Pancakes For Breakfast

Ahead of the big fiftieth anniversary weekend, we had scheduled a daisoji, an hour of temple cleaning. We were all to wear work clothes to the zendo; I had posted a sign at the top of the stairs to remind people, and last night I moved my robes from their usual place in the closet as I know how little conscious thinking I am capable of before five in the morning.
I was tracking people as they came into the zendo, wondering if we would get a good turn-out or if people would take this as an excuse to stay in bed. When it came to the work, though, I even saw a few people who hadn't made it to zazen, diligently cleaning away. I busied myself in the kaisando, cleaning the top of the picture rails, the screens on the window, the altar and especially the black lacquer floor.
Todd had made pancakes for breakfast, which was a lovely thing to have after such an active time. As we sat down, it was quite evident that the energy was very different from a usual morning - there was a real buzz in the room, a sense of shared accomplishment. Christina thought that we should try doing this once a month, just to have this feeling in the temple regularly.
I have commented before about having multiple abbots about the place, and this morning, the table I sat at became a rather exalted four-abbot table, with Richard Baker, Blanche, Steve and Christina all together - not to mention the tanto, director and ino. We heard the old admonition that if the abbot did not take part in soji, the jisha had to leave the monastery, as well as a lovely story from the seventies about Jerry Brown, newly elected as governor, trying to enter Tassajara during practice period. The monk at the gate wanted to turn him away, but Baker Roshi remembered that in Chinese monasteries, the gates were always open to local government officials and major donors to come and inspect. I think something similar will be happening here over the next few days as well.

The kaisando floor a couple of years ago after the lacquer was refinished

Footnotes

I am back to my usual habit of studying after breakfast, now that the Tour de France and the summer retreat are both over, and was keen to pick up Dogen's Genjo Koan, Three Commentaries again, while I still have that mind-attunement from the Genzo-e. Starting to read Uchiyama Roshi's commentary - Shohaku is not only a student of his, but the translator for this as well - I came across this footnote, which seems to contain more concentrated teaching than you might find elsewhere in a month of Sundays:
"Because the present moment is always the present moment, there is no way the present moment can become something else. And yet, because our mind often wanders here and there, in the past or in the future, we lose sight of the present moment, and therefore we need to practice letting go of thought and returning to here/now. This returning to here/now is nothing special, it is a really ordinary thing, because through this practice, the present moment simply becomes the present moment. However, within this ordinary practice through which we become simply ordinary, there is infinite possibility."

Coming And Going

Roxie and I were half way around the jundo for her leaving ceremony, and I realised I was going to have a protocol issue ahead. Richard Baker had arrived at Zen Center on Tuesday evening, and this morning he was sitting in the seido seat, the one designated for senior teachers or visiting dignitaries. I had noticed that he had chosen to sit facing the wall during zazen. I was debating the possibilities, and almost overshot Paul and Steve's empty seats, where we turn and bow; the form of the jundo is that for the Abbess, Abbot, tanto, and senior teachers like Blanche, who was there this morning, instead of passing them by in gassho with head bowed as we do for other members of the assembly, we turn and do a gassho bow with them; they are standing upright rather than with head bowed as you approach, which is your visual cue. As I rounded the last corner, I could see that Baker Roshi was standing, next to Robert, the doshi for the morning, with his head bowed. But it would have felt wrong just to pass him by, so I turned to bow to him before returning to the tsui-ching to make my announcement.
After we had left the zendo, and I had given her a hug, Roxie apologised for the slight mis-steps that she had made during the ceremony, and I said to her that the feeling is the important thing, and that the feeling had been good. I have often used this guideline as ino, where sometimes you have to improvise forms or create them, but equally when I see beginners making mistakes - apart from the mindfulness aspect, forms are about creating a particular feeling, of respect and intention, and if that is communicated, then being right or wrong can be secondary.
There is a nice feeling about Baker Roshi's presence here, ahead of the the 50th anniversary weekend. At work meeting yesterday, Christina acknowledged that without him, none of us would be standing in this beautiful building together. When we came out of senior staff meeting later, I saw him sitting behind the big bell in the Buddha Hall, trying out the sound. He then came to visit the ino's office as part of a little tour of the building with Reb.
The consensus seems to be that the last time Baker Roshi visited was for the celebrations for Suzuki Roshi's one-hundredth birthday in 2004. I was struggling to recall the occasion, but remember the day: there was a big crowd in the dining room, with most if not all of Suzuki Roshi's ordained disciples in attendance, and many statements. I was in charge of the sound, which meant I was in the Buddha Hall trying to ride the mic levels of people I couldn't see, in the sole company of Lou, who didn't care to be in with the crowd. I think I will be a little closer to the action on Saturday, and Monday, though somehow I am still in charge of the sound.

