“Writing Practice”, see earlier entry – a timed free form writing exercise, initiated by an open ended topic: no good writing, no bad writing just write….anchor your mind with the pen.

On Christmas eve I threw out the topic (to myself) “Christmas Morning”, 20 minutes, go….
~~~
When I was young Christmas morning always began in front of a heavy set of wooden doors. A checkerboard of small 8 x 8 windows that separated the living room from the hallway that would always be closed. Emerging from their wall pockets creating a barrier that was only seen once per year - and always in the early hours of Christmas morning.

The location in the living room of the artificial Christmas tree varied over the years. Weeks earlier its pre-sized color-coded twisted wire limbs were sorted then carefully inserted into the green painted post. It is most vividly remembered just to the left as you enter from the hallway, across from the baby grand piano.

The style of the decorations would change, evolving in later years to birds and bows; but I remember most fondly the large blue silver orbs and the sheen of metal tinsel draped across the boughs. It was the days before mini-lights, the larger green bulbs nestled in the wiry needles glowed brightly.

In the days leading up to the 25th, the collection of gifts beneath the trees bouncing lower branches would expand, a rising tide of brightly colored paper and ribbon. Then somehow on Christmas morning the collection was even larger than thought possible.

I was usually the last to wake, prodded by the middle brother who would have already completed the first reconnaissance. Together, the three boys would then slip through the doors to confirm Santa’s presence by finding at the far end of the room engorged Christmas stockings lying in a tidy row. These bulging felt sacks lay across the parallel inlay of the hardwood floors, tiny packages spilling onto the tile hearth that fronted the fireplace.

Extending awkwardly from stretched cuffs of faded polo brand pjs, little fingers would cradle and fumble the collection of packages being transported up the stairs and across upper hallway to the broad expanse of bed in my parent’s gray and white bedroom. Sitting amidst the strange bumps of the dual controlled heating blanket we would tear into the first gifts of the morning.

The glass doors would normally again be pulled shut. The old lead pane glass, rippling the view of the shimmering cellophane and tissue. Any intelligence on what might be found under the tree was the specialty of the middle brother. His intensity on Christmas morning was always fueled by the overnight additions. More items to be catalogued and much new speculation on what would be revealed. The eldest would watch with curiosity, as interested in his younger brothers angst as to the rewards of the day ahead.

Upstairs soft footsteps, the smell of ‘white shoulder’ perfume and pipe tobacco as visiting Grandparents, painfully slow, seemingly purposefully so, get ready for the day. The eldests bedroom, converted to their apartment now steeped with the same smells and stale warm air.

I can’t remember where the eldest slept on those annual visits. I just remember how the back corner bedroom became an open house but altogether different during the grandparent’s visits. The rest of the year it was a private space, the one room of our family home that I can’t clearly picture in the minds eye. I don’t ever remember being scolded or told to stay out, the room was just out of reach. A vague memory of birds on a window ledge, a very different view of the sprawling cherry tree that dominated the back yard and like most of the other rooms, the exposed ribs of the iron radiator, thick with many layers of paint.

In the days leading up to my grandparent’s arrival, I was always fascinated by the mysterious tradition of bleeding the air from the radiators. I would follow my father as he took a white plastic cap from an aerosol container and walked from room to room. There was always a hiss, its pitch varying as my father rested his fingers against the now loose wooden lozenge shaped dial that controlled the valve. The sputter and spitting would signal the end and the flow cut off. The cup splattered with a milky gray solution. Water that pumped endlessly through the house. The air released would bring new water and heat back to this room.

On Christmas morning, like any other day, the grandparents were not to be rushed. In that agonizing hour my brothers and I always wondered why she had to bathe instead of the expediency of a shower.

At last we would assemble in a big circle, my father would sit cross-legged and look to us boys to deliver the gift to their recipients. As ‘helpers’ we would watch the piles grow. Inevitability as one person’s pile lacked height or depth, the reminder would be pledged, ‘that good things come in small packages’. As the tree is emptied, a few remaining gifts for family members that would visit later in the day would be tucked to the back – as a finale, my father would demonstrate his ability to rise from cross legged position to standing with seemingly little effort. He would then slip away to refresh egg-nog with fresh ground nutmeg and at last the tearing of paper would begin.

By mid morning it would all be over. The piles were reorganized, nearby hastily scribbled lists of uncles and aunts and the items received. Those toys without too many pieces or ‘some assembly required’ playfully sampled.

With further waves of family to arrive, we seldom ventured out and had little contact with our friends in the neighborhood. Looking out the window, sometimes onto a snowy landscape, but normally a whiteness of a cold, overcast Vancouver day. Families could be seen out walking, new bicycles, wagons, and toys proudly paraded down the sidewalk.

