Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Miss Kinetic Energy to Ommmmm

Suzie kicked off her tennis shoes the moment she entered the yoga room. With a quick flick of her two little feet, a dis joined pair of pink Nike Freedom Lites flew through the air, landing smack in the center of our yoga space. Moments later Suzie, who I have always knows to be a pretty mellow, academically gifted student, started leaping around, singing to her self. She paid no mind to the group of young yogis sitting and talking quietly on their yoga mats and they paid no attention to her. Once finally seated on the floor, she struggled to get her mat out of its plastic wrap, appealing to me for help. One of her yogamates, a sometimes nervous little girl with special education challenges who has been a yoga student for a while, came over to help her. "How interesting," I thought to myself, "the special education student calmly helping the brightest girl in the room who is acting completely helpless and not a little as though she is jumping out of her skin."

Her little blue mat finally flat on the floor, Suzie commenced rolling around, even rolling up in her mat as though it were a blanket all the while making funny little noises. I decided to not say a word to her. The school teacher in me wanted to make her pay attention and stop moving around but the much wiser yoga instructor in me let her be. As Suzie was busily filling the room with wild kinetic energy, her classmates sat peaceably on their little mats. With an eye fixed on Suzie just to make sure she didn't flop on top of another student or dance out of the room, I opened class. For the next 30 minutes we practiced different yoga partner poses. "Friendly warrior," I instructed my young yogis, "is a pose of both strength and friendship." Once into the posing, Suzie seemed more engaged with those around her but only because she had to be.

Towards the end of class we took a guided meditation to Fairy Land. Afterwards we talked about what we experienced. "I just drifted away on a cloud," one of the students shared as we talked about our meditations. "I loved the toadstool table and chairs!" Suzie quietly told the group. To my surprise, we were all whispering in the quiet calm of the yoga room and it was at this very point that Suzie seemed to finally slow down. She had gone from 100 miles an hour to 1. And I could tell by the look in her eye, that this amazed her. As she left I asked her what part of the class she enjoyed. Without hesitation she told me, "The meditation." Her mom later told me that Suzie did not want to come to yoga and only tried it because she knew me and because her mom insisted. Days later when I asked Suzie what she thought about yoga and if she would be returning she simply smiled.

I know, had my yoga class been more hyper Suzie would have orbited! Somehow by letting her be and changing the energy in the room, she was able to calm herself down. What a lot for a little girl to learn :)

Sunday, March 21, 2010

Welcome Spring








Last night we had a wonderful, healthy dinner. We savored home-smoked salmon, spicy beans and rice and a delicious walnut/apple/feta cheese salad. After dinner, the beautiful and talented daughter of one of my best buddies and dinner guest/cook stopped by.......with boxes of pastry! She had been at a pastry competition earlier in the day (I'm sure she won!) and we were the lucky ones to eat all her leftover sample pastries. Healthy dinner.....5,000 calorie dessert. Good thing I went to spin class this morning!

Saturday, March 20, 2010

The Work I Love



Despite all the reams of redundant paperwork, endless and sometimes difficult meetings, boring and nonstop data entry, tedious and tiring secretarial work and recess duty where I often feel like a prison guard, I love my work. After a recent illness (nasty and annoying case of Fifth Disease) I went on vacation and spent a lot of time (still sick) thinking about what I do for a living. After long and thoughtful hours of thinking, journaling, and just wondering, I have finally made peace. I love my work with children. I'm born to do it and I am, thankfully, pretty good at it. But the other half of my job (never used to take up so much time but now it does) I like not so much. Not sure what has happened to my job description and not sure what the answer is as I swim around in paperwork, but for me, I need to remember, every moment I sit in a never ending meeting or pound away on the keyboard, how much I genuinely love my work with kids. And in that, I find peace.

Thursday, March 18, 2010

New England Pot Hole


I called my husband around noon. He is happy as he answers the phone in a van full of family. "Bye. Love you." I hear from everybody in the van. My father-in-law and Jo are on their way home and my sister-in-law and husband are driving them down to the airport in a borrowed van. "Great to see them, love family, good luck on the trip home," I'm thinking. 3 hours later I call my husband again just to see how things went. This time he's not so happy. He's at a tire dealership somewhere in Massachusetts. Two tires on the van, he tells me, blew up when the van and a pot hole met on the ramp just this side of Boston Logan airport. "What?" I ask him for details. Apparently, a giant pot hole wrecked havoc and blew out tires from several cars on their way to the airport. My husband called 911. The Boston police quickly escorted a city truck to the pot hole to fill it up and then.......drove away, leaving my husband, his sister, father, and Jo, to sit like naked ducks in the middle (and I mean middle as there was no place to pull over) of Boston traffic...for 2 hours! A tow truck came and helped the car ahead of them, with similarly blown tires. And then drove away! All the while the rain came down fiendishly, sideways. Of course, Ken's father missed his flight and it cost over $300 to replace the tires but let's look on the bright side. The borrowed van now has two shiny new tires!

Sunday, March 14, 2010

We All Belong to Something or Someone!

Here you have the mother of the Navy graduate (Ensign Rooke!), the uncle (and owner of Easterly Surveying) and Grandpa of the graduate...with his Navy sweatshirt on (which he loves..and thanks Cam for!).

Father and daughter (great photo).

Father and son :) Another great photo.



These shirts I have NEVER seen before....here we are....
crazy family members of the guy who owns Easterly Surveying :)
We all belong to someone :)

Addie and Daddy


How cute is this...Addie and Daddy. While we were in Florida a windstorm took out the power so the girls had been coming over with daddy for a bath. When we got home, the power was still out. So, here we are, ready for a bath. This shot we'll have to show Addie's first boyfriend :)
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Saturday, March 13, 2010

Every Step of the Journey


Every step of the journey is the journey.

Be present, I remind myself, a hundred times a day.

Saturday, March 6, 2010

Back in the Groove Again

I don't know what happens to me. I get away from who I am. I start running around like a crazy, can-do-all woman and then I get....sick. This time I think I developed Fifths Disease...itchy legs, whole-body rash, hot red cheeks, arthritic symptoms for 2 1/2 weeks. I get it. Stop. Be present. Enjoy life again! So, after much reflection in Florida (where I was still sick!), I started up my daily practice of yoga and meditation (made for a wonder week despite what went on around me and there was a lot of crazy going on around me). And, I started back to yoga training! Love my yogi friends. Loved yoga training last night. Ommmmmmm.