Holding Things Close & Letting Them Go ...

Tomorrow I will face another birthday, and I must admit that I've been been repeatedly announcing to any who will listen lately that I'm going to be 70 so that I will actually believe it!  These decade birthdays are tricky.  As soon as you land on one, you begin to look back at the others:  reminiscing with yourself about what it felt like to be 50, 60, or god knows, even 40.  I swear that I can't go back beyond 40.  That seems too far...  It becomes pretty dim, like the swirl of chaotic memories I have been navigating lately in my book.
Yesterday I had a surprising conversation with a young woman in her late thirties, I'm guessing, who was actually reflecting on how cool she thought older people were.  They in fact didn't seem old to her.  And I started to think about the delights that come with the increased freedom as you get older.  Freedom to think your own weird thoughts without apology, freedom to just up and go to the movies at the last moment, spend a lot of your day in your pajamas, eat left-over chicken for the third time, or better yet, splurge on an expensive sushi dinner!  Yes, freedom comes, and slowing down comes, and reflections galore.  You spend a lot of time in your head; you settle in there and begin the process of getting to know your elder self.  You don't worry -- and this I told the young woman with great pleasure -- about the things you're NOT going to do in your life.  There is nothing to prove to yourself anymore, except perhaps that you have the desire and capacity to take good care of yourself, and open your heart to others.  You worry less about going out there and changing the wrongs of the world.  You stay close to home.
Speaking of staying close to home, I am acutely aware of the things I hold close, as I remain close to home.  They are, for starters:  those I love, and my cats.  And finding truth.   My Zen calendar had a great message for me today -- it said:  "Love of the truth puts you on the spot."  Yes sirree, it does!  I recently experienced one of the great noble truths when I forged ahead to uncover a truth that was not going to be forthcoming, and I experienced suffering.  Yes, there was hurt in my heart because for some reason I assumed that everyone in the world held the same conviction as I that telling the truth is an inherently good and necessary thing to do as long as we watch our intentions, of course, and not speak "truths" with destructive or harmful wishes.  What I discovered in this last experience was that I was not in control (yet again!), and that there would be things inside the heads of others that I would never know, no matter how much I persevered in the cause of truth.  What do you do then?  Well, of course you let it all go, and breathe, and put one foot in front of the other to engage in the array of opportunities that present themselves to you.  Everything IS uncertain, and some of what comes can be unpleasant, BUT also some of what shows up is pure magic, a tiny fragment of time that sets your heart stirring, like a little house finch gobbling up seeds on your roof, or listening to the words of Alice Walker.  Small moments, big expanded feelings...
We must let go and show up, or show up and let go, whether we're 70 or 40, really.  I do think that as we age we have an easier time with this letting go stuff.  Is it that we just have less energy to wage all our battles?  Or ... that we are in fact wiser?  I like to think the wisdom plays a part because that just sounds better to me! I've always loved the idea of being wise.  And it is wise to see that all the varied and uncertain phenomena we meet make for a great adventure.
Tonight I will share a dinner with a number of people I hold very dear, and have gratitude for this array of good friends and family.  If you don't have love and closeness in your life, you miss the point of this human journey, I am positive.  And the more you see the ephemeral nature of loving relationships, the more extraordinary and beautiful they become.  As I get older I promise to pause so I can really see what is in front of me, to be held with care, and to express my own true nature.  I cannot do this if I stay entangled in struggle, unable to let go... I'm going to remember the words of the wise Thai forest monk Ajhan Cha who said in so many words that the more you let go the more happiness will be yours.
And tomorrow I will get in my car and drive north to the ocean to be in my little beach house and work for a week on revisions of my manuscript, and I will bring with me my beloved cats and the affection of those I have had the fortune to call loved ones.  That sounds like a most lovely prospect, and I'm sure all of this will dull whatever angst I have been carrying about becoming old.  Simple as that........

