I found out from listening to memory and silence that I didn't much care, at least then, about going to Paris. That what I wanted was the breath in the house and the warmth and demands of someone who needed me.
"It's your love," my old friend Pete had said to me years before, when I was trying to leave a lousy relationship. "You get to keep that." My love: precious, lonely gift.
pg.183
Let's Take The Long Way Home
by Gail Caldwell
Saturday, August 25, 2012
Love Must Be This, If It Be Anything
"I pray you if you love me, bear my joy"
~ by Edna St. Vincent Millay
I pray you if you love me, bear my joy
A little while, or let me weep your tears;
I, too, have seen the quavering Fate destroy
Your destiny's bright spinning--the dull shears
Meeting not neatly, chewing at the thread,
Nor can you well be less aware how fine,
How staunch as wire, and how unwarranted
Endures the golden fortune that is mine.
I pray you for this day at least, my dear,
Fare by my side, that journey in the sun;
Else must I turn me from the blossoming year
And walk in grief the way that you have gone.
Let us go forth together to the spring:
Love must be this, if it be anything.
~ by Edna St. Vincent Millay
I pray you if you love me, bear my joy
A little while, or let me weep your tears;
I, too, have seen the quavering Fate destroy
Your destiny's bright spinning--the dull shears
Meeting not neatly, chewing at the thread,
Nor can you well be less aware how fine,
How staunch as wire, and how unwarranted
Endures the golden fortune that is mine.
I pray you for this day at least, my dear,
Fare by my side, that journey in the sun;
Else must I turn me from the blossoming year
And walk in grief the way that you have gone.
Let us go forth together to the spring:
Love must be this, if it be anything.
Friday, August 24, 2012
The One Place I Can Always Feel Good Now
In my life as a teacher, I used to hammer away at the idea of simplicity. In both fiction and nonfiction, there's only one question and one answer. What happened? the reader asks. This is what happened, the writer responds. This...and this...and this, too. Keep it simple. It's the only sure way home.
pg.150
She takes my hand like a woman in a dream. She is in a dream, and so am I. Like all sweet dreams, it will be brief...but brevity makes sweetness, doesn't it? Yes, I think so. Because when the time is gone, you can never get it back.
pg.841
From the novel 11-22-63
by Stephen King
I recently finished my yoga teacher training (YTT) summer intensive program and boy was it intense! And terribly tortuously long and yet brief at the same time - and so so sweet. Even though I enjoy having my weekends back now and feeling like I finally have time enough to actually take care of my life again, I miss it.
I don't pretend that this matters to anyone else but me and maybe my husband, close friends and those who went through it with me. It doesn't matter on the grand scale of world events or whatever - it's not as important as the situation in Syria, the upcoming presidential election, or Summer Olympics that are now over (to which I somewhat paid attention, listening on the radio while driving back & forth to training), no one really cares in the face of so many other things pressing for our attention - I know this.
But still, it meant something really important to me. It is my current story.
So, this is what happened...and this...and this, too...I took the YTT course and I wanted it to transform me. And yet, now that I am through it - I don't feel any different, or I do but just barely.
I complained to my husband David two weeks in "it's not working!" and he said "it's not working - yet" and that was very positive (and David is often much more positive than me, truth be told), but I can't wishfully think myself into being transformed, I have to FEEL it.
I wanted it to cure me of various self-destructive habits (such as drinking too much and smoking), but I'm surrounded by these very things at home so it's hard not to...I wanted it to help me feel stronger, and I do.
I have these new arm muscles (that I'm afraid will disappear fast if I don't keep using them), that I love and the pose "chaturanga" that kicked my ass & I complained about on FaceBook two months ago is easy(ish) now.
That is a change I can see and believe in and love. My friend, that I hadn't seen since before the training, when we finally got together kept commenting on how changed I seemed, how toned! But also my thinking, the things I said to her were different and I seemed mentally stronger.
What I love about this story is how now I feel wrong if I can't do yoga every day, and I think about being present with my breath to manage stress much more than in the past.
There is still a lot more life to manage ahead, but I always have at least this yoga/meditation practice I can rely on, this yoga mat I can step onto and take a deep breath and forget all my worries...the one place that I know I can always feel good now.
pg.150
She takes my hand like a woman in a dream. She is in a dream, and so am I. Like all sweet dreams, it will be brief...but brevity makes sweetness, doesn't it? Yes, I think so. Because when the time is gone, you can never get it back.
pg.841
From the novel 11-22-63
by Stephen King
I recently finished my yoga teacher training (YTT) summer intensive program and boy was it intense! And terribly tortuously long and yet brief at the same time - and so so sweet. Even though I enjoy having my weekends back now and feeling like I finally have time enough to actually take care of my life again, I miss it.
I don't pretend that this matters to anyone else but me and maybe my husband, close friends and those who went through it with me. It doesn't matter on the grand scale of world events or whatever - it's not as important as the situation in Syria, the upcoming presidential election, or Summer Olympics that are now over (to which I somewhat paid attention, listening on the radio while driving back & forth to training), no one really cares in the face of so many other things pressing for our attention - I know this.
But still, it meant something really important to me. It is my current story.
So, this is what happened...and this...and this, too...I took the YTT course and I wanted it to transform me. And yet, now that I am through it - I don't feel any different, or I do but just barely.
I complained to my husband David two weeks in "it's not working!" and he said "it's not working - yet" and that was very positive (and David is often much more positive than me, truth be told), but I can't wishfully think myself into being transformed, I have to FEEL it.
I wanted it to cure me of various self-destructive habits (such as drinking too much and smoking), but I'm surrounded by these very things at home so it's hard not to...I wanted it to help me feel stronger, and I do.
I have these new arm muscles (that I'm afraid will disappear fast if I don't keep using them), that I love and the pose "chaturanga" that kicked my ass & I complained about on FaceBook two months ago is easy(ish) now.
That is a change I can see and believe in and love. My friend, that I hadn't seen since before the training, when we finally got together kept commenting on how changed I seemed, how toned! But also my thinking, the things I said to her were different and I seemed mentally stronger.
What I love about this story is how now I feel wrong if I can't do yoga every day, and I think about being present with my breath to manage stress much more than in the past.
There is still a lot more life to manage ahead, but I always have at least this yoga/meditation practice I can rely on, this yoga mat I can step onto and take a deep breath and forget all my worries...the one place that I know I can always feel good now.
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