Chasing Lucy is here!

I’m pleased to announce that my memoir, Chasing Lucy, is now available on Amazon.com.

To find it, I recommend searching for “Chasing Lucy Benson Branch”, or you can just click on this link: https://tinyurl.com/mf7dbxcm. Both eBook and paperback editions are there.

What is the memoir about? I’ll copy the back-page blurb here. It’s written in a blurb-ese tone, of course:

Black market drugs – first marijuana, then psychedelics. Ben was searching for something, a deeper sense of meaning. Then he stumbles across Transcendental Meditation (TM), which enables him to quit drugs and excel in university. While living a normal life of employment and marriage, he continues on a fifty-year journey towards enlightenment, diving into Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's teachings, joining retreats, and acquiring advanced practices such as the TM-Sidhi program. While this path sustains him, the road holds potholes as well as smooth paths. He encounters both fascinating experiences and bitter disappointments. He wonders how to resolve all this into a coherent vision, as you will see in this memoir.

Fairfield 14: Poetry, a Reunion, and More

In the latter half of March 2017 I journeyed out to Fairfield, Iowa, with Belle and Alboart.

Belle on the left.

The pigs help keep me grounded after several hours of group meditation in the Golden Dome each day, on the campus of Maharishi University of Management (MUM). They approve of the plentiful vegetarian food, and remind me to partake often.

The place I had stayed last November was already booked when I enquired, so I stayed at the Men's Peace Palace for the first time.

Men's on the left, Women's on the right.

The ground floor has several meeting rooms and the upper floor has seven-ish guest rooms for rent. Mine looked out onto the back. The public spaces were adopting a new, less pastel color scheme. At first, colors were being tested.

Later on the new palette was taking hold.

Early in my visit I attended a poetry reading by Bill Graeser, Rustin Larson, and Glenn Watt. The event consisted of two rounds wherein each poet recited from their work for ten minutes.

Here's the setting in the MUM library.

Rustin Larson.

Glenn Watt, an avid birder.

But Bill's my main poet.

Thanks, guys!

Early in the visit I had a chat with Dr. Birx, the TM-Sidhi administrator. Any certified TM teacher can check your TM meditation, but only a handful of TM-Sidhi administrators exist. He wanted to follow up during my next visit, and I'm sure we'll have more to talk about.

I also reconnected with Tom Hall. Tom and Jill Murphy (later Hall) were the TM teachers in Knoxville, Tennessee when I was attending UT; Tom interviewed me and Jill was my TM instructor, and Jill taught the SCI (Science of Creative Intelligence) course when it first came out. Although I had bumped into Tom once or twice at MUM in the last couple of years -- he splits his time between Atlanta and Fairfield -- and learned that Jill had passed away, we hadn't had a chance to catch up.

Tom invited me to have dinner at his new condo in North Campus Village.

He was lucky, because there's a waiting list for these units, but a friend of Tom's who had made a deposit on one later decided not to purchase, and the developer was willing to transfer the sale to Tom.

He whipped up a Thai-style dinner while the NCAA basketball final was on the TV, and four of us, including his son Orion and a friend of Orion, sat down to eat and to chat. It gave Tom and me a chance to sketch in what had happened to us over the last thirty years or so. Afterward Orion took a photo.

Tom on the right.

I took two "day spa" treatments at the Raj. Before when I've booked at the Raj it's been for several days of the full panchakarma regimen, which includes pulse diagnosis and consultations with the director of the Ayurveda program, special meals, and extended daily treatments. I didn't feel ready to jump into all that again, and the "day spa" allowed me to simply book treatments, albeit from a restricted set, not from the whole panoply that the director might prescribe. I had two shirodara, oil on the forehead, very soothing. I fell asleep during the second one.

During the two weeks I toured the campus, its landmarks, and immediate environs, as well as shopped for a couple of friends back in Columbus.

The bridge over nothing was now complete: there were caps on the "interior" posts, which had been bare wood back in November.

A closeup.

The nearby bridge that actually spans Crow Creek now has wooden safety wings instead of yellow tape.

The removal of dead wood and replanting of the area along the creek made progress over the winter.

Looking towards the Dome.

By the end of my visit the banks of the creek had been completely cleared of deadwood. Future plans include appropriate species such as willow.

This view combines the Argiro Student Center and the miniature Vedic Observatory.

Closer to downtown an old house -- check out the stone foundation -- had been demolished (click on the image to enlarge). Who knows what I'll see on this lot next visit?