Drops of Rain

  Was it something that was said yesterday or just listening to the rain falling on my roof on this grey Sunday morning that makes me want to talk about impermanence?  About the truth of everything mutating moment by moment in our lives and continually becoming ... something different.  Rain, the food I eat, and the cat who perches on my desk one day looking right at me and today with his back to me ... It is clear that nothing is solid.  The earth is different this morning than it was yesterday, my body has changed because I ate salmon and potatoes and beet salad at a party last night, and the cat ... well, cats are enormous mysteries, aren't they?  Yesterday he was interested in staring me down as I wrote, and today not so much.  Beautifully different.
   When you admit to the not knowing, to the mystery, it makes the world a fascinating place, one in which you can be always curious.  There is a lightness and a freedom in that.  And in being curious you will have realizations, you will gain wisdom and understanding.
   I sat yesterday at the Green Dragon Monastery - aka Green Gulch Farm - north of San Francisco on a deeply misty morning along with a handful of my fellow Zen Hospice volunteers in order to consider the value of sangha, or community.  We sat on dark pillows and heard the rain on the roof of our yurt and our teacher said with a sly smile, "it's all about impermanence."  He was repeating something Suzuki Roshi told a student, I think, which pointed to the blurring of boundaries between inner and outer, the fluid character of existence, and the interdependence of all beings.  And on this peaceful day yesterday we were urged to carry this understanding of impermanence into our work with the dying, not just because we are dealing with death (certainly a symbol of impermanence), but because we as witnesses to death become part of the landscape of arising and falling away, coming and going, as we show up without our agendas and plans.  Agendas actually don't work here.  Remember:  we are not in control, and everything changes.  We are  now free to be shown the mystery of the end of life.  The dying will actually teach us how to do it...
   Last night I attended the 80th birthday party of a very dear friend, a woman I have known for forty years or so.  I watched as she accepted with grace the speeches of her loving daughters, and all the raised champagne glasses toasting her wonderfulness, and I marveled at her snow white hair and the bright light that shone in her face.  Though her fine snow white hair has shown up recently, the bright light from her spirit and heart has always been there, or perhaps it is coming through more clearly now that she manifests a certain transparency.  As we become older, I believe we're consciously and unconsciously shedding our skins, our stuff, our thoughts, and the surface of our bodies and our lives becomes less hard and tough, and more translucent.  We become more who we really are.
And for that I am very grateful.
Proud.
And more myself.


From Peter Matthiessen's Snow Leopard:

"... there is no real edge to anything, that in the endless interpretation of the universe, a molecular flow, a cosmic energy shimmers in all stone and steel as well as flesh."

"As We Get Older...." Looking at a New Decade

It seems that every year the month of January, that sometimes dreary period following the holidays, goes by more quickly.  And this year is no exception.  Of course for part of it, I was marching about in New Zealand, trying to keep up with daughter of longer legs and more speed.  Following my landing back in San Francisco I continued to battle a respiratory illness that I had carried with me for much of the trip (do I hear a "no fair" in response?), and thus many more days just blurred on by. And now we're staring right at the end of the month, which brings me to my granddaughters birthday (she'll be 15 I think - eek!), and the long uncelebrated anniversary of my marriage to my children's father.  And THEN, February arrives and delivers my birthday.  This year I will be 70 years old, which is a daunting sounding, daunting looking number, I must say!  There's no kidding ourselves now that we're not old.  Seventy is NOT the "new 50" or anything like that.  Yes, we are living longer, but the old body still ages with inexorable regularity.  Old is what we're becoming.

So I decided that before I gather friends and family about me to be celebratory about being 70, I would reflect on pieces of my journey, and on what I see are graceful consequences of becoming older, less powerful and more vulnerable. A doctor told me today that "as we get older, our systems don't respond to trouble (e.g. infection) as quickly..." and to top that off, they apparently continue to respond to infection even after the insult has actually ended!  That sounds a tad deranged to me, but sadly it makes some sense.  Things are wearing out.  But not my brain, I swear it!  Much of my life I fed myself knowledge in a voracious manner -- I read books a lot, big important books, I studied Shakespeare and Homer and James Joyce and even William Faulkner...... I became an ongoing student of literature.  And happily it has stayed with me.  I see it showing up in my writing all the time.  The other workout my brain got as I grew was traveling to far away places, and doing it a lot.  It all started when I was taken by my quixotic and crazy mother to live in Italy at age 11.  I was hooked from then on and have traveled with both the important men in my life and also traveled solo.  I think I have been looking for the understanding that we humans are all essentially connected and of the same heart, whether we live in India or Burma or Paris, France.  There were love affairs with both music and food, and these too had early roots, as I learned to cook in Italy, and to shop in markets where the most beautiful vegetables could be found, and I discovered the beautiful world of classical music because my grandmother pointed the way as she played her baby grand piano.  My heart still softens and melts at the sight of a perfect roast chicken or the sound of a Bach Invention.  I have been beautifully educated, and even though the body tires of performing, my mind (and heart) are still beating wildly because of how long I've trained them.

