tending and walking the labyrinth, living like weasels (or perhaps like otters)

On Monday we brought a labyrinth from the First Parish Church to Bowdoin College. Before the set-up began the labyrinth existed as an 8-hour block in my calender, a box from 3-11pm marked "LABYRINTH" right after "8:30-10:30 MiP", "10:30-12:00 Edit Paper & send" and "12:00-2:30 Robin at Jr. High + notes". Mentally, the physical presence of the labyrinth, and the mindful practice it entailed, ceased to exist. Instead, it felt like one other commitment, with hardly enough transition time to give it thought or enjoyment.
Luckily, the labyrinth proved me wrong. It surprised me, and relaxed me and awoke me. Sue, the coordinator for the church who supervised and organized the making of the 30x30' labyrinth that we used, is an incredibly positive and calming presence. She seems very wise to me, although I'm sure she'd deny this, and to be filled with patience and understanding. Over the course of the event she came to the BOC no less than 4 times, first to move the canvas, then to fetch brooms from the church for sweeping because housekeeping had not cleaned, then to bring us a boombox because the stereo did not work, and finally returning to help us re-fold and transport the labyrinth back to it's home in a church cabinet. At no point did she seem frustrated, anxious or inconvenienced. Instead she emanated peace and goodwill- I hope someday I can discover a similar stability and perspective.
Tending the labyrinth was an equally calming, mindful activity. The music, low lighting, and muted whispers all created a safe space in which to let go of the anxiety and schedules shadowing my dreams for the last week. The presence of the fire was equally felt- from the moment I coaxed it into life it emanated warmth and comfort throughout the room, and the act of kindling and feeding was a ritual. I enjoyed the level of contact shared between visitors to the labyrinth and the tenders there- because I knew many of those who came I also shared many lingering hugs, genuine smiles and squeezes to the arm. So much can be communicated through touch- I am always amazed.
After several hours I walked the labyrinth myself, comfortable leaving the tending to Katherine and Chanoong while I walked. Initially I got a little anxious because I realized that the fire had gotten quite low and didn't think anyone was aware. Although I tried to let go, this thought kept pressing back into my awareness. When I was close to the fire I stepped out of the labyrinth, placed several logs behind the screen, and then resumed my walk. By taking care of what was ruffling the waters of my mind I was then able to calm it. Although I do think meditation can be a solution for a distracted mind by providing discipline, in this case I am glad that I took the time to remove a distraction that was easily dealt with and satisfying to resolve.
My fist labyrinth walk was very centered on life and death and the paths that we each walk. Although this metaphoric way of using the labyrinth was what I needed at that time, this walk was centered around relaxation and goodwill. Walking was time to just 'be', to notice what my body was saying to me. To relax my knotted shoulders by rolling them around, and tip back my head until I hear that light 'click' that brings so much relief. I stretched my thigh muscles, sore from Teleskiing, and felt the clarity of my newly-healed lungs. Before I knew it I was at the center- the walk had flown by.
I sat and did a short loving-kindness meditation, sending love to my family members, myself, a loved one and someone who had proven difficult recently. It felt good to send these thoughts out, and I also recognized my 'limit', signaling a close to the meditation. Leaving the labyrinth was likewise very physical, focused and calming. I left the path with a sense of peace and happiness that certainly hadn't existed before.

My friend Sean sent me Annie Dillards "Living Like Weasels" essay, which really speaks to that idea of 'mindlessness' and living in the moment off of your immediate experiences. Although I think such moments need to be balances with periods of thought and introspection, her description is so lovely and apt that I thought I'd include an excerpt. I think I would choose to live like an otter instead because of their playfulness, but I suppose otters and weasels are related enough.

"That is, I don't think I can learn from a wild animal how to live in particular- shall I suck warm blood, hold my tail high, walk with my footprints precisely over the prints of my hands?- but I might learn something of mindlessness, something of the purity without bias or motive. The weasel lives in necessity and we live in choice, hating necessity and dying at the last ignobly in its talons. I would like to live as I should, as the weasal lives as he should. And I suspect that for me the way is like the weasel's- open to time and death painlessly, noticing everything, remembering nothing, choosing the given with a fierce and pointed will... I could very calmly go wild. I could live two days in the den, culred, leaning on mouse fur, sniffing bird bones, blinking, licking, breathing musk, my hair tangled in the roots of grasses. Down is a good place to go, where the mind is single. Down is out, out of your ever-long mind and to your careless senses. I remember muteness as a prolonged and giddy fast, where every moment is a feast of utterance received. Time and events are merely poured, unremarked, and ingested directly, like blood pulsed into my gut through a jugular vein. Could two live that way? Could two live under the wild rose, and explore by the pond, so that the smooth mind of each is as everywhere present to the other, and as received and as unchallenged, as falling snow?
We could, you know. We can live any way we want. People take vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience- even of silence- by choice. The thing is to stalk your calling in a certain skilled and supple way, to locate the most tender and live spot and plug into that pulse. This is yielding, not fighting. A weasel doesn't "attack" anything; a weasel lives as he's meant to, yielding at every moment to the perfect freedom of single necessity.
I think it would be well, and proper, and obedient, and pure, to grasp your one necessity and not let it go, to dangle from it limp wherever it takes you. Then even death, where you're going no matter how you live, cannot you part. Seize it and let it seize you up aloft even, till your eyes burn out and drop; let your musky flesh fall off in shreds, and let your very bones unhinge and scatter. joosened over fields, over fields and woods, lightly, thoughtless, from any height at all, from as high as eagles.