Hello Friends,

I haven't written a blog post since the unexpected advent of the worldwide pandemic that has, just in the span of a few short weeks, upended the assumed order of our personal, social, political, and (god help us all) economic lives. 

To be perfectly honest, I haven't known what to write. Everything is just so . . . different. I have so many thoughts, none of them particularly digested.

It's like Devon said the other day when I asked her how she was processing the sea change: "The world is too close to my face."

In other words, we don't have enough room, any of us, to say anything particularly smart about all this, because it's all just still happening in rapid succession right now.

Or as my old friend and writing buddy Sloane Crosley put it in her recent essay for the New York Times, "Yesterday was approximately six and a half years ago."

But in the hope that the personal contains themes that one or two of you might jive with, I'll report a couple things that have happened for us along the way.

1. We cancelled our book tour

Many of you know that Devon and I were planning a five-month book tour/road trip/adventure around the United States and Canada, in which we would purchase a fabulously expensive Mercedes Sprinter van that's been converted to an RV and then drive it in a zig-zaggy line around the continent, all the while dispensing the wisdom of How Not to Be a Hot Mess to the masses. 

Well, we purchased that fabulously expensive Mercedes Sprinter van. And now it's sitting in the dealer's lot, waiting to be resold. Ah, the vicissitudes of this life.

The silver lining: We've moved all our events through May online. Which means you can join us along the way no matter where you live, if meditation and dharma is your cup of tea. 

2. Our book launched early

This might sound like a great thing. Actually, it was confusing AF. Basically, the virus has disrupted shipping routes and warehouse schedules and Penguin Random House just needed to get books out the door fast. So we launched early.

The problem? All the bookstores were closed. And Amazon, which now accounts for about half of book sales in the US, was a stinky dumpster fire of messiness, first telling people the book was available, then telling them it wasn't, then telling them it was . . . In fact, there are folks who ordered the book a month ago and still haven't seen their hot pink copy.

The silver lining: It looks like How Not to Be a Hot Mess is finally shipping from Amazon. Plus it's definitely available on Kindle. Plus you can listen to it on Audible. Plus this would be a great time to order from anyone but Amazon, because . . . well, for all the usual reasons.

3. We're still in semi-retreat

One thing that's a silver lining all on its own is that we're still in home retreat, living above the temple in Ashland, Oregon. While we were definitely looking forward to our 10,000 mile road trip in our fabulously converted van, it has been a sweet little slice of heaven to keep meditating 30 or 40 hours a week even in the midst of our launch.

These days we get up early, meditate until lunch, put in a five hour work day setting up events, teaching, and mentoring meditators one-on-one, and then meditate again until bed. It's also spring, and we do a lot of our practice outside. Some of it by Ashland Creek. Some of it by Bear Creek. And some of it high up in the hills. 

*

And that's my update. Maybe someday I'll be able to write about the hard stuff and the weird stuff, like my brother and sister both getting sick (and then better) and my whole family on lockdown in New York (that's still happening), and the way this pandemic has exposed all over again the ugliness of our nation's (literally) deadly inequities . . . but I just don't have it in me today.

What I can say is that I am personally grateful that, if I'm stuck somewhere, at least I get to be stuck above a Buddhist temple; and if I'm stuck with someone, at least I get to be stuck with Devon; and if all our expectations have been turned upside down, at least I have meditation and dharma to wake me up and see me through.

At any rate, my heart is with all of you, wherever you are, whatever is happening. I am sending many, many heartfelt wishes for your safety, health, and happiness.

All good things,
Craig