Speaking of training, I thought I could train myself to walk 100 miles in Africa amongst the elephants this summer, but I have discovered that this was more problematic than I had thought.  I have bad knees, bad ankles, and I am not an exercise freak who's going to spend every day of the week at the gym to condition myself to walk those 100 miles.  So I admit I cannot.  So what.  I can still journey to Africa and see the grand beasts in another kind of experience.  What we need to "get" as we march onward into our last phase is that while we have strong wills and great imaginations, they are no match for the impermanence of the body. Humility and letting go are necessary.  What else do I have to relinquish, I wonder?  Perhaps the notion that I will re-read William Shakespeare in a definitive way, take down from the bookcase my grandmother's little leather bound books, and sink into deep study.  Lovely idea, isn't it?  But...  I want to read new things, like Matthiessen's The Snow Leopard, and Gawande's On Being Mortal, and any number of recent memoirs by sharp and interesting women.  And though I am attempting to re-read Anna Karenina, one of my most beloved novels, I may not make it.  As yummy as the idea is of losing myself in this glorious book, I somehow don't feel I have the time.  There are too many things pulling at me.  Like finishing the memoir I've spent the last two years working on and trying to market it (ugh to this last part!).  Like planning a trip to the Galapagos with some of my family.  Like going to Florence this spring to stay in an apartment alone - a luscious birthday gift to myself to make up for not going to Africa.  I used to think I would learn all of Bach's Goldberg Variations, but my wise teacher reminded me that I was in this business of learning Bach in order to have fun, be happy -- NOT to prove something.  He was right.  Learn the pieces you love and let go of ambition to be accomplished.

What I've been playing with here is the importance of relinquishing expectation, and keeping your vision clear and your intention honest.  How do you want your last decades to look?  Probably not engaged in a struggle to become something different.  You are what you are.  And it's good one you are (sounding a bit Irish here!).  And the threads of your very fortunate life are still wonderfully present -- the books, the food, the music, and of course your children and grandchildren of whom you're very proud.  And on top of that you have summoned the courage to tell a story of your life that peels away many layers, struggles with imperfect memory, and presents a pretty interesting character.  Not bad, eh?

