little squeak that makes my heart sing

Our boy Mr Burns is a bit of a talker.  I'm hoping I can teach him to say, "I love you," in some fashion over the course of the next 15 years, but for now am contenting myself with the sounds he makes on his own.  Which are very talk-y sometimes, like this evening.  

Here he is making the sounds he makes when he wants someone to come over and pet him, hang out with him, stop typing and be near.  It's not whining, exactly.  At least that's not how it sounds to me.  All I hear is, "hey, come see me, I need you, I love you."

You! You! You!

I heard Martha Beck speak at an Oprah Winfrey event, O, in San Francisco in October 2008. Two of my dearest friends and I made a weekend out of it: we booked a hotel, got in Friday night, had a shopping blitz, dinner, drinks and amazing conversation with strangers at our downtown SF hotel, where we barely slept a wink thanks to the almost constant sound of sirens. It didn't matter. Those were the heady days pre-election 2008, when we were so excited about the possibility of Obama as our president, our eyes wide with excitement watching history unfold around us, being a part of a historic and momentous change. And we were going to see Oprah and all of the Oprah people speak, live, in the flesh.

I'd probably watched the Oprah show maybe five times at this point though one of our party is known to fill up her family TiVo with the show. I have nothing against Oprah, but went into this, not as a fan, but more like an eager passenger being taken to a place everyone had been many times. The excitement was palpable, as we walked in the door, the lines of chattering happy women waiting to check-in long but fast-moving. What would happen? I had no idea. I had a full dance-card, having signed up to hear all these different people speak. I was most excited to go see Stacy London of What Not To Wear, since that is a show I've been known to binge on, crying at the end of each one as a precious person's life is re-made thanks to Stacy and Clinton Kelly. It's such a simple formula and it gets me every time.

And of course, Stacy was wonderful, funny, lovely and transformative.

Transformative.  That was the point of the whole weekend, and so it was moving for me to look around at all these glowing female faces of all races, everyone hungry for and open to transformation.

Those were heady times, right?  We knew we were on the brink of an enormous national transformation.  We could feel it coming.  So how not to transform ourselves, too?

I had signed up to hear Martha Beck mostly because my girlfriends loved her and I wanted at least one session with them.  I had some skepticism about her as a "life coach," even though I'm a person who loves coaching, who did a 6-month professional coaching of my own once, a coaching that profoundly changed not just Professional me, but Me me.  Duh, since it's pretty much always Me me.  From the moment Martha Beck opened her mouth, I had goose bumps.  I cried.  I felt this insane recognition of her like I'd known her all my life, like I'd been missing her without even knowing I'd been missing her.

If that sounds crazy to you, consider that that's not the first time that's happened for me.  In fact, it has happened for me with greater frequency since I started yoga 9 years ago which gave me the opportunity to meet more people.  It doesn't mean I fall in love with each person I meet -- far from it.  But sometimes, sometimes, there's this prickle, there's this strong knowing within the first 15 seconds of meeting someone.  It doesn't matter where he or she is from, what they do for a living, what they wear or drive or do in their spare time.  There is a *something* about that person and we're fast-friends, true friends, locked together like magnets from the moment we meet.  It happened when I met Michelle, it happened when I met Kristin, it happened when I carpooled to John Friend with Trixie.  It happened with Martha Beck.  Unfortunately, I haven't had the chance to tell Martha this, until now, in this way, but I told the others.  I remember telling Kristin, within 10 minutes of meeting her, sitting in a tiny cafe in Oaxaca drinking cappuccinos with a bunch of other yogis, looking into her eyes and saying, "ohmygodiloveyousomuch."

I'm reading Martha's new book, Finding Your Way in a Wild New World, and the chapter I'm jumping around about the most so far is the one entitled, "You! You! You!"  She is describing the experience of meeting someone for the first time and hoping her expression "looks relatively normal.  Linky, beautiful and brilliant, sardonic and fierce, is not someone who seems easily disturbed, but if I showed what I'm feeling right now, it might alarm her."  Martha is having what she calls a strong bout of "You! You! You!" -- that feeling of "having inexplicably emotional reunions with dear friends I've never met before, who live all over the world and seem to have nothing in common with me."  Later on she says, "It's as if there's been a Linky Nkuna-shaped absence in my heart since I was born, a missing piece of my own soul's puzzle, and that piece is clicking deliciously into alignment."  It's that feeling of wanting to take that new person you've met by the shoulders, that person you feel you've always known and will never have to live without again, and delightedly exclaiming, "You! You! You!" Or, in my case, "ohmygodiloveyousomuch!"

This is, naturally, exactly what I've been experiencing, and what I hope you've been experiencing, too, along your way, making new friends you feel like you've always had, filling out the corners of your heart.  Martha calls it being part of the Team, meeting other Team members -- all of us on a mission, with our own role to play in saving our own lives and saving the planet.  When I heard her talk about this idea of the Team the first time, live, I got goosebumps all over.

You!  You!  You!

So anyway, that's all.  That's what I'm thinking about this morning in these spare moments before I have to get ready for work and another day of dealing with a sourpuss boss and tasks I'm not really crazy about, tasks that make me feel stupid, that bring me down from the high of the weekend until I'm standing about half my real height, which means I can barely see over the top of my desk.  I'm tucking this delicious feeling I'm having right now into my pockets, hoping I can reach in all day and remember, stay standing tall (that's a relative term, obvy), thinking of all the great friends I have, the way we are all part of something so great, the way we love each other so much even if we don't see each other enough, how we're changing the world by just being who we are and getting better at it all the time.

