Roy G Biv, courtesy of my yard

 

 

Every winter, I think I have killed everything, and every spring, my yard comes back to life like nothing happened.

On a related note, I sneezed thirty-one times in a row on Sunday afternoon.

On Being Laid Off

There’s no such thing as a wrong decision. Things just don’t always work out the way I expect.

I was offered a new position at my company after my department was dissolved due to a recent acquisition. The job was sold to me as “customers will call in and yell at you.” It would be a stepping stone to a sales position, if that’s where I wanted to go. That’s where the money is.

I took a few worrisome days and sleepless nights, negotiated here and there, but I had made the decision the instant they handed me the offer letter: I want out of corporate life.

I spoke to my dad about it, framing it as a choice between a very clear path and an opaque path.

“Which is which?” he asked.

“The corporate job, that’s the clear path.”

“No, it’s not.” He’s right; working for other people is never a clear path. Who’s to say when the next round of lay-offs will be?

The CEO called me to talk me into the job, but I don’t want a life wherein my day is dictated by the few people who are actually making money worthy of the stress.

So I chose freedom.

Almost instantly, the depression that’s been hounding me for the past several weeks, the illness that’s been keeping me home “sick” from work at least once a week, began to lift. I could sleep. I could wake up and look forward to my day.

So what now?

I’ve spent the past three years building up my yoga teaching reputation, and the yoga community in Santa Barbara is beautifully supportive and exploding right now; two more studios are opening this month in an already saturated market. There is no dearth of opportunity there.

I’m looking into various education opportunities, now that I have the luxury of time: massage school? Buddhism studies? Physical therapy?

I don’t have to make a decision now, but even if I did, it would be the right one.

“Partner” Yoga

Twice this week, I’ve set up to record a practice and………..forgotten to hit “record.” Twice! Ah well. Squeezing in a short practice between work and a celebratory dinner with friends. Inversion workshop this weekend should resolve those handstand issues. I noticed upon first watch that my hips are sticking out too far in vasisthasana – not sure how to resolve?

Yoga practice

First intense yoga practice six months after a car accident injury. Handstands used to be a lot easier!

“Your Love Keeps Lifting Me Higher”

Our lock is buried somewhere in here.

We waited in line too long at Pierre Hermes for the macarons and the apple fritter. I had been ogling the merchandise, and though I came exclusively for the pastries, I snatched a jar of strawberry and pistachio jam at the last moment for our 2011 Christmas feast, knowing how Chad loves pistachios.

He never got to try any; I ate the whole thing in ten hours, occasionally spreading a taste onto a torn piece of baguette like a civilized person, but mostly with a spoon inserted directly and messily from the jar into my mouth and back, like I was feeding myself baby food.

I haven’t bought jam or jelly or preserves since; when I’ve had the best of something, I would rather live without than attempt to pacify a craving with a lesser attempt.

Chad gave me two jars this year, one for Christmas, and one for my birthday. They were the second best presents I received.

The best present I received was instant karma.

Champagne and people watching, pretty much the only reason to go to Paris.

My brother and I grew up with a father who appreciates the subtleties of music. He has a pretty decent record collection and an admirable sound setup. I used to come home from school and ogle the covers before placing The Supremes, almost always, on the turntable. Motown can make anything fun, as it did homework for me back then, as it does reconciliations and margin analyses now.

I started my own record collection with an ex-boyfriend, who dutifully divied up the wax when we broke up. He took the turntable with him, so I carted my records to the bar I tended three nights a week, DJing during my shifts. Customers loved it; more often than not, that one perfect record would carry all of us through a bad night. The Specials could turn up the energy when 4am rolled around and there were still glasses to wash.  Studio One Soul comps can mellow out a rambunctious crowd. Jackie Wilson will make even the shyest soul shimmy.

Though I love the sound quality and visceral experience of playing a record, I don’t value it enough to purchase a decent turntable when there are so many cute dresses to buy. Instead, I bought a semi-decent turntable for my brother for Christmas, sort of; we give each other gifts whenever we see something the other may enjoy, regardless of arbitrary anniversaries. Amazon was having a sale in early December, so my brother got an early Christmas/late birthday/just because present.

While checking out, I thought for a moment that it is a strange thing to give a gift to someone that I would be happy to receive myself; why do I not deserve that same elation? Why not ship it to myself? He will be none the wiser. Nevertheless, I directed the turntable to San Francisco, and my brother can now play the two records that comprise his collection to his heart’s content.

Remembering the Alamo, fondly.

We passed Christmas this year in Texas, where the air is arid and the food is meat. We remembered the Alamo and BOOB (brought our own booze) to the local barbecue restaurant. I ate food served out of trailers in Austin and walked the river in San Antonio. I drank Lone Star; one sip was enough.

My birthday, unenviably, falls on December 29; my mother chose this date for the tax purposes. Now you understand why I am an accountant.

I was served cake and champagne for breakfast on my birthday, before being invited to open my gifts. One larger box was particularly enticing, although I have been disappointed before by excessive packaging and bulky sweaters.

The very last thing I expected was a turntable, which is exactly what my boyfriend gave to me.

Bright red and portable, I felt that inimitable glee that a true surprise garners, that childlike ecstasy of getting exactly what you want even though you didn’t think you’d ever have it.

I smiled, wide and ugly, as I did when my baby teeth first fell out.

I was a kid again.

On Mania

It happens after a trauma, like a car accident or the end of a relationship. It’s like my spirit is running after itself and gets entangled in my organs. It’s like there are many of me, with different priorities and goals, all operating out of the same body.

There’s so much to do, and fatigue has no effect.

Meaningless shit, baking cupcakes and reorganizing scarves by material and length.

Packing for a trip that’s still two weeks away and washing musty but clean sheets.

