Yoga for Cynthia
Lots going on this week. First, a quick trip to Las Vegas for a press check. The main thing to say about that is just that the hotel was great, there were no major glitches at the press, I got out of there three hours ahead of schedule, and I saw several very interesting people at the airport. These included a 30-something Elvis lookalike with the biggest black sideburns I've ever seen, hustling down the terminal with his wife and four young children in tow; a very tall, long-legged dude all pimped out in a sparkling golden do-rag, a very furry long black coat and glittery bedazzled black satin jeans; and a woman of at least 60 years of age, wearing a lacy black mohair mesh sweater cut so low in front that I could see her fancy black lace bra in its entirety – and even a tiny bit of skin below the bra. Would that I should have such body-confidence at that advanced age!
The stink is off the dog – meaning, the skunk bath worked. You can still smell it a little if you press your nose right up to his face, but if you don't like the smell of skunk – just don't do that. The other dog continues to perform the daily routine I've taken to calling "poopin' 'n' walkin'," by which I mean he can no longer stoop to poop. With the condition of his hips, it's all he can do just to get up and walk, so that's what he does. I took him to the vet for another cortisone shot yesterday and found out something I hadn't known before: he's not fifteen years old. He's almost eighteen years old. When we arrived at the office, the nurse brought out his chart, which I had not seen before, and it shows that the first time he was seen, in 1990, he was between one and two years old. So ... wow! As Mr. A is always saying, he's an ancient animal. Now I believe it, and am cutting him even more slack than I already was when it comes to activities like sharking up dog treats, turning over garbage, and yes, even poopin' 'n' walkin'.
Last night I went to a three-hour restorative yoga class. I hadn't done restorative before, and I wasn't expecting much of a workout from it – mainly, I was thinking of it as what my yoga teacher friend M. calls "furniture yoga," and looking forward to an easy, relaxing evening of lying draped over bolsters and rolled up blankets with my eyes closed. Well, it was that, but it was also a lot more – I was surprised at how much stretch I got out of even the easiest poses, just by holding them for what seemed like forever.
The class also included guided meditation, self-massage and aromatherapy, and somehow when I first sat down on the mat, I suddenly started remembering this girl who used to go to the same summer camp I went to as a kid. Her name was Cynthia, and she was sort of an outcast – oversized, awkward, unfashionable and socially inept. I remembered how when she plunged into the lake to complete her swimming test, she bobbed to the surface howling from the cold, with a big green goo running down her nose. It took two people to haul her out of the water and onto the dock, where she sat all bunched over and breathing hard in her baggy yellow old-fashioned knitted bathing suit while one of the counselors tried to get her to wipe her nose. I was horrified that anyone could be so utterly uncool. Later that night she accidentally dropped her flashlight into a pit toilet, and made such a fuss insisting that it had to be retrieved that soon everyone at camp knew it was in there. All night long girls filed in and out of the outhouse to look in at "the glow from below ...."
When I got home from camp my dad heard me telling one of my brothers or sisters about this embarrassing, unusal person, and he stopped me and said, "Let me tell you a few things you probably don't know about that girl." And then he told me how she really was socially inept, even more than I could have realized. She was growing up in a poor little shack in the middle of nowhere way back in the woods with her weird, mean dad and her weird, terrified grandmother, and she didn't really have any friends to speak of, and except for going to school and church wasn't really even allowed to leave the house. I realized that even though I hadn't made fun of her at camp, or done anything specifically to hurt her or exclude her, I hadn't done anything to help her feel welcome or supported, either. I felt uncomfortable around her, so I just kept my distance.
Mr. A likes to remind me that it is not my responsibility to fix every troubled person who crosses my path, that what most people need more than anything is simply to be accepted as they are, and allowed to Be .... Well, maybe so. But when Cynthia's face came to mind during that class, I decided to dedicate the evening's practice to her. In my mind, I sat down next to her on the dock and gave her a blanket to wrap up in. Then I invited her to lie down in the sun and get warm, and I told her I would sit by her until she felt safe and comfortable. And then I did the class.
The thing is, I could have done something for her at that camp. Even just making a space for her at the breakfast table, or standing with her in line – any little thing would have been better than what I did, which was to do nothing. And I think the reason I thought of her in that class last night is because there's a new person in my life right now that I'm really struggling to accept, and I'm finding myself once again wanting nothing more than just to turn away and ignore this person until she gets the message, and stops trying so hard to be my new best friend. Avoiding her altogether isn't an option, unfortunately, but even if it were – that isn't really the way I want to deal with a fellow human, even one I don't like or trust.
What is the way to be in relationship to a person I'm uncomfortable with? What would my best self do? Not to try to "fix" the situation, but just to be able to hold my heart open within it? These are some of the questions I held in mind as I sat there on the dock in the warm sunshine next to Cynthia, listening to her breath and feeling my own, feeling my heart beat in my chest as the waves moved on the water.
Also this week, I made a persimmon pudding as a surprise for Mr. A. It's the first one I've ever done and it turned out beautifully.
The stink is off the dog – meaning, the skunk bath worked. You can still smell it a little if you press your nose right up to his face, but if you don't like the smell of skunk – just don't do that. The other dog continues to perform the daily routine I've taken to calling "poopin' 'n' walkin'," by which I mean he can no longer stoop to poop. With the condition of his hips, it's all he can do just to get up and walk, so that's what he does. I took him to the vet for another cortisone shot yesterday and found out something I hadn't known before: he's not fifteen years old. He's almost eighteen years old. When we arrived at the office, the nurse brought out his chart, which I had not seen before, and it shows that the first time he was seen, in 1990, he was between one and two years old. So ... wow! As Mr. A is always saying, he's an ancient animal. Now I believe it, and am cutting him even more slack than I already was when it comes to activities like sharking up dog treats, turning over garbage, and yes, even poopin' 'n' walkin'.
