Sesshin began Sunday (technically, Saturday evening after dinner around 7:30pm immediately following the reading of the admonitions.). Sesshin is a fully silent and introspective period of time lasting a day or longer. This sesshin is six days long. I have participated in a number of sesshins ranging from day-long sittings to the seven-day Buddha's Enlightenment sesshin. I have participated as a fully supported individual just following the schedule completely. I have also participated as a key supporting element of the schedule, for example one of the time-keepers on the doanryo (fukudo and doan). This time I am in the sesshin schedule as a nourishing support. I am cooking in the kitchen.
I have been working in Zen Center's kitchen full time for about 5 weeks now. Previously I had volunteered twice weekly in the afternoons for about a year. Outside of Zen Center, my kitchen experience is limited to work-study in the cafe at the San Francisco Art Institute and the desperate struggle to feed myself in my own kitchen with the help of The Joy of Cooking. My copy of The Joy of Cooking was the sweetest and best going away gift I received from my friends' mom, who encouraged me to let go of my fears of not knowing how to cook. What I'm trying to make clear is I never grew up feeling comfortable and confident in the kitchen. I watched my friends move around their kitchens with ease and whip up delicious meals seemingly effortlessly. For me, the experience is painstakingly slow in following the recipe to its letter (and numerically measured amount).
If you read Suzuki Roshi who founded San Francisco Zen Center, his most famous book, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind as well as the name of the City Center Temple where I live, is all about Beginner's Mind. He says, "In the beginner's mind, there are many possibilities, while in the expert's mind, there are few." Even though the kitchen has much potential for danger, walking into the kitchen with beginner's mind opens up the possibility to nourish my friends, the community, the sangha with really yummy food. In the kitchen, especially during sesshin, we work in mostly silence. Functional speech is necessary, but too much explanation and talk can pull attention away from the vegetable we're scrubbing and chopping, or the soup we're cooking and developing, or the knives and pots we're cleaning. Paying attention to what I'm doing in the moment and being with what I'm doing in that moment allows me to not only impart my intentions of love, care, health, and well-being, but also keeps me safe from burning myself or accidentally cutting myself or accidentally harming the others I'm moving around the kitchen with. Being in the kitchen during sesshin is also much like being on doanryo during sesshin. Each member has an important part and as we each do our assigned task, we move together as one body, creating three meals a day to feed the entire community.
This sesshin, the Tenzo (head cook), gave me the responsibility of making the soups. There is always soup for lunch as the main dish. Being a Zen monastery, our offerings are vegetarian and nothing fancy as monks have begged for alms in the past. We do not individually go door to door with our bowls these days, but Zen Center runs on the dana (generosity and monetary donation) we receive from the friends and community who support us. So our meals are not full of extravagant ingredients, but we get a lot of greens (kale, chard, spinach, cabbage) from Green Gulch Farm, and of course necessary items. In the buying, we purchase seasonally and we try to purchase locally and organically. Although City Center is short staffed and has resorted to purchasing, the three Zen Centers generally make their own granola, yogurt, fresh squeezed juices (when the fruits are available), stock, and reuse leftovers in many ways so as not to waste any bit of the food that was offered to us.
So as I tend to the soups, I am thinking about how all the flavors develop and come together over time in the pot. Each time I stir the pot, I am trying to take care of each item in the pot. I am encouraging the onions to get sweeter and darker over time. I am encouraging the carrots and celery and chard stems and broccoli stems to soften and surrender to the olive oil and heat. I am taking care not to tear the leaves of chard and kale and spinach and sorrel. I am releasing the aromatics of the bay leaves and parsley and thyme and rosemary. I am stirring my heartfelt wish to feed, heal, and love the community. I appreciate being allowed the time to give the soup this attention.
I am also developing a relationship with fire and heat. Normally I see fire and heat as a difficult element and really my reason for not feeling very confident in the kitchen. Fire will burn as hot as fire burns and at that heat it will not only burn itself into existence, but will burn other things out of their desired existence. How do I develop the soup without charring the onions and leaving a burnt flavor in the soup, in all the soups? How do I "tame" this fire? Today I learned that it's not about me controlling the fire. Fire is going to burn and heat as it does. In the Sandokai or Harmony of Difference and Equality chant, it says "The four elements return to their natures.... Fire heats, wind moves, water wets, earth is solid..." Meaning that these elements are being just as they are. Instead of me trying to make the fire do what I want it to do, I need to pay attention to what the fire is doing. Is there too much of it? Can I turn the flame down a bit? How does the flame act with this pot? How does the flame act with that pot? When the onions are sizzling loudly, what are they telling me? Are they saying the fire is too much or is the fire just right for now but maybe will be too much in the next moment? Today I'm going to practice with the fire and share its energy. Perhaps we will heat and warm the bellies of the community together.
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