Rilke talks about patience in meditating on the unresolved issues in one’s life, on living the questions rather than seeking the answers.
Our friend, Cushla (Maori healer whom we met in Santa Barbara) reminded us, in a recent note, that it is "the journey not the destination",
And, upon our arrival at Light Morning, Robert had written a quote from Osho (found in a National Geographic article) on the white board: Each day is a journey and the journey itself home…
An interesting collection of thoughts and feelings have been playing through my mind today.
Dave and I always enjoyed a lot of downtime in our home in Winnipeg at 173 Tait Avenue. We lived there for 15 years and fixed up everything to our own specifications and standards. We lived our lives, made our meals, worked our landscape, read our books, watched our videos, entertained our friends, and slept -- all under our own auspices. Now that we’ve been on the road since October 26th, we’ve enjoyed increasing our fellowship with others, and, surprisingly, for two people that made all their own food in their own kitchen, following a diet developed over decades, have fared well in the food department, continuing to grow and evolve. It has been satisfying to work in the garden, supporting the growth of our own food, picking the greens that we eat steamed and in our salads. We’ve enjoyed sharing our connection with food with others, and observing and learning from others’ connections with food. We’ve seen many people, speaking in many voices, walking many different paths.
Since I posted that last blog about staying still in Costa Rica, we have been on the move! After landing in Atlanta, Georgia, we found our way to 2 weeks in North Carolina, one week in Virginia (Lightmorning.org -- recommended as a personal retreat centre) and we are en route for menla.org in New York.
As we breathe the air of the different places we come to, things look and feel differently. When we return to the space in between, usually in the form of a Greyhound bus -- it is exciting getting back into our own perspective, modified in its way by the influences we have just entertained.
We are coming from a variety of powerful influences, including having encountered 2 couples who have both started out “pioneering” the land that they’ve now developed by living in tents, without electricity, etc. Robert and Joyce, our most recent hosts at Light Morning, emphasized hospitality, space for personal growth and reflection, fellowship, and a well run homestead in tune with the earth. Joyce is a former (long time ago when computers were the size of dinosaurs) system analyst. Truly, she is gifted in this way and has worked out how the household at Light Morning functions. As well, she has a sense of space that is pretty amazing, and became the amateur architect of the lodge in which we were guests for the week. She has the household running like a charm, and has set up a most pleasing, efficient kitchen. She does not enjoy cooking and we were happy to step into the fray. Her calligraphy skills can be seen on the signs -- humourous, philosophical, articulate, and informative by turns -- that grace the household surroundings. We enjoyed common meals in a space well suited to it and, thanks to Richard for both sharing and facilitating, we heard many stories, histories and dreams in the past week! At Light Morning, they enjoy a regular weekly dream group, and keep the discussion of dreams flowing in and out of regular mealtime conversation. In their discussions, they showed a valuing of the questions.
There were other people that we met at Light Morning that were close to the community. Pam and Bruce, Ron, to name three key people. Enjoyed a visit with Alice, too, during the community pancake breakfast held there each Sunday. What a clever way to stay in touch with everybody! Ron’s pancake recipe didn’t hurt either. Very good tasting. Another dear friend we met at Light Morning is Jason, who was also visiting, and was expecting his partner, Gretchen, the day that we moved on.
