Oh, where have I been? Oh, where is home? What a strange interstitial moment of my life — a new and changing story in old places. The more I poke around in others’ stories, the more I am finding how spun the pandemic made us, or at least a certain subset of us, and I have resigned to the spin cycle, one day at a time. I’ll get to that down below.

The highlight of May has been two long weekend trips to west Sonoma County. The first was a trip to Sea Ranch with my mom over Mother’s Day; the second was a yoga retreat held at Ratna Ling, a Tibetan Buddhist center near Cazadero this past weekend.

(For my non-California readers, Sonoma County is northwest of San Francisco; it is agricultural (grapes, produce, dairy) on the south and east sides of the county and open coastal mountains on the west.)

Catherine and Margaret - dinner at the Sea Ranch Lodge, Mother’s Day 2022

West Sonoma’s landscape is both wild and sweet; this time of year is particularly wonderful as the grasses are green still, the birdsong loud, and wildflower blooms are abundant. Seals and their pups dot the rocks in many places. It was perfect sunny days on both trips — good luck or climate change? I am not sure because fog should be the default, but I enjoyed the weather all the same.

A few words on each place:

Sea Ranch is a planned community that was developed in the 1970s with a distinctive look under the eyes of a collection of notable Bay Area architects. Along a 10-mile stretch of coast, there are around 3,000 homes — it’s both wild and highly manicured. The style is grey-ish timber houses, with asymmetrical lines and big windows. The aesthetic is highly uniform and between each house is another kind of sea of wild grasses or redwoods. Two recreation centers pin the north and south edges; the locker rooms have original super-graphics by Barbara Stauffacher Solomon (exciting for design nerds like me.) The biggest deviation of the Sea Ranch style is a small chapel that’s designed to look like a sea snail. Every power line is underground and there is nary a piece of trash to be seen.

My mom, always the socializer, interviewed two ladies her age about living there, digging for the dirt on HOA drama. Unsurprisingly, they mentioned that the population of permanent residents and children increased during the pandemic; the HOA costs just went up to the dismay of older residents, and there is a lot of tension between tennis players and pickle ballplayers. (Which by the way is a drama also playing out on the courts of San Francisco I learned.)

Super graphic in men’s locker room, Moonraker Recreation Center, Sea Ranch.

In a funny way, it reminded me of parts of Santa Fe along Hyde Park Road — but sub water for desert, and seagrass for cactus. Sunsets are shared. Of course, like the good emotional tourist that I am, I immediately started placing myself in context about living there. I would say the biggest drawback is simply its remoteness (and cost, natch. Houses are all $1M+.) The closest airport, in Santa Rosa, is a windy 90-minute away. But my adventures in Sonoma didn’t end there.

Two weeks later I was at Ratna Ling, a remarkable retreat center deep in the hills just north of the Russian River, and a few clicks past Jenner on the coast. The backstory on the retreat center (as told by the coordinator, is that it’s an old property that has changed from a boarding school to a resort to a Buddhist retreat center over the years, and its current version — filled with architectural detail and precision — is the result of a very generous private donor.) It’s associated with the Nyingma lineage of Tibetan Buddhism and teacher Tarthang Tulku. If you go there, request cabin number two — the view off the back porch, is…well I can’t describe and I’ll let the photo speak for itself.

As a young child, I spent many summers in east Sonoma County (my grandparents had a small vineyard in Geyserville). To say that I feel absolutely at home in this regional topography is a true fact. The angles of the sun; the ways the dirt smells; the birds; the cows; the vines. It’s always hard not to wonder what life would be like to move there now. Of course, real life is not comprised of only weekend retreats and walks on windswept ocean cliffs.

As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, my top is still spinning around on this question of home — but what’s emerging is a shift in the question. What had started as a question of a physical location (and still is) is clearly a more a question of mental location. It’s clear that my current job (which takes up a lot of my mental bandwidth) is just a form of treading water. The team is hardworking, I am hardworking. But ultimately we’re in the business of “rolling money uphill” and for me personally, that doesn’t light my “purpose” fire.

A little inspiration from a book I found at Ratna Ling from Tarthang Tulku:

Here is some parting advice: No matter what, don’t be a traitor to yourself. Do not trade your happiness away; do not sell yourself out for anxiety, resentment, addiction and loneliness. Promise yourself now: From here on out, to the best of my ability, I will take care of myself, body and mind, emotions, and perceptions. From here on out, I will make the most of my journey. - Tarthang Tulku, Caring

I know that the real work of this quest is actually to find a new direction and livelihood therein.

I already know that direction is pointed at climate issues and sustainability — and the intersection with economics, spirituality, and systems of meaning.

This is a path that involves new training, new people, and possibly some new financial leaps of faith. Onwards.

With love, Cat and Bruno

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