Oh wow ...

...I really missed the boat on this one. Talk about not being present....

Here's a lesson in impermanence, and in the need to stay connected.

There once was a man who had a major impact on my life. I don't know that he ever knew what a huge effect he had on me. He was a coffeehouse owner, a hobo, a poet, and a wonderful percolator of creativity and unity. It's hard to find words that haven't already been used to describe him, and better....

Suffice it to say that his slow, genuine life is something that both my husband and I honor in our lives. We mention him fairly frequently, and will continue to do so.

When I left New Orleans after college, I knew I was leaving an important and formative part of my life behind. I was also leaving a city and people I love behind, and I didn't know when I would be back. When we filled up at the gas station that day, I broke down and cried. I had to face impermanence head on, and just accept change.

Things change, time passes, people live and die. Bob Borsodi died, just as we all must. However, to learn that he was so racked with the pain of metastasized, fatal cancer that he leapt to his death from the Hale Boggs Bridge, into the Mississippi River...and not only that, that I missed his passing by more than four years....well, it's just given me food for thought. What a mindfulness bell.... I've got much to think about.....

A Cage Without a Bird -- Bob Borsodi

I have a dove that dwells

Within a cage without a door.

(I took the door off years ago.)

And pretty girls have asked,

Their minds full of externals,

"Is it safe?"

And how perhaps he needs a door

To protect him

Lest he sneak away somehow to the city outside

And be lost.

And compounding their request,

If he needs a mate

That he might want for friendship

In his prison without a gate.

Well, here it is.

The dove and I have achieved this rare liberty

Only after many years,

A tedious story of near disaster experiences,

Murky and dreary, too unkind to recall.

The surest safety

Comes from a source deep inside,

Deep inside the boney cage,

From a peaceful feeling there

Which I would do harm to explain.

And the sweetest friendship likewise

Comes from a free feeling there, deep inside,

That I would do harm to tame.

Yet peaceful and free

We do no harm to be.

Impermanence

I had the fantastic fortune of going back to yoga this week. I've really missed it since we moved. I tried to establish a practice here, but it's a bit crowded, and never very quiet. When yoga is properly practiced, at least for me, it's such a wonderful moving meditation. At least, that's how I think it ought to be.

I was lucky enough to have a classically trained teacher - a true yogini. I learned SO much from her. In fact, right before we left, I was contemplating certifying, at her suggestion. At this point, though, I've got a long journey back to where I was....

At the end of my first week back of regular practice, I had an instructor who's practice was less than balanced. We did entirely too many sustained inversions, to my mind, at least for the mixed level of participants there. I was thinking that through most of the practice. After the class, I was trying to show my MIL (she was in the class that day) the traditional sun salutation (Surya Namaskar) I "grew up" with when my right shoulder just gave way and collapsed, right in the middle of bhujangasana. Talk about a total shock. I use my arms all the time - they are not weak, to my mind (think farmer's wife). The only thing I can think of is that it was the same shoulder that I dislocated 3 times when I was a toddler. I dunno. Anyway, I've been forced to rest it this week, and practice has been impossible. Actually, for the first few days, a lot of things were impossible, or at least very painful.

It occurred to me that this was a great teaching for me - a lesson in humility and impermanence. Life changes, we all age, the range of possibilities shifts. I have no doubt I can return to my yoga practice. I just need to be more mindful and gentle with myself.