'Round the Hood During Golden Hour

Lame-o

I feel so lame. Not being able to take a few minutes to take a few photos and post one. Jees. Am I really that busy? I don't think so. I think I'm just that unorganized. Although, I did kind of get slammed with a lot of things at once in September. But that's all over now. It's a new month and I'm hellbent on getting organized and being more creative. The stinking heat of the summer is over. There I said it, OVER. I just can't believe that in October we will hit 90 degrees. The stinking heat lasted into September, continuing to stagnate my energy. But today, October 1 there has been a shift. It's cooler and I feel more alive and full of energy. So let's see what happens and where the month of October takes us.

Jonesing

Sweet little Lenny Boy

Did you know jonesing is in the dictionary? It's basically a fixation or compulsive desire for something. Well, I've been jonesing to be on my blog. I don't know why I'm having so much trouble coming here and posting stuff. It's not like it has to be all deep and full of anything. I guess part of the problem is that I'm pretty busy with a lot of stuff and haven't been managing my time very well. I've learned not only am I a master procrastinator (like right now I'm procrastinating working out but hey I've only been up for 30 minutes!) but I'm also a pro at wasting time. If I would stop wasting time, I would have more time. But often, I find myself overwhelmed with the task(s) at hand and become paralyzed with not knowing where to start or what to do next. So, I waste time instead with my procrastination techniques, i.e. the internet! Anyway, that's where I am right now, in this moment. Present with my procrastination. And at least acknowledging that is worth something, right?

Working from Home

Working from home today. It's kind of hard to stay focused.

A View from the Top

Well, almost the top. This was taken from a hike over the weekend. There's this trail that we've been attempting to hike for several years now. The first time, Lisa and I made it about 40 minutes or so into it. We passed through an area at one point that had this weird feel to it. Like we passed into another realm. That kind of spooked us so we turned around. A year or two later Lisa, Mo and I attempted to hike it but it was too hot and we only made it about 30 minutes into it. Last year we were going to hike it and then we had a run in with Jack the night before. Jack Daniels that is and there was no hiking or much of anything for that matter the next day.

This year we were hellbent on finishing that damn hike. Another friend had told us were only like 15 minutes from the top. So we started out and an hour later and few steep inclines, we weren't at the top. We were wondering if there really was a "top" or if maybe the trail just wound back down the other side of the mountain. We also ran out of water so we had to turn back. But we were close. Evidently there is a clearing where you get a great view and then the trail splits into two directions. And apparently we were only about 10 minutes from that. One day we will finish this hike!

Oh, Sweet Patience

I've discovered that I'm not a patient person. You'd think being a yogi and all, I would be, but really being a yogi is all about practicing. So I try to practice patience. And I practice, and practice and practice. In fact, my practice these days is Inhale Patience, Exhale Judgement. You'd think with all that practicing it would be working but clearly I have a ways to go.

I've been dealing with a lot of things lately that need extreme patience. Obviously my husband's condition. I want him to walk now. I want my husband back, 100% now. I want to go on bike rides and hikes and adventures with my husband now. Not later. Now. But he can't now. He will later, how much later we don't know, but he will. So, for now, I have to be patient.

I want Lucy Poohead to be friends with Leonard T. Kat, now. I want to see them romping and stomping now. Not later. Now. But it's not time yet. It's been less than 2 weeks and the Poohead is still warming up to this big change in her life. I mean, a walnut size brain can only process so much. So for now, I have to be patient.

I have an intern at work who has no design skills, doesn't follow directions and doesn't pay attention when I'm giving him said directions. I'm trying to be patient with him but seriously, 8 times of telling someone something and they still don't do it correctly, do I have to be patient with that? Well I guess I do, because he's here until the end of the month. And that's part two of this lesson in patience. I want July 30 to come NOW! But July 30 will come when July 30 comes.
So, once again, for now I have to be patient.

I guess part of the problem comes from expectations. We expect things to go a certain way and people to do things right, or more correctly said, the way we would. When they don't, we get upset or angry. And that's not good. Take traffic for example ... I expect that I should be able to get in my car and drive to work with nothing in my way to delay me. But when there's bs traffic, I get impatient and then usually angry. Ha! There's the problem. I should expect there to be lots of obstacles preventing me from getting to work unhindered.

So what's a person to do? Well, practice, practice, practice at being patient. Inhale Patience, Exhale Judgement. I'm going to start a meditation where I take a mudra (hand position) with my middle finger touching my thumb and do the breathing practice, Inhale Patience, Exhale Judgement.

Here are some quotes I found about patience that perhaps I will write down and read everyday:

All human wisdom is summed up in two words - wait and hope.