The afternoon would move slowly in the wake of such an exciting morning.

In September 2005, I was blessed to be in the presence of the Dalai Lama at an event in Tucson. It was my first time to see him in person. Prompted by the opportunity to repeat this experience, this time in September in Vancouver Canada, I went back and re-read my journals and now offer this as a second installment of ‘looking back at old journals', excerpts from my writings at the September 2005 event.

Arrival
It is a mélange of culture, class, and pop ideology that plays out around me. The StarPass Westin Resort, a brand new luxury hotel has opened its doors to the Tibetan community, western Dharma seekers, and His Holiness the Dalai Lama. The hems of burgundy and saffron robes now dust the shiny marble surfaces. The polished brass and southwest Arizona décor is a long way from the dung brick houses of Tibet. Hospitality begins in the resort lobby, all around the murmur of monks, lay people, and curious onlookers begin to settle and change the feeling of this elite environment.

My traveling companion and I are decompressed into a large suite with a separate living room (the benefit of knowing someone that knows someone), It was more space than we could ever use. Then again, perhaps we will make many new friends and decide to throw a party. The expansive living room seemed wasted in a sold-out resort that could turn people away. I imagine orderly rows of monks on their mats spread across the trimmed manicured carpet.

In previous years my September pilgrimage was a long journey, two airplanes, an airport shuttle, two ferries, and hitchhiking across two islands to meet with my Buddhist teacher. The contrast of this year awoke me to having less time to cross that threshold and begin to refocus, calm, and awaken the to the truth and simplicity yet poignancy of each moment.

On the balcony, first night
The expanse of sky is black, warming to gray where the Tucson city lights fifteen miles below at the mouth of the valley wick upwards. The stillness of the air lends clarity. Our nights will be graced with a full moon. At this hour, still low on the horizon, the reflective lunar light silhouettes the Saguaro cactus that drape the resort’s generous patio.

Morning – Day One
The first morning is witness that a gentle transcendence has begun. To see over the stucco’d railing of the balcony, I balance on the back of a teak wood deck chair. The cool air can be traced as it fills the lungs. My breath begins to reach into the recesses and little used crevasses of memories and perception. ‘Breath Sweeps Mind’ I have always responded well to this expression.

It is early, somewhere between 6:30 and 7:00am. Three stories below the articulate landscape begins to populate,A woman in a gray body suit sweeps a saffron ribbon through the air, her feet play out in gentle taps on the sprinkler wet grass as she embraces the morning sun and pulls the fleeting cool air into her being. She pauses in the fetal position before the ‘samsaric’ cycle (birth, life, death) begins again with a smile and a leap into the next moment.

Beyond a low stucco retaining wall, a couple, in unison move through a series of Tai Chi postures, connecting with the earth, the air, themselves and a growing spiritual energy all around them.

Poolside, a woman chatters on a cell phone. We all connect in our own ways.

After breakfast we moved politely into the meeting room. Rows and rows of red chairs, a little lotus flower tag with our seat numbers to ensure we are in the right place. As if there could be any doubt.At the appointed time, more than a 1000 people paused and fell silent, perfectly focused. A distant door swung silently on well-oiled hinges. Over the shifting landscape of heads, a petite figure moves towards the center dais, stopping frequently, connecting. A man of history: a Nobel Laureate, a figure of an exiled people, the embodiment of compassion, and the reincarnation of Avolkitshevra. What choices have I made, what Karma has ripened that I can share this moment completely connected with the thought that we can make a difference – starting with ourselves finding happiness and joy in every moment.

For the next four days His Holiness would invite us to walk with him on the path of the Bodhisattava

Morning – Day Two
If breath sweep mind, the AZ sun sweeps the chill. Even now in mid September, as the sun crests the eastern conference building the temperature rises multiple degrees per minute. Within the pottery belly of the chinminea to my right, dying embers are drowned in the growing heat. The traditional aromatic and pungent fragrance of mesquite wood on this morning is laced with an offering of Sandalwood incense.

Earlier, the morning breath of this ancient land had carried it to our window. As out of place as we are in the borrowed landscape of succulents, scorpions, snakes, and Javelinas.This shiny new resort, its carefully green painted fairways and the stucco clad brick and steel – this land must be sacred to someone. Who wept on the stony ridge as the bulldozers placated the natural arroyos and challenged nature by straddling what is now a controlled wash. And who am I to sit on this plastic rattan chair, the steam drifting from the pill sized opening of my Starbuck’s Chai, A visible consumer feeding the hunger that scraped away this landscape. Trying to reconnect with myself and in doing so, all living things around me, I pay homage and go for refuge – may all beings be free from suffering and the causes of suffering – another wisp of sandalwood at the exact moment I wrote suffering -- mindfulness.

