Return of the Prodigal Zum

It’s been a busy few weeks as I transition back to my life before robes.

I flew back to Los Angeles and it's been great to be back in the warm glow of family again. I finally fessed up to them about my walkabout activities over the past year, but they didn’t have much time to chew it over before we all headed down to San Diego for a cousin’s wedding and the big Takahashi family reunion with the relatives on my mother’s side.

My cousin’s wedding was a beautiful celebration near the beach on Coronado Island. The bride was lovely, the groom charming, and it was all a very sweet low-key ceremony, as evidenced by all the bare feet walking down the aisle.






It was great catching up with all of my relatives at the wedding reception and especially the next day at the reunion on the beach. Fun was had by all, tons of food was eaten, sports and games were played, and we finished the day off with a bonfire. We even had a watermelon eating contest and a donut eating contest with the donuts suspended on strings and the competitors not allowed to use their hands. After my past year with limited access to food, it was slightly strange to be a part of all this conspicuous consumption. I'm not judging it---cuz hey, watermelon eating contests are a fine slice of Americana---I'm just recounting my initial awkwardness. I played way too much volleyball and spent the next couple of days recovering from over-exertion and aches.




And of course I spent a lot of time trying to explain my walkabout. The most common questions dealt with my motivations, biggest challenges, and lessons learned. (I plan to write a future entry to try to sum up some conclusions.) I was pleasantly surprised---okay, extremely relieved!---that my mother took the news really well, and was actually looking forward to reading this blog. My sister, on the other hand, had the completely opposite reaction and was very angry with me for being dishonest with the family, especially when I was close by on the streets of Los Angeles.

Of course, her point is totally valid: it was very uncool of me to keep the family out of the loop. It was just a matter of being the lesser of two evils since I didn't want my mother to worry about me over the whole year. Not telling my family the truth during my walkabout was actually the most uncomfortable part of this whole monk experience. (Okay,  maybe "God" threatening to slaughter me was a little uncomfortable too.....and alright, the whole episode with Carol was pretty overwhelming...)

I returned to some of my "old" haunts in Venice and Santa Monica. I've only been away for a few months, but it feels like a lifetime ago. Well, perhaps a lifestyle ago. I drove around the roundabout that I shared with a sculpture of a nude female torso where I used to eat my Vienna sausage dinners while watching the surf movie projected on the wall of a nearby restaurant. I drove past my Venice alley nook and saw that someone had significantly upgraded it by placing a comfortable looking chair in it, though it must cut down on the limited sleeping space considerably.

I wandered the Venice boardwalk, taking in the comfortably familiar vibe and characters. I looked for Sean and Rebecca, my two homeless artist friends who were trying to carve out their survival selling their art along the boardwalk, but I couldn't find them anywhere. I did see Mr. Choeng Kim at his bike rental shop and he said that business is doing much better now that summer is in full swing. And as I drove to Santa Monica, I went past a fellow waving one of those advertising signs and then realized that it was Derrick, the Christian apologist who tried so hard to save my soul. I would have stopped to say hello, but I was already late to meet up with Rob.

I met Rob at Chess Park and it was great to catch up with him and some of the other guys I'd gotten to know over a chessboard. Kind Ronald, the homeless El Salvadoran illegal immigrant who had been so generous to me, was as congenial as ever. Gruff “Download” was showing his genuine sweet side, playing a game with a little boy and keeping his conspiracy theories under wraps. Sir Charles was trash-talking as much as ever as he chased Dwayne's pieces all over the board.

Dwayne is one of my more eloquent homeless friends. What he lacks in chess skills, he more than makes up for in street smarts from various life experiences. He is one of the few who have actually chosen to be homeless, seeing it as an opportunity for adventure and learning. Originally trained as an army engineer, Dwayne has held various jobs all over the country, including lumberjacking in the NorthWest and being a stockbroker on Wall Street. (Although he does admit to being a pretty lousy stockbroker.) He had run across a book a while back and had been holding it for me. It's called Practical Mysticism by David Samuel. It kinda looks like a typical New-Age/self-help distortion of Eastern traditions since it bills itself as a path to "...self-awakening, financial growth, and harmonious relationships", but I'll try to keep an open mind and give it the benefit of the doubt.

Of course Rob and I had arranged to bike down the beach along the bike path just like the "old days". He treated me to lunch at the Baja Cantina and then we headed off down the beach. I made it down to about Manhattan Beach and chose to be humbled in a game against his chess computer while Rob continued biking down to Redondo Beach. Besides being quite generous, Rob is also quite an excellent chess player. When he returned, he soon helped me with my humility practice by thumping me in a couple of quick games.

We got back to Chess Park too late to see if my zen buddy Gentle Gene had showed up. And I was a little disappointed that I had also missed both the skill of Duckworth and the antics of the Great Carlini. Jocular Shoma, the Russian immigrant who had been injured when he was hit by a car, was still not well enough to return to battle at Chess Park. And Wolf, the native Apache who turned his life around after prison, hasn't been seen since he moved from his apartment near the park.
 
