Blog #35.   August 6th

Transition Home – What is Here, Now?

As I described in my previous blog, I spent my last couple of days in the Brittany region of France.  I stayed in a small cheap hotel, above a bar in the tiny town of Thiex, about 8km from Vannes, the regional capital.   The continental breakfast in France included coffee, juice, a baguette, cut in three or four pieces, butter, jam, and also a large croissant.  After breakfast, I would always save a piece of the baguette with bread and butter (or with cheese if I had some) in a napkin for lunch.  Occasionally, a hard boiled egg would be part of breakfast, and I could add that to my lunch.  

Each morning, I drove west into the Breton region of the Morbihan Gulf, a large area of water, islands, wetlands, bird sanctuaries, and complex ecosystems.  In this area also, are a multitude of Neolithic standing stones from the prehistoric Celtic tribes related directly to those is Ireland and Scotland, their Breton language closely related to Gaelic.  They too share in the legends of King Arthur and Merlin, and a common body of oral history.  I wandered through acres of aligned standing stones, stretching for kilometers outside the tiny town of Carnac.  Dolmens, menhirs, tumuli, and ring forts are widely scattered about the landscape.  I hiked on forest trails, in some cases, alone, to discover a huge Dolmen hidden away in a wooded clearing.  Later in the afternoon, I drove to the end of the Quiberon peninsula to find a swimming beach.  Both days, I was refreshed by a swim in the Atlantic Ocean.  It was a bit of heaven, standing stones and ocean swimming.  It seemed an apt circle to complete as I returned to Celtic lands and Neolithic sites in France after beginning my sabbatical in Celtic, west Ireland, searching for neolithic monuments.

On August 30th, I began my return home, driving from Brittany back to the Paris area.  As I got within 45 km of Paris, at 2:00 PM, in the 4 lane traffic came to a stop.  It took 31/2 hours to get through the Paris area and north to Senlis, an old village with many Medieval buildings.  I stayed there, 35 km outside Paris, and only 20 km from the airport.  The next morning, it was relatively easy to return my renal car and make my way through the labyrinthine airport terminals to my departure gate.

On August 31st, I departed Paris Charles De Gaule Airport on Icelandic Airlines at 2:15 in the afternoon.  There was a 2 hour layover at Reyhavik, Iceland, with a change of planes.  I arrived at SeaTac Airport at about 6:25 PM and 9 hours time zone change, a little early, and customs and immigration went remarkably quickly.  It had been a comfortable and smooth flight, and I contacted Pat by cell phone when I landed.  She had  checked on the flight time of arrival and was already at the airport, so we met at baggage claim.  My bag was among the first unloaded.  Before I knew it, Pat and I were on our way home.  The weather was beautiful, sunny and balmy, and welcoming.
I noted a feeling of the strangeness that everything was familiar, after 3 1/2 months of continuous unfamiliarity.

My first week at home, I was jet lagged, fatigued, and forgetful.  I sorted through my mail that Pat had saved in a box, while I was away.  Over the next 1-2 weeks,I noted an inner pressure to do, be be busy, resume a task driven schedule, as Pat was doing with her work life.  I made lists and pushed myself to accomplish them for a few days.  I could notice waves of urge and compulsion to make more lists and earn my worthiness somehow, since I was not “gainfully employed”.  However, as the jet lag mental fog cleared, I found myself able to restrain my automatic reaction.  I practiced being quiet, meditating, and allowing sufficiency to live in me.  Of course, there was yard work, house decluttering after having moved out of my professional office, and some professional and business issues that needed attention.  I wanted to begin to discover a new pattern of life, a creative way forward, without preconceptions or cognitive lists and goals.

However, it was August in Seattle, a month of optimal weather and fun local activities.  Almost immediately, we planned and enjoyed Pat’s mom’s 85th birthday celebration.  David was preparing for his move out of his rented apartment of 2 years and mobilization to active duty in the Navy.  He had struggled and pushed the Navy bureaucracy over the past year to qualify on a fast track, in his specialized duty as an information dominance warfare officer (IDWO), and then obtained orders to Djibouti, Africa for a year.  Also, Maureen had completed a grueling summer internship with a leading consulting company, commuting from New York City to Washington DC each week. She flew home for a vacation and to see her friends and contacts here in Seattle.  During her stay, we enjoyed a relaxing 4-5 days together with our adult kids, in Chelan, swimming in the lake and visiting wineries for tastings and dinner.  Maureen departed a few days later to visit friends in San Francisco and Los Angeles, before returning to New York to prepare for her second and final year in her MBA program at Stern School of Business, NYU.

