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I spent the day by myself on gigantic granite slabs and calm, sparse, evergreen forests. Okay, I wasn't really by myself, but sometimes it can feel that way when they're all speaking and being Korean and you suddenly start feeling very very foreign. I feel less so when Scott and I brave such outings together. But today Scott went to church like a good boy, and I went with Jinsoon and our Kouksundo teachers and friends to a mountain with cliffs speckled in snow, about an hour south of here. It's all God in one form or another, I figured. Besides, the city drains me, and I cannot turn down a drive to blue skies, fresh air, and mountain paths. I didn't intend to hike far. My body has no intention of moving quickly or long or hard as of late. But Koreans rarely hike that way anyway. They take rather slow, deliberate steps, with many breaks for sitting and breaking out fruit to share. So I was able to easily keep up with the party and enjoy the Asian-looking treeline and increasingly fresh air. Jinsoon and I talked as we climbed little stony, wet paths, as we often do, of anything that comes to mind. We chatted about Buddhism and marriage and food and truth and religion and Korean traditions. I was touched again way deep down by the familiarity of her words, though they came from a source far different from my experience. She was speaking of old, wise traditions of her country--of energy (chi) in the land and in the body. Of Buddhist monks taking on a new name as they depart from ordinary living. Of the Buddha not being "enlightened" in any sense of heaven or angels. It's more like he discovered a very regular way of being here, and living here, but differently. Not above and apart. But within. Sometimes I'm amazed at the universality of all of it. Of the same truths I know and have felt but in different words, with different peoples, and different traditions. For there I was, around the world, apart from anything familiar to me, but walking with a foreign friend who feels both old and dear, discussing truths I've learned in other holy places and with other beloved people. How long ago was it, for example, that Jeremy and I picked through sage and juniper and blue skies and red dirt? That we sat in front of burning juniper, warmed by the wild? Touching in our hearts and in our words the same truths I feel here. Sitting not on granite surrounded by bonzai-looking trees, but on warm red rock. Talking not of Buddha, but of Edward Abbey. Choosing then to live more fully and more presently, just as I practice each day here. It wasn't long ago. Today I cried when we reached the top. I cried because I miss the mountains. I cried because of gratitude and adoration. And I cried for my people, who awakened my love for mountain and tree and sky and air, and for the blessing of my past and my present. My Korean friends noticed my stillness, and perhaps the tears, too, and asked maybe if I were homesick. "Uh, I always cry in mountains," I stammered. "Even at home. Ask anyone..." My voice broke off. The fullness in my heart could not be explained in rough translation. I have been spinning in this country. I have loved it and opened to it, but it has been dizzying for me, and sometimes, yes, frightening. Going to the mountains fills me with love for Korea, yes, but it also fills me with home. I go home when I go to the mountains--"home" in the dearest, deepest sense of the word. I wind back down rope ladders I've thrown up in my soul, and refind and retrieve my roots. I'm still quite attached to all this loveliness about being human, despite my sincerest efforts to let go--of even the good--and just live. Still Quite Attached, ck [1999-02-25]
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