Home

Today is a day of rain and more rain, steady and reasonably heavy. Now the sun begins to sink behind the cloud covered mountains and darkness begins. I am once more alone as night falls. I have sense of the vastness of the mountains and forest around me, feel vulnerable, open.

It was a day of vulnerability. The batteries are not charging well since I washed the clothes, the internet went off once, and earthquake shook and jolted on through--6.0. Who knows what the road is doing. It has been out right past my place toward town and also the main Hayfork road was closed for two weeks and has only now been opened. I have been in Boston where you flip switches and light come on, move dials and heat rises and day and night are not such noticeable changes in the winter.

Yes darkness and vulnerability surround me. The dog lies by the wood stove which I have just fed. The wind which was blowing the door open has quieted now that the rain is pouring. The storm has over taken us. There has been no traffic and Richard is holed up at his house. I am amused at the irony in modern conveniences which leave us feeling stranded when they fail. Life was so much simpler when there was no power to go out.

This solitude and openness to a moment of the life carries a truth that I bow to. I am open to the coming darkness, to the loss of power, to the snags swaying on the hill, to the live pine and cedar by the road dancing with the wind, to the cold rain and green grass and 10,000 frogs chortling and gruging. This moment of my life I am looking out the casement window and loving all of it. The sorrow of the things gone wrong and the purity of the rain washing and soaking deep down, the wind chime, all the decisions I made to get me to here and now, all the roads taken and not taken. Being alive to it all is magnificent! From the openness and the vulnerability comes gratitude for this simple imperfect moment, which is all I have or need or want.

Constellation of Woes

I awoke at 4am and stared into the abyss for an hour or so, before remembering to do metta which soothed me into a more relaxed state which wasn't sleep, but was skimming the surface of it. I got up at dawn prepared for a tired day, but actually feel fine. Yesterday I had just been listing all the things that were wrong with my life, starting with global stuff, then politics(so many disappointments there this year), then the list of woes regarding the trip home, the slide blocked road, the snow, the potential of wet furniture in the back of the truck, the caring for the dog who is has lost the ability to know when he is pooping, the failed repoint of the internet satellite. I listed these troubles with some satisfaction to see how really unpleasant my world and my homecoming was going to be. I could indulge and pity myself at how the woes seem to pile on, to constellate around certain times or events and this homecoming in particular.

But last night I awoke, defenseless from this onslaught. The fun was over as very dark negative energy paralyzed me. This is a very tricky place for someone who practices the art of mindfulness whose rules are don't push it away, don't engage it, just let it be there. The foremost impulse is to get rid of it, in my case, by finding out what is the cause of it. And this approach is like touching a Tar Baby. The more you probe and try to figure it out, the more you get stuck until you are wrestling with the darkness and hopelessly entangled.

I have spent a lot of time with this black stuff. It is, I think, old trauma, a black hole which has gathered a orbiting array of old injuries around it. It has tremendously powerful magnetism so that it is difficult to resist falling into orbit around it and being sucked into darkness, completely forgetting it is a trap with no exit. I have dealt with this enough that after the initial shock and the arising hopeless fear, I begin to remember that this is trauma, and that I know everything I can know about it and that leaving it alone is the best response. I am usually by this time focusing my attention as much as possible on my breath and if I can remember to do metta, the black hole diminishes, the constellation of woes recedes in importance as I wish myself well over and over again.

I have had trouble doing metta because I thought it was a cop out, that I needed to engage with the blackness, that it was the truth and so needed to be investigated. But the truth is I need concentration to deal with the Tar Baby and metta produces concentration and gentle loving kindness simultaneously, replaced dread and fear with their opposite. For the first time I wonder if indulging in the constellation of woes was a prelude to the darkness. Maybe the indulgence is not much fun or so skillful after all.

Leaving

I awoke this morning with angst. I am leaving Boston and heading back to my cabin in the woods. I have been impatient about being here feeling like I am wasting time and not engaged. Generally my only life here is the family and I don't make decisions or initiate anything, I just tag along. I sometimes feel like I am 80 or 90 years old. So I was surprised to feel the sadness and heart ache at the thought of separation that came a week prior to departure. I feel it on the other end when I am leaving the cabin heading to Boston.