Returning to my Work

It has been a week since I flew back to San Francisco from "down under," that pristine little country of New Zealand where they seem infinitely sensible, and I've spent the time trying to recover from a nasty respiratory illness and deep fatigue.  Happy to say that I'm finally back.
Though I toted parts of my manuscript with me on the trip, I got little done.  And that's o.k.  It was "vacation" after all!  This book I've been working on has been inhabiting my brain for a year a half now, and is not likely to dissipate with a few weeks of disregard.  I think I took the pages of writing with me because, like Joan Didion, there was a certain comfort to be derived from having my words on the page VERY close to me physically ... as though they would continually seep into my brain just because I had them close to the bed where I slept.  And because the words from the pages moved through time and space toward me, my brain could mysteriously and quietly work on them.  When I was in high school I remember putting the notes I'd written for a test under my pillow at night!  And I was always convinced that it worked in the end...
So I am returning to work on the revision of the chapters of this book - ten of them in all - and I am discovering what most writers already know:  the primary challenge is in the revision.  And revision is the hardest thing of all!  It seems that every time I return to a sentence or paragraph, I can think of yet a different way to write the same thing.  And I ask myself :  how long does all this go on?  The answer: until it stops happening.  Cardinal rules I'm trying to keep in mind:  tell unadulterated truth (even though you embellish here and there), keep it clean and honest, write the way you would tell the story, show as much as you can ... keep remembering that someone is sitting there about to read all these words, and try not to bore them.
One of my struggles is that I'm afraid I am too preoccupied with myself.  The subjects of my writing are so familiar and so interesting to me (Burma, Paris, India, and African elephants, for instance), that I forget that I may be circling endlessly and monotonously around the workings of my mind.  I guess part of this is true -- it is my own mind that I'm using to investigate and speak.  And, to give myself some pats on the back here, I think my patterns of thought are actually kind of interesting -- e.g.  looking into the hero's journey, seeing the parallels between literature and real life experience, finding a spiritual path in looking at art, letting go of pain and suffering, and investigating the Buddhist perception of non-duality...  I guess I figure these are thoughts that a number of readers out there might share.  Am I right?  I am looking too at the interconnection between the far past and the present day.  I ended up in India to examine duality and non-duality because I lived a life with a woman who forever set herself apart from the mundaneness of real life.  I went to Burma because I was seeking a deeper understanding of the Buddha's way.  I lingered in art museums in Paris because I was raised by a quixotic, selfish, but gifted painter who was driven to create beauty.  I walked slowly through the Killing Fields in Cambodia because I have been haunted by death.
Am currently struggling with a title for my book, my collection of pieces about travel and self-revelation.  Every single title I come up with is too long and convoluted.  I started out with:  Bowing Camels and Bloody Red Roses.  Then I added to that:  The Journey Out and Back.  Too bland, I realized.  And much later I thought about something like this:  Finding Myself in the Landscape of Memory.  Oh well ... it's still a work in progress.  I love the first part, because the image of the camels is poignant for me, pulled from a time in India where I entered a palatial hotel from the dirty chaotic streets of Rajasthan and colorfully dressed camels bowed to me  The roses are the ones at the grave of Frederic Chopin in Paris, and they conjure my tragic mother and her love of beauty and the color red.  Images are important here, but so are over-arching ideas...
Am reading a book about memoir writing called Handling the Truth, and the writer quotes Patricia Hampl who says, "True memoir is written, like all literature, in an attempt to find not only a self but a world."  I love this.  And as I go back to revise and tune all these pages of memory, I am trying to make sure that there is as much of the world in there as there is myself.  And I am also noticing that my theme of discovery of self through travel is coming through pretty clearly.  And so, as long as I can stand to review my thoughts and purpose, I will be revisiting this work so I can bring it all forth as clearly and honestly as possible.
Happy New Year to all you who arrive here to read and think about this!

A Wise Young Place Far Away

I am sitting under an awning outside my villa at the Vintner's Retreat in Marlborough, New Zealand, gazing at a magnificent expanse of vineyards stretching out before me, and thinking, why this looks a lot like the Napa Valley : a lush valley surrounded by hills and beautiful vines everywhere, but no, this is a sometimes tropical, very green landscape where they drive on the wrong side of the road, where they speak in often unfathomable accents with the flat a's and e's, eat sausage rolls, and say, "jolly good," and "brilliant" for positive emphasis.  Very hospitable, very safe they are here.  Reminds me of traveling in Ireland where the goodwill and hospitality of the Irish washed over me and in no time caused me to become more cheery, genteel, and kind myself!

After staying in a house near Auckland for some days, and making numerous drives into the countryside around, we headed to the South Island for the next chapter of our visit.  Though plagued for days by a head cold that won't quit, I soldier on because I must, and have been responding right and left to the kindness that surrounds me.   My terribly clogged head has made understanding the Kiwis just a little harder than normal, but I don't mind asking people politely to repeat themselves.  I guess it comes with age.

The landscape here defies description.... I have been meaning to chronicle the visual experience and each time I was about to sit down with it, I paused, and hesitated, and in fact didn't move forward.  I think when it comes to capturing physical beauty I am (we are) daunted.  Language can be painfully inadequate when it comes to looking at the sublime.  But oh well, here I go:

The oceans and bays here have water that is various blues and greens and turquoises, and crystal clear.  Like the tropical waters I've floated on in the Caribbean... The forests are dark and lush, almost jungle like, with trees I've never seen before.  The mountains are significant and covered in green.  Lakes abound and again with a pristine beauty that surpasses most bodies of water I've laid eyes on.  Yet, here I sit at the edge of a vineyard and there are big pink rose bushes growing (not so foreign), and yesterday we saw eucalyptus and beautiful crops of silvery grey olives trees at the edge of one of the vineyards -- again something familiar. We took a wine tour yesterday with a beautiful warm woman called Faye who drove a cushy black BMW 700 with perfect air conditioning and took us from one end of the valley to the other as she narrated the inspiring details about the NZ wine culture.  They have been at it for only forty years and seem to be flawlessly at the top of their game, many of them producing organic wines.  She had worked herself in the vineyards when she was younger, and she knew her stuff.  The temperature hit the high 80's and we motored on through the intense heat, sipping way too much Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Noir, but it felt glorious and perfect somehow!  

