Author: Thomas Walker

After crossing the country from New York City to Portland, Oregon, I landed with dear friends, with a couple of days to spare to get ready for a month-long backpacking trip with Dharma teachers Soten and Shinei. A couple of days quickly passed, and became a couple of hours, becoming mere moments. My dear friend Eric drove me up Mount Hood as I continued to shoot off text messages.  It was an hour to drive, and he had a good story to tell, but I was about to be off my phone for a month and I still managed to have some loose ends. I was a bad listener. Sorry, Eric! He was a great driver.  Thanks, Eric!

We arrived to our destination, where a number of humans and a dog huddled around food by the roadside. I saw old friends and met new ones, weaving stories within our very first interactions.  We were Colin, Mimi, Veronica, Tom (him), Thomas (me), Soten, Shinei, Robin, and Cata.  Remembering now our first day on the trail, I think back with such fondness—our naivete, our blister-less feet, the kind and wet landscapes on the west side of Mount Hood.  “Leg one” of our three-leg hike would be circumambulating the mountain, seeing her majesty from all sides!  We moved through mountain meadows and rocky trails. In one moment, the mountain would sparkle with life in all manner of ways—flowers, butterflies, waterfalls.  Then we would walk through a burn, and later on, the rocky side of the mountain, where patches of snow interspersed an otherwise dry landscape. 

Each day we would wake around 4:30 and started meditation with an awakening energy practice, along with tea and a small piece of chocolate.  After our morning meditation, service, and breakfast, we would breakdown camp and got to hiking.  By now it would be about 9 AM, and we would hike until lunch—dependent on a mix of timing, distance, and mood.  Until lunch, we hiked and practiced in silence.  At lunch, we broke silence until dinner.  Hiking in community, we moved through different constellations of connection, each pair or group finding their own way of inter-being. As we walked slowly or quickly, gathered water, tied shoes, or took breaks, new constellations of relationship would form, weaving us more thoroughly together. The first leg of the trip we hiked about 40 miles, out of almost 200 during the whole trip.  Plenty of time to be with the mind, and to be with friends.

At the end of our Mount Hood segment, we camped above the Timberline Lodge and attempted to make reservations for breakfast in the morning.  Things looked gloomy as Soten’s try at a reservation fell short (for lack of charisma, let’s say.) Yet, it was not without hope! Shinei’s shining smile, and her Jedi mind-tricks helped to manifest a breakfast reservation when morning came. We drank coffee, and ate richly.  The Timberline Lodge bustled with tourists, hotel guests, and Pacific Crest Trail hikers, a unique assortment of beings living luxuriously, and others encountering their first warm water in days or weeks.  I found the Timberline Lodge to be a beautiful setting of comfort and compassion, as so many different kinds of people came together to enjoy the mountain in their own way.  They even let us use the bathroom.

“Leg Two” was the stuff of legends.  It took us down Mount Hood, around Mount Jefferson, and then to the Three Sisters area.  Did you know you can walk from one mountain to another? Something about that was surprising and deeply empowering.  As the days passed by, knees aching and toes blistering and muscles wearying, our schedule slowly shifted.  The reality was that we were going slower than expected, and that we needed to be going just that slow.  We started sleeping-in one more hour each day, while Soten continued to get up early, honoring the silence before the sunrise.

We cannot forget our dear friend Samaya.  We don’t know why Samaya was named Samaya, whether she broke samaya in another lifetime and re-incarnated as a dog, or perhaps some good omen, seeing that she, as a puppy, crawled out of the trash and was quickly adopted by Soten and Shinei as they walked by in Central America.  Samaya knew we were her pack, so one night when she didn’t come back for a little too long, our collective concern grew.  Soten ran one way to check for her, and then back the other way, and finally again in the direction that we would be going the following day.  The rest of us stayed back by our water source and stayed the night, wondering about Samaya and Soten and their travels through the night.

