Notes from the Transition

Habiba: 8-year old daughter of a journalist - friend of a friend - killed in Gaza It's November 3rd, 2023. I am sitting here in Portland Oregon, the 'bubble within a bubble' as my friend from Jerusalem calls it. And I know that this is true - that this city is a bubble within a bubble - because somehow there seem to be two realities that are somehow coexisting, and I cannot reconcile that in my head or in my heart. For the past three weeks, my life has consisted of a constant stream of horror from Gaza - from morning until night, I scroll through images of burned and mutilated bodies, mothers screaming, fathers breaking down and crying as they hold the lifeless bodies of their kids. Another day, another massacre, this time in Jabalia refugee camp - and the videos show the before and after: kids and adults gathered in a circle in an open square. Then someone pointing to the sky and everyone running. Six missiles hit, all in a row, killing 400 people. Screams of horror, gray ...

Sometimes I feel like the 2020s are a lot like the 1020s must have been in medieval Europe. Now hear me out! I know we have a lot of technology and progress and modern day luxuries. But I feel like our mentalities, and a lot of our social and economic structures, are stuck back a thousand years ago. The wealthiest live in castles on hilltops, beautiful manors with gardens and plenty to eat, not a care in the world. In the golden city - the desired place - the castles, the gardens, the fountains - are surrounded by dangers and treachery. Moats made up of snaking highways encircle the forbidden city, impossible to cross on foot. The wealthier ones have steeds they can mount to cross over into the golden city. Horses in the 1020s ... cars in the 2020s .... There are bridge trolls at the off ramps into the golden city, demanding payment or exacting revenge. Panhandlers? Or criminals, waiting to pop tires and steal the precious jewels of a catalytic converter from underneath the steed .... ...

When I found Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay) at Plum Village in southern France just over 20 years ago, I was on a bit of a pilgrimage. I didn't know exactly what I was seeking, but I had left my dot-com job in New York, shipped my motorcycle to London, and began riding rather aimlessly around Europe. I had just found out that someone I loved had been killed, and was having trouble making sense of the world. So a spiritual journey through Europe in the dead of winter seemed like a logical thing to do. And something must have guided me to type "meditation center southern France" into the computer at the internet cafe in Bourdeaux, and a picture of Thay's face popped up, with his gentle smile, and pictures of blossoming plum trees in a place called 'Plum Village'. So I headed that way, and found, when I arrived, a sweet, beautiful community of people living lives of mindfulness. And by that, I soon discovered, they did not mean that their minds were full. On the contrary...

On the fifteenth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, I thought it an appropriate time to share my journal from those days, 15 years ago, when I rushed to New Orleans to do what I could in the wake of the hurricane.   I happened to be in Portland, Oregon when Katrina hit New Orleans (followed by the breaking of the levees and the flooding). I was helping my sister with her baby at the time, and not paying too much attention to the news....the first warning I got that things were bad, really bad, in New Orleans, was when i heard a friend's voice on the radio, the Tuesday after the storm. My ears perked up when I heard his voice, then when I heard what he was saying I found myself next to the radio, clutching it with disbelief, “I'm here in Memorial Hospital in New Orleans”, he was saying. “The water is rising...There's no electricity, the people on life support are dying and we're running out of water.” His cell phone then cut off, and the radio station wasn't able ...