Occup, Loving-Kindness, And Boy, I'm Glad I Brought My Flip Flops

This time, I came prepared for the rain.

Umbrella? Absolutely.

Two—that’s two—rain ponchos. You know, in case one gets ripped, or stolen by bears, or clashes with my outfit.

Extra shoes. Extra socks. Extra everything. No way I could run out of dry clothes.

Hooded sweatshirt to battle the chill? Uh-huh. Hat? Yup.

This is my third October “retreat” to Farm Sanctuary, and after two windy (I mean cabin-shaking windy), rainy (rainy) (wonderful) trips, I knew what to prepare for.

I came prepared for the cold October rain.

And I brought the flip flops, of course, for those trips to the main building (where the bathrooms are) in the middle of the night.

It’s 8:45 pm right now. I’ve been here for almost five hours. The path to my cabin has been shoveled twice.

I didn’t come prepared for the snow.

Because it doesn’t snow in October.

But it did. It is. And I’m awfully damn cold.

No boots. Because it doesn’t snow in October. No gloves. Because, you know, it doesn’t snow in October. Nothing heavier than that sweat shirt.

And a cabin equipped with The Little Heater That Could(n’t). Although, for the last half hour it’s been making an effort, making some noise, kicking out something akin to warm air; I’ve been able to crawl out from under the pile of blankets, I can feel all my fingers again.

But that’s all: meaningless, nothing, find, good, part of it.

Part of it.

It’s a beautiful day, a beautiful place, a beautiful chance to get my thoughts together, to let some thoughts go, to sit and be and read and write and stretch and have the silence broken only by the noise of my own breathing, my own mind (and now this cat, the cat that followed me into the cabin, who occasionally bites but mostly wants to be loved, who is on the bed purring behind me as I type).

I look forward to this every year now.

Two years ago, my head was swimming. I was busy. I was stressed. I didn’t have time to organize my thoughts. Work was hell. Being a dad was awesome but still sort of new and very, very tiring. I was vaguely dissatisfied. Sometimes unvaguely dissatisfied. But I couldn’t organize my thoughts, I couldn’t say “this is what I think,” I didn’t have the time or the energy at the end of a day to think what I needed or wanted to think, to say what I needed or wanted to say.

And so I asked my wife: “Do you mind if I drive out to Farm Sanctuary myself some weekend, take a solo trip, a retreat?” And she didn’t mind. And so I did. I packed up a notebook and some clothes and some meditation cushions and Karen Armstrong’s The Case for God, and I came out here, and I sat still, and I read, and I let me thoughts come and go, and I wrote them down, and I sat with them some more, and I read some more and read some more and read some more, and I had a really good dinner at The House of Hong, and at the end of it, I wasn’t enlightened. I didn’t transcend. But I’d had time to think. I’d had time to wrestle with some trivial questions and some big questions, some mundane questions and some spiritual questions, I’d had the chance to think those thoughts from beginning to end and occasionally to sit without thoughts and just be be be, and I went home feeling a little different, a little better, and I was glad for that. Very, very glad for that. Hard to put it into words, exactly, but I was glad for it, and I felt that I could make some choices, do some things, choices and things I hadn’t allowed myself before. I started attending the Zen Center. I started sitting at home regularly, hitting the yoga mat. Taking steps in the direction I wanted to go.

Last year, I came out again. October, solo. I brought David Platt’s Radical, thinking (hoping) it was full of the things I most needed to hear at that point (it wasn’t; there are some good things in that book, but I find much of Platt’s theology objectionable, creepy even). But I read, and I sat, and I thought, and it was good.

And so this year, weeks (months) in advance, I started thinking about the third trip, asking myself which questions I’d want to ask, which books I’d want to read, which thoughts I’d want to think. In a vague sort of way, not a script.

Early this afternoon, after a few delays (including a stop to the Occupy Syracuse site; I was extremely impressed with what I saw and heard there, and hope to become a part of that when I return home, even if I can only play a small, supporting role; I’ll have more to say about this later), decaf soy latte in hand, car packed with books (Thich Nhat Hanh’s For a Future to Be Possible and Pema Chodron’s Awakening Loving-Kindness), with magazines (Veg News, Tricycle), with rain gear and clothes and a yoga mat, meditation cushions, candles, notebooks, laptop, a pile of road trip CDs, I left town, drove fast, music loud (The Roots How I Got Over the perfect soundtrack, songs all about transformation, God, letting go), had trouble keeping it under 90, then music off to allow those thoughts, the thinking, the wonder.

Thoughts about love. Love for everybody. Love for the people I can’t stand. Thoughst about The Five Freedoms (something that comes up often for me, but more on that later). Thoughts about writing letters. Real letters, to real people. About feeding hungry people in the cold. About activism, about choices, about saying “no.” About my body, getting older (getting old), being alive, being dad. About a hundred books I want to read and a dozen that I want to write (two urgently, two now).

Drove, drank coffee, thought, listened to The Roots and to Rush and to NPR, and then pulled into the hills behind Watkins Glen, drove up into the snow, the snow that kept coming down and coming down and coming down, not that indecisive “do I really want to do this?” fall snow that tickles your nose and melts again, but real snow, pretty snow if this wasn’t such a cold cabin.
For the last few hours I’ve been reading Pema Chodron, sitting on that cushion, stretching on that mat, scribbling in a thick notebook, occasionally talking to the few people who are hanging around this place when I bump into them on the path (a woman and her young son from Albany, a guy who has worked here for years and years).

Enjoying the quiet.

Even, sort of, enjoying the cold nose, stiff fingers (but happy to let them go if this heater keeps working it’s magic, if this isn’t just another tease).

I’ll be happy in a couple of days, when I get home, to give my son a huge lift-him-off-his-feet hug, to hear him tell me what he did while I was away, to snuggle into bed with him and a book before he goes to sleep. To kiss my wife, give her a hug, make dinner, do dishes. I will tell them both that I missed them and that will absolutely be true.

But in the meantime I will also love this, love this silence, love this chance to just be be be. “Be be be the infinite fertilities of the one mind of infinity.” Or something to that effect.