Page 200 - Dark Matter:Women Witnessing Issue #3 - December 2015

LW:

So you’re saying everything you do is a response, you can’t separate it out. It’s just how your life is

unfolding.

AS:

That’s right. I can’t separate it out. It’s not as if I don’t make decisions and distinctions, but it feels more

like ... like a river. Like a big river. It doesn’t mean I’m always happy, sometimes it’s very painful.

LW:

So you live in response to the conditions that present themselves.

AS:

Yes, it really feels like that. For example, we didn’t know where we were going to go, we just thought

“West coast” and now here we are in the Sierra foothills in this tiny town, we’re actually twenty minutes

outside the town, and I don’t really know how we got here. Before we had a house in San Francisco a

block from the beach, and now here we are in the forest, there is forest all around.

LW:

Well, that must be good.

AS:

Yes, it is good, but it’s also isolated. When you’re pioneers the way we are, there’s a lot of work. And

we’re a small group of women and it’s not always easy. We have a dormitory where three women can

stay as guests for a few days to several months. But it is beautiful, we have no light pollution so we see

the stars, and we have deer, bobcats, coyote, turkeys.

LW:

You mentioned somewhere that you wanted to live in nature because you wanted to listen to her, to

hear what she had to say. What is she saying to you?

AS:

You know we are trained in the Thai Forest tradition and we now call ourselves nuns of the Theravada

Forest Tradition in the West. The forest tradition, like most spiritual traditions, has a wilderness