Later that evening, I met up with Kevin and we had a nice conversation about his homeless status and his political blog at BTCnews.com. It was nice to hear that he's on track to get out of the homeless shelter and get his own housing. He's still looking after my bike, which is a win-win situation for both of us since it comes in handy for him when he needs to run errands. Seemingly contrary to his leftist leanings, Kevin has an interesting take on the presidential election. He actually believes that a McCain presidency would be better for the country in the long run. However, this is because Kevin thinks that McCain's Bush-style policies would further drive the country into the ground which would in turn provoke the radical will to turn this country around on a grass-roots level. Not quite a revolution perhaps, but a resolve to implement New Deal style changes birthed from a depression.
 
The next morning I met exuberant Ruben for some paddle tennis out on the courts at Venice beach. Ruben is a jovial friend who was living out of his car. He has since moved in with his girlfriend and is also enjoying bonding with her young son. The paddle tennis was a blast, especially since it was a lot easier to play than regular tennis. But again, I overdid it as we played for four hours and I ended up exhausted and well-cooked by the blazing summer sun. Except for a bit of biking, this monkabout year has left me fairly out of shape and I'm paying the price as I transition back into sports.

As expected, my life has sped up again. There are definitely less moments of calm comtemplation, especially as I bounce all over visiting friends and family. Distractions and activities abound and I'm pretty much back to my old scatter-brained ways. But then again, I was a pretty scatter-brained monk too, so no big difference really. I do seem to be maintaining a fair amount of self-awareness, and this helps me remember to relax into the unpredictable flux that is my life---an occasional calm in the eye of the storm.

I remain appreciative of beds, hot showers, plentiful food, and the roof over my head, among other things. Gratitude has been one of the big lessons on my monkabout and I definitely don't take these blessings for granted. At least for now. I'm very well aware of my propensity to get used to the status quo and start taking things for granted, so we'll see how long this lasts.

There are lots of little things I'm getting used to doing again, like using money (borrowed!) or wearing different clothes. I got so used to wearing my simple monk robes that it felt strange to choose shirts and pants to wear. I do miss my robes a little, but it's also nice not to be a walking sideshow freak. (The Amazing Homeless Kung-fu Janitor! Watch him sweep the street! Look at him run from the cops! And you can even feed him too!)

An example of not quite choosing appropriate clothes occurred when I visited some friends who live in the San Fernando Valley. To avoid the traffic, I had gone early and read in a park until they got home. I had forgotten how hot the Valley gets in the summer (upper 90s fahrenheit that day) and had dressed in long pants and a black shirt. It made for quite a sweltering wait.

Whenever the heat starts to get me down, I try to remember something I saw in the city of Lucknow in northern India. It was 117 degrees and I was slogging my way through the heat to a market to buy some fruit. As in other third world countries, Indian merchants and peddlers often set up tables along the sidewalks to hawk their wares and skills. I was bemoaning the oppressive heat when I looked over and saw a tailor happily working away at his sewing machine. He sat in the direct sunlight, right next to a large patch of shade. He could have easily moved his little table into the shade, but he seemed oblivious to the heat as he sewed away, humming a tune to himself. And he was wearing a black long-sleeve sweater.

On the other end of the spectrum, I remember seeing a picture of some very young Japanese schoolchildren walking to school through the snowfall, wearing only shoes and matching red shorts. The mind can be so powerful if we give it some room to flex by removing the constrictions of previously conceived notions and conditioning. When I remember to let go of my resistance to the heat, I definitely suffer much less. I've tried this with the cold too, but have gotten mixed results since I find it harder to relax into the cold.

Anyways, I ended up falling asleep in the park, so I guess I haven't given up all of my homeless ways just yet.

So what's my Plan? Well, I will soon be heading back to the Omega Institute in upstate New York. This will bring my walkabout full circle since Omega is where I first set off on this monky path a year ago. And, appropriately enough, "omega" is the last letter in the Greek alphabet. (The institute's name is derived from Teilhard de Chardin's concept of the "Omega Point": the endpoint of complexity and consciousness toward which the universe is evolving.)

And yet, I have another wedding to attend in San Diego in October! This time it's a couple of good friends who are operating under the delusion that the event is all about them and audaciously neglected my needs when they set the wedding date.

And at some point relatively soon, I will need to make some life decisions about what direction I want to head in, probably involving some form of employment since the jig is up regarding my monk gig.

But for now, this wandering boy with his wandering mind and wandering eye is on the move again. For the road is singing its siren song, the horizon is opening its arms wide, and marvels are blossoming on all sides, especially when I remember to keep an eye out for the miraculous in the mundane.

Ever stalking Wonder.



“Our battered suitcases were piled on the sidewalk again; we had longer ways to go. But no matter, the road is life.”
---Jack Kerouac, from On The Road


"So how's it being back home? Monk all gone, spastic boy back?"
---email from a friend


“I have come to accept and make peace with the way you live your life.”
---my mother


"I don't want to talk to you because it will probably end up in your blog."
---my sister

 
“You’ll end up in the street.”
---an aunt, predicting the fortune in my fortune cookie at a Chinese restaurant
 

“Next victim!”
---Sir Charles, exclaiming victory in his chess match against Dwayne


"I should note here that I’m not advocating individual or mob violence as a solution to financial difficulties; only the credible threat of it."
---Kevin, on his blog at BTCnews.com