And now for something a little different …
I wrote this unpublished piece in my late 20s, while living in Europe. It’s about the pleasures of reading abroad, while completely ignoring what the world has to offer.
Enjoy!
When I first moved to London, I lived in an East End flat so grim that I’d only come home to sleep. I was unemployed, and spent my days either looking for work, or – more often – reading. Late in the evening, after the cafés and libraries had closed, I’d read in tube stations, flipping the pages under the fluorescent platform lights. When the underground closed, I’d get on a 24-hour bus and patrol the city. The buses became my favorite refuge. Day and night I’d wind my way up the narrow staircase of a double-decker Number 8, and pull out my book.
It was here, while reading Bill Buford's Among the Thugs – a harrowing examination of English football hooliganism – that I first became attuned to the pleasures of ignoring the city. Church, river, park, market, museum. I missed them all. My eyes were set on the words, no matter how much the bus lurched, or how many drunken passengers brawled in the aisle (it was easy to know exactly when the pubs closed).
My practice was simple. I’d seek out a bench or spot of open grass in full view of some well-known London landmark. Then I’d slowly lift my book to block it out, so the world became a frame around the pages. In this way Trafalgar Square formed the background to Zadie Smith’s White Teeth, Hyde Park sat behind Jonathan Raban's Soft City, and Norman Foster's glass ceiling in the Great Court of the British Museum glowed luminously through the pages of W.G. Sebald's The Rings of Saturn.
Since then I’ve ignored the sites in some of the greatest cities in Europe. Rome and Milan I can hardly remember; likewise Amsterdam, though I do recall the way in which the canal-side buildings seemed to lean into my reading horizon. In Barcelona I found a seat along Las Ramblas, the city's great thoroughfare of watchers and watched. Unobserved in my discreet corner, I plowed through Orwell's Homage to Catalonia, marveling at the indomitable Catalan spirit. In Paris I chose not to look at the busts of famous writers in the Jardin du Luxembourg, but concentrated instead on anthropologist Claude Levi-Strausse's Tristes Tropiques – a poignant study of a fading culture. If there was anyone who could appreciate my reading position, it was the French. They gestured and argued furiously in cafés without paying each other the least bit of attention.
It was in one such café, trying hard not to notice the beautiful gothic cathedral across the river, that I worked out the appeal of being a reader abroad. I got to occupy two worlds simultaneously. The narrative was a tunnel in the center of my vision. As I tumbled through, the peripheral world grazed my senses with exotic clues. Literary observations could be confirmed or rejected by a quick survey of real places and real human subjects.
That is, if I cared to look. Which I didn’t.
I pondered this on the way to Paris' new Bibliothèque Nationale, the last of Mitterand's Grands Projets. There were only a few benches in this vast wind-swept plaza, and I felt very small below the L-shaped buildings that sat at each corner of the complex. Each building was said to represent an open book, and each window a block of text.
I raised my book, aligned it with the buildings beyond, and resumed my reading.
Finding this old piece reminded me of a beautiful Dzogchen practice
once guided for the Do Nothing Project. It‘s about experiencing your own thoughts and feelings as pure creativity. So for the guided meditation this week, I borrowed her theme and made it my own, as is creativity’s wont. Tasha is putting together a workshop on natural creativity for 2025; following her is the best way to stay in touch about that.Thank you for your practice!
Jeff
NEW YORK INSIGHT FALL BENEFIT
In-Person and Online: The Heart of Connection – Spiritual Friendships in Challenging Times, with Dan Harris, Sebene Selassie, and Jeff Warren
Monday, December 9th, 2024, 7:00pm – 9:00pm ET
Join us for New York Insight Meditation Center’s annual benefit—a special evening dedicated to exploring the impact of spiritual friendship in addressing the loneliness epidemic affecting individuals and communities across the globe.
This year,
and Jeff Warren join their good friend and fellow teacher for a mix of lively conversation, guided meditation, and audience Q&A. So bring your questions and join the dialogue! All proceeds from this event will go to support the New York Insight Meditation Center, a nonprofit 501(c)(3).THIS WEEK ON THE MIND BOD ADVENTURE POD
Today we head into the spiritual undergrowth, where the wild things are. Our guest is Diana Piruzevska, aka
: psychic, medium, healer – all that! For her guided meditation, Diana takes us through a grounding breath practice that she uses with clients before sessions. Then, to demo her intuitive process in real time, she reads Tasha’s neat and orderly brain and shares her insights.
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