Tag Archives: big life decisions

tassajara

{01 August 2010}

last weekend was an experiment in being off the grid; for my birthday my brother and sister-in-law treated me to a weekend at Tassajara, the san francisco zen center’s monastery in the ventana wilderness. most of the year Tassajara is a closed and working monastery, but they open up to guest season for a few months each summer. as a mountain retreat, they got it right. getting there isn’t easy: the road in to the center of the remote valley is the bumpiest, steepest, toughest 14 miles of dirt road i’ve ever encountered (even having grown up driving around the backwoods of idaho), so it’s not a trip to undertake lightly, and there’s no quick trips back to town once you’re there. the sense of isolation is complete. they have the required amenities (running water, delicious vegetarian food), but not the unnecessary ones (electricity, internet/phone service). this works because: kerosene lanterns are charming, but outhouse stink is not.

staying at Tassajara is the opposite of being on a cruise ship. rather than providing a day full of activities, Tassajara provides a beautiful, open space, in which guests can just slow down for a little while. there isn’t much to do besides hike, read, nap, and bathe in the beautiful bathhouses (fed by natural hotsprings). zen practice is available for those who want to participate, and though i am fascinated by it (my dojo in chicago also served as a zen temple and many of the aikidoka i trained with were also zen students), it also terrifies me. seriously, the thought of sitting sesshin for five days makes me feel panicky. i can’t even get up the nerve to attend a half-hour zazen. it’s an understatement to say that i have trouble with being still. i’m quite aware that this is something i need to come to terms with. just…i’ll get there when i’m ready. until then i creep around the edges, with things like aikido and yoga and hanging around monasteries as a guest.

in spite of the fact that i’m normally an action-packed-adventure vacationer, there really is something profound about a vacation in which there’s nothing to do. i noticed that i walk differently when i’m not in a hurry. (and i’m pretty much always in a hurry). my posture changes, i relax muscles that are normally tensed, my whole gait & posture change. and this transformation was almost immediate. within minutes of arriving, i found my whole body felt different. while hiking i’d catch myself trying to push further, faster – get some cardio exercise, or see what was around the next bend. and then i’d remind myself to try being deliberate in my actions, just to see what it’s like. there’s nothing i have to accomplish with this hike, no time i’m due back. to notice where i walk, what i see, what the path feels like under my feet. i’d grasp that focus for a few moments, then it would slip away again. like all unfamiliar habits, it only comes through practice. a practice i’m not quite ready to undertake, but i know it’s out there. but for the short duration of the vacation, i found that going off the grid was easier than it seemed. its like quitting a job you’ve worked very hard at. quitting seems like it’ll be agonizing, but once you actually pack up your things and leave, it’s easier to detach than you thought it was going to be (is there an echo of a zen lesson in here? yeah yeah, shut up little bird on my shoulder.)

also, i knocked off a 101 in 1001 list item, by the way — skinny dipping in the creek.

new home.

{09 May 2009}

as of june 20, give or take a couple of days, i live here. oh yeah, i’m moving to california. i haven’t officially blogged about the big move here yet, tho i’m pretty sure that most everyone who reads this already knows i’m going.

i was trying to figure out why i’ve been putting off blogging about something so obvious and significant, while making time to blog about the color of the lake on a morning’s run, or what color Ira Glass’s dreamy eyes were, or puns on swine flu. i think, in part, because i dislike it when i put up poorly-written “catch up on the last few weeks/months” posts, because i never really intended for slithy tove to be a news wire of my rather ordinary life (update! i had a cheese sandwich for lunch. update! it’s raining. *yawn*). i’ve been thinking lately about what on earth slithy tove IS for. it’s not the same thing that it was when i started, and i’ve thought about closing the doors a number of times, but i just don’t quite want to. i love writing to the ether. of course, when i write some part of me is aware of and governed by my actual readers, made up of a few friends and family, mostly, but there’s something lovely and poetic about writing to the universe, putting it out there for anyone or no one to read. my blog is a language sketchbook. a place for me play with words, and maybe, once in a while, the exercise of writing routinely leaves me with a turn of phrase here or there that i’m pleased with. in the mean time, i process, i learn from the act of writing and re-writing more about what’s in my head than i would if just scribbled it down in a private journal and filed it away. which is why i dislike half-assed posts that are just announcements of what i did yesterday, with no attention to language or shape or texture.

but, putting that aside for a moment: I AM MOVING TO CALIFORNIA. there, announcement made.

i think the other reason i’ve putting off blogging this post is because i don’t have a succinct way of writing about this change, because it’s not a simple decision and my feelings about it are all scattered about on the floor. professionally, i’m moving to take a job, it’s a good promotion with a good company, and i’m lucky to have it. i’m excited about finding work that challenges me again, work where i feel like my contribution truly determines the direction that the art takes. i was tired of feeling superfluous. and personally, i was feeling this profound sense of stasis. i love my life here. i love my friends, the arts community here, the sports i play, the way chicago blooms in may and comes to life in june, warm summer nights and sunrise over the lake. i love cheap falafel and cheering for the underdog cubbies as tho i actually care about pro sports and riding my bike to work and my aikido dojo and walking into a party and knowing that i’ll know half the people there because i am an integral part of this arts community. but my life today is pretty much the same as it was three years ago. i’m better at the jobs i’m doing, i’m making a little more money, but basically, nothing was changing. and around me, the lives of my friends are changing in big dramatic ways, and rather than feeling secure in my stability, i was feeling stifled by it. i can’t stop time, i can’t cling to the things and the people that i love, so i need to move forward, boldly, gracefully*, instead.

so here i go. off the cliff. i tippy-toed around and whined about it for a good long time, but i finally made the plunge (and signed the contract and the lease, just to make it stick). it’s time for the next chapter.

well, we strive for grace, anyway. it can be elusive.