A resident left today without saying goodbye. She packed her bags and got on a train bound for California. Going home. This happens. We are a tight little group and it is shocking when someone leaves, whether we expect it or not. They leave a hole like a pulled tooth. But soon the gap heals …
Sewing my rakusu
I spread out the pieces of my rakusu, in readiness for dunking in the pot of black dye. A ragbag of precious bits gleaned from the patchwork of my life, these include: -A piece of denim from faux-bro Ki’s favourite jeans, veterans of many a forest rave we danced at together. -A scrap from my …
No muss no fuss
Bzzzzzzzzzzzz…gone! Years of old memories, a tangled mass of chemically tormented dead cellulose, a dry pile of old me, fallen to the bathroom floor and carried out with the trash. My head, my body, my spirit feel lighter. Passing a mirror i catch the sun glowing through my backlit ears. What hair is left is …
Taking jukai
I made a vow that I would return to the high desert. I made my promise to the scrubby hills and the adobe walls, to Roshi Joan, and to myself. Vows are not lightly made and this one is ripe to be honoured. I’m a little terrified, tremulous, and excited. Trying to simply be ready …
Carmen goes dancing
I went to my first rave in the mid-’90s and remembered that i can dance. That i had always danced, that dancing was in me, as it is in every toddler and each child in the womb. I realized that dancing had never left me, and never will. Even when i can no longer walk …