Shundo David Haye – Zen Priest

Over the weekend at Wilbur, I was struggling to remember when I was last in such hot conditions; certainly at Wilbur and Tassajara last year the temperature was lower than we might expect for mid-summer. There was the roam we had to cancel because it was too hot for most people, but otherwise the city has really not seen a heatwave in a long time. It was 102 when I arrived at Wilbur on Friday afternoon.

I had felt a little run down on Wednesday of last week (news of a bunch of people I had spent some time with subsequently getting COVID might have contributed to this). On Thursday I felt better, but after taking a short ride on Friday morning before I left town, I felt pretty tired during the drive up.

After catching up with beloved members of staff at Wilbur, I dozed off on the deck in the shade. Once the sun had gone down, staying out on the deck and the late evening light, was joyful. I slept deeply that night.

On Saturday morning I woke when it was still dark, and took a bike up to the nature preserve, and sat in the tub there watching the sun hit the hillside, seeing deer come by and graze on the plants along the banks of the creek.

Attendance at the first meditation session was quite impressive considering how a few people were at Wilbur;  a number of people were already doing their yoga practice when I got up to the deck before the session started. We filled out the cushions I had set out and I had to put out some more. 

The majority of attendees came back for one or both of the other sessions, and I was happy that a number of staff were also able to come and sit; not wanting to repeat myself between sessions, I was a little more diffuse on the Sunday morning sit, but I hope people felt suitably instructed.

It was really wonderful just to be basking in the heat all afternoon, with nothing to do but read. Sometimes I have taken projects up to work on, but I specifically didn’t want to do that this time around – apart from a little rakusu sewing – and I was very happy to turn my phone off for the duration (apart from making some notes about what to write here.

After I got back to the city on Sunday afternoon, I kept the rental car so I could head down the peninsula on Monday afternoon for a wedding, a sweet occasion up on Skyline, at a venue I will also be officiating at in a couple of months. 

We have a mostly unscheduled holiday weekend ahead, and then I will be offline again after Tuesday, as I take my students – and a few other folk – down to Tassajara for the week. Hopefully also hot and very relaxing.