Afternoon – Day Two
At one point this afternoon I was steeped with profound sadness. As his holiness chirped and laughed up on his dais, my mind reflected on the retail booths out in the foyer. Faces of Tibetan Pilgrims who looked out from framed glossy prints and coffee table books, their weather worn skin and dark eyes reduced in price as we near the end of our program The real Tibetans, 100,000 prostrations later – a population systematically eliminated by the Chinese, with no material wealth and a crippling life, would find no greater joy than to be in the presence of His Holiness. Who was I to be sitting on a red cushioned chair, complaining of a stiff neck. What compassionate selfless act in a previous life brought me to this moment? What an incredible privilege to see , hear, and be part of a group in a time with an active teaching Dalai Lama.

Out in the foyer, the artwork, silent pilgrims, line the walls. Do they somehow know that their lifeless eyes were now feet away from a man who could be as much myth as reality to them.

Final Morning
The prayer flags that we strung across the balcony last night were up less than fifteen minutes before hotel security came. I had completely expected this to happen. Even with the absorption of this group’s mood, the hotels staff would have been conditioned to different circumstances. In their eyes a string of silk flags, blue, red, green, would be no different than someone drying their laundry. There would be little room for bursts of creativity. I wonder what conversations are happening behind the scenes, as the staff try and make sense of our group. What have the few other guests had to say? Were there many complaints? Has a monk called down to complain? Room service was two minutes late. The view from their room is inadequate. My robes were not pressed properly.

Departure
In a few moments we will depart. Out on the patios and the pathways the chimineas will be re-lit, air fresherner will extract the lingering smell of sandalwood, rows of coffee cups and chairs will be set, and the National Association of Plumbing Contractors will arrive and seek enlightenment in their trade.

Namaste.

In the last few months I have become more vocal about my ‘interest’ in writing. I am careful not to say ‘of becoming a writer’ as I believe the stigma attached to that role is too dramatic. Instead, I use my personal approach to writing a segue to discuss writing as both a ‘practice’ similar to meditation and an outlet for creative energies. Inevitably, the subject turns to journaling. I am pleasantly surprised at how many people admit me to that they kept, or still keep a journal. The next query is ‘do you every go back and re-read? To my surprise, very few say that they do.

For the last 25 years, with the exception of being grounded on 9/11/2001, I have made an annual September pilgrimage. Initially the trip was born out of restlessness. In the mid 1980’s, having completed my schooling I didn’t want to deny the inertia of summer cracking the whip spiraling us into fall, it was time for change and that had always been school.
The first years away were quiet times to read, walk and take photos, and write. I have fond memories of lugging my father’s original IBM PC with a single disc drive, ‘mulimate’ word processing software, and a lead weight monochrome green screen to a cottage on the shores of Howe Sound on the west cost of British Columbia.

Writing in the third person, here is how I described myself at the time:

With three days off from his job as a front desk supervisor at a Vancouver luxury hotel, Kevin was in need of an escape. Bowen Island afforded this luxury. He got particularly frustrated with a constant need to be doing something constructive. He has forgotten how to be idle, accepting that just sitting can be quite therapeutic. The stress from work invaded all his moments with a chattering, chiding voice.

Forty minutes later a white car rolled to a stop in front of a small wooden house. It's red stained wood siding and brown trim blends into the Arbutus trees that cling to the sparse earth and rocky surface. Off to the right a gravel path leads around towards the front of the house, to the left a vegetable garden long unattended reaches through the wire fence to be nipped at by the abundant deer population.

A tall man emerges, obviously cramped from the small Japanese car. He stretches his slender 6'4" frame and lets out a long sigh. Pausing for a moment he stands with eyes closed, listening to the nearby sound of waves moving across a rocky shore. A smile purses his lips as he runs his fingers through his thin receding brown hair. Still warm for September, he wipes the moisture from his hand on his shorts and begins to unpack the car.

The interior of the house is cool; as the blinds are drawn back the silvery gray hardwood floors reflect the brilliant afternoon sunshine. A breathtaking outlook across the Pacific Ocean to the south and east greets the eyes. The house, which is about ten years old, has recently been completely refinished. Throughout its three bedrooms, two story living room, dining room, and kitchen, a general openness prevails. The cool grays and cotton coverings suggest a simple uncluttered comfort. After opening many of the windows Kevin sinks into a deck chair and looks silently out at the water. A few seagulls anxiously pursue a small fishing boat and a slight breeze from the east ripples the water. Fifty meters below, through a tangle of sword ferns and salal bushes, the water relentlessly rolls up onto the rocks with the rising tide.

