It's amazing and crazy being in this intense self-development program at this intense amazing and crazy ashram.
I have learned from physical messages inside my body and from clear messages in my dreams that my nasty old friends Judgemental, Controlling, Insensitive, Nervous, and Overanalytical are perversions of Discernment, Self-discipline, Self-protection, Awareness, and Reason... and they occur when I don't allow my emotions. My old friends turn nasty when the messages they give me about sadness and fear and vulnerability are pushed away. I've been pushing my negative emotions away in order to get stuff done ever since I was 12. Was it ever a shock to me, when I tried it in karma yoga the other day, to discover that yes I can still get stuff done even when I don't push my emotions away. It just feels more sad. Sometimes.
Yes, that is what happened. I made a decision on a high of inspiration to allow my emotions and see what happened... and the next day I was deep in a pit of despair.
I was crying all day, for all kinds of things, little things, big things, that I had just pushed away before. It was not pleasant but I did observe that I am just as capable when I am feeling negative emotions as when I am feeling positive ones, or none at all. I also observed that the feeling of dread hanging on the horizon was gone when I didn't push my sadness and fears away and just let them inhabit me. I guess the only thing I was scared of, the only thing that was really making me so anxious before was the fact that I was trying so hard all the time to hold off the rainy weather.
I missed home, my mom, my dad, my brother, my hometown, all my exes, my computer, my dead dog, my sitar, so desperately. My whole body was seething with sad longing and I knew that my sadness was inflected with earlier sadnesses I'd pushed past, just to get stuff done: people and places I'd left, turning on a dime, without ever looking back. The sadness I had felt when I got my first period at the tender age of 9 and lost my innocent belief that I would someday be a certain kind of man. Sadness from being sick and almost dying last year. Sadness from my grandma dying. Sadness from my grandpa dying. Sadness from my great-grandma dying. Sadness from not being Chinese. Sadness from not being able to fly like Peter Pan. I could get into a list... but no. That's not the point.
For two days I was the embodiment of sorrow! Crying constantly, crying all night, crying myself to sleep. I have never really let myself do that before. I just let it happen. It was soft. I had to check in often to stop from pushing it away - admit it, you're scared of this - yes I'm scared - but I want to let it happen. I want to go to this place where my emotions are allowed and I can be with myself and care for myself with my old friends, not turned nasty. Discernment, protect me - judgement, don't torment me. Etcetera.
It lasted for two days. The next day, every movement felt like making love with myself, my breath, my body. My self.
Om Nama Sivaya!
2009-01-25
Savasana
I breathe in, the universe breathes into me. I breathe out, breathing back into the lungs of god, reciprocating, responding in the only way I'm meant to and the way I always will. None of us will die with our lungs full of air. We always give it back before we go.
In life what comes to me, what I receive through my senses in my daily existence, like my in-breath, is what the universe gives to me. My awareness of it all and my attentiveness to it can be honed to better receive this gift. Like my out-breath, the actions that I give back out into the world also affect my own body. Every response brings me tension or relaxation. Relaxation or peace of all kinds, and stiffness or unease of all kinds: these are the binary ones and zeros of my communication with god. In and out. We are mouth-to-mouth, we are communicating in morse code. Relaxation is a reward. It's god inside me saying yesssss.... I can choose to feel this relaxation and invoke it with every action I take, accepting that god is speaking to me through my autonomic nervous system, prompting me, as one of his creatures, to do his work of creating a sattvic universe. Being aware of what I receive, creating peace with what I give back out. Yessss....
In life what comes to me, what I receive through my senses in my daily existence, like my in-breath, is what the universe gives to me. My awareness of it all and my attentiveness to it can be honed to better receive this gift. Like my out-breath, the actions that I give back out into the world also affect my own body. Every response brings me tension or relaxation. Relaxation or peace of all kinds, and stiffness or unease of all kinds: these are the binary ones and zeros of my communication with god. In and out. We are mouth-to-mouth, we are communicating in morse code. Relaxation is a reward. It's god inside me saying yesssss.... I can choose to feel this relaxation and invoke it with every action I take, accepting that god is speaking to me through my autonomic nervous system, prompting me, as one of his creatures, to do his work of creating a sattvic universe. Being aware of what I receive, creating peace with what I give back out. Yessss....
2009-01-23
Dhanurasana
The Bow. Like bow and arrow. Like Sagittarius. Like Robin Hood.
Robin Hood. I've always wished I could be a hero for myself and others. But I tell myself I can't, that I'm not strong enough. I usually feel like I would need to be stronger to be able to embody my heroic ideals. So I try to force it. Grrr! The result? Rigidity, not strength.