This land is lovingly cared for, diligently protected and nurtured by the people here.  This is a young country with a lot of earnest wisdom about conserving resources, and loving the environment.  They are a younger people than we are in America but they seem on some levels wiser and more present when it comes to the land, sea, and animals.  We took a boat trip on Queen Charlotte Sound the other day looking for dolphins, and viewing rare seabirds.  The island of Motuara is a bird sanctuary, one of many where birds close to extinction are helped to live without predators.  They are monitored and protected, the most incredible of which was the small (and rare!) blue penguin.  We were able to see them nesting in little especially constructed boxes as they molted and protected their eggs -- a matched pair -- husband and wife.  The ethereal grayish blue of their feathers that made you want to reach out and stroke it.  We stood in silence and just loved them instead...  We learned about Project Jonah which trains anyone to assist in the tending of stranded seals and small whales, and I bought a kooky reusable tea/coffee cup to remind me of their valiant mission.  

I thought that I would miss my usual cultural fixes when I came here, so conditioned am I to museums and art and heady learning, but I have found this refreshing and inspiring.  Yes, there is art, and yes, people do write and read books here, but it is the culture of stewardship of the land and all that comes from the land that is so interesting and moving.  From that come all the extraordinary wines, the quite sophisticated cuisine with bountiful seafood, the exotic carved green jade, and hard woods which are products of the enduring Maori culture, and most importantly:  the good will.

People drive fast here on that wrong side of the road - we've discovered that - but they are kind and generous and content in their lives from what I've seen.  A non fiction writer I've been reading lately described the state of contentment as "being in the right life (living in a place where you connect to a community, doing meaningful work, surrounding yourself with people you enjoy, respect, and love)."  Yes.  When you are doing earnest and righteous work and living in awareness of the present moment, this sort of happiness comes.  I believe this is going on here, and it is a very good thing indeed.  

The Gift of Music at Grace Cathedral

Prayers in the Air at Grace

Last night I noticed that it was warm at Grace Cathedral as I sat for two and half hours listening to the Messiah.  I do this every Christmas time - I go to Grace and listen to the American Bach Soloists sing and play their hearts out in this magnificent gothic structure, surrounded by thousands, music lovers and those bound to tradition, all sitting on hard pews, all dressed up in dark holiday attire, all relaxing and breathing together as Handel's magnificent music washes over them.  The faces of the soloists shone with a pleasure and sense of inhabiting the words of devotion in this oratorio.  The musicians mostly smiled as they stroked their ancient violins and cellos... 

Devotion and trust and good will.   Christ was all about good will, wasn't he?  Treat others as you wish to be treated.  See yourself in others...  He would have been gratified that this country was about to reach out to the heart-ful and suffering people of Cuba, I'm sure of it.  And that our black president had worked hard to make an equitable health system in this country.  And that people were baring their souls about the unjust violence perpetrated against young African American men. And that countless unnamed people give their time and their resources to help the hungry, the dying, the vanishing wildlife on the planet.  There is some goodness in the land.  I don't know whether they are the "10,000 Joys" or not, but we can see our humanity rising to meet trouble.

We were told this performance was being recorded and urged to maintain quiet as best we could throughout, and of course what happened part of the way through was I had to cough.  A hideous tickle bubbling up in me.  Deep breathing didn't help.  A woman dressed beautifully in black and red who sat next to me offered me a little tin of round candies.  And those lovely little morsels did the trick.  As I said, it is about trust and good will.  Christ was a human being - now more alive for me than he ever was when I was younger - who believed in the essential goodness of man, of ALL men.  And he was a humble man, too, who dedicated himself to teaching his fellow human beings and bringing them from the darkness of ignorance into the light.  Much like the Buddha, really.  The music of Handel in his Messiah, of Bach in his Passion of St. Matthew or his Mass in B Minor, offers us a musical canvas that shows what this generosity of heart feels like.  We hear and sense the joy of believing, the sadness of cruel loss, and the hope that we're all capable of having lives of beauty and goodness.  As I think I said in my memoir when I was writing about the influence of JS Bach, he showed me what the love of God felt and sounded like through his music.  And for that I will always be grateful.