I am fond of saying that this family is the one I know is mine since I grew up in a family where I felt out of place. I was not my father's child. This family I know is mine as I know where my daughter came from and who her father is and I feel apart of her life.

My journey back to the cabin is usually fraught with some anxiety. I am reminded of the Pharaoh in "Josepf and His Brothers" who always comes back to his home, asking, "Is everything well in the household" always afraid his wife had been unfaithful. I am always afraid that the home power system will be down, or the water off, or neighbors will have moved in or my environment will be altered. Such fears about water and power are real, but hoping the environment is unaltered is a free floating anxiety since I am helpless to stop change or return things to the statis quo.

This time I have the weather as a concern. The main winding mountain road is closed due to a landslide and all the side roads are snowed in. I am coming back with a truck load of furniture and though I have four wheel drive, it won't get me through 3 feet of snow. My dog is with a friend and I haven't room to bring him back also. My Internet service is down and the satellite dish that provides my contact with the outside world needs moving and that has been impossible to arrange before I get there.

These anxieties are of a different nature than the angst of leaving this warm "home" with small children and adults I love. But each end of the trip is painful. The plane flight itself--the discomfort of the seating, the tin can with wings bouncing occasionally in turbulence with only icy sky and no air outside the small oval window, the packed like sardines breathing other people's breath experience is, if you ignore or accept those fact of your extreme discomfort and your possible immanent death, a kind of limbo transition between worlds, a being in suspended animation. You feel it at the touch down when suddenly every one's personality comes back to them and they begin to cell phone or chat or show their impatience or excitement.

It's a strange life I lead now traveling between two different coasts. And it will probably continue until the grandchildren are old enough that they stop thinking that grandma is cool, but instead see her as an old woman they have to be polite to when they are impatient to be with their own friends. At that time I can get the trips to Boston down to maybe once a year with a reciprocal trip from them yearly also. Who knows? Life seldom follows the plans you have set out for it so better enjoy it the way it is.

On Death

I had a major dream last night about wanting to find someone to talk with about death. I found Gisino, a neighbor. He was in a room talking with someone else and I go in and wait for a while, but then leave. Then I am in his workshop and we are talking about our lives. I say when I grew up everyone was poor and no one thought anything about it. It was a much more peaceful time, although WWII was on. And then I awake to remember that Gisino is dead which startles me. We were the same age and both had had cancer, although different kinds, at the same time.

I have just recovered from the stomach flu. I spent one night all night alternately and sometimes simultaneously vomiting and pooping. My granddaughter had it a week before me and was fine the next day. I was not fine the next day and the lag time of my full recovery made me remember how it was possible sometime to get sick and the lag time of recovery instead fades into death. The kids say I have been brooding, but it is hard to talk to anyone about such things unless they are my age and not in denial. There is the famous dharma story about a god or guru who comes to earth and is asked what is the most amazing thing in the world and the god/guru replies that although everyone is going to die, no one talks about it.

I stepped out of my usual more participatory role in the household and coasted along, just being an observer. To my surprise, I saw this subtle program of mine that something needed to be fixed in this family and I needed to take care of fixing it. I realized there was nothing to fix. Everything was working just fine. It was a loving nurturing family. That was a shock but a very sweet shock and an insight I am grateful for.

But after my first well day, I dreamed of Gisino and awoke to awareness of death. I felt that death rules our lives yet we pay no attention to it. I felt I should bow to death every morning on awakening to acknowledge its reality and the fact that this small splinter of awareness of body and world will disappear. It gives my view another perspective. When I thought I was dying from cancer, there was a quickening sense of the preciousness of life. My actions were more informed by the understanding that hating or holding grudges is a waste of energy which could be better used enjoying life and loving. Don Juan suggested that death was always over his left shoulder. That is the context in which I wish to live.

