Meeting

It was midsummer of the 8th year of training at the Monastic Academy for the Preservation of Life on Earth. I was visiting the center as a first-time guest for four days. This particular day was a "care day," a day where the focus is community connection. The group had just come back from a walk on the loop trail, a circular trail that goes through some of the wooded parts of the rural 124-acre property. Now the group gathered on the porch with chips and salsa, and Soryu, the head teacher, joined. While I had been there for a few days, I had not seen him yet, as he was off schedule writing a book. He spoke casually, yet in a way that enraptured the group. I was sitting near the back and was caught up in severe self-consciousness. I don't remember what he was talking about, but at one point he turned his attention to me and spoke to me directly, asking me an unimportant question related to the topic he had been speaking on. I answered with a single "yes." This was our first interaction, and the only time we spoke during my four-day visit.

Within 45 days, I had finished the job I had been working, moved out of the apartment I had been living in, and had entered full-time training with Soryu at the California center.