Patience is waiting. Not passively waiting. That is laziness. But to keep going when the going is hard and slow - that is patience.

Patience is the companion of wisdom.

He that can have Patience, can have what he will.

All good things come to he who waits.

Patience is the ability to idle your motor when you feel like stripping your gears.

Patience is passion tamed.

Patience can't be acquired overnight. It is just like building up a muscle. Every day you need to work on it.

Ok, I get it:) Here's the link where I found these. http://thinkexist.com/quotations/patience/
There's at least 9 pages of them, so it's nice to know I'm not the only one to have ever struggled with cultivating patience.

And hopefully with a little a patience towards myself, I will become a more patient person.

What do you do to be a more patient person?

Obsessed

Seems I'm just a little obsessed with taking photos of the lovely flowers in the cool bottles with buddha. It's always so zen that I just can't help myself.

A Special Birthday Weekend

Yesterday was my birthday. 46! Damn. I'm one of those people that loves my birthday and celebrating it. It's my special day so why the hell not. I don't work on my birthday. I think the last time I did was 2001. As long as I can remember I have tried to take off several days surrounding my birthday or perhaps an entire week. This year, since my birthday was on a Sunday, I figured a 3 day weekend would be sufficient. Anyway, this weekend marked two years since Lucy Poo joined our family. And while I don't have a photo tribute to her, I do have this http://www.youtube.com/user/pyle2atearthlink#p/u/6/ZeZZClsY6W8. This was one of my birthday presents from Shawn. I could watch this all day. My silly kitties. And we don't actually have 4 kitties now, 2 of them have passed away. We are actually thinking about getting a new kitty to join our family.

And one of my other presents from Shawn was a big, standing hug. We've certainly shared some hugs since he's been home from the hospital, but it's hard to get good hug while he's sitting in the wheelchair. So yesterday, we helped him to stand up with no walker or bars or anything. Then while I helped to support him just a little we got to share our first, standing hug in over 5 months. This was one of the best birthday presents ever. Just behind him being here this year to celebrate with me, because he might not have been.

Shawn also isn't able to make it out of the house alone yet, so he had some challenges to surprise me for my birthday but there's obviously no challenge too great for him. While I ran out to the store he set all of this up:














































Balloons, cool glass bottles, a new yoga mat and some kick ass wrist bands. Thanks to ebay and his mom, he pulled all of this off. And he set this up by himself. AND ... he made me a card with an awesome little poem. It was truly one of the best birthdays ever. And no birthday would be complete without cupcakes!

Out of My Comfort Zone

(In the class I took yesterday, sweat would be dripping off each of these fingertips!)

Yesterday I took a Baptist Power Yoga class. A friend had been wanting to try this particular studio, and I was going to see my Dad which is nearby, so we decided to go together.

I had taken a Baptiste Power Yoga class at a yoga conference a few years ago and new it would be challenging but given my recent regularity with vinyasa and Jivamukti I knew I would be able to handle it. Plus I'm very much in tune with my body and when it's time to rest, I rest regardless.

So, the one thing I forgot was that Baptiste Power Yoga classes are done in a room heated to 95 degrees. At the conference in the ballroom that was pretty much impossible, it was warm but not hot. Not like the sauna that I stepped into yesterday morning. Yes, sauna. That made me remember to run out to my car and get the towel I brought. We were sweating just sitting there. And I've sweat just sitting in some yoga classes before, when it's just hot outside and there's a lot of people but this was not by default but purposefully. At this point I was wondering how I was going to make it through the next 90 minutes. It was hard to breath it was so hot. So we get started, straight into down dog. And go from there.

The poses and flow weren't anything different than I'm used to but the heat, OMG. So in true yoga fashion I had to detach from those sensations. That's called Pratyahara. Detach from outward sensations and go inward. It worked for the most part but then there was the sweat. I'm all about a good sweat but when you are drenched, water dripping off you onto your mat, clothes saturated, I felt like that was diminishing my practice. Slipping and having to wipe my hands became a distraction. That said, it kept me in the present moment. And that's a huge part of the practice.

Anyway, I got through about 45 to 50 minutes of the 90 without having to rest a lot. I felt dizzy a few times, so I started to back off. With an hour done and 30 minutes left, I muddled through, resting in child's pose or corpse pose for a few minutes and then coming back for some deep stretching. By this time I would say at least a third of the people were doing the same. Some more than others.

When we were finished the teacher asked how many of us wanted to bolt halfway into the class. I and a few others raised our hands. Hey just speaking my truth here:) Part of me did want to bolt but the other part of me knew I could do it. Her response was "But you didn't." That's right we didn't. We persevered. But why? Why did we persevere and stay in that stinking hot room, drenched head to toe?