Resisting an urge to switch on the stereo and bring a speaker to the outer patio, Kevin listens intently to the sounds around him. Slightly disturbed that he feels the need to have music when the water and birds form an entirely more relaxing soundscape. He recognizes that this impulse is somewhat indicative of the way things have been going in his everyday life. Being caught up in a big drama and the role he plays. Ask one his associate at work, and they would describe him as being a bit excitable but always smiling and apparently in control. The urge now to play music, he recognized as a symbol of using someone else's creativity to manipulate the senses and create a mood.

A change in the tempo of the water on the shore brings his eyes out to the horizon where at a distance of about 15 kilometers, one of the large ferries can be seeing slowly moving through the Strait of Georgia towards Nanaimo. How long will it take for its waves to make it to this beach he wonders and corrects himself, this waterfront. Once he had referred to the strip of shoreline below the house as a beach, and had been corrected. A beach has to be sand the person had said. This area was almost complete rock

As the afternoon wore on Kevin finally appeared to let go his concerns and thoughts of the work place and slip into peace with his secluded environment. Sitting in the shade of a patio umbrella he became lost in the pages of his book…

Twenty years later, only the geography and the hairline have changed.

I recently had the good fortune to participate in a writing workshop. Only my second, the first had been a weekend and whet my appetite to discuss and share writing in a group. In fact my absence from these pages is directly linked to the course work of the last 8 weeks.

One of the exercises was born out of a discussion of J. Robert Lennon’s “Eight Pieces for the Left Hand” (from Granta), a collection of clever and insightful ‘flash’ fiction.
We had an in-class exercise to create in 20 minutes 8 of our own short pieces.
Here is one of my attempts

You’ve Sent Mail
I leaned back and looked at the page, proud in an anachronistic sort of way. The cursive twists and tiny bumps of the pen filled the page, left to right, line after line. It was a hand written letter. There were no emoticons or clever fonts, no imbedded photos or colored borders. The letter had not even spell checked itself.
In just a moment I will carefully fold it in thirds, hand-write the address, all the while marveling at the simplicity of the English postal system, Babbling Creek House, Weybridge, Surrey, KT13 3BR. No street address, just a name and obviously a much more detailed postal code system than used here in the U.S.
After placing the letter in the envelope, I will run my tongue with only slight disgust across the shiny swath of glue. The hunt for a stamp will last only a few minutes; about half the time I will pause with the uncertainty of how much postage is required to make it across the pond.
Ultimately it will end up in her hand, not glowing on a back-lit computer screen that has called out “You’ve got mail’, and not released with a tap of the left mouse from behind a blinking cursor.
She can sit in her favorite chair and be with my words. At times she will need to pause to decipher my left-handed scribbles. “Are you sure you’re left handed” my father once asked in bewilderment of my penmanship” “You should become a doctor” a high school English teacher once commented, “Doctors can’t write legibly either”
I know she will be able to read my writing. All the while she will touch the paper that I touched and feel a connection that I did really care and had wanted to personally congratulate her on the birth of her child.

The last posting remined me of a selection I wrote in Hazelton Lanes, an upscale shopping facility in the Yorkville section of Toronto.

This is an excellent place
to practice non-judgment
surrounded by the beautiful people….
I’ve failed with first glance

As a visitor
to this wealthy conspicuous niche
why is it harder
to practice compassion
off the street
without the sidewalk dramatics
where trembling hands reach up
tattered raiment frame the puddle of humanity
we step over

A Jewish couple
struggle with appearances
economies of expectation
their community
a dominant force in this room
in this neighborhood….
judgment again

Back to this excellent place
I sit
focused on me
where it all begins

My daughter is often invited to birthday parties. On this particular Saturday, finding a gift will be one of a number of errands we will complete. I am therefore required to join the excursion. Nearing the end of our list, we arrive at the mall where my wife chooses to buy most presents.
“They gift wrap for free and have a ‘rewards’ program,” she reminded me.
“Excellent reasons” I agreed.
Pausing for a moment, she gives me a look that in most families would be reserved for the children. Knowing my penchant for quiet moments in bookstores, she releases me for half an hour to go to the Starbuck in the Barnes and Noble. Not unexpected, and always prepared, I retrieve my journal from the car.

The misters knock seven or eight degrees off this 110-degree day. Moist breath from overhead hangs in the air for pedestrians to paddle through. The consumption of energy is all around; the hum of air conditioners chilling to absurd levels the interior retail spaces.

A predictable blast of cold air greets me as I enter through the single side door. In any other part of the world, double or revolving doors would be mandatory to shield the cold. Why is the reverse, keeping the heat out any different?