Gardensnob post for the New Year

A new year and a new decade! I have a commercial blog on gardening(I didn't choose the name) and this is the first post of the new year. It is a challenge to keep the commercial blog fresh and interesting and honest. I have some resolves regarding it. First and foremost I will be going into more depth in covering garden problems and processes. I have gardened for forty years and live in an area where there are many expert gardeners, some of whom make at least a partial living selling their produce. I want to draw on their expertise also and also do a review of their methods. But I have to mention to my readers the reasons for gardening! One thing that gardeners have going for us is our attention to the seasonal cycles of renewal and rest that is an intregal part of gardening and our lives. We also reap the benefits of the activity. All that hauling, bending and stooping, keeps us younger and more supple. And the activity is always changing and so provides new interest and challenges. What's needed in the spring for planting is not the same as the needs of harvest. Then there is the produce itself. There's nothing quite as satifying as going out to the garden and picking what you need for dinner or a salad. Vegetables can never be fresher than this and the difference in taste between home grown and store bought is huge as we all know. What is grown on soil that is nutrient rich without the use of pesticides and chemicals is both healthier and tastier. And then there's the joy involved in being a part of the process of giving life, nurturing it, and then being nurtured by it. So if you hesitating about starting a new cycle, or discouraged about last year's difficulties, or if you can't wait to get back into the dirt, take heart, because a new cycle of life is coming, the light is returning and preparations for a new growing season can begin. It's worth every aching back, broken nail, and muddy knee. It's self sufficiency at the most basic level and feeds that part of ourselves that has lost touch with the earth and where our food comes from. It's sun and water and soil and the magic of seed. So we gardeners are really happy to be a part of something so basic.

Florida

I have a quiet moment at the beach house. The family has gone out to get sandy. From the front room I can see the pelicans dive into the ocean and the only noise is of the construction going on around us with various loud power tool noises. We have the worst beach house we have ever had. It's small and there is no privacy on the porch over looking the ocean. Rick, of the enormous belly, and Shawna, of the bleached blond hair drink bloody mary's for breakfast next door but fortunately seem to retire early instead of having drinking friends over late at night as I had feared.

My sister is in the hospital with pneumonia which casts a sadness over the holiday, but the 16 to 3 year olds liven up the day with constant games and phone calls. So far they are not bored with each other. Anya can't wait to see the cousins and immediately takes on the persona of a teen, refusing to give it up at bedtime and succomb to the rules. Ewan is mostly agog and aghast and a follower at three.

The beach in Florida is all pastel during the day, light blue/green ocean and sky with pale clouds and drifting gulls and diving pelicans. The waves hardly break the ocean is so peaceful. I love being near the water and feel calm and happy. Honey baked ham, orange juice, chips, a little beer or wine in the evening and no need to go out into the concrete car ridden world of strip malls and a Publix on every mile long block. There are two pockets of comfort. The beach house and Cara's, the rest of Largo is like anywhere USA only warmer.

Anya's First Day of Kindergarten

The whole family went with Anya to drop her off at first day of kindergarten. As we started out, Ewan on Jay's shoulders, Anya holding Maya's hand, me behind, Anya asked, "Where are the rest of them?" as she searched the empty streets. On the cross street up ahead we first saw a mother and child, and turning the corner toward the school, they came in a surge of family groups, lots of dads, all the mothers and many grandparents and babies in arms. It was quite the scene with strollers, backpacks, the parents, dogs, a veritable parade converging on the school, lacking only the elephants, balloons, clowns and cotton candy to complete the atmosphere. There was a timeless moment when I was taking it in. The walls of separation became thin and transparent and I was participating in the closest thing our culture has to a ritual. The playing field was level. We all had a precious person we were letting go into the wider world this morning. It was a rite of passage and because of that, was sacred. That is when my tears of gratitude and love came.

The mundane soon overwhelmed me as we walked into the school yard amid the chattering, yelling, running, clinging reality, as acquaintances nodded and compared their own and their child's reaction to this first day of school with a fervor of excitement. A buzzer sounded. "What does that mean?" asked Oscar, Anya's friend, with nervous energy. The parents then edged their children inside the classroom and, after however long it took to let go, walked out. I peeked in at Anya and held Ewan up to see her. She was doing a puzzle. She was in her own world.

When we went to pick her up six hours later, she came out smiling and shook Ewan's hand, and then took her mother's hand to shake it, but of course her mother grabbed her and hugged and kissed her. I offered my hand solemnly. A small adult part was asking for recognition or so I like to think.