I can only read two pages of a book at a time, but I want to be reading, so I’ll keep a stack of eight books near me and read a few pages of one, set it down, read a few pages of another, set it down, cycling through the books, confusing the plots, until it’s all one massive literary nightmare of overlapping motifs.

I don’t eat. My stomach grumbles and I acknowledge and ignore it. I get faint and, like a poor college student estimating just how far I can go on fumes before my car will sputter to a stop, assign myself one more meaningless project before I can deal with the one spoonful of Greek yogurt I’ve allotted myself.

I don’t sleep. No matter what time I go to sleep, I’m awake far too early, and cycle through my books until I can take a shower without my housemates wondering what I’m doing showering at 4am.

Eventually, weeks or months later, I’ll hit a peak and begin the tumble, when I cannot sleep enough, 14 to 20 hours at a time, cannot eat enough, thinking of what I’m going to eat next without even noticing that I’m already eating.

I feel nothing, nothing at all, but a grey heaviness. Crafting any facial expression requires an energy to which I have no access. I hardly exist. I am nothing. I am no one.

Eventually, months or years later, I will even out. There are drugs I could take to speed up the process, but they haven’t done much for me in the past. There are people I could talk do, and they get me through the worst days. Yoga and meditation have been the most useful, but I prefer/require an active meditation, and I cannot be adequately active with my current injury.

In the meantime, I’ve lost 14 pounds and my closet is spectacularly organized.

Pain

Alamo Square Park

I broke my foot once, running away from a girl who accused me of stealing her dog. (I did not steal her dog.)

I refused to accept that my foot was broken, so I waited two weeks before going to the doctor, carrying on my normal life, bookkeeping during the day, bartending at night, taking weekend trips to San Francisco.

Those two weeks cost me six months in the boot.

I continued to live my life with the encased injury; I convinced my doctor to give me a walking cast instead of a plaster cast in order to go on a long-planned trip to Costa Rica, snorkeling and zip lining and hobbling about with my walking cast wrapped in a garbage bag after I got caught in an afternoon thunderstorm at a local shop.

I continued to bookkeep during the day and bartend at night. One slow evening, I let customers graffiti my cast with puff paint we happened to have on hand.

I tried not to let the boot stop me, but I still gained a good twenty pounds, and my immobility led to a months-long battle with depression even after I was able to walk around with two matching shoes.

I eventually found yoga, looking for a low-impact but effective form of weight loss. Now I’m a yoga instructor.

At one of my recent private sessions, I found myself discussing the merits of pain. When one is injured, a broken foot, a pinched nerve, a dislocated shoulder, one is at her most present. Initially at least, there is nothing to focus on except for the pain. And so, you focus: 

You describe the pain. Pulling, throbbing, hot, cold? Red or white or bruised?

You experiment with the pain – what makes it better, what makes it worse?

You bargain with the pain – “I’ll ice you if you give me twenty minutes of relief.”

There comes a point when you do whatever it takes to dull the pain.

But you could learn to live with it. There are people who live with pain every day of their lives. Nobody  dies from pain, a sensation that exists separately from the injury or disease.

Your pain forces you to go deeper into your senses. You must learn to respect the pain in order to live with it. You must move deliberately, to encourage the pain to release, and gently, so as not to exacerbate.

I try to bring everything that I’ve gained from yoga – strength, patience, acceptance – as I deal with this current injury I took home with me from San Francisco.

Two weeks ago, a driver misjudged the timing of a yellow light just before I made my way through an intersection a few blocks off of Union Square.

Those nanoseconds before impact are so striking in their detail. Seconds I would only have barely observed pass by like epic journeys: I turn to see a car, and it is not slowing down. I look up at my light to verify that it is green. I glance back at the Lexus, coming toward me at an ever-faster velocity. I open my mouth. I inhale deeply. I scream, my esophagus rattling. I’m thrown toward the passenger seat; my seatbelt locks onto my left shoulder. I’m snapped back into my seat; my spine snaps back into a vertical position.

The insurance company declared this totaled.

 

The policemen show up within minutes of impact and are very kind. I have never had any trouble with any police in my life (that’s not to say I haven’t gotten into trouble). They take control of the situation, redirecting vehicles, gathering witnesses, collecting our insurance information. They write their collision report, make sure I have the contact information for the witnesses that offered to back my version of events, and clean up the area.

The car is drivable, so I drive away and burst into fresh tears three block away from the accident. I drive to visit my brother at work, but he isn’t in yet. I almost ask his coworker for a hug, but then decide I can’t handle a stranger touching me on top of everything else.

I drive home to Santa Barbara.

Now I am two weeks past the point of impact, one doctor’s appointment and one set of X-rays behind me, two effective chiropractic appointments sorted out, two glorious massages enjoyed, and now I’m receiving acupuncture, which I’ve never tried prior to this accident.

I try not to think about what my former body used to do. My former body used to transport me thirty miles a week on a bike. It could soar through a 90 minute vinyasa class no problem. It was ready and willing to try anything: throwing its legs over its head, jumping out of an airplane, jaywalking.

This new body can barely get through 90 minutes of the most gentle restorative yoga you can imagine.

This new body, it can get through a long week of bookkeeping and teaching yoga. It can do what it needs to do to pay the rent. It is just as useful as it needs to be, and no more.

This new body, it feels a jab of terror in its torso every time it crosses an intersection.

I used to exercise three to four hours a day. Now, I think twice before moving at all.

I’ve never known pain like this:

Pain that ranges from merely annoying, to completely debilitating. Pain that requires seductive muscle relaxants in order to live a more immobilized version of the life I used to live. Pain that is constant. Attention-seeking pain.

I try a new mantra, one I’ve been feeding my private client as she recovers from her own injury: I have pain. I am not my pain.