A tour of the store’s perimeter confirms earlier musings that the inviting black desks were stacked high with books and not available to sit and write. With the café area offering the only table seating, I feel obligated to buy something and select a bottle of Fiji water.

My first choice of a table, one with anonymity and an angle for surveillance was occupied, at least with someone’s personal items. I settle into the spot next to it across from the periodicals. A low wall to my right separates me from the food service area. Cracking the blue plastic seal on the bottle, the first impression on the mouth is that the Fiji water is warm. Glancing back, I see they know that the cooler is not working. A man in gray overalls is removing the base plate, a toolbox and gas canister by his side.

Appreciative of a few moments to write, I am physically distracted. My stomach is bloated and uncomfortable from lunch. Excesses of potato chips and junk food left me with no way of knowing which item my fragile intestines were rejecting. The buffet of choices from which I sampled included any number of dietary sins: the msg and food coloring of the Doritos, the salt and chemicals of Cheetos, hydrogentated oils, MSG, or the artificial spices.

A slender woman with close-cropped brown hair has rejoined her personal belongings at the table behind me. She has excessive body odor. It lingers in the displaced air as she shuffles by. She has three bags. On the floor closest to me, an overflowing vinyl satchel, a curling iron pokes out from beneath a brown wide knit sweater or shawl. A plain white plastic bag, the kind you would put laundry in at a hotel has the drawstrings pulled tight at the top. The curve of the plastic shell, rounded like my bloated belly, belies clothing within. The third is a canvas gym bag. The zipper broken at the midway point, papers and a thick paperback novel poke out.

She drifts in and out of the scene. Each arrival shares a wave of sweat and dirt. As I ponder changing to a different table, I awaken to being immune to human suffering. I had been very slow to realize she is a homeless person hiding in the air conditioning. Calculated pacing of the store, not wanting to linger too long in any one place for fear of being evicted. This slice of suburbia that I call home is a long way from the downtown shelters and shadowed alleyways. My life in this hermetically sealed world has shielded me for too long from social unpleasantness -- out of sight, out of mind.

I am disappointed in myself for my earlier aspersions. I had spat judgments on her appearance and smell, as if really had any influence on my ability to be happy in this moment. We are both strangers here. She is probably hungry, at least now cool, while I lament about too much junk food and warm bottled water.
She is probably looking at me, wondering what its like to have idle time to sit in a café with a shiny black fountain pen and crystal clear, chlorine free bottled water shipped from some distant island.

“Only boring people can be bored”

There are only two things that I remember taking from my 11th grade English teacher. This quote was one of them.

It was my first connection with the concept that every moment should be celebrated. When forced to pause, either in a waiting room, in traffic, or while waiting for a meeting – the opportunity to connect with the mind is a precious thing. To just follow the metronome of the breath, wrestle with a philosophical concept, engage the storyteller, or drift in a self-serving imaginative daydream. These fleeting seconds are valuable. The opportunity to be with the mind should never be wasted.

I was eventually forced to decide that the concept did not apply for students. In these situations the requirement is to pay attention, ostensibly to learn. Therefore I had to look for my own ways to animate the topic.

In the years that followed, I took to being prepared for idle moments where classroom attentiveness was not required. For example, Shambhalla publications release miniature versions of many of their titles. Living in a big city, frigid in winter, I would keep one of these miniaturized tomes in the deep pocket of my overcoat. Waiting for the subway or bus, I would paw at the pages with thick gloves and hear others voices.

Writing is the other use of such moments..

Whenever possible I carry a well-worn journal. A5x7 page format with a soft leather cover held closed by a thin leather wrap-around strap. The entries range from the incredibly mundane, to snippets of verse, or specific descriptive writing practice. Letting the pen dip into shallow cursive thoughts, at times yielding something latent within me.
The experience opens me up to a reward similar to that of contemplative meditation. Writing is my practice.

What was the second thing from my 11th grade English teacher that I grateful for? We could submit writing for (much needed) additional credit so I presented a collection of my first poems. While he had little to say about them, he knew of my interest in music and complimented a piece about a bird, suggesting I was writing about the legendary Saxophone player Charlie Parker. I accepted the compliment but had really only been writing about a bird. Or perhaps not.

Settling into the coffee culture, even as a tea drinker is not without its challenges. A new set of language and rules to learn that define the culture. Having complexity and rites of passage is important to any ‘club’. When did ‘grande’ become a synonym for medium?

As a writer, one of many launching points I use to get the hand moving and the brain engaged is to focus on an object within view. On the wall beside me a poster is visible behind non-glare glass. It caught my eye, a lotus blossom and my proclivity to anything Buddhist. A longer pause followed to linger on the rich palm frond palette, a green that awakened a communion with nature, on offer of serenity in a sip.