I am moving now from an angst-ridden, anxious feeling that I didn't like December and dreaded the enforced togetherness of holiday celebrations where we need everything to be perfect.  No, we know that everything cannot be perfect -- we sweep the floor, wash the dishes, feed the cats, light the candles, and breathe deeply, touching that openness of heart that we're all capable of.  And then everything is fine.

I wish love and peace to all in this fragile and beautiful time...

The Pleasure of a Solitary Movie & Why We Need to Welcome all the Guests

In a beautiful poem by Rumi called "The Guest House," he writes:
                   
                              This being human is a guest house.
                               Every morning a new arrival.

                              A joy, a depression, a meanness,
                            some momentary awareness comes
                                    as an unexpected visitor.


And it goes on, of course.  This poem is framed and hung in the dining room at Zen Hospice Project's beautiful Victorian house which we have always called "the guest house."  I work here every week.   It hangs here to remind us of the ever changing nature of our lives, the temporary character of the human journey, the ineffable preciousness of the ride we're on.  It makes me think that not only is there a "new arrival" every morning, but perhaps every hour of the day, if we are open to it.  And our task if we are to live mindfully and follow the Buddha (or not), is to take what presents itself to us.  Invite it in as we would a guest on our doorstep...
Yesterday evening I went to the movies by myself, enjoying the fact that I've been doing this pretty much all my life.  As a child of 10 or 11, I used to walk to the Palace Theater on Washington Square and buy a movie ticket for 50 cents, and sink into a seat in the dark, leaving behind my angst and my own bad stories.  I just sat myself down in the seat, and opened the door to a new guest.  Yesterday I saw a hugely creative film called "Birdman" which tells a deep story seriously and comedically.  An aging actor loaded with self doubt mounts a huge effort to create a comeback for himself, so the world will again love him and he can see himself as worthwhile, or even wonderful.  The entire film rides on this obsession of his to dig himself out of the hole of self loathing, in a way.  I identified with this, yes I did, because I saw that some choices I've made in my adult life have been to create a self I can get others to notice, then admire, respect, and love.  This is problematic, if not damning.  In our logical mind we understand that creating personas so that others will adore us is false, and we know too that loving ourselves is the most profound goal, and yet we forge ahead trying to make out of ourselves something deeply significant to the world.
While Michael Keaton's heartbreaking rendering of his character in the movie shows someone who has pursued the same path all his life, I have tried more than one "career" as I went along, hungering for a belonging and, yes, approval.  Teaching was a most exciting role that I chose in the eighties, it felt natural, and it made me feel gloriously alive, and I thought I'd do it forever.  I was good at it, and amazingly I understood that.  But personal upheaval in my life and the need to re-group forced a change.  I moved into jewelry design, working for a change with my hands, and it felt exciting in the beginning: to fashion things of surprising beauty without any great master plan. But my struggle came when I tried to become a commercial success.  I wanted to make my mark, because I really thought I had something beautiful and unique to sell.  I failed at this because I was not a good business person, because the market wasn't the right market, and finally I decided that there was something better to do than peddle beads while educating the public about their worth.  I turned in a very interesting new direction, became a volunteer at Zen Hospice Project, and for the last nine years have been attending those who are dying.  An extraordinary "career" that has no room in it for trying to be noticed or adored.  It is service pure and simple, and it allows you to give and receive love every day you show up.  People who are working out the complexities of their last days have no time to become "fans."  Thank god.
My heart went out to the Michael Keaton character in the film yesterday, I actually felt an aching inside my body for the person who drives him/herself so desperately to find relevance.  Because I remembered it in myself...  It still lurks there as I peck away at revising my memoir manuscript, turning the pages, making marks and adding thoughts, erasing thoughts, and trying so hard to create a wonderful book.  I don't want or need to be famous like the guy in the movie, but I really want to see my words in print.  And I also know that if I can't make that happen I will have to wrangle again with the self worth demons who screech at me.
I need to remember that as the hours and days and months unfold, many new guests are going to arrive before me, and I need to keep opening the door.