The next morning, we started hiking south to follow Soten and, hopefully, Samaya.  Pacific Crest Trail hikers are generous in their information sharing, and several had either seen Soten or heard of a dog hiking south.  This was another example of the constant exchange of information that exists on the PCT—where is the water, where is good rest, what can I expect. The rest of us continued hiking, hours and miles behind Soten and Samaya, and intermittently received messages with our spotty service, hinting at Samaya’s presence on the trail.  As we hiked, the fire of bodhicitta was ignited, and Mimi, the most blistered among us, proposed that we finish the previously planned two-day hike in one day, making it a 17-mile day.  The women of the group led while the three of us men just tried to keep up.  It was a feat!  We were the last to camp, where we were greeted by happy hikers, Samaya, skittles, beer, and the promise of two(ish) days of rest.   We had crossed the threshold into being halfway through the trip.  The next week was our longest half, and was often threatened by, or affected by, the smoke.  At Olallie Lake, our halfway point, we saw smoke rising up over the distant Mount Jefferson. 

As we got back on the trail, two hikers decided to step off the trail.  One for a few days (our heroic Mimi, to care for her blisters) and another, who left to Great Vow Monastery also to care for her heavily-walked-upon feet.  This was one of the more difficult days of hiking, at least emotionally.  At lunch, I left the group after singing our lunchtime song to go cry in the stream made by melting glacial waters.  The heart doesn’t just open one way, it opens all ways and in every direction.  And that’s a lot. Best to let the water take it, the rocks to hold it.

Hiking southward the east side of the cascades, in this section of the hike we encountered miles upon miles of burnt forest.  Day by day conditions would change, with varying levels of smoke to walk through, each of us with our sensitivities, reactions, and meanings attached to what the smoke meant for our body, our world.  This section of the hike felt like a pre-apocalyptic training ground.  What a treat, to meet the end of the world with a roving band of bodhisattvas.  Where else would you rather be?  Where else could you be?

Did I mention the huckleberries?  No.  Come to Mount Jefferson in the high summer and nibble to your hearts delight.  Do not plan to walk fast, there is much, MUCH snacking to do!  But Soten is waiting ahead at our new camp.  One more huckleberry.  On our night at Mount Jefferson, we made the collective decision to sleep in an extra hour.  Only two of us did. The others woke up before the sun to greet the stars and mountain, much to my benefit  There’s nothing quite like sleeping within the vicinity of meditating people.

We hiked for another week across the cascades, about 10 miles a day.  We crossed the lava fields and Highway 126, the road that I probably most love in the world.  Strange to love a road.  We wound our way into the Three Sisters Wilderness, and down to the lake where our dear Veronica ended her journey with us, and picked up four fresh new meditators with lots of food.  Apples! Cheese! Greens!  Finally we were on our last leg.  Once a creature becomes three-legged there’s really no counting how many it might grow.

In all reality, this pilgrimage had become a many-legged beast.  But one of the many legs was our weeklong retreat by a hidden mountain lake.  It sounds idyllic.  And it was!  Alas, many of us know the idiom: “Wherever you go, there you are.”  For a week we sat in a circle, breathing together, and singing together.  The simplicity unveiled itself: all we were really doing was sitting, eating, and sleeping.  On sesshin, we speak few words, lending our ears, and attention, to the Earth. The sounds of water gushing out of a mountain spring. Of rocks tumbling.  The afternoon delight of watching friends swim.  It was here I remembered, while swimming across our little mountain lake (a pond, perhaps) — “Oh yeah! I love being alive!”  It struck with both grief and joy, as I had forgotten.  Life had become a problem.  I fear that I’ve done it again—made it a problem—and I pray to remember again: “Oh yes! I love being alive!”

We walked back down the mountain, towards Bend, over a couple of days.  By another lake, on a rainy night, we started our first fire of the whole month.  The warmth penetrated through the cold night air, and the mountain monks gathered with few words, enamored by light and the play of flames.  Wendell Berry writes “To go in the dark with a light is to know the light; to know the dark, go dark.”  It’s nice to know the dark.  But it’s also nice to know the light and warmth of fire, and of good Dharma friends.

What did we do on our journey? We walked a lot, and I think we got closer.  Closer to each other, of course.  But also closer to the Earth, and closer to the stars.  We got closer to the mountains, and to the huckleberries, and to the mountain goats.  Closer to the fire.  Close enough to see, to taste, to smell.  Closer to our footsteps, and closer to our breath.  There’s something else too.  I’m not sure quite what it is, but I think we got closer to that too. 