Casting my thoughts to the poster’s origin, the pen begins a cursive trail across the page (I often start with a watery fountain pen instead of the keyboard) I imagine a boardroom in the SBC (or maybe Starbucks) corporate headquarters. A broad sheet of glass faces west, pulled taught between the steel girders, it translates the sonorous vibrations of the Seattle harbor: a foghorn, a ships whistle, and the low vibrato of giant diesel engines. Three stories below, from a narrow strip of buildings, the sounds of the famous fish market rise and fall.

On this day, a young woman slowly pads back and forth on the hardwood floor of this converted office building. To her left, an easel props up a series of poster boards, the plane white backing facing outwards. Over the door ‘stir stick’ hands on a clock remind her that it is five more minutes before the meeting is to begin.

In the following hour, murmurs of agreement, questions, and plaudits arise as the woman, doing well to calm her nervousness, presents the plan for a tea promotion: Tantalizing Tea Lattes, maybe her name was Tracy as she touted a trilogy of Tazo Teas. Surely these would be popular amongst the ‘wanna’ be writers that flock to their coffee houses.

The poster eventually found its way into SBC stores across their network, and now hangs up and to my left. Across the gray slate like tile, another copy at the front of the store balances in its medal stand. I was ready to be led across the poster, a path laid out, Green Tea Latte, Chai Latte, and Vanilla Tea Latte.

The Green Tea went well. No hesitations when ordering, even the soy modification at .55 cents extra yielded no embarrassment.

On the next visit, I was ready to venture another step, skipping to the next lotus leaf step to the already familiar chai, though silently wondering if chai means tea in Hindi, is ‘chai –tea’ not redundant?

The final step, a Vanilla Tea Latte. I ordered carefully, knowing now to ask for a mug (anything to avoid the apparently disposable) . Placing the exact change, $4.11 on the counter, I was suspicious when the price was .25 cents higher. The pressure of the assembly line was building behind me, there was no time to question and betray my freshman status. I was pushed along the counter, the screech and hiss of steam, the banging of metal, a manufacturing process was about to be complete -- consumer with beverage, packaged, and ready for consumption.

Reaching out and sliding the steaming mug off the polished bright red laminate counter, I was curious at how much darker it was than most teas. I walked back to my table, lips hesitantly placed, the mouth pulling the first taste. Coffee flavor, I had stepped off the posters careful path. But for a single letter, I had inadvertently ordered a Vanilla Latte, not a Vanilla ‘T’ latte.

A favorite writing spot
at my brother's.


I began to look around for convenient public places to write. I am not a coffee drinker; tea is my libation. Regardless of what steamed in my cup, I like the concept of sitting in a coffee house.

My niece, up until recently worked at a ‘Seattle’s Best Coffee’ in a busy urban setting. One day last year I was visiting her town and sat and watched her in action. The barista is the bartender of the current age. No dark corners and shadows for this ‘counter’ culture hero as they brew their own comforting beverage. I sat at the small round table near the front of the store and watched Elizabeth flit back and forth behind the machine, bouncing in and out of sight, a silk yellow daisy-- lotus like on her bobby pinned ink black hair. At times her generous smile and bright eyes would peer out from the side, not quite able to see over the polished Italian machine, she would engage in conversation with her regulars. Calling out the language of the coffee house, she spoke over the effluent steam and flowing brown liquid. She knew her customer’s names; she knew their drinks, and like a crispy sliver of biscotti, snippets of their lives as she filled their mugs.

Some people that know me were surprised that I had not wholly rejected the big business of Starbucks. But they also know my insatiable curiosity for people and ‘pop’ culture. People watching and pretending to be part of the crowd was research and consumption.

So I came to sit. The beautiful people queued up in an environment where marketing peeks out from every corner. The impeccable service, spit polish shine, and a quality product is perfectly matched to this consumer culture.

Is it inappropriate that I can forgive Starbucks for what they may or may not have done to the neighborhood coffee houses? I have never been one for legislated culture. It must be organic and self supporting – but more on that another time.

During my test phase I started noticing the proliferation of computers. There were many people that came to work, it was not just students with highlighters, coil ring notebooks and textbooks in hand. Does anyone go to the library anymore?

I sampled a few Starbucks, one on my way to work, another at the edge of a shopping plaza. The narrow seating areas and little tables were good for drop-in sessions but I am too self-conscious to write with people looking over my shoulder. The wobbly pedestal tables are especially awkward for my larger than average computer. Einstein’s bagels seemed another good spot. The design gave me a wall to back onto. The buzz and comings and going a soothing white noise. Ultimately though, a subtle guilt set in for taking up a table and nursing a single Iced Tea for a couple of hours.