In The Bow, one lies on the stomach, holds the ankles with the hands, and lifts the hands and feet up while looking farther and farther forward. According to the instructions, this pose requires me to balance flexibility with strength. What strength? I feel so weak. Usually I try to get into the pose by brute force, straining to lift my legs up behind me. Grrr! The result? No power... groan, grrr, wind down, dead batteries: I'm still on the floor, unable to even imagine lifting up.
Now, one of the things yoga is about is the union of opposites. What are my opposites? And how do strength and flexibility relate to them? Since kindergarten, I have been consciously attempting to get my masculine self in balance with my feminine self. Flexibility, openness, receptivity... these "feminine" traits are at the core of my being and they have allowed me some amazing experiences throughout my life. But until recently, my masculine side has kept these delicate creatures carefully protected. My strength, which in childhood was my precocious rational-intellectual ability, has been allowed to do the talking since that was such an advantage in terms of getting me through my interactions with my confusing world. No wonder I sometimes feel weak! There's nothing tough about being a bookworm!
Yet in the Bow, I'm supposed to balance my opposites. I hadn't gone into the Bow since last fall, before my freakish illness and bizarre recovery experiences began to open up a leading role for those softer aspects of my nature. I didn't know what to expect going into the pose now. I relaxed and reached my arms back, clasping my feet. For the first time, it seemed obvious to use my super-snap-back-ability and bennnd my spine baaack while lifting up, only then using strength to stabilize myself in the pose and lift higher. In other words, for the first time in this pose I was leading with my flexibility and assigning a supporting role to my strength.
Ta-da! It was easy to come up when I used my resources in this new and different way. Is this my real balance? Am I more at home when I let my softness lead my way? In this new balance, my flexibility becomes my true "strength" and my strength acquires the "flexibility" to step back and be supportive, instead of pushy.
Maybe I can be stronger when I use the strength I do have instead of focusing on the strength I don't. Maybe I can hit my targets if I let my soft side feel my way forward, instead of squinting into the distance, hardening myself, gritting my teeth, and pushing. Maybe the strength I already have IS enough for me to be a hero after all, if I remember to use it supportively and let my gentleness lead the way.
I'm such a gentle hero that my bow shoots flowers instead of arrows! And they hit the spot!
Robin Hood. I've always wished I could be a hero for myself and others. But I tell myself I can't, that I'm not strong enough. I usually feel like I would need to be stronger to be able to embody my heroic ideals. So I try to force it. Grrr! The result? Rigidity, not strength.
In The Bow, one lies on the stomach, holds the ankles with the hands, and lifts the hands and feet up while looking farther and farther forward. According to the instructions, this pose requires me to balance flexibility with strength. What strength? I feel so weak. Usually I try to get into the pose by brute force, straining to lift my legs up behind me. Grrr! The result? No power... groan, grrr, wind down, dead batteries: I'm still on the floor, unable to even imagine lifting up.
Now, one of the things yoga is about is the union of opposites. What are my opposites? And how do strength and flexibility relate to them? Since kindergarten, I have been consciously attempting to get my masculine self in balance with my feminine self. Flexibility, openness, receptivity... these "feminine" traits are at the core of my being and they have allowed me some amazing experiences throughout my life. But until recently, my masculine side has kept these delicate creatures carefully protected. My strength, which in childhood was my precocious rational-intellectual ability, has been allowed to do the talking since that was such an advantage in terms of getting me through my interactions with my confusing world. No wonder I sometimes feel weak! There's nothing tough about being a bookworm!
Yet in the Bow, I'm supposed to balance my opposites. I hadn't gone into the Bow since last fall, before my freakish illness and bizarre recovery experiences began to open up a leading role for those softer aspects of my nature. I didn't know what to expect going into the pose now. I relaxed and reached my arms back, clasping my feet. For the first time, it seemed obvious to use my super-snap-back-ability and bennnd my spine baaack while lifting up, only then using strength to stabilize myself in the pose and lift higher. In other words, for the first time in this pose I was leading with my flexibility and assigning a supporting role to my strength.
Ta-da! It was easy to come up when I used my resources in this new and different way. Is this my real balance? Am I more at home when I let my softness lead my way? In this new balance, my flexibility becomes my true "strength" and my strength acquires the "flexibility" to step back and be supportive, instead of pushy.
Maybe I can be stronger when I use the strength I do have instead of focusing on the strength I don't. Maybe I can hit my targets if I let my soft side feel my way forward, instead of squinting into the distance, hardening myself, gritting my teeth, and pushing. Maybe the strength I already have IS enough for me to be a hero after all, if I remember to use it supportively and let my gentleness lead the way.
