calm abiding

trained in observation

i am dizzied by my thoughts.

sit wandering mind sit.

ruby red

the wicked witch is dead.

may she rest in peace.

may the sun set in the east.

slowing down

internal temperature

falling.  cooling unit in place.

summer’s day passes.

hand me my blanket –

the wet one.  the one damp with

a summer night’s  humidity

 

Anahata nada

stillness bathed in light

silence fecund with unstruck

sound I hear myself

January 31- One Year, One Day at a Time -Hot Bod

Hot bod.  You know that commercial with the Arian man and his south american counter part running up and down the bleachers?  Young, hot girls are watching, starry-eyed, swooning because the two young men have such great bodies.  Really?  I have a hot body for a 62-year-old woman.  Okay is that arrogant, or am I giving you the facts?  Why do I even want to write about this?  Why, because tonight at dinner when the 3 other people we were with talked about procuring second homes, selling and buying condos and the like, I thought, what am I doing with my life?   Writing, teaching yoga, counseling, doing life coaching and ….I have a hot bod.  I just snickered.  This is really quite funny coming from the girl who, in eighth grade heard the gym teacher tell her, “You are weak and terribly over weight.  You should be ashamed of yourself.  You need to lose weight.”  She was so angry all because I could not pull myself up a climbing rope.

And so I was for years to come.   That was a turning point for me. I immediately started dieting, starving myself in hopes of attaining my goal, the perfect weight, 110 pounds.  I only weighed 120 to start.  Was I even overweight, or had my body not quite caught up with my….What am I talking about.  I was at one time heavier than I am now.  Embarrassed about my weight I dieted, took pills, used enemas and tried my best not to eat at all.  If I did eat and especially when I overate,  I took laxatives.  No one, no one was ever going to discover my sordid secret.  I ate and ate more to escape feelings for which i had no explanation.

Today, I do not eat or drink to cover up or hide from who I am.  I do not drink or eat too much to escape my feelings. I enjoy food and alcohol to the extent that i am having fun with friends. Over consumption of food and alcohol does not erase the past.  We each must do that for ourselves. Learning not to be a victim of the past does take time and effort.  No matter who you are, the past does effect you.  Samscaras, our perceptions of what has happened, the scars those experiences created are a sticky spider web waiting to ensnare us.  We cannot change the past but we can kill the spider, that part of ourselves that works feverishly to weave a web of self-made obstacles, false ideas of who we are, illusions of reality, avidya, a film that covers our eyes and hearts obscuring the truth, misapprehending, creating confusion and fear.

Ha, I have to laugh.  My perception of myself, me seeing me as having at hot bod for a 62-year-old grandmother may well be just another filament in the spider web I am trying to escape.

I am falling asleep sitting up in bed.  I must to go to sleep.  I will be back in touch tomorrow.

Stickiness – I want to stick with you

Have you ever referred to one of your close friends as sticky?  Kathy is one of my stickiest friends.  She has stuck with me through thick and thin.  When others questioned my motives, she had my back.  When I stood my ground and fired five of the teachers who taught at my yoga studio, she never asked why.  Two weeks ago, when I struggled with the question of alcoholism.   Am I an alcoholic?  Am I the living legacy of my mother?  She texted me every day.  “Been reading your blog.  Stay strong.  I love you.  As they say, one day at a time.  Sending love and healing energy your way.  You’re on my mind and wanted you to know I’m here for you in any way I can.  Good for you.  You deserve a great day.”  Now that is a sticky friend.  No judgement, no shame, no doubt, just love and support.

Although stickiness is not a quality you might strive to achieve, it embodies all that is good in life.  Honey is sticky.  Who does not like honey?  Adhesives are sticky.  They hold things together.  What would we do without Elmer’s glue, super glue, hot glue, wood glue, rubber cement, glue guns, glue sticks and epoxy.

How would we attach a stamp to an envelope?  How would we keep wrapping paper on the presents we give to our loved ones at holiday time?  Without stickiness, super models would have to forgo fake eye lashes and nails, children would not have stickers to play with and I would never have chewed bubble gum, which by the way, rotted my teeth.  And  what about gummy bears?  Now there is a sticky business that is bad for the teeth.

If something is worthwhile, if it has purpose and meaning, if it is universal, like a moral, a folk-tale, an urban legend, it will stick.  Good ideas stick.  Inventions that make life easier stick with us.  What was a kleenex called before it was a Kleenex?  Kimberly Clark trademarked the name Kleenex for its paper handkerchiefs in 1930.  Now we call every facial tissue, Kleenex.  The name stuck.  Copy machines were once just that. Now we know them as Xerox machines.  Apple was Steve Job’s favorite fruit.  There are more sticky brand names that are now nouns:  Alka Seltzer, Frisbee, YoYo, Escalator, Chapstick, Ping pong, Styrofoam, Scotch Tape, and my all time favorite, Hoola-hoop.

As a writer, I want to be sticky.  I want my ideas, my thoughts, my words, my sentences, my stories to stick with you.  I want them to be unique and universal.  I want my name to be bandied about like, Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Woolf, Henry Miller, Toni Morrison,Maya Angelou,  Flannery O’Conner, and Margaret Atwood.  These are not just words,  These names mean “writers.”  Do I want to be famous?  No. I want to be good, really good at what I do.  I want to challenge, awaken, enliven and engage my reader.  I will keep writing, day after day, month after month, year after year, until I learn how to be sticky.