Deer Park Monastery, Escondido, CA

Counting down, yes, counting down once again. Once again posting with location heading to indicate location changes, and counting down to it. Counting down to leaving the monastery on Sunday, the same day the monastics leave for Vietnam, to fly to New Jersey on Monday. When will I stop counting down?

It has been confirmed that when if I return here in March or April, I will officially be an aspirant to become a monk (ie, won't have to pay anymore). I'm not sure if this place is what I always imagined monasticism to be, and that has its good points and it has its bad points, and I have to take the good with the bad, the bad with the good.

The bad is well-documented. The good is that I will be able to have a laptop and a guitar, and I'm hm-hm-hming over an iPod. Self-discipline and self-restraint are the rules of the day, though, and I fashion myself to be reasonable in that department.

I'm a little concerned about the two and a half months I'll be gone. I can't expect the comfortable little niche I've carved out for myself to be here when I return. That's probably for the better, though. And I'll get by with a little help from my friends.

I still wonder about that romantic, diary-narrated hermit life I could live in San Francisco. One of the guests here told me about a place where she lived for several years, a Tibetan place near Balboa Park, near where the band I was in used to rehearse, where you can rent a tiny room for $300 a month. She described the Dharma talks there to be very heady and theoretical – right up my alley.

I could live my hermit life, be immersed in a tradition more aligned with my own philosophy, probably land a similar job as I had before. I would be able to afford a shared room in that rehearsal space! All to myself. Bring my drums back out from New Jersey. No joining bands, though.

Snap out of fantasy. That's not reality. New Jersey on Monday. Taiwan two weeks later. No agenda, no fluent English speaking relatives. I have no idea why I'm going to Taiwan, but if my relatives don't have a plan, I'm committed to making something up on my own. Make it up as we go along. Something breaking out of any past travel habits.