Home from Retreat

I'm home from retreat. I'm back. My body is back, my mind is still in swirly wanderland.

I really like being on retreat. I like meditating, I like ringing the big gong, I like staying up late giggling with my coworkers. I like having meals made for me, and the food was mostly great. A few too many hardboiled eggs for protein, and I'm clearly more addicted to kombucha to keep me ungassy, but well, so it goes.

Meditation retreat is such a precious gift. I can't believe I have a job where I get to go on retreat for a week once a year. A gift! It is so incredible seeing the students at the end of a 3 year graduate training program that is so much more than just training to work with others. Getting to see and hear students speaking their truth in so many ways was amazing, powerful, and inspiring.

There was a lot of pain this week--my knees are unhappy, my back is tight, my heart is aching. And I just want to be held. And right now I am alone. My best girl dol in her amazing thoughtfulness invited my roomie, Mr. Guy, over to play tonight, so they could hang out, and I could have some decompression time. I considered going over there to hang, but I'm not ready for lots of people yet. I'm unpacking, I'm decompressing, I'm reflecting and trying not to process too much.

When I got back to cell phone range, I found many messages from friends--I will call you tomorrow, as I'm not quite ready to make calls.

Sincerely yours,

The Outrageous Buddha Buzzard

the coconut poem

TIMELY RAIN

by Chogyam Trungpa





In the jungles of flaming ego,
May there be cool iceberg of bodhicitta.


On the racetrack of bureaucracy,
May there be the walk of the elephant.


May the sumptuous castle of arrogance
Be destroyed by vajra confidence.


In the garden of gentle sanity,
May you be bombarded by coconuts of wakefulness.



20 October 1977

home from retreat

I'm back from a week-long meditation retreat and my heart is open and achy and tender.

I got home a little before 5pm on Saturday and slept 15 hours. I spent most of yesterday in bed and took today off to mope and to recover from this cold/cough that started yesterday.

While I was on retreat Nemo my cat died. This weekend one of my chickens, Big Mama died. I suppose the message from the universe is "LET GO!" or perhaps "Remember Impermanence!"

I'm so attached to this graduating group, and I know I need to let them go. They are so amazing and brave and strong and talented and smart and loving and wow, I guess I could go on and on. This group has been my "baby"...I started a few months before they began their journey, even interviewed some of them. I sat in on classes with this group, learned to meditate with this group, mourned my first pets, Chicken and Duck, with this group, watched them develop as a community and as therapists.

I am so proud of them all. And it is so hard to let them go.

Tomorrow I head back up to SMC to set up the next month-long retreat.

First Snow and Practice Day

Today, October 17, 2006 we got the first snow! It's been snowing pretty steadily for the last several hours, but has only in the last half hour started to stick to the grass...no sticking to the other surfaces yet.

Today was also Fall Community Practice Day at Naropa (where I work). All classes were cancelled and offices closed. I took myself to breakfast in Boulder this morning and then sat (meditation) with the first year students from 9-10:30. I had to come home after that because Pokie's boyfriend was scheduled to come up for an afternoon visit, but because of the weather that got cancelled. I considered going back down to Boulder to do more sitting because I really wanted to, but I got stuck at the house...it is SO hard to leave a cozy home to drive 30+ minutes back to Boulder in crappy weather. This at least gave me the kick in the butt I needed to get myself on the cushion again.

I'd been pretty down on the coming winter, but seeing the snow...well, it is just so pretty :)

We picked another 2 cups of raspberries last night. The chickens have only been laying 3 eggs a day...this cold weather is hard on them!

First Snow and Practice Day

Today, October 17, 2006 we got the first snow! It's been snowing pretty steadily for the last several hours, but has only in the last half hour started to stick to the grass...no sticking to the other surfaces yet.

Today was also Fall Community Practice Day at Naropa (where I work). All classes were cancelled and offices closed. I took myself to breakfast in Boulder this morning and then sat (meditation) with the first year students from 9-10:30. I had to come home after that because Pokie's boyfriend was scheduled to come up for an afternoon visit, but because of the weather that got cancelled. I considered going back down to Boulder to do more sitting because I really wanted to, but I got stuck at the house...it is SO hard to leave a cozy home to drive 30+ minutes back to Boulder in crappy weather. This at least gave me the kick in the butt I needed to get myself on the cushion again.

I'd been pretty down on the coming winter, but seeing the snow...well, it is just so pretty :)

We picked another 2 cups of raspberries last night. The chickens have only been laying 3 eggs a day...this cold weather is hard on them!

free and well favored

The Buddhists speak of the preciousness of a human birth that is free and well favored. I thought about this quite a lot today while I was volunteering at a home-rebuilding project for an elderly, low-income family in Denver.

This particular volunteering group was organized by Michael's companyHere we were, a bunch of employed, well-paid, mostly caucasian individuals who were taking a few hours of free time to help another family.

In the midst of all this, there were a few volunteers whose job it was to make sure the other volunteers had their free T-shirt and foodlots of food. We were provided with free Starbucks coffee & Einstein bagels all day, and a barbecue lunch (hotdogs, sausages, 4 kinds of chips, sodas, bottled water, 2 kinds of potato salad and slaw). And since I'm choosing to be meatless right now, I starting thinking about the lunch I would make out of pretzels and potato salad when it really hit me how much privilege I have...

I can make the choice not to eat what is provided for me at this event because I know I don't have to worry about whether or not I'll be able to get food again whenever I want. I can actually make a choice to not eat meat because I can afford other options to remain well nourished. Here I was volunteering to help re-build someone else's home when I've been paying someone else to remodel my bathroom.

Sure, I've experienced my share of oppression and prejudice, but the amount of privilege I have is really incredible. And I am grateful for the opportunity to experience such a precious human birth, free and well favored.

9 eggs today (forgot to get them yesterday)