Patience is Efficient

I stand in line to get a ticket for the Portland Japanese Garden. “Line” is technically a misnomer, since only one couple is ahead of me at the ticket window. Yet the line feels long, due to the many questions the man asks. He sounds like he’s querying a car salesman he doesn’t trust, trying to catch her in deceit. He makes it clear that he’s never been here before, and isn’t sure whether the price is worth it, to take his wife in. I’m impatient with him, until one of his questions lightens my mood.

“Is this the place where that really pretty tree is?”

“Yes,” the agent answers, without asking which tree he might mean.

I think she sees me smile, as my annoyance melts into amusement. I look around, noticing that I can see at least a hundred trees from where I stand. Every single one is really pretty. I smile even more broadly. This time the agent catches my eye and returns my smile. But the man’s not finished with his interrogation yet.

“What’s the best way to see this place?”

“Slowly,” she replies, with another smile. This seems to satisfy him at last, and he finally completes the transaction.

I’m tempted to compliment the agent on her perfect one-word answers, but our silent shared smile seems perfect already, without a word needed. I buy my ticket without a question, and amble into the garden… slowly.

With every tree I pass, I silently repeat the man’s exchange with the agent. Every tree is really pretty, and appears ever more so, the longer I look at it. Moving slowly is indeed the best way to appreciate the garden.

A familiar thought recurs as I pause on a garden bridge. Hurrying slows you down. I’ve learned the truth of that, over the years. Hurrying leads to mistakes, which leads to starting over, which leads to wasted time.

I remember a friend who went to Plum Village in France, in her role as an editor of The Mindfulness Bell, Buddhist master Thich Nhat Hanh’s publication. She was stressed about deadlines upon arrival. She was ready to immediately get to work with him.

“Let’s have a cup of tea,” he insisted instead. She resisted, but agreed.

“Let’s go for a walk,” he said next. So they did a slow walking meditation under the plum trees, each of which was undoubtedly really pretty.

When at last he was ready to talk about magazine content, she was relaxed and fully present. They accomplished the editing in much less time than if they hadn’t sipped tea and gone for a slow walk first. She related the lesson to me, upon return to Oregon. Patience is efficient.

This again seems apt, since I’m only free to visit the Japanese Garden because a planned meeting has been delayed. It’ll probably be a more efficient meeting later, as a result. My mind has time first to find clarity.

Watching the koi swim leisurely in the garden pond, I doubt they’re aware of how beautiful they are. But they’re as pretty as that really pretty tree.

I spend hours in the garden, moving slowly when moving at all. I watch as beauty reveals itself in every place in which I pause. I try to recall the beauty of slowness later, when freeway traffic causes me to move even more slowly than in the garden. I keep repeating that old mantra: Patience is efficient. Patience is efficient. Patience is efficient.

My meetings in Portland do prove efficient. The ones that don’t happen at all, apparently didn’t need to yet.

I’m home now. This is the place where that really pretty tree is. And it hasn’t taken me long to patiently write about it all.