After our trip together to Chelan, and Maureen had departed, Pat worked hard to catch up with her work life.  David’s time in Seattle, near to family, was rapidly drawing to a close.  We both knew that David would be gone for more than a year on a tough assignment to the Horn of Africa, and wanted to enjoy some time together.  He invited me to fly with him, in a small Cessna aircraft, at sunset over the gorgeous Puget Sound area, and practiced “touch and go” landings and flying with instruments only, as the summer skies darkened.  He has completed his commercial certification as a pilot and trained as a flight instructor.  A few days later, David and I met in Seattle at Century Link field for dinner and a Mariners game.  The Mariners won their game and we had a great time together.  And then the day arrived when he was moving out of his apartment.  A friend helped him with the heavy furniture, and I enjoyed helping him complete his move, organize his stuff in a storage locker and prepare for his time away, separating his civilian clothes from military uniforms and the few things he would need to take with him.

After David’s move, he stayed with us for a few days, sorting his life in transition.  After we dropped him off at the airport in late, August, I awoke and began to refocus on my sabbatical journey. I am entering new territory, without professional job or income for the first time in my adult life. I now have the opportunity to follow my heart and listen to my soul’s call as to what is next for me. I have a teaching project at the UWMC, teaching 1st year medical students about “medical student well-being”…. Which requires research and discernment about what these young doctors in the making really need to know to survive and thrive in the chaotic modern world of medicine and health care.  My past study and teaching on the topic of “The Wounded Healer” is directly connected to this topic of medical student well being and invites creative thinking, mining my own experience and research as I seek to build my expertise in the growing field of physician well-being.  

Swimming in Lake Chelan was heavenly during our days east of the mountains. It was like a baptism and a welcome immersion in the elements of sun, earth, air, and water, continuity from my pilgrimage in Europe.

The Swimmer    Mary Oliver

All winter the water 
has crashed over
the cold sand.  Now
it breaks over the thin 

branch of your body.
You plunge down, you swim
two or three strokes, you dream
of lingering

in the luminous undertow
but can’t; you splash
through the bursting
white blossom,

the silk sheets—–gasping,
you rise and struggle
lightward, finding you way
through the blue ribs back

to the sun, and emerge
as though for the first time.
Poor fish,
poor flesh,

you can never forget.
Once every walll was water,
the soft strings filled
with a perfect nourishment,

pumping your body full
of appetite, elaborating
your stubby bones, tucking in,
like stars,
the seeds of restlessness
that made you, finally
swim toward the world,
kicking and shouting

but trailing a mossy darkness—–
a dream that would never breathe air
and was hinged to your wildest joy
like a shadow.

I Am Too Alone in the World, Yet Not Alone Enough      Rilke

I’m too alone in the world, yet not alone enough
to make each hour holy.
I’m too small in the world, yet not small enough
to be simply in your presence, like a thing—–
just as it is.

I want to know my own will
and to move with it.
And I want , in the hushed moments
when the nameless draws near,
to be among the wise ones—–
or alone.

I want to mirror your immensity.
I want never to be too weak or too old
to bear the heavy, lurching image of you.

I want to unfold.
Let no place in me hold itself closed,
for where I am closed, I am false.
I want to stay clear in your sight.

I would describe myself
like a landscape I’ve studied
at length, in detail;
like a word I’m coming to understand;
like a pitcher at mealtime;
like my mother’s face;
like a ship that carried me
when the waters raged.

Husam      Rumi

There is a way of passing away from the personal,
a dying that makes one plural.

Serve light in the buttermilk to become nourishment
for many.  Your soul is like that, Husam.

Hundreds of thousands of impressions
from the invisible are wanting to come through you!

I get dizzy with the abundance.  when life
is this dear, it means the source is pulling us.

Freshness comes from there.  We’re given the gift
of continuously dying and being resurrected.

the body’s death now to me is like going to sleep.
No fear of drowning.  I’m in another water.

Stones don’t dissolve in rain.  This is the end
of the Fifth Book of the Masnavi.

With constellations in the night sky, some look up
and point.  Others can be guided by the arrangements:

the Sagitttarian bow piercing enemies, the Water Jar
soaking the fruit trees, the Bull plowing its truth,

the Lion tearing darkness open to red satin.  Use
these words to change.  Be kid and honest,

and harmful poisons will turn sweet inside you.