Kindred Spirit

 

Earlier today I hiked up at Mt Toyon. I walked past the vista point with the bench and out “my” little remote trail, where I generally just stand and take it all in—the silence, the greenery, the trees, the grass, the bushes, the breeze, the view through the trees to the ocean. I feel how my body is in the moment, I settle down into it exactly where I am standing. I don’t consciously “merge myself with nature”; it just happens, like exhaling and inhaling: I take in the forest as it takes me in. I take in the silence as it takes me in. Yet, most strangely, I felt a presence, a person, close, but, looking around me and gazing up the path I had taken, saw no one. So I let that go and started walking back on the path I had taken there.

 

As I exited the path, I noticed a young woman standing there looking at me. Her presence was a surprise to me, though I realized I had already previously felt it. We spoke as if we knew each other well and deeply. She spoke of her current state of mind and I spoke of mine. She shared with me her view of how she was, in so many words, and of her interests. I was amazed at her honesty and place of self-knowing. There was what I perceived as an immediate trust between us and also our ability to understand each other. She carried with her a Buddhist meditation bench on which one sits and kneels. I was most impressed by this, for I had built one for myself probably forty years ago and had used it for the last thirty years before storing it in the garage, where it is now. We talked about many topics and our personal sense of things.

 

I have walked on Mt Toyon for ten years and have always wished to meet someone on the trail and to be able to engage in a deep and enjoyable discussion with them. And today it actually happened. The very fact that she goes to the same out of the way place in the forest where I go touched me. “Here is a person with whom I share something in common,” I thought. To be able to share a deep meditative state of mind and to be understood by another is quite rare. We seemed to be able to understand each other on a philosophical level. Compared to me, she was quite young, yet she expressed such depth and honesty as if she were without guile. It was a most pleasant experience that I appreciated. I gave her my card listing my various blogs, email address, and my quote: Too much irony makes one overwrought (which not every gets). It was a rare and special moment. I have my wife and a few other friends with whom I am able to share of myself on a deep level, but to come upon such a rare person in the forest “just like that” is a rare pleasure. I am grateful to her for her openness and trust.