Seasonally Adjusted

Just as the han to end zazen began yesterday, the sun burst through the Laguna Street windows, and from the ino's seat I saw the people on the far tan illuminated with a wonderful yellow glow; with the sun so low, there seemed to be an intimate inquiry between the person and their equally tall shadow right before them, sitting together.
This morning I had dokusan with Steve, so I left the building at kinhin. It was wonderful to wait on the corner for a moment, in the fresh clear dawn air. I also got to meet at last the little dog who regularly contributes to our morning sitting these days. It was nice to put a face to the voice.
As I have noted before, and as people who live in San Francisco would undoubtedly agree, when the skies clear after the weeks of predominant fog, there is a palpable feeling of something lifted. For me as well, there is the added pleasure of seeing where the sun is hitting the building in the morning, and what is illuminated. As I went down to breakfast, I saw a similar shimmering effect on the silhouette of Suzuki Roshi that I have previously photographed:

Into Great Silence

The first time I went back to London after I moved to San Francisco, I was staying with my best friend and his girlfriend, and hearing about their stressful, over-filled lives, and how that impacted their time together. With all the zeal of a new convert, I suggested to them, unlikely as they were to develop a meditation practice, that they try just sharing an evening in silence: cooking together, which they loved to do, eating, cleaning up, reading, just hanging out, without conversation, and no TV or radio as a constant backdrop, which was the norm there. They both looked at me like I was crazy.
One of the most rewarding aspects of the last three weeks, for me, was this extended shared silence. Many people here at City Center have commented on it, how widely it was upheld and how refreshing and relaxing it was to be immersed like that for that length of time. Green Gulch during sesshin was the same, with of course the added backdrop of the mostly silent grounds. Yesterday I was noticing how jarring it felt to be walking around City Center and hearing loud conversations everywhere.
There is a couple who have recently been showing up regularly to afternoon zazen, and I was happy to see them when they appeared. I know nothing about them; I have a story in my head that they might be Russian, just from appearances, but they used to come pretty often when I was first ino, and then I didn't see them for a long time. I have never talked to them, so I don't know why they stopped coming, but I was just glad that they were sitting again and that we have the opportunity to spend time in silence together. I have similar stories and feelings about other people who come in the afternoons, or on Saturdays, with whom I have also never exchanged more than smiles. As I have said before, when you live at Tassajara, and most of your time is spent together in silence, social bonds are formed in different ways, as energy and intention become your cues to other people.
Simon, Tim and I were having one of our regular chats about Young Urban Zen over lunch yesterday, and Tim said he wanted to try having the group end and leave in silence some time. The energy shifts during the meetings are always fun to observe - the crescendo of chat as people arrive (we had more than fifty again last night), the rapid settling into quiet as we sit together, and then the hum of conversations as we discuss the text we are studying. At the end, a more intimate but also louder arena of socialising - I had some lovely conversations myself last night during the 'after party'. The three of us could definitely also see the value in having a short sit at the end of the meeting to bring everyone back to that shared silent intimacy that we create during the period of zazen, and having everybody carry that out into the night by themselves.
I had to do more talking myself than usual yesterday, as I sat down with Valorie and started the transition process. The first stop was the computer, and we worked through the ino's storehouse of folders, the electronic version of which I am happy to say is more organised than the actual cupboards in the office. But it was also clear, in response to several questions, that there is also a lot of stuff that just resides in my head, which we will have to find ways to unearth and pass on.

Study Hall - Extensive Record

Happy to be reading more Dogen, of course, and these are two of the three mountain poems Shohaku refered to during the Genzo-e:
"Zen Master Hongzhi said in a verse,

With coming and going, a person in the mountains
Understands that blue mountains are his body.
The blue mountains are the body and the body is the self,
So where can one place the senses and their objects?

