a day in the life

The Vermont Zen Center version of "ango," an intensification of practice, has started. Yesterday I worked at the Center, putting up No Hunting signs and mowing the lawn. At some point I heard the screeching of hawks high overhead. Four or five raptors were circling the grounds, that was a first. I figured this might be a part of the raptor migration and headed to Mt. Philo for lunch, and observing. On the way I saw another 10-20 hawks and eagles in the sky over Shelburne, think I saw a bald eagle! I thought I was really going to be in for a treat. When I got to Mt. Philo, however, whatever had been going on had petered out and died. It's all a great mystery to me.
We had our weekly meeting at the Center, getting out about 8:30. I went into town to get an evening snack. The stars were out. I had brought my binoculars along, hoping to get a closer look at some raptors. Got a good look at Mars, the Andromeda Galaxy, and the Double Cluster in Cassiopeia before bedding down for the night.
Dokusan (one-on-one meeting with the teacher) started at 6 AM. I got up at 5 to pack up the car as I had to leave early for a United Way meeting in Rutland. The sky was still clear. Hauled out the binoculars and got a good look at the Pleiades and the constellation Orion; Sirius blazing in the south. The drive home was beautiful. The sun was rising over the Green Mountains, peaking through clouds of yellow and gold. The maples glowed through the morning mist in the colors of autumn. There was a man taking a walk when I passed through Middlebury armed with a camera, and the joy of being in the right place at the right time. When I was just to the north of Brandon, the migrating geese began to rise out of the neighboring swamps, ponds, and rivers. As they rose, they began to organize their journey in ever-changing kaleidoscopic patterns; a blob becoming a circle becoming a line, becoming a V. There were over a hundred of them. There really aren't words to adequately describe the feeling that came out of witnessing that spectacle.
The United Way meeting started at 8. The day has just begun. I feel like a pretty lucky guy.

In his first summers, forsaking all his toys, my son would stand rapt for near an hour in his sandbox in the orchard as doves and redwings came and went on the warm wind, the leaves dancing, the clouds flying, birdsong and the sweet smell of privet and rose. The child was not observing; he was at rest in the very center of the universe, a part of things, unaware of endings and beginnings, still in unison with the primordial nature of creation, letting all light and phenomena pour through.

The Snow Leopard
Peter Matthiessen