Then I sampled a Barnes and Noble store, it seemed perfect! Surrounded by books, black lacquer tables and old-fashioned wooden chairs that lent an air of academic credibility. The guilt was held at bay by the knowledge of regular book purchases offsetting the entry fee. Then one day the tables were gone. Pulled into the traffic flow, now piled with pyramids of books to sell. I was no longer welcome as a writer; the chairs remained to encourage readers.

The next stop has become my new writing home. A Borders Books with a Seattle’s Best Coffee at the back. A corner table gives me privacy while affording an un-obstructed view down the store. If I had any complaints, the lack of a plug limits my sessions to the life of my battery. Secondly, month after month, no attention had been given to a burnt out bulb on the track lighting. For longer marathon days, the table by the condiments has a wall plug. And a bonus! My chai latté and tea orders count towards their rewards program. This is starting to sound like a commercial; I would like to assure readers that I am not affiliated in any way with Borders (or Starbucks that owns the SBC brand).

With a spot identified, now comes the choice to make the time.

Even with the extravagance of having my own room and a blessed door to close off from the family, I have accepted that my home is not the place to write.

In the modern vernacular it is a 'home office'. Suitably equipped with a mélange of abandoned furniture. An old gouged Bombay Company writing desk rescued from the scrap heap in a remodel of a long ago employer. The black desk chair - a lucky buy at a silent auction. A hand me down wing back chair, 36” TV, a small Buddhist shrine, and bookshelves to complete the picture.

The term from my childhood would have been a study. I find I cling and use this term frequently. All the rooms in my childhood white, two-story house were appropriately labeled. The ‘Living Room,’ seldom used for anything it seemed at the time. The ‘Dining Room’ with its vast antique table, seating for 12, only used on special occasions.

Family dinner was just after 6:00pm and would draw my two older brothers and I from the ‘Rec Room’ in the basement or our individual Bedrooms, into the kitchen nook to be seated at a curly wrought iron Sundae shop table. The stark white laminate (called arborite in those days) polished to dullness under the constant scrutiny of my mother’s dishcloth.

With the dishes rinsed and tucked away and the garish overhead fluorescent light extinguished, my parents would retire to the ‘den’ to read the evening newspaper and drink their coffee. Later my father would occupy his desk in his ‘study’. The clatter of his ‘adding machine’ becoming quieter over the years as he migrated from mechanical, to first generation digital, then years after to a computer.

Only now do I realize his gift of concentration. Somehow he managed his way through stacks of ledgers and memos as my brothers and I came and went. It surprises me now that we were able to watch as much television as we did, (we had the first color tv in the neighborhood) without distracting him. Then again, in the late 60’s and early 70’s, the programming options were limited as were the times of day you could watch.

In my modern world, it isn’t my children that lift my head from the page and cause my pen to halt. Why else would we have two other televisions and a second computer but to occupy children and create a bubble of isolation for me? The real demon is all the associations that ground me in the practical world and lure me onto other tasks. Bills to pay, files to organize, emails to reply to, naps to be taken, and the worst of all, television shows and movies. My study is a place I will reserve for ‘editor mind’, web research, and managing the details of a modern middle class family home.

Writing for me needs to be in the world amongst many anonymous witnesses.

One of the writing techniques that I enjoy as a warm up is a method of free association. With 'Editor Mind'* tucked away, select a simple topic, and write for 15 minutes on it. No stopping, no editing, no evaluation. It is the flow ink that is important, not if the scribbles are good or bad -- just write.

This morning I picked an old favorite, “Where I would like to walk”, --fifteen minutes, go!

I found myself out on the ‘swagged’ ribbon roads that cut through the Sonoran desert. The arroyos, natures storm sewers that funnel the torrential rains, (sometimes at the expense of passing motorists) were but a row of dashes on the line I was traversing. As sometimes happens when the pen picks up speed, a shift occurs and I was then being introduced to a new character, someone who may inhabit a future work.

With some editing for clarity, here is an excerpt from this morning’s piece.

He was attentive to the world around him. He would stop at times on the edge of a stairwell or midway around a curve, not the places one typically pauses to look around. Sometimes he would kneel to see a different perspective.

One day, with a backpack full of sport top water bottles and an old pair of broken-in shoes, he set off in the pre-dawn light to walk the 18 miles from his home to work. He wanted to see all the things that normally blurred past his car window: the rocks and scrub foliage, withering Saguaro Cactus, even the debris from careless motorists.