I'm girding for the job, but it's OK because I've got you in my corner.  You! You! You!  ohmygodiloveyousomuch!

XX

Valentine's is for chicks...

With Valentine's Day 2011 behind us, I wanted to get down my Valentine's Manifesto as a way of already getting ready for next year.

I love Valentine's Day so much I should marry it.  At minimum, I should make it its very own Valentine, covered in stickers and glitter.  I love Valentine's like I love Santa and Christmas and New Year's Resolutions and a host of other holiday traditions that make so many people grumble.

And there are really so many haters out there!  I get it.  For some people, these externally-imposed obligations are such a drag, create so much pressure and anxiety.  The cynicism and negativity abound.

That's just wrong.

It's such a missed opportunity to use it for your own ends, to make something beautiful out of what might otherwise be a chore.  Somewhere recently (maybe in Gretchen Rubin's The Happiness Project) I read, "if you can't get out of it, get into it."  Such great advice!

The essence of my Valentine's Manifesto is getting into it, getting deep into it, up to your elbows in glitter glue and construction paper.  

I have been doing it this way for years, so long that part of the fun of the activity is thinking back on the old days.  It's bittersweet for me, too, because my strongest memories, the sweetest, are of hours spent over teacups and music, making delicate, beautiful Valentine's with a friend who's entirely lost to me now, eaten by substance abuse, vanished from the texture of my life.  I think of her so much as I cut out hearts, remember being in her house surrounded by her mewling cats.  For some years, we'd make a tea party out of it, but she was always at the center of the making, its creative hub.

Even then, like now, for me Valentine's Day is not a romantic thing.  It's a celebration of love between girlfriends, between friends, a day for me to express love to all those people -- besides my husband -- who fill my little world with love all year long.  For some, those for whom I have addresses, this means a Valentine in the mail.  And that's the super-fun part.  

I devoted an afternoon to Valentines this year, a whole leisurely slow happy Saturday afternoon while Joe was off racing, to cutting shapes from construction papers and doilies, applying the glitter glue, then the stickers.  It was a three-step process, since they had to dry in between.  It was sweet, listening to music, thinking of my friends the whole way through.  They had to sit for a week to be good and dry before going into envelopes, then I had a little schedule for mailing, to  ensure that the East Coast people got theirs in good time, the West Coast people not too early.

This is, no doubt, another manifestation of my Inner Dork, but like I said, Get Into It.

And, to be clear, I do not refuse the box of See's dark chocolate Nuts and Chews which Joe always brings me.  

So here's my Manifesto for next year.  

- Make an Open House out of it
- Lay in a supply of paper, pens, glitter, glue, stickers, what have you
- Bake a batch of cookies, make a big pot of coffee
- Put on music and 
- Go

I can only fit a certain number of people around my table, so I'm inviting others to have their own Valentine's parties.  Really, it's so fun.

Because Valentine's Day really is and should be a way to love up your friends, to let them know in a small but powerful way that you're thinking of them, holding them in your little paper heart.

And how nice would it be for me to receive some Valentines by mail next year!  Get Into It!

Cycle 6, Day 3: The bounty of friendship, another gift of yoga

After walking with Jasper at the levies this morning (big tide rushing in, harriers trolling for their breakies), I sat with Joe by the French doors in our room for a while and watched the busy-ness of birds outside. Joe had a bit of a rough night, feeling very weak today and funky, but nevertheless left for work around 8:30, which is late for him. Not sure how long he'll last there today, honestly. Even though it's the last time, it might be the worst time, his poor body weakened by all of the chemo and side-effects that came before. Hanging in there...

I continue to be amazed at the kindness and love of the beautiful people we are so graced to call friends. Last night, darling sisters Alexandra and Gillian brought us an enormous pot of delicious chicken soup tied with a red bow, warm, delicious garlic bread, fresh and delicious zucchini bread. And a handmade sweet card. We were all delighted and dazzled by their presence, so moved by their generosity and unbelievable cuteness.

Besides the sheer delight of their presence, just how lit-up they each are, what's so awesome about it, for me, is that I only met these two lovelies in April of last year, when we had the good fortune to meet and spend a week together at Laura's retreat in Careyes, Mexico. For me, it was love at first sight, in that way I've grown to expect through yoga, that the people I meet through the practice become my fast- and heart-friends. I would do anything for them and know they would do anything for me. It's as if we've always known each other, because we see and know the truest thing about each other from the very beginning. Until last night, Alexandra and Gillian had never even met Joe, but still they came, bringing all that love for us to eat.

I never expected this, to meet such wonderful people through Anusara, to rest back into the arms of such a warm and loving community of yogis and yoginis, to be so very loved and to love so very deeply, so very madly, all these new friends all the time, every day.

The gifts of yoga are so much more than flexibility, handstands, peace of mind -- all of that is wonderful, but what is the real gift, the biggest joy, is this super-connectivity to others. I am so grateful to our teacher, Laura, who creates the conditions in which these friendships burgeon and flourish, Laura who consistently inspires each of us to see the good, the light, the beauty all around us. Through these glorious friendships, I touch the One-ness of which we truly are a part. Thanks to these lovely friends, I am reminded every day, on the mat and off, that Love is all that matters, the one and only real purpose of our time here on this earth.

XX