On the Eighth Day of 2025. . .

. . . while my friends in the east and the middle are freezing off their nards, and my Southern California friends are guarding against wildfires, here in the Pacific Northwest, during a miraculous dry spell of three straight days and counting, I worked in the yard today wearing a t-shirt. Today was one of those days when the morning routine is just not in the cards. I mean, there are the non-negotiables: the dogs and the coffee, but the only other morning ritual I achieved today was a 20 minute meditation–which went pretty well, by the way. I situated myself differently today, attempting to find a position that would not put my feet to sleep. So I sat myself down on top of a cushion (the zafu) on top of a chair ottoman, raising my body maybe a whole two or three feet off the ground, and I let my feet rest on the cushion (the zabuton) that the zafu usually sits on top of, thus avoiding the position that typically puts at least one of my feet asleep after about ten minutes. I was successful. No needles.–sleep needles completely absent from the session. And my attention was more focused, less like a hamster on a spinning wheel. But there is something about being closer to the earth (or the floor) while meditating. There is something about sitting cross-legged that is satisfying. Until the needles show up. Then there’s all manner of shifting and stretching and fidgeting and massaging the sleeping feet that is ultimately no good for quieting the mind. I think one of the most important things I learned from reading Thich Nhat Hanh was that it’s stupid to think that one must be uncomfortable during a meditation. He didn’t use the word stupid, but that was the gist. Suffice it to say that shortly after my morning meditation I found myself walking one of the dogs and then coming back home to work in the yard, moving the leaves around and out of the way so as to determine what in the back yard was poop and what was not poop, scooping up and disposing of said waste material, and picking up all the detritus from that last few weeks of rain and wind. Sticks and twigs and clumps of tree-moss everywhere. I was clearing off the driveway and the patios, a meditative practice in and of itself. I took a nap. As I stand here, writing this, it’s 4:30 in the afternoon, a half an hour into what has become a weekly zoom session with some writer friends. But I’m alone on the call. One of my writing buddies is at a concert, another keeping fire watch, another on a trip to New Orleans, and one more who is late because of some transportation obligation. This week might be a bust, but I am here, all the same, a zoom call of one, doing what we do together every week in our mostly generative practice: writing.