He was grateful that he had a choice; his commute did not require the use of an interstate. The few minutes of time that would be saved were offset by not having to push his little car over 3000 rpms to reach the normal 67 mph cruising speed. Other days in the stop and go he was concerned about the nine-year-old clutch that was begninig to slip away. The slower route was just fine. It was more important to avoid all the anger and rage that was bred in rush hour drivers.

Instead, his commute cut through suburban walled communities and along the frontier of the urban sprawl. A nine-mile east west stretch of road where evenly spaced sentinels, municipal government signs with black letters on a white reflective coating, played harbinger to the inevitable loss of wild spaces – ‘future crossing of 56th street’. If you drove fast enough, they were not legible.

Even when anxious about the day ahead, the few legislated stops and slower pace helped him feel like he was more a part of the landscape than simply passing though it…..

*For more on editor mind, monkey mind...seek out books by Natalie Goldberg

A writer writes, a daydreamer dreams, an actor pretends: which of these roles do I truly wish to be identified with?

Now months after the writing retreat with Natalie Golberg, I am making a new commitment to my writing. The pressures of a typical 60-hour workweek, family, and the business of living are not going to prevent me from finding my voice. It is all about choices. At this moment I alone am choosing not to write. Standing high on the pulpit of my to-do list, projecting to all that would hear, I mute the cliché of having “no time”.

Is time scarce? Absolutely. I have many responsibilities but if I truly want to do this, it is within my reach. The difference is being cognizant of the choices I make and not blaming some nebulous external force that prevents me from reaching my goal.

Writing is my meditation, my practice, and another world that I can inhabit. In the words of Joni Mitchell, I need to be there when ‘the janitors of the shadow lands, flick their brooms at me.”

Who bears witness to this? This blog in essence is my public declaration (albeit to an empty room). On a practical sense, I see this medium joining with my handwritten journal -- used for my warm ups -- the laps I will swim, the blocks I will run; all to remain nimble as mind flows into the ink or the tap tap tap of the plastic keys on this computer.

Last fall, amidst the towering terra cotta cliffs of Sedona, nested in a valley of sycamore and cottonwood trees, I had the privilege of attending a workshop with Natalie Goldberg at the Sedona Arts Center.

In the mid 80’s a friend had given me her first book “Writing Down the Bones”. Heather could see I had a dream of one day being a writer. The book was a sublime gift. It showed me in the four years we had known each other; she had listened to more than my words. She connected with a restless creative spirit in me and offered my muse a path to be followed. While I read and enjoyed the book, I was too focused on building a career and finding excitement in the material existence around me. The shiny white paperback came to rest on a bookshelf that has since then leaned against many walls. For years it moved with me, second shelf down on the left side, propped between the “The Elements of Style” and a dictionary.

In those years, a gentle awakening began as karmic seeds ripened. I floated through a series of experiences that led me from ‘myth’ to an interest in Buddhism. A favorite pastime of lingering amidst the stacks of local independent booksellers had advanced the library beyond what I was able to read. The contents of the bookshelf began to change while it swelled with new titles.

One rainy afternoon I was re-organizing the shelves to make room for some new books. A perceptible shift away from fantasy fiction and books on cinema, particularly Alfred Hitchcock. The new recruits, Joseph Campbell, Huston Smith, Chogyam Trungpa and Lama Surya Das were standing in a row and needed more room. It was the spine of Natalie Goldberg’s book that caught my eye. Shambhala. I was immediately curious what a Buddhist publisher was doing amongst my scant collection of writing books.

Natalie writes from a Zen Buddhist perspective. While my training to that point had been more on the Tibetan side, I had been curious but immune to this angle years earlier on my first read. Though I immediately recognized that it was another moment of serendipity, while not cognizant, these teachings had become part of me.

I devoured the book again, and was left hungry by a single concept. A writer writes. In the ensuing years that little voice would remind me, while writing a business letter, during the birth of email, training manuals, performance evaluation, it was all writing.

It Starts.....

Angled and slightly propped up, a mere meter to my left on a side table, the supple leather covered journal watches me in an almost accusing manner. Is this the end for the Waterman fountain pen, shiny black with a brass pocket clip and midnight blue ink even now drying in the nib.

Is this the beginning of the end for the handwritten journal?

In some form I have more than 40 + years of personal writing. Vast tracts of uncontrolled musings. Bookends to hollow spaces of days, weeks, years, then back to inconsistent, spasmodic surges, of trite and self serving dribble. Neatly formed conventional and boring dissertations, controlled discussions of veiled emotions - expectant of a future audience. It's all there, words of prose, poetry and essays, and then the photography.

And now a new venue, anonymous but not private. Where will my fingers take me?