Several of Irene Murphy's paintings are on display at Everybody's Cafe, where I met her for lunch.

She likes flowers.

One afternoon I took a long walk along the reservoirs on the Jefferson County Loop Trail, not far from campus. Halfway on a flock of huge birds flew by, high enough to be in controlled airspace, first heading north and then northeast. The light was such that the maximum zoom photo was almost black and white to begin with, and I completed the job with the GIMP.

Does anyone recognize the silhouette?

This striking sunset framed the Men's Dome (the Maharishi Patanjali Golden Dome).

At the Women's Dome (Bagambhrini Golden Dome) some drainage work (pipe replacement, apparently) was going on.

On a misty evening I experimented with photos. Here's the Men's Dome, viewed from the north. Note that the padlocked basement entrance is nonetheless well illuminated.

A look at the Women's Dome from the parking lot. It's backlit by the spotlights for the Invincibility Tower.

Then after two very restorative weeks it was time to head home again.

Fairfield 11: Repairs, Renovations, and Upgrades

I will jump this post to the front of the queue, and then we'll get back to Canada.

In November I returned to Fairfield, Iowa for another two-week visit, primarily for extended group meditation in the men's dome (Maharishi Patanjali Golden Dome, a mouthful) at Maharishi University of Management (MUM), but also for visiting friends and just wandering around Fairfield. Speaking of the Dome, it now has a glowing, brand-new roof. The old one had been leaking badly enough that replacing was better than patching yet again.

The women's dome (Bagambhrini Golden Dome) was in better shape, and needed only spot repairs. In this photo, the blue layer (sprayed on just as the underlying foam was) has some pockmarks on it (click to enlarge).

In a couple of days those were fixed. I do love the off-center top cupola; it creates a jaunty appearance.

But soon it was re-centered. At least the golden paint layer won't be applied until the spring, and that provides a pleasing contrast.

A striking addition was 40 kilowatts of photovoltaic solar panels on the west side of the men's dome, to supply power to the dome. At the time of my visit the two rows of panels had been installed but they weren't wired up yet.

The road past the dome from Highway 1 has been completely resurfaced. It sees a lot of traffic and the Iowa winters are very hard on it.

Work was going on all over. The McLaughlin building on the MUM campus was being repainted (work still in progress).

Seamless gutter installation on an MUM dormitory.

Porch repairs on that dorm.

The sustainable living building now has a pair of high-tech sundials on either side of the south face.

A closeup.

These are accurate timepieces, not a stick in the sand. The following poster gets blue vs. green wrong, but otherwise explains how the sundials work.

Just east of the sustainable living building is a small structure supporting more solar panels, and where batteries and other equipment are housed. I noticed a  level 2 (240 volt) electric-car charger from Sun Country attached to the outside. Note the motto, "Greening Canada's Highways." 

This is how the plug is arranged.

The campus library is next door, and in the foyer there was an exhibit by Bill Graeser, MUM locksmith, poet, photographer, and artist. The show included a poem -- my apologies for the poor photo, click to enlarge,

photographs,

framed art, including this "rejection match,"

and more.

Also on campus one day was a bloodmobile.

At Everybody's, the grocery-and-more store between campus and downtown, the Christmas railroad setup had begun.

Around the square, second-floor space has been and is being renovated into apartments.

Just off the square is the Istanbul Grill, a restaurant I visited for the first time on this trip. The outside is unprepossessing, but the interior is cozy,

the proprietors are charming, and the food is good. There are kebabs, steaks, and burgers to appeal to the carnivorous set, but I tried the veggie platter,

which included falafel balls, pita, tabouli, hummus, and baba ganoush. Yum!

The weather was generally agreeable on this trip, allowing several walks, some on the Fairfield Loop trail. There I encountered this sign describing the stages of the trail's construction. It lies atop a green-tinted map, perhaps a satellite view, of the Fairfield area.

These grasses near the trail caught my eye,

and they also drew the notice of my walking companion, Cary Davis.

One afternoon as I walked to the dome the light and the foliage were just right. The tree on the right of the path started dropping leaves the next day.

Here the Tower of Invincibility catches the early morning sun. It may appear to be a leaning tower, but it's not. Perhaps I was.

In my perambulations I began to take note of interesting "vanity" license plates. Ignoring ordinary specimens, such as people's initials, I focused on MUM-related themes.

I had a great rest and look forward to "Fairfield #12."