We're getting ready to head south again.
Ready to find our place on a lovely piece of land.
... sometimes I wonder if we will.
Soon our year of preparations will come to an end.
Everything we owned will either be given away,
sold, or packed up for storage.
We will leave our cool green
farm in the Pacific Northwest.
We'll leave the salmon, the river, the blackberries, frogs, firs, and misty days behind us.
Some other life awaits us in Central or South America.
On our way to Colombia
we'll visit Costa Rica,
Panama, & perhaps Nicaragua.
And if we happen to find
some happy place
on the way to Colombia?
We'll probably hang around
for a while. Maybe forever.
This plan of voluntary
displacement
It's our choice and we're getting used to it.
On the other hand, I know
5 million Colombians who
don't feel so OK at all.
5 million displaced from
their homes by corporate
greed, violence, disaster,
and global politics.
How can we live in our
peaceful Shangri-la,
knowing all the pain and turmoil
that would be in motion around us?
And yet, pain and
turmoil is present
here in the US.
And somehow we
can still enjoy the
rainbows and roses.
For sure, our search for "Home"
has brought us into
personal contact with
confusing political realities.
But even more, it has
been an internal quest
for meaning in our lives.
We've already deconstructed our existence as cultural Americans.
We've released 90% of our possessions,
and disconnected from our careers.
Leaving the embrace of family behind,
and in the absence of jobs and
possessions, what will be left of us?
Who will we be?
It is nothing less than a complete
re-direction of our lives.
We're exchanging control
and security for unknown
possibilities and risks.
Why would we choose this path through life?
I found part of the answer in Los Angeles 8 years ago.
Long story short:
I co-founded a non-profit,
Earthworks Community Farm,
Our mission was to provide
life skills training in a
farm setting to local "at risk"
We put over 100 local students
through our program on the
4 acre site the county gave us.
And we won recognition
and awards for our work.
Tractors, greenhouses, irrigation systems; everything was needed.
Through my connections in agribusiness
I obtained material and service donations, equipment and supplies.
I designed and installed
fences, buildings,
& irrigation systems.
I controlled the cropping plan,
put in the fruit orchard,
the timber bamboo hedgerows,
and the native plant arboretum.
I jumped on the part of the project
I could see, understand, and control.
I succeeded in creating a beautiful urban farm,
and I enjoyed the personal challenge.
But building the farm was not ALL that was happening,
and it was not the most important part.
Our Buddhist curriculum manager, Mary Maverick,
began to get me more involved with the students.
I began to see the kids as
individuals that I cared about,
and I felt a change
happen in myself.
I saw city kids come on to
our farm with their heads down.
And I saw real change
happen in their lives.
And I was humbled by it.
For me the farm became a place
to experience life-changing
relationships to the land
and to each other.
I learned how to trust
the power of relationship,
and understand how to
step away from my need
to control outcomes.
I am not exactly sure how
my LA farm experience is related
to the search for a meaningful existence
that Starr and I are engaged in.
Perhaps an unexpected
surprise awaits us.
Perhaps we are
needed somewhere.
I don't need to know.
Because I can trust.
I can accept that the dream of that sweet little farm in the country
might just be another relic of our American materialism.
That dream had the power to put us in motion,
but just maybe there's a lot more going on.
Something more difficult to imagine,
but more meaningful by far.
I wonder . . .
MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!
