisdompubs.org/landing/satipatthana-sutta .  The translation we studied was a little different (mostly organization); this was the closest I could find.
Until next time!

Week 5: New Mexico

I crested the San Andreas mountains at lunchtime.  The San Andreas are the range of black mountains that separate Las Cruces and Truth or Consequences from valleys to the east.  The Tularosa Basin was before me, home of White Sands National Monument.  I have wanted to visit the dunes for years, but for some reason or other, and despite several efforts, the closest I had made it until this day was Albuquerque.  I had first seen the dunes, rare gypsum sand worn from the hills to the southwest, in a yoga video I acquired while stationed in Korea.  I’m not sure whether it was the yoga, or being able to spend an hour ‘in the States’ while I did the poses, or the sheer beauty of the photography, but the dunes always seemed like a refuge to me.  It was not until I was driving up the west side of the range, out of Las Cruces and towards the monument, that I realized the monument was adjacent to White Sands Missile Range, one of the most physically violent places on earth.

The valley is huge, hundreds of square miles of dry lakebed.  It is quite beautiful, the desert rock of the mountains still open to the elements, the lower elevations covered with thin patches of dried grass and low desert chaparral.  I was immediately taken (and this was completely unexpected) by the weight of this place, or, more specifically, our human actions towards it.  It is a remote area, and desolate, and for these reasons has been designated expendable.  The earth here is regularly shattered (and the animals and plants assailed) by the force of missile tests and impacts.  Trinity, the site of the world’s first atomic weapons test, is northwest of the monument, the scar still visible on satellite photos.  And we, as a nation, have decided this is ‘OK’.  I pondered these thoughts as I continued towards the park.

I could not initially see the dunes from the highway, but as I drove they began to shimmer along the horizon to the north.  Once you reach them, they are beautiful.  The sand is white, and softer than beach sand, and unexpectedly bright.  As you go deeper in to the park, the grasses and yucca gave way to open dunes.    For some reason they are popular for sledding, with the sand marked with footprints and long impressions near most of the parking turn-outs.  I found a shady spot (to help out my faithful houseplants) checked the map and headed out for a hike.  For such a remote area it was surprisingly busy.  There were close to twenty cars in the lot, and on trail I would meet another group every few minutes.  One couple wore an unusual tee shirt and we stopped to talk.  They were in the area for the Battan Memorial Death March, held two days before.  Two thousand of the soldiers sent to the Philippine theatre were from the New Mexico National Guard.  Following months of intense battle, they were part of the contingent surrendered to Japan.  These Prisoners of War were then forced to march to their confinement camps, 65 long miles with little food or water. Nine hundred New Mexico Guardsmen survived until release, but close to half died within a year of returning home: to vehicle accidents, alcoholism or ‘unexplained circumstances (most likely suicide).  The Memorial March had been held two days earlier, twenty six miles in the high desert of the test range.  This year eleven of the twenty still alive were able to participate in the memorial.

DSCN2051DSCN2052This may be the time to speak of the orb in the sky.  Rumor is that it is still ‘not working’ in the northeast, at least the radiating warmth part.  Let me tell you, it was ‘working’ this day.  It was hot, and there was nothing between me and the sun but blue sky.  But it was a nice sort of hot, dry, in the way that you and your clothes don’t get sticky.  I took off my shoes and the sand was warm on my feet, very easy to walk in, cool just under the surface.  I expected the trail to wind along the semi-hard beds between the dunes (the name was ‘the Alkali Flats Trail’) but it meandered up and down and around the dunes.  Three weeks driving had taken it’s toll, after a short while I was huffing and puffing.  Aware of the altitude, and my thirst, and my friends waiting in the car (still recovering from mild frostbite at Arlington) I turned back early.  It was a nice visit, thought not anything like I had expected.
DSCN2072DSCN2070DSCN2067I arrived in Santa Fe on Wednesday.  I will be spending five weeks here, at a Zen Center nestled in a canyon on the east side of town.  For the past four weeks I had been living out of four bags, so it was nice to settle and start to unpack the Xterra.  My room is in the main house, a former dining room off the kitchen that opens onto a gorgeous courtyard.  It is a Pueblo style home, low adobe with rounded corners, accented with corner fireplaces and large wooden beams.  Inside it is natural wood cupboards and furniture, primarily in the raw, lightly finished Ranchero style, with Buddhist artwork.  It is above seven thousand feet here, spring still creeping up from the valley below, so the earth was still brown, and most plants dormant waiting for warmer temps.  The exception (other than the pine) was the cherry trees, bright with branches of pale pink flowers.  They provide a pleasant contrast to the earth tones of the buildings of the land.
The first week was a retreat with Stephen Batchelor and Joan Halifax.  Stephen traveled to the east in his early 20s, studied with Tibetan masters for nine years and Korean maters for another three before returning to England with his bride Martine.  He is probably most known for his book Confessions of a Buddhist Atheist.  Roshi Joan is the dharma holder for the center where I am.  A medical anthropologist by training, she worked alongside Alan Lomax and Joseph Campbell at Columbia before dedicating herself to study of the dharma.  Since founding Upaya, she has grown it in to a mini-university of the mind. (If you are interested, I encourage you to take a look at their schedule.) This retreat, titled ‘Being Completely Human’ focussed on the four noble truths: suffering, craving, the release of craving, and right living. Stephen, an avid scholar of the original Buddhist texts re-translates them as tasks: when craving, fear or attachment arise, recognize it, let it of and ‘get on with your work’.  In addition to being closer to the original writings, it makes them accessible to all, regardless of religious inclination.  The daily schedule was filled with meditation, lectures, work practice and fabulous organic, locally sourced vegetarian meals.  I had arrived quite harried, but over the five days I began to unwind.
If you would like to follow the lectures I am sitting in on, you can do so here: www.upaya.org, then scroll over ‘Teachings’, then click on ‘Free Dharma Podcasts’.  (For more about the retreats, scroll to ‘Our Programs’ then ‘Complete Program Schedule’.)  I am writing this on April 1st, the afternoon before I begin an eighteen-day electronics-free Spring Practice Period.  I was hoping Stephen’s opening lecture would be on line by now, but it is not.  If you can find it (March 25th), it was the most accessible of his lectures, and a good intro in to what interests me about Buddhism.
I haven’t mentioned it lately: I hope you and yours are happy and healthy.  I look forward to reconnecting with you ‘on the other side’, on or about April 20th.