Grounds for Meditation

MUIR BEACH, Calif. — On the first day of our weekend visit to the Green Gulch Farm Zen Center in Marin County, my boyfriend and I found our unenlightened selves surrounded by serene, gliding students of Zen--all in casual western dress, but all bowing and chanting and falling into step apparently as one--and we felt as out of place as Maria in the convent in “The Sound of Music.”

The center, located on 115 lovely acres in the Muir Woods near Muir Beach and five short miles north of the Golden Gate Bridge, is one of three Soto Zen practice centers affiliated with the San Francisco Zen Center (the others are the center in the city itself, and the Tassajara Zen Mountain Center in Carmel Valley).

Overnight guests (the center has room for about 30) are welcome to participate as much in the Zen-related activities that residents and long-term students pursue, but if you are true neophytes, as we were, you may feel a little out of place at first, surrounded by calm, single-minded people who all seem to know the protocol and gestures--the proper way to bow before serving oneself at the buffet line, when to speak and when to remain silent, how to file into and out of a room. And the good news is, one’s feelings of awkwardness--like all else in the physical world--as Buddha teaches, shall pass.

Students of Zen can come here for intense study, but non-meditating guests, even business travelers, are welcome to simply spend the night. We’d also heard that the vegetarian food, all organically grown in the center’s farm operations, was tremendous, and that the farm’s produce was bought by such well-known restaurants as the affiliated vegetarian cafe Greens. So, armed with stacks of reading material and two untutored but open minds, we arrived on a Sunday afternoon for two nights.

The farm is just outside of Sausalito off California 1 on the way to Stinson Beach, in a sharply carved valley, once a cattle farm, surrounded by dense eucalyptus groves. We drove through the quiet grounds over a small creek, parked and went straight to the Lindisfarne guest house, a Japanese-style two-story wood structure of simplicity and warmth.

We went into the house, gently escorting out the resident cat, Bobo, who a sign warned would try to slip inside. Leaving our shoes downstairs, we went up to our room, one of 12, which had a double bed, reading lamps, desk (appointed, as all rooms are, with a copy of Zen teacher Suzuki-roshi’s “Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind”), a dresser and two wicker chairs. It was completely comfortable, though the amenities are a tad spare--every two rooms share a half bath, and there is just one shower stall for all 12 rooms.

It was after 5 when we got settled, and the guest house and grounds seemed very quiet. We later learned it was because the day’s main zazen, or sitting meditation, is from 5:15 to 6 p.m. Since dinner was at 6:05, we decided to explore the house and grounds.

We took a quick cruise through the first floor of the guest house, where a living room has a comfy couch and some reading material about the center and a small kitchen is stocked with teas, coffee (yes, real coffee, with caffeine), fruit and freshly baked bread. We made a mental note to come back and “raid the fridge” later.

The buildings are all unpretentious and mostly weathered wood. We followed the paths around the grounds, stopping periodically to look at the many small, handmade shrines to Buddha set in nooks and alcoves.

Dinner, as are all meals, was a communal affair in which we served ourselves delicious rice, soup and salad from a buffet table. Residents and others all seemed to know each other, but we struck up conversations with some other outsider types--a couple from New Hampshire; a young earnest Zen student from Chicago; and an energetic elderly woman from rural Illinois who was out visiting her son, a student resident.

After dinner, and a little weary from the traveling, we retreated to our room, Steve curling up with some work notes and I with the latest Sue Grafton book. It was all so quiet and so dark in the forested valley that we nodded off for good before 9:30.

Nonetheless, we weren’t up for the 5 a.m. zazen. In fact, we barely made it up in time (after jockeying for the shower, reminiscent of being in a college dorm) for breakfast at 7:20. Breakfast, we learned the hard way, is taken in silence for the first half and is broken by one of the Zen leaders who will start a small chant to the silence. We ate hot cereal, fruit and yogurt.

Our first order of business, on this, our only full day, was to get some orientation and instruction so that we could attend at least one zazen session in the grand meditation hall, or zendo. We signed up at the office for 3 that afternoon, leaving us the day free for exploring.

The day was lovely, sunny and not foggy, so we hiked through the rolling hills of the vast garden down to the ocean and then decided to take a real hike along the Coyote Ridge trail in the mountains above the farm.

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At last it was time for our instruction. Our teacher was a slight, soft-spoken man named Stuart in a Mill Valley International Film Festival T-shirt. He demonstrated how to walk and hold one’s hands, how to enter the zendo (with the foot on the side of the door hinge), how to sit on the cushions (zafus and zabutans) and how to align the body while meditating.

Green Gulch’s zendo is a very serene, long, wooden room, with an elevated platform along either side (newcomers and nonresidents must sit on the floor in the center) anchored on both sides with altars to Buddha. During the official zazen, about 40 of us filed silently into the hall, carrying our zafus and bowing as we passed the center altar. Forty-five minutes of meditation is not for the faint of heart. I found I spent most of the time catching stray thoughts and trying to let go of them. But we were assured that all beginners had this experience, and the truth is that after the session, filing into our second dinner, I did feel calmer and more centered.

Dinner the second night was a delicious sun-dried tomato and walnut pasta, with brown rice and salad on the side. Several loaves of freshly baked bread--white and mixed grain, with organic butter--were on a sideboard for self-service and there were cookies for dessert this night, though they disappeared nearly immediately. Luckily for those of us a little more worldly, Zen doesn’t mean self-denial across the board.

Hurley is The Times’ Executive Film Editor.

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Budget for Two

Air fare, LAX to S.F.....$246

Budget car rental......100.37

Lodging & meals........215.36

Gas, tolls, etc.........10.00

FINAL TAB.............$571.73

Green Gulch Farm Zen Center, 1601 Shoreline Highway, Sausalito, CA 94965; tel. (415) 383-3134.

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