Shundo David Haye – Zen Priest

There are many reasons to go to Tassajara, but looking for sunsets usually isn’t one of them. It turned out the the week we were scheduled to be there coincided with a rare weather event; it was 95 on the day we arrived, but then cooled down each day, got cloudy, with highs only in the 70s. At least one evening was unusually streaked with pink.

That made it more pleasant to be in the zendo with all my robes on in the evenings at least. I was asked to be kokyo for the Full Moon Ceremony on Tuesday, the day we arrived, and that was hot work indeed. I felt okay about my kokyo voice – it has less oomph than it did years ago, but I still had a good amount of puff, and I think the pitch worked for the group. I took myself off to the bath house to wash off the sweat afterwards, and then got to see the intensely bright supermoon rising over the valley (the previous night, having read about when and where it would be rising, Ruth and I had walked two blocks over the top of the hill and seen it come up, fat and orange, behind the Bay Bridge).

The next evening I gave a talk (my first one at Tassajara since the summer I lived there before leaving Zen Center, in 2015). I had had some things in mind to say, but since at least half the people in attendance were visiting Tassajara for the first time, I thought it would be worthwhile explaining the significance of the elements of the Full Moon Ceremony, as well as offering some ideas on how to make the most of this week in the wilderness – and was later told by some of the residents that it was a good reminder of the wonder of the place.

Even though there were several senior priests in residence, I also had opportunities to be doshi for morning service on a couple of occasions, including doing the morning jundo on my last day, and for evening service twice as well. Both of those were memorials for people close to current residents, so they were moving occasions. 

Finally, there was Obon, with the courtyard decked out in lights, and streamers filled with names of those who have died. I was the doan for that – a complicated service for the bells, but one I knew I had in my body, and I hope I helped bring out the energy of the invocations. I heard a couple of names of people I knew through Tassajara who I did not know had died.

During the days, I was helping with the memorial rock project, scouring the land for suitable-looking rocks, after last year’s choice was deemed too small. Amy, who I knew in my earliest days at Tassajara, had found a beautiful rock for Sojun in the creek at the women’s bathhouse; I managed to get down there once to see it with her. I found another that might be suitable in the future. I also worked at cleaning up the site that I had prepared last year, after finding that the altar stone and ashes chamber had been covered in dirt in the meantime. 

The group of students I was down there with was also able to go for a hike; a couple just came up the road to the first lookout, while most of us continued around the Horse Pasture trail. I found myself extremely nervous on the cut off section – not just because that was where Caroline had died earlier this summer. I had the same fears last year, on a section that had been covered by a slide and rebuilt, with a precarious drop down the side of the hill. I needed plenty of help from the others to make it around that section; in years gone by I ran up and down there without a second thought.

As always, it was a delight to be there, to bask in the Buddhafield that we were creating. Having one day more than I usually get when leading retreats made it feel like a good long stay. And, as always, it takes a little adjustment to get back to the regular routine of the city, though the fine weather there helped. And, by the time this is published, I will have given the Wednesday evening talk at City Center. People asked if I would give the same talk both times, but that wouldn’t work at all, so I will be figuring out how to rework what I said in the monastery for those in the city.