Well, the feeling after it was all over was awesome. My body felt detoxed. My back which is usually stiff throughout class wasn't at all, before or after. My mind was clear. I felt like I burnt all kinds of shit out, physical, mental and emotional. Bad karma melted off. It pushed me out of my comfort zone and when that happens we really have no choice but to grow somehow. And it's all about growth.

Will I go back? No, because it just isn't convenient. If it was convenient I might add this style to my practice. As hard and challenging as it was and as soaking wet as I was, that feeling afterwards just kicks ass. But I almost always get that kick ass feeling after a good yoga practice. And, I prefer more spirituality thrown into the mix. And a much longer svasana:)

So how can I continue to step out of my comfort zone? To reach my edge, acknowledge it and then move past it? To continue to get that kind of growth? Well there are a few ways. For my home practice I can certainly take it up a notch. No need to be all pansy about it just because I'm at home. And for the Jivamukti class I take it's time to not back off for some things but forge ahead. If I can make it through what I did yesterday, I can make it through anything.

Before and After

Finding a Groove

Shawn is home and we're trying to find a groove. We are experiencing what I would compare to parents bringing a new born home. They kind of tell you what to do in the hospital, there's books you can read, but seriously, nothing can prepare you. The role of caregiver has been added to my resume.

As a caregiver you have to take care of yourself first, on multiple levels. I know this. I tell people this all the time. But now living it I'm asking when the hell are you supposed to do that? O.M.G. I thought I was short on time before. Now, that said, I realize we are in the process of trying to find our groove. We have with some things. Things that frustrated the hell out of us just a few days ago, we are laughing about now.

I have to start doing some things for myself, so that's one reason why I'm here, right now. The other reason is that I had a photo to post, because I took a few minutes last night to be present with something else. Something that caught my eye and made me realize that whatever I thought had to be done within the next five minutes, could simply wait another 5 minutes. And it did and it was all fine.

Fragile

Everything in life is so fragile. Tonight I watched a neighbor's townhouse burn. In a matter of minutes, it went from me hearing a fire engine to looking out the window and seeing smoke coming out of townhouse up the street to that smoke getting thicker and blacker to flames in the front to flames engulfing the entire front and back of the house. The fire department was there and they put it out within another few minutes, the entire event, that I witnessed, probably happening over the course of 12 to 15 minutes. Those 15 minutes have changed the people who lived there, intensely and immediately. Their lives are now in a state of devastation and chaos. Their home, that protects them from the elements, provides them safe harbor and if they're anything like me is their oasis, gone in an instant. Fragile.

Fragile is defined as easily broken or damaged or delicate and vulnerable. Everything about us, our bodies, our homes, our lives are so fragile. My incredibly strong husband who could lift and move anything ... fragile. In an instant an infection got into his body and changed our lives forever. It didn't matter how strong he was because ultimately he was and we all are so vulnerable.

Luckily the people in the townhouse got out unharmed. The fire was caused by their dryer. Luckily for us, Shawn is alive, surviving the crisis that is our health care system (another post on that coming soon) and regaining physical strength. I'm shaken to the core after witnessing the fire tonight. It's just one more thing that reminds me of just how fragile we are.

If we think about this too much, we might never leave our homes. Somewhere along the line we have to have faith that things will be ok in spite of how vulnerable we are. Or that if things aren't ok we will find the strength to overcome it. I have found an insurmountable amount of strength throughout this ordeal. How is it that we can be so fragile yet so filled with strength at the same time?

Peeks Around 23*

Peeks Around 23* is the second Buddha to find a home. This is Meditating Buddha with a Begging Bowl. I still don't know the significance behind the hand positions, etc... and need a good resource. The internet is not helping with this one.

So this Buddha is maybe brass or copper and I'm guessing that the color is some sort of patina. The little table this sits on gets used a lot and it moves around depending on space and need. My bff Lisa found this table and two matching but smaller ones. And each table fit underneath the other. I don't know what happened with the other two but I got this one. It has followed me through something like 8 moves. Maybe more. And it's not the most stable thing, although I think Shawn may have done something to it to make it a little more sturdy. It's also painted gold and has some sort of damask type of pattern on it.

This past summer it was in the living room. Once the plants came in Big Buddha had to move and the table had to move into our bedroom. There was stuff from the Big Buddha altar that needed a home so I decided to make a small altar in the bedroom for the winter. This new meditating Buddha is perfect for it. He's in the photo with his buddy Ganesha, a Buddha candle from Soaring Spirit Yoga studio, a shiva lingam stone, a couple of crystals and some other stones. It's exuding some really great energy.

