My Year of Dirt and Water: Journal of a Zen Monk’s Wife in Japan

In February 2004, when her American husband, a recently ordained Zen monk, leaves home to train for a year at a centuries-old Buddhist monastery, Tracy Franz embarks on her own year of Zen. An Alaskan alone—and lonely—in Japan, she begins to pay attention. 

My Year of Dirt & Water is a record of that journey. Allowed only occasional & formal visits to see her cloistered husband, Tracy teaches English, studies Japanese, & devotes herself to making pottery. Her teacher instructs her to turn cup after cup—creating one failure after another. Past & present, East & West intertwine as Tracy is twice compelled to return home to Alaska to confront her mother’s newly diagnosed cancer & the ghosts of a devastating childhood.

Revolving through the days, My Year of Dirt & Water circles hard questions: What is love? What is art? What is practice? What do we do with the burden of suffering? The answers are formed & then unformed—a ceramic bowl born on the wheel & then returned again & again to dirt & water.