The teacher Dogen followed his rhyme scheme:

A person in the mountains should love the mountains.
With going and coming, the mountains are his body.
The mountains are the body, but the body is not the self.
So where can one find any senses or their objects?"

(Eihei Koroku, volume 9, 25)

It Is Possible To Illustrate This With More Analogies

At a time when riding up Mt Tam seems straightforward, the thing to do is to go to Mt Diablo, which I did today. Once again, I got above the clouds and the greyness of the city, into warm, dry California mountain air. There are two ways up the mountain, and I usually alternate - up one, down the other. The North Road is a very steady climb, which means that you can settle into a sustainable rhythm for the seventy-plus minutes it takes to get up the road, and adjust when the gradient is a little steeper. The South Road, my choice today, starts a little harder at the bottom, but then levels off for a couple of miles, before rearing upward again just before it meets the North Road, four miles below the summit, so you have to find your rhythm a second time. These days I don't worry about anything much until I get to that junction; a mile beyond that is a steeper section, which then eases off at a sweeping bend at Juniper Camp, a spot like the corner of Mt Tam where you are suddenly overlooking the ocean, where I almost always feel a great burst of energy. Then the trick is to see how much is left in the tank for the final couple of miles, which are, or at least feel, a little steeper than average, before the final effort of the last ramp up to the summit, which may only take a minute, but is always hard. As the miles tick by, I focus my effort on relaxing my spine between the shoulder blades, which releases me from a feeling of wrestling the bike, and allows the legs to do the work more fluidly.
I had plenty of energy when I was a kid, and was usually either riding my bike or playing football (the kind the rest of the world plays, with the feet), so it was hardly a surprise that I gravitated towards endurance sports as I grew older, first cross-country running, and then biking. There was something I found purifying about sustaining an effort until the brain subsides and there is just the motion and the intention to keep going, and something gratifying about learning the body's limits, how long you could continue, staying just below the threshold of exhaustion, and at the end, about feeling depleted and fulfilled at the same time. It was a great counter-balance to my tendancy to be cerebral, and has probably spared me much stress and anxiety in my life. Meditation, of course, has the same effect, but at the complete opposite end of the spectrum, and I have never stopped being a little surprised that I took to it.
On the way down, since the descent is not so technically demanding, I was nodding at those coming up, noting those who had a clean style and energy to burn, and those for whom it was a greater effort - everyone who can get up Diablo on a bike deserves huge credit. I felt the temperature changes as I dropped through the layers of air, a thousand feet at a time, and then I was down with the traffic again.
I don't think that this is what Shohaku was refering to when he talked about san chu nin (山 中 人), the person in the mountains, during the Genzo-e, but I was thinking of that phrase on Mount Diablo, as well as remembering other details of my time at Green Gulch. There was Shohaku's practice, which I remember well from other times, of starting every class, after he had nodded to the ino to lead us into the chant, by raising up his cup of water, taking a sip, and then bowing and saying "Good morning, everyone", or "Good afternoon, everyone". There was the almost complete silence of the zendo, apart from what sounded like plastic sheeting flapping on the roof from time to time; there were no streams of traffic, no passing cell-phone conversations, and not even the steady creek and bird calls of Tassajara. There was the sunshine, which we arrived in, and which made progressively fewer appearances as the days wore on, but which allowed me to sit out by the tea house after dinner the first few evenings, and feel warm and quiet. There was the intimacy of the priests in Cloud Hall; perhaps twenty priests were participating, and at most junctures in the schedule, before and after soji, before zazen and before meals, there would be a close array of us kneeling on the cushions and either putting on or taking off okesas together in silence. And there was of course the fact that, thanks to Carolyn's understanding and sympathy in the matter, I had absolutely no responsibilities during the sesshin, and could just sit there through it all.
Finally, I feel like I short-changed the garden in my last selection of photos, so here are a few more.

