So, what would be a good beginning to a sabbatical, a sabbatical for rest and to change highly productive and very unhealthy habits of over-work? Travel. So, best to marry someone from a warmer place and go home for the holidays and someone in the midst of his second masters (tuition-free) who has to bunch his vacation time together so as not to miss classes and internship teaching. Marshall has been working 70-hour weeks. He grew up riding his bike through the orange groves in the small towns east of Los Angeles. We slip out between 2 large snowstorms for 3 weeks in California.
I had pushed very hard to get my Year End letter out. My last work trip, Oregon and California, was the week before Thanksgiving. We both needed deep rest. Marshall’s folks live in a suburban ranch style home. They are both avid gardeners so as I sit in the backyard to write in my journal I am surrounded by roses, vegetables, bird of paradise, but mostly camellias entering flowering time. In that setting I can finally stop rushing- the to-do list is done, the schedule gone, and email & phone far away. I begin the let down physically, emotionally, mentally.
We have a few days at the beach. Our room allows the sight and sound of the ocean surf to pound our senses. We leave windows and doors open all day and night to be washed by sound and sea air. How wonderful to be humbled by something so much larger than the self. We walked 2 hours each morning on the beach watching seals and dolphins.
For me there is the slow awareness that all the learning I’ve done on torture the past 3 years burdened me. As I had foisted myself into leadership I had postponed much of my emotional response for later. Feelings from my early life arose brought on by the study of torture. I’d been wondering why I was feeling restless, like a 2 year old resisting a nap. In the quiet, I could now remind myself that the time of my own violence was over as it was for the numerous torture survivors I’ve come to know. This brought deeper sleep each day and night.
The large family Christmas was loud and fun and best were the nieces and nephews who have grown so and are reaching for hopes and dreams. Uncle Marshall and Aunt John had brought the right gifts from afar. We verge on coolness. Soon we travel to the desert with Marshall’s folks. We pass Palm Springs and Joshua Tree for a smaller town more removed. Crossing over badlands where nothing grows and coming into the most remote area imaginable, we have a few days viewing a vast landscape where life has a tiny rainfall.
Here there was more deep sleep and two feelings come clear for me. The first is an assumption from grade school- that things generally get worse. This idea has been washed by years of healing work. I thought it had disappeared. But learning of torture as a world-wide system had brought this up again- my own dance between hope and fear. Again I’ve the need to be open to listening to deep stirrings, to embrace whatever aspects are revealed, and to cradle all with some tenderness and the Light of a broad overview showing things do get better with work and time. Again deep sleep. A second feeling came entwined in all this- that of grief for all of humanity, grief that we wound ourselves and each other with such meanness, violence, and poverty. We are in times of great meanness and all people are part of a parade of consuming greed bringing injustice. The payment for this awareness is simply staying awake to make careful choices and not loose track of the real story. I can see why the desert features so prominently in so many religious stories of seeking.
And now we are home. Vermont has just had more snow and more is on the way. The wood box is filled and refilled and the woodstove brings us cozy heat when the greenhouse is dark and cold. I’ve some letters to write but next week I’ll start to paint the bedroom and remove myself from desk, computer, email, & phone entirely. It’s mid-January and I’ve set sail on sabbatical leaving port after a year of organizing for rest and refreshment. All made possible with good help and care from many.