I had a disturbed sleep again last night, which is very unusual for me. Last night I woke with a start from a dream. It was 11.15 (I had been asleep at 9.00), my mouth was dry and moonlight from the window above my head again threw a blanket over me. I feel as if it is the light that wakes me, that causes me to toss and turn in my sleep. In my dream I was searching for a place to meditate. I came upon this house, a huge beautiful, grand looking place with wide pale plaster walls. Inside the entranceway, stuck against the wall there is a piece of A4 paper with a handwritten note and an arrow pointing to the right. It looks completely out of place and when I look away and back it has disappeared. I can’t make it out, and before I start worrying I take the stairs on the right descending in a broad spiral fashion into a vast room below.
The room is empty and immaculately clean. The walls are smooth and creamy and the floor as far as I can see is covered in lush soft white carpet like a field of newly fallen snow, across which there are one set of footprints leading away from the stairwell where I stand.
I venture through the room and veer left into a broad corridor. I can hear voices: people talking, chatting, laughing together. There is a room to my right with people in it, I recognize no one and no one speaks to me, yet nor does anyone question my presence. I feel slightly uncomfortable, out of place, yet not so much that I am afraid. I walk further past another room, also inhabited with the same relaxed looking people, I continue on to the end of the corridor and step out into a vast outdoor area. I take a few steps and looking to my right I realize that the corridor I have walked down and the rooms I have passed form the left-hand wing of a huge U shape. From where I stand I look into the courtyard at a massive pool, tastefully and immaculately surrounded by stucco and small palms. Just visible at the other end of the pool is a small group of people, seated at a table. Their eyes turn towards me and I feel as if I am not meant to be here, outside like this, in their space.
I return inside and enter the first room I previously passed. Now a ragged queue has formed snaking its way around the edge of the room to a small rostrum where a woman stands taking money. I understand that people are preparing to pay for the meditation session. I join the queue, feeling less conspicuous and more comfortable in doing so. I ask a young man standing near me how much is expected. I am unsure of his answer, but think he says nine dollars, or perhaps nine pounds. I rummage in my pockets and withdraw some change which on a quick count amounts to perhaps five or six dollars or pounds (the currency is unclear).I realize I do not have enough and as I begin to become worried about this someone else in the queue tells me that I can pay whatever I can afford. I am relieved and the queue moves amazingly quickly towards the woman and the makeshift counter.
As it comes my turn to pay I pay more attention to the woman. She is slight, perhaps 5’ 8’ tall with full auburn hair in tight curls that frame her face. She is standing in front of the rostrum, in front of me, talking with another woman of the same build who has just paid. The red-haired woman turns towards me and puts her arm around my waist and rests her head gently upon my chest. I am startled but do not pull away as I do not feel threatened. The women are smiling, happy and the other woman says repeatedly in broken English ‘tall…very tall’ and smiles knowingly at the red haired woman. The red haired woman snuggles against me, it is as if she knows me.
And then I woke, suddenly. The dream, it’s vividness and my sudden awaking remind me of the dreams I have when I am on Vipassana retreat. It is another reminder of the nature of my time here.
I still managed to rise just after 4am and meditate and do some work on my grammar. I think though I will definitely be having a nana nap later in the day. I am also aware that I am starting to smell and will probably light a fire in the wetback so as to heat up some water for a bath.
Caroline contacts me and I wish her a good nights sleep and sweet dreams. We have come to text each other each morning and evening, as one rises the other gets ready to sleep. It is nice to have this, particularly as yesterday I came to realize the completeness of my silence (I spoke to no one all day). It is sweetly ironic and yet wonderfully appropriate that the only person I am in any communication with is Cari, on the other side of the world. It feels good that in this moment she is closer to me, in all ways, than anyone else.
This morning’s routine is similar to yesterday, except for my bath which is no small thing requiring as it does the lighting of the fire in the wetback oven to heat the water. It didn’t go particularly well and after over an hour or so of fire the water was still only lukewarm. I made do and had a shallow bath, at least I felt a lot cleaner.
Work on my dharma course progresses well, though as with yesterday it does so in an amorphous manner with ideas, associations and concepts coming to me more often when I am walking away than when I am seated with the writing pad in front of me. This afternoon I began unexpectedly to write a dharma book rather than the course, something that I have started and discarded numerous times before. This time however I felt no concern, rather it seems now more than ever that I am in the right place at the right time to do this. I sat at the table outside and wrote a postcard to Scott and in doing so was reminded of the short videos he took just prior to my leaving, and the script he wrote for me, in which I declare that I am writing a book.
It was this moment that drew me once again to the question that has plagued me since leaving the UK. There have been so many mornings, both here in Aotearoa and in Australia that I have woken with the thought “what am I doing here?” Today I felt as if I had an answer other than “I don’t know” (which itself is an answer I am completely ok with). Today standing under the fruit trees in Jim’s front yard, alone now for two days, a book of scribblings and notations on the table in front of me, I knew another answer. This is what I am here for. Just to be here. In this place, in this space. In this way.
Today has been overcast, the sun resting behind clouds of differing shades of grey. I do not mind I have had no urge to venture out. My routines have seemed less so today, perhaps I am already becoming accustomed to them. I nap around midday and wake just before 2.30 completely disoriented. For a moment I do not know what country I am in and am relieved once I finally grasp where I am in the world even though I am still unsure of exactly where I am. My sleeping and waking are definitely different here, I am interested to see how this continues.
The lack of orientation returns later this evening when it takes me some time to understand that today is Thursday. I have come to think that my departure from here will be determined by how long my stocks last, in particular my food and cigarettes. I think I will probably be walking out on Wednesday morning next week.
day three…
day one …
x bhavatu sabbe mangalum x
all memories from before me. In front of me nothing