Jizo garden

Overlooking the garden

Starts in the greenhouse

I am reliably informed these are montbretia, or coppertips - they filled the area in spectacular fashion anyway

Sweetpea down at the farm

The Wheelwright Center

These are apparently cosmos, but the colour is cyclamen in my book

Definitely a poppy

Transitions

As the days went by in the retreat, I appreciated the silence more and more; eventually the notes and requests slowed down some, and the after-breakfast schedule of sitting, study, and extended open sitting felt very settling to me. There was something about being able to flow right from one activity to the next that reminded me of being at Tassajara, and was deeply rewarding.
I was still struggling with my own suffering, and this meant that patience, kindness and compassion were in short supply. For anyone from the retreat who was on the receiving end of a sharp glare or a snappy response, I can only belatedly apologise.
Having long been a fan of the format, I had some time ago requested to be allowed to take off for the Genzo-e sesshin at Green Gulch; Teah was kind enough to encourage me to go, even though it would inevitably have an impact on the retreat, and Rosalie and Christina worked to make it happen. Djinn was brave enough to volunteer to sit in the ino's seat, which I will have to make up to her somehow. This meant I had to prepare everything for the City Center sesshin, happening simultaneously, a few days ahead of time before I left - of course there were people who I didn't have in any of my lists who I happened to hear from other sources were intending to come, so I had to do most of the logistics twice. The end of the week before last was filled with sorting out: all the Saturday sitting paperwork, Saturday lecture announcements for two weeks, a sound system guide, the sesshin admonitions, sesshin announcements, sesshin services, sesshin paperwork - schedules, jobs list, participant list, seating charts (some marked for meals), doanryo schedule - as well as full instructions for the other things that were going to be happening during the week: a leaving ceremony, memorial ceremonies, the full moon ceremony, the Suzuki Roshi Memorial ceremony, and not least, a day-by-day checklist of things that would need to be taken care of.
Which was more stressful than to be doing the sesshin myself. Nevertheless, on Saturday morning, for the first time since I came back from Tassajara four years ago, I stayed in my room and let the morning schedule go on without me, and at the end of the morning, rode over to Green Gulch. Once I got over the bridge, I could feel myself relaxing.
Now, I have only really sat at Green Gulch on Sunday mornings occasionally, and been to a few ceremonies, so I was bringing some beginner's mind with me. Carolyn, my counterpart there, was surprised to see me come for the zendo forms introduction, but I had no idea what the form for kinhin was like, or for leaving, and I had never seen a service or done oryoki there. Of course, it was mostly familiar and easily deduceable, but there were lots of little things just different enough to keep me on my toes.
Having spent two weeks getting close to silence, this was another smooth transition from one activity to another. There was just a little bit more sitting through the day, about as much as a regular winter day at Tassajara, which was no problem for my legs. And after two weeks' of study time and Teah's classes, I was already attuned to reading and thinking about Dogen. Now, Teah's style and Shohaku's could hardly be more different: in the city we screened a PBS show from The Fabric of the Universe that illustrated the illusory nature of time, to go with Uji, which we were studying there; Shohaku is more likely to pull out an old Chinese waka to demonstrate how two kanji made their way into a phrase by Dogen, and not by accident, and also give deep contextual meanings to the kanji themselves. Both were completely enlivening - when I was able to focus.
After I had got used to the novelty of sitting facing the wall again, I found myself very tired on the second and third days, and swamped with difficult thoughts again; it was less 'dropping off body and mind' than body and mind falling apart, and on the third day I felt barely functional. In the zendo I made myself focus on three things: the weight of my body on the cushion, the air filling my upper body, and my eyes resting on the richly coloured wood of the tan. A couple of days later, on the last full day, I was back in focus again; I told myself I was not defined by the thoughts, and they receded accordingly; I was fully absorbing the teaching, and feeling energised by it.
My work assignment was the farm; a group of us spent about forty minutes each afternoon variously weeding, hoeing and digging up potatoes, which was very refreshing to do; on Thursday, as I started to feel better, several of us noticed an owl in the trees above the field where we met for work.  Some crows were trying to shoo it away, but it remained unperturbed; horses and bicycles were also ignored. I was happy to keep looking up at it as we worked, and it kept its gaze on us, and the surroundings, right through the work period. That may have been the best moment of the sesshin, for being so unexpected.
This morning once again, back in the city, I heard the morning schedule going on around me, and kept a low profile so as not to be in the way of the sesshin's final hours, which gives me a longer weekend than usual. On Monday the plan is to start training Valorie as my replacement, which will go on through the month before that transition takes place, and that seems a little closer now.

Greens in the fields

Starts in the greenhouse

Lavender with many bees

Watchful owl

Jizo in the zendo