White Blank Page

Stealing the title from a song by my newest musical fascination Mumford and Sons feels right enough now a full month since my last blog post. The computer screen presents its own version of a white, blank page as does my mind, all but for a bit of longing I feel for a quiet, clean slate with no intrusive words or thoughts. Now what would Mr. Freud have to say about that? But the words they do intrude and I'm here again on a slow July afternoon ticking away at the keys with nothing more exciting on my mind than the thought of weeding a garden.

The large plot my sisters and I have cultivated is growing. The potatoes, squash, beans and corn are thriving, as are their fiercest competitors, weeds. Now in the thick of the season I go to the garden to commit a slew of murders on the bindweeds (we called them morning glory when I was a kid) and the red roots my grandpa says can be used to fatten pigs. It's tedious, but only as tedious as meditation. Once I'm there and in a groove, I rather enjoy it. I've unintentionally chased mother spiders carrying egg sacks into nearby holes and left beetles scurrying for the next patch of overgrowth, only to be disrupted again my my pink gloved hands of the goddess. If the earth is soft, the roots slide out with satisfying ease. Similarly to beginning a bike ride or working through sun salutations, I start out with my mind chatter racing on an on about pretty much nothing: imaginary conversations I'll never have, plans, lists, sentences I think I might write. Chit, chit, chit, chit. I can get pretty worked up emotionally. It's a hoot, really. So I'm constantly reeling my attention back in to my breath, the the next stem I'll pinch just below the soil, the feel of a bead of sweat making its way down the funnel of my spine. After 20 minutes or so I can look back and see the cleared space behind me with only the foliage of potato plants. Mmm. That's nice. On a good day I can slow the monkey mind down, too, or at least recognize it for the biological functioning of the organ we call a brain and not Ultimate Reality. That's nice, too. I get a little less worked up then.

Yesterday I spent two and a half hours in that weeding dynamic, feeling good about clearing, erasing, creating some white blank page.  I began to see myself there on the edge between cleared space on the left hand and rampant jungle on the right, sensing the next generation of jungle was waiting to burst into the empty spaces the moment I turned my back. As nice as the quiet is, I also saw in me something that likes noise, disturbance, passion. I wrote before about this thick, comforting, human mess that is life and poetry. A part of me wouldn't trade in the mess for all the equanimity in China, and I have to be honest about that. Well, that is until I see the wreckage left in the wake of passion fueled by fantasy and mis-viewing the world as it is. Maybe there's right passion, a fierce kind of love that's based in reality. Where would be the fault in loving life, as it is, with one's whole heart? (Even if life doesn't appear to return the affection.) But right view first, I think. You have to really see it to love it. I doubt I do, at least fully. So I turn to the right and start picking at the unnecessary grasses and vines that would choke the life out of plants that will nourish me later. And so it goes.

Like I said, nothing more exciting than just this. My summer break has been all about weeding. This morning I ravaged my bookshelves and let go of most titles crowding the space on my shelves. I also turned in a letter of resignation to the fitness center where I teach yoga, opening the space for my own practice. I need more room to breathe when I get back to the daily ins and outs of teaching school. I've weeded most TV out of my system, too. I watched a few shows at the beginning of summer, but now I like not watching someone else's drama or hearing someone else tell me how the world is. I'm functioning on minimal plans which keeps me from feeling disappointed when they don't work out anyway. I've been frequently, pleasantly surprised by serendipity and have relished the company of the living, breathing people around me more. Summer vacations are a luxury, a perk of my job, I guess. Can I maintain some white blank page when I'm back in the thick of the game playing my role in this fast, modern culture? Time will tell.

These Are The Days it Never Rains But It Pours

The word "retreat" has been on my mind this week that has seemed like just too much mindless running on a treadmill. I even looked up a Zen retreat in Santa Fe--still thinking about that one. Several quiet days of not doing could do me a world of good. Yes, that's a romantic view of it. I know it's harder than it looks. I'd be wrestling with urges to seek out entertainment that couldn't be found, no Facebook or YouTube to fritter away the hours. Who knows what else would bubble up when all other distractions were limited? And still, I could go.

I received an email requesting my submission for the Parent Council newsletter of my children's school. The sender apologetically asked for our blurbs so that she could get this newsletter out in this busy time of year. What makes this time particularly busy? I don't deny it, but what? Is it the hustle and bustle of Valentine's? President's Day? The incredibly beautiful intimation of spring we've got going on outside even as I write? The only thing that makes it busy is us.

Looking for some solace, and probably some escape, I stumbled on the exquisite performance of "Under Pressure" with David Bowie and the mystery performer who says as much when she cuts off the sound as she does belting it out. Who is she? If you know, let me in on the secret. There are a couple of lines I swear I heard for the first time, "It's the terror of knowing what this world's all about," hits me with a sense of what we see when we strip away our pretenses and ideas about what's what. Seeing. And then transcending an old-fashioned, romantic notion of love for something that dares us to care "for the people on the edge of the night" as well as for ourselves in a new way.  The song recharges me with its undercurrent urgency.

This morning I allowed myself to wake naturally. With every intention of planning out a yoga class for this Sunday community that's gathering momentum, I sat down with coffee in hand and laptop in lap. I did a quick check of some blogs and took a peek into one I don't read as often, Mind Deep. The author has posted a number of videos of Jon Kabat-Zin. Telling myself I didn't have time for this, I don't have time to spend an hour watching a video on meditation, no, I've got a yoga class to prepare, I've got to correct a stack of spelling tests and homework assignments and make Valentine's cards for each of my 27 students, and read my assignment for class this week, and look up restaurants to celebrate V-Day with my significant others, and, and, and, and I'm glad I watched the entire clip.  Retreat! Drop everything! What is THIS? (I don't know!)

Maybe you don't have the time either, but dip your toes in for a few minutes and see.   If you can watch the entire clip, there's some good insight in the last ten minutes about being human when Kabat-Zin mentions Philip Zimbardo and a lecture entitled "The Banality of Evil." At the very least, this clip did me good in the way Bowie does, in giving me a motive to take up meditation that has nothing to do with attaining enlightenment and everything to do with simply finding an awareness of what THIS is, and looking love in the face when it dares you to change your way of caring for yourself.