Last night I went to a three-hour restorative yoga class. I hadn't done restorative before, and I wasn't expecting much of a workout from it – mainly, I was thinking of it as what my yoga teacher friend M. calls "furniture yoga," and looking forward to an easy, relaxing evening of lying draped over bolsters and rolled up blankets with my eyes closed. Well, it was that, but it was also a lot more – I was surprised at how much stretch I got out of even the easiest poses, just by holding them for what seemed like forever.
The class also included guided meditation, self-massage and aromatherapy, and somehow when I first sat down on the mat, I suddenly started remembering this girl who used to go to the same summer camp I went to as a kid. Her name was Cynthia, and she was sort of an outcast – oversized, awkward, unfashionable and socially inept. I remembered how when she plunged into the lake to complete her swimming test, she bobbed to the surface howling from the cold, with a big green goo running down her nose. It took two people to haul her out of the water and onto the dock, where she sat all bunched over and breathing hard in her baggy yellow old-fashioned knitted bathing suit while one of the counselors tried to get her to wipe her nose. I was horrified that anyone could be so utterly uncool. Later that night she accidentally dropped her flashlight into a pit toilet, and made such a fuss insisting that it had to be retrieved that soon everyone at camp knew it was in there. All night long girls filed in and out of the outhouse to look in at "the glow from below ...."
When I got home from camp my dad heard me telling one of my brothers or sisters about this embarrassing, unusal person, and he stopped me and said, "Let me tell you a few things you probably don't know about that girl." And then he told me how she really was socially inept, even more than I could have realized. She was growing up in a poor little shack in the middle of nowhere way back in the woods with her weird, mean dad and her weird, terrified grandmother, and she didn't really have any friends to speak of, and except for going to school and church wasn't really even allowed to leave the house. I realized that even though I hadn't made fun of her at camp, or done anything specifically to hurt her or exclude her, I hadn't done anything to help her feel welcome or supported, either. I felt uncomfortable around her, so I just kept my distance.
Mr. A likes to remind me that it is not my responsibility to fix every troubled person who crosses my path, that what most people need more than anything is simply to be accepted as they are, and allowed to Be .... Well, maybe so. But when Cynthia's face came to mind during that class, I decided to dedicate the evening's practice to her. In my mind, I sat down next to her on the dock and gave her a blanket to wrap up in. Then I invited her to lie down in the sun and get warm, and I told her I would sit by her until she felt safe and comfortable. And then I did the class.
The thing is, I could have done something for her at that camp. Even just making a space for her at the breakfast table, or standing with her in line – any little thing would have been better than what I did, which was to do nothing. And I think the reason I thought of her in that class last night is because there's a new person in my life right now that I'm really struggling to accept, and I'm finding myself once again wanting nothing more than just to turn away and ignore this person until she gets the message, and stops trying so hard to be my new best friend. Avoiding her altogether isn't an option, unfortunately, but even if it were – that isn't really the way I want to deal with a fellow human, even one I don't like or trust.
What is the way to be in relationship to a person I'm uncomfortable with? What would my best self do? Not to try to "fix" the situation, but just to be able to hold my heart open within it? These are some of the questions I held in mind as I sat there on the dock in the warm sunshine next to Cynthia, listening to her breath and feeling my own, feeling my heart beat in my chest as the waves moved on the water.
Also this week, I made a persimmon pudding as a surprise for Mr. A. It's the first one I've ever done and it turned out beautifully.
4 Comments:
Great post, t.
I had my first ripe persimmon this week. OMG, good. I had tried an unripe one before. OMG, bad, bitter, bleyuk! Wikipedia taught me that persimmons are nasty if unripe and that they can't overripen. I would compare you to a persimmon, except that you were never nasty.
I have struggled with not wanting to be close to undesirables; I have the added advantage of being an undesirable myself so that I have instant identification with undesirables working for me. I find that if I can generate love in my heart, it replaces the fears of suffering or loss because of someone else's nearness. I can also sometimes manage to turn the moment into an opportunity to face my insecurities and destructive emotional habits. Sometimes I give myself permission (persimmon?) to be imperfect, to simply not extend myself.
Sometimes I go to jail for 35 days because I snapped.
With coworkers whom I don't trust, I feel thrust together with them; I try to remember that it isn't an all-or-nothing proposition. Hey, I can always learn something from them--or use them, right?
You did ask. :)
I remember the flashlight incident - it was my first year at camp. I think she was mostly terrified of her Dad and what he'd do when he found out she'd lost her flashlight. I wonder where she is now... did you ever notice she had remarkably beautiful eyes behind those glasses? An amazing shade of blue-green with long thick lashes.
I was kind of a Cynthia type at girls camp. I may have not been so awkward, but I felt like I didn't have any good friends there, and through the whole period of adolescence, I was very insecure and socially anxious, and ashamed of my family's circumstances. So I relate to her, and good for you for reaching out to her through your practice.
Julie,
I apologize for making out with you after the band performance and then never speaking to you again. But in my defense, you were crypto-hot and I was an immature Lothario.
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