I clicked www.humanclock.com regarding time this evening, and the home page photo that popped up dated November 27 was of a woman on the Muir Woods trail I walked December 7. The location given for the photo was Mill Valley. I stopped at a Mill Valley grocery after the Muir Woods hike, bought a thermos and some food, and then sat in the car in the parking lot for a long time, eating a muffin, then staring in the dark, all addled, until I felt collected enough to drive.

I was given homework to practice shoko-tenso, a meditation that involves holding a sword toward horizon, then toward sky, then back toward horizon. Might as well bring the sword stick to Muir Woods, right?

But the reality felt like a bad idea at first. To carry a ‘weapon’, even one in quote marks, is a burden. Heavy and awkward and obvious and kinda lonely. Sticking out of my backpack, it caught on the car roof as I bent over, tree branches as I walked, attracted stares. And the woods, which felt rather distant to me anyway, seem to grow cooler and more withdrawn with my taking out the sword and starting a meditation. As though I were gauche and way too harsh. It was too much.

Without thought as I followed the trails, my practice evolved away from the wooden blade, so divisive that had felt. Sunlight glinting off silvery bay leaves below, I tried shoko-tenso with the sword contained within its cloth (much less brutal). Walked on. Then, no sword, just hands; to no hands, just eyes; to no hands, closed eyes, just mind. Very good.

In one place I stopped along Fern Creek, the lower trunks of two giants had been scorched black by a fire between them, and sculpted into gaping caves tall enough for me to stand in. The trees were very much alive, healthy, and connected by their mirrored gouges.

Then there were redwood circles, each a cluster of trees born of the burls of a single ancestor in the middle.

The redwoods were so big and so ancient that perhaps our mutual reserve had nothing to do with my sword behavior (or my projection). It's was more like ant meets horse. Ant doesn't see giant animal, horse doesn't notice tiny ant. Just share space, feel energy.

Though by the end of the hike, this was moot. I no longer felt separate from what was around me.

Interesting encounters with park employees, wise, dedicated individuals, came about in part perhaps because of the stick wrapped in the Japanese cloth.

No. Bringing the bokoto wasn't a bad idea at all.