A friend and I were pursuing the I-Ching.We had found our mountain and were determined that we should climb it.
Such a narrow and determined focus naturally attracts others of the same mind. So we found ourselves with a dozen or so people who were looking for a social hook up. Were looking for the path less taken.
San Diego was becoming expensive and there were no farms available. Two of these people had money they wished to invest in a home for all of us.We lived together in S.D. for two years
So My friend stayed in San Diego and then to Oxford England to continue his formal education. I took the our vagabonds north to Santa Cruz, well just south of S.C. in Watsonville. We bought a 33 ac. place, had a few Redwoods in their infancy barely three feet across. But mostly grass.
There we began a series of farming disasters as we knew nothing about how to farm. We raised dairy calves from 3 days old to 6 months. We watched to many die of our incompetence to continue.
So after 4 years in Watsonville we came to a parting of the way. Many were unhappy with me, but not all.
I learned something that I would have to carry the rest of my life. Almost no one shares my interests.
a few perhaps would like to, but it's simply not what they are called to do.
I was 27 when I undertook my study of the Martial Arts. I had not yet begun to imagine that in ten years I would withdraw into complete solitude, and there remain to try and fulfill a calling I did not and would not for decades understand. When your flying blind the thing that most amazes you is how seldom you crash and burn.
But I have my scars from those years.I was embittered and I was angry...There was much ahead for me to do.