Zen and Now by Mark Richardson

Author:Mark Richardson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction
ISBN: 9780307270481
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2008-09-08T16:00:00+00:00

There are actually two yurts in the meadow below the main house. They’re solid canvas tents, each about twenty feet across, that have been raised on wooden platforms in which wood and tools are stored. Mongolians carry their yurts from grazing place to grazing place across the plain, but this pair hasn’t gone anywhere for a while.

The first yurt belongs to Nolan and Jessie, “tenants” of the DeWeeses who live there for free in return for help on the property and their good company. Nolan is an art student at the university, thirty-four years old; Jessie is a botanist with the forestry department, away upstate mapping vulnerable areas of flora and fauna. She’s the one who makes the bucks.

The guest yurt is a little farther along the overgrown path, supported on a wooden base six feet above the long grass and wildflowers and wandering chickens; its deck is also the entrance, on the other side, to a short raised pathway through the woods that leads back up the hill to the main house.

Tina and Tom lead the way up the ladder and through the wooden door. There’s a woodstove in the center that won’t be needed tonight, some shelves and a few books and clay pots, a flashlight beside a large bed that takes up all of one side, an easy chair covered with furs, and looking over everything, a life-size bronze of a featureless man, arms spread slightly in supplication.

“I love this guy—I find him so comforting,” says Tina.

I find him a bit creepy but am too polite to say so.

Oh, and there’s a stuffed turkey in flight hovering from wires over a side table. Not stuffed like a Thanksgiving turkey but stuffed by a taxidermist, resplendent with feathers and a bright red wattle.

“This is great,” I say. “It would be wonderful to sleep here tonight.”

Tom and Tina look pleased. They’ll see me at Gennie’s in an hour, they say.

There’s silence when they leave, except for the sound of a shallow stream nearby that’s splashing its way down into the valley. I unpack a change of clothing and toiletries, roll the sleeping bag out on the bed, and sit in the fur-covered chair awhile, just listening to the quiet. After hours upon hours of hearing the muffled chug-chug of the engine through the motorcycle helmet, it’s a pleasure to listen to the gentle splash of the stream.

I close my eyes and doze, pleased to do nothing.

Soon it’s time to change. I put on the dress shirt and jeans, freshly laundered at the motel at Laurel. With a nod to the bronze guy and a glance at the turkey, I head out of the yurt and venture along the wood-planked walkway, more of a boardwalk over the mud than a path through the trees. Entering the basement of the split-level main house, I hear a new voice in the main room.

The new voice turns out to be Nolan, tapping away on a laptop on the floor while Tom and Tina busy themselves in the kitchen.

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