And ultimately there was a lesson learned from this altar that I didn't realize until this very moment. When the plants first came in for the winter I was bummed about having to move Big Buddha and losing the space. There was a hard attachment to the way things were and I was having a hard time letting go of that, even though I knew it was coming. And attachment only causes suffering. The end result of the change that I didn't want, is a beautiful altar with amazing energy that I see every. single. day. Not such a bad change after all.

Lunch*

This is one of my favorite lunchs. Whole Foods International Food Bar. There's fried rice, green beans, tofu and today some veggie lo mein. It's missing something though, purposefully. I'm taking the first steps of reducing my intake of meat and working my way towards being a vegetarian. So, today no chicken. And honestly, I didn't miss it all. So, there you go. More on this later. I'm on vacation now so back to my cocktail.

Sun Spots*

Kitties enjoying sun spots on a lazy Sunday morning.

Cuteness on Color*

Here's Lucy sitting on the kitchen rugs. Every time I pull them up, shake them off and throw them in the other room so I can sweep up the kitchen, she goes right to them. Well, first, she comes in the kitchen to try and walk through the mess I'm trying to sweep up. So after I chase her out of the kitchen, she goes right to the rugs. And they make the perfect colorful backdrop for a little black kitty.

Tiny Droplets*

We've been getting quite a bit of rain the last few days. This afternoon I spied a spider web built over some leaves with tiny water droplets resting on it. Pretty cool how the water droplets are softly laying on the web. They're not dripping and they're not pulling the web down. It was probably about 3 to 4 inches. I might not have noticed it except since I've been doing this blog, I'm much more aware. And it's that awareness that pulls my eye to right places.

Toad Stools*

Seems like there should be some little fairies fluttering around.

Present at the Grocery Store*

Have you ever wondered where brussel sprouts come from? Like, do they grow in a bunch? Or do they grow on a bush? Well, turns out they sprout from a stalk.

I had a photo shoot this afternoon (more of that to come and some absolute gorgeousness of a goddess friend) and then had to go to the grocery store. Our Scion is a hatchback, so there's no trunk to hide expensive gear in. And I've had a camera bag and contents stolen, smash and grab style, right out of my car in the middle of the day. Anyway, so I just strapped the camera on me and went into the store.

As I was walking around I started thinking I should be taking pics of all the food and displays, different colors, textures, all kinds of stuff. Usually when I'm in the grocery store my main goal is to get the hell out of there as fast as possible. And then I wondered, if I'm taking pics will the store people get pissed? Will other people look at me weird? First, I don't think the store people would care and if they did, I would stop. As far as other people, so what?? Let them look at me weird. If I really want to be present with photos then I just need to go for it.

But in the interest of time, since I had been out pretty much all day, I decided no pics, just get the groceries and get home. Then I saw the brussel sprouts and had to get a shot. I've never seen anything like this. The stalks were about a foot to a foot and half long. It makes me want to try them but I'm certain I need a good recipe.

And beyond everything else, so if this is a brussel sprout, does it grow into a big brussel? Is the plant called a brussel? Guess I got some googling to do.

Romp and Stomp, Rough and Tumble*

This was the scene this morning. Some romp and stomp. Some rough and tumble. With Lucy and Tiki. Tiki the Old Girl. This is the third time in about 10 days there has been this play scrapping between the punkass and old girl. And Tiki is the one instigating and pushing it.













































After this scene, Tiki started backing Lucy down the stairs. I say this is play scrapping because while there are paws and claws flying, it's not dive and dig into the other with fierceness and desire to really hurt. You can tell the difference. And Tiki kept going at it.

Lucy certainly spends a good amount of time pestering her. But Lucy also had Mr. to play with up until 6 months ago. In fact it was just last week the it was 6 months since Mr. passed. Hmm... maybe the 6 month mark is significant here. Back to Lucy's pestering. She's a young cat and likes to play and run and wrestle. I would say she tries to provoke Tiki into rough and tumble, just like she did with Mr.

But I worry a little more about Tiki because she's old and I don't want Lucy to be a bully. Mr. was so much bigger than Lucy that one swat and he'd put her in her place. And she was much smaller than she is now. So the rough and tumble almost had this goofiness about it. Where as with the current rough and tumble it's a little less goofy looking, but amusing nonetheless.

I think Tiki was just finally like alright, that's IT! I'm going to kick your punk ass! Lucy is very vocal as well. Hissing, growling with some little meows in there as well. I don't remember if she did that with the Mr.




















































This is where I finally broke it up. Lucy gets pissed when Tiki puts her in her place and comes back a little more vicious and we won't have any of that. So I got them separated but Lucy kept stalking and not wanting to let it rest for a while. All of this was about 15 minutes before I left for work this morning. I was laughing about it for most of the day.