The past four years, I have been living primarily in Brooklyn, New York. I moved here to study at Union Theological Seminary, to eventually receive a “Masters of Divinity” and work as a chaplain. After graduating from seminary, and completing my chaplaincy residency the mission was complete. However, the mission was overlaid with significant life changes, including the death of my father, which left me feeling depleted. Unlike most of my chaplaincy cohort, who moved on to other work, I decided to take a step back to have time to process all that had taken place—and more deeply, to find a bit of the spark within myself that I used to know and love. It wouldn’t have done anyone any good to keep chopping through the thick vines of samsara as I had been, calling myself a bodhisattva. All the other bodhisattvas let me know as much. They lovingly said, “Get out of here!”

I decided to take a long road-trip, across the country to my homelands of Oregon and California. I was pulled by the gravity of dharma and friendship; and I was pushed by a wish for peace. With the intention to, for a time, put down the struggle. What soon became obvious—as with any (some? all?) retreats or pilgrimages—was the disappointing reality that, “Wherever you go, there you are.”

One of the themes that came up quickly while leaving New York, and entering the road trip, is the question: what happens when we have time? I spent many hours looking at the ETA while driving—devising solutions for how to pass the expected amount of time. Often, 7-10 hours. Likely, I spent more time devising solutions than actually implementing them. And time passed anyways. Several days in this earlier part of the roadtrip, I would set out to leave, only to be stopped or slowed down by a torrential downpour. “Go slower,” the universe whispered.

And then, what happens when we have time, with friends? What is it like to feel like there is enough time? I recall seeing movie promotion for James Bond while riding the subway to work— No Time To Die was the name of the film.This felt just like the energy of the city. Who has to time to die around here? Most of the time, we see nothing of death or sickness. Let alone look at our own. I am waiting for the train, looking at my phone. There is no time for this. No Time to Die say the faces and bodies of so many of us bustling about. Leaving the energy of the city, I came to find so many kind presences that could sit and listen, share and be heard. Which, in some way, feels like a celebration in itself. Listening to and celebrating each others’ existence.

With the intention of heading West to Oregon, I first went… East. I drove up to Maine, and a small part of sweet spiritual community I have been a part of in New York City. One of these friends owns a small house on Acadia Island, and there we had a small retreat of rest and healing, and much fun. We sang songs and prayed, but mostly we hiked and played. It was the quick reset before the long reset. I even got to see my childhood friend, Celine O’Malley, who would meet me at the swing set at the elementary school between our houses.

I left from Maine and started driving West. Ultimately I would drive about 3,000 miles from Acadia Island, Maine, to our Dekeling retreat near Otis, Oregon. I stayed with family in Trumansburg, New York, hometown friends in Cleveland, a family motel in Colfax, Iowa, and in the beloved Medicine Bow mountains of Wyoming. I visited a college friend and her family in Logan, Utah, and re-met a fellow road-tripper in the middle of Idaho. In Oregon, I stayed with a dear friend turned organic farmer in La Grande, and then with my dear friends, Eric and Maggie in Corbett. (Many of whom are pictured here)

And everywhere in between, I found kindness. I recall a conversation with a worker at REI, telling me about his happiness for his daughter who moved to Colorado. And a conversation with an old mechanic friend in Oregon, who affirmed that if my car broke down, “I’d just come and get you.” In the driving, and in the decision-making, I encountered the spaces where my Dad used to support me. Especially across the Mid-West, I encountered these spaces as empty. Or perhaps not empty, but new. I grieved in my confusion as I drove West, but was constantly caught by the kindness of new and old friends. I felt very alone, but found myself to be very supported. Often not knowing where the next day would take me, I would ask for advice or connections from friends, and find that between the nurturing Earth and good ol’ interdependence, there’s almost always a bed waiting. Learning to ask, and learning to receive, and learning to meet this new life. The road-trip, pilgrimage, whatever we may call it, is a practice in walking out of the comfort zone, into the unknown, and finding that we’re still here. That kindness is still here. Thousands of small decisions to nourish life and notice how each road leads to the next one.

And, there is a mutuality in being caught. At least, I hope. To arrive into the home of a friend who lives hundreds or thousands of miles away. To witness the new manifestations of their life, the comings and goings, feeds the reality of our mutual lives. Most precious to me, I found, was being a part of the morning routine, as kids get ready for school, or work needs to get done. The enchantment of being a new visitor fades into the reality of daily life. Learning to look at the small moments.

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