I'm such a gentle hero that my bow shoots flowers instead of arrows! And they hit the spot!
2009-01-22
Ombama Obamananda
The ashram got really excited about Obama's inauguration.
1. They put an Obama/Biden campaign sign on the altar in the Temple of Divine Light on the 18th and I think it is still there.
2. The morning of the 19th, it was announced that just as Barrack and Michelle had designated Martin Luther King Jr Day a "day of service" and were themselves dedicating the day to "karma yoga," so we too would engage in selfless service all day. I vaccuumed the whole Barn. (There are no actual animals in the Barn except for the girls. That's right. They named the building where they keep us "The Barn." Which makes us the...? The painting on my wall, depicting a super-hot Krishna petting his cows, answers the question. And gives me something to focus on when I feel lonely... come on Krishna, pet ME!)
3. On the 20th, in the atrium after dinner, one of the swamis showed us a video of the inauguration. Everyone crowded around and many people even sat in the lotus position with spines erect as though listening to a spiritual talk by an enlightened master. Thank goodness we were "on silence" otherwise I'm sure I would have heard some sensitive new age commentary. Not that there's anything wrong with that...
4. The next day, during evening satsang, we got a lecture featuring many references to the beautiful metaphors for the spiritual path contained in Obama's "talk." Come on, I thought... it wasn't a "talk"! It was a speech!!!
So what do you think about all that?
1. They put an Obama/Biden campaign sign on the altar in the Temple of Divine Light on the 18th and I think it is still there.
2. The morning of the 19th, it was announced that just as Barrack and Michelle had designated Martin Luther King Jr Day a "day of service" and were themselves dedicating the day to "karma yoga," so we too would engage in selfless service all day. I vaccuumed the whole Barn. (There are no actual animals in the Barn except for the girls. That's right. They named the building where they keep us "The Barn." Which makes us the...? The painting on my wall, depicting a super-hot Krishna petting his cows, answers the question. And gives me something to focus on when I feel lonely... come on Krishna, pet ME!)
3. On the 20th, in the atrium after dinner, one of the swamis showed us a video of the inauguration. Everyone crowded around and many people even sat in the lotus position with spines erect as though listening to a spiritual talk by an enlightened master. Thank goodness we were "on silence" otherwise I'm sure I would have heard some sensitive new age commentary. Not that there's anything wrong with that...
4. The next day, during evening satsang, we got a lecture featuring many references to the beautiful metaphors for the spiritual path contained in Obama's "talk." Come on, I thought... it wasn't a "talk"! It was a speech!!!
So what do you think about all that?
2009-01-19
Kurmasana
As we entered the tortoise pose, our teacher asked us, "When is withdrawal helpful in life? How can you create sacred space in your daily life?"
The harmonium broke the silence of the dark early morning; the voices of my classmates rose in response. We chanted AUM as we relaxed forward, taking refuge under our tortoise-backs in the safe cradles created by our opened legs and hips. OM...
I withdraw when I need the support and cradling of my ancient animal body self, the one that has been passed down to me through the vastest span of intergenerational time, from when we first were single-celled organisms pulsing and living and dying in rhythm with the eternal Ocean, and the tides would cycle with the Moon, and the Sun would rise and set just as it still does today with my now-human breaths to echo it, along with the four-chambered pulsing of my mammal heart. I can create my body as a sacred space by tuning in to the rhythms of Nature, to its timeless cycles that my body has evolved to mirror, to reflect, to pay tribute to. If Nature is the Mother, and imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then my Body is a living breathing upright-walking temple to Her. I myself am a form of worship, as is each creature who shares the gift of Life: we are an hommage to our sacred origins. We've been creating ourselves and each other in Her image since before time began.
And we're gonna keep on doin' it! Yeah!!!!
The harmonium broke the silence of the dark early morning; the voices of my classmates rose in response. We chanted AUM as we relaxed forward, taking refuge under our tortoise-backs in the safe cradles created by our opened legs and hips. OM...
I withdraw when I need the support and cradling of my ancient animal body self, the one that has been passed down to me through the vastest span of intergenerational time, from when we first were single-celled organisms pulsing and living and dying in rhythm with the eternal Ocean, and the tides would cycle with the Moon, and the Sun would rise and set just as it still does today with my now-human breaths to echo it, along with the four-chambered pulsing of my mammal heart. I can create my body as a sacred space by tuning in to the rhythms of Nature, to its timeless cycles that my body has evolved to mirror, to reflect, to pay tribute to. If Nature is the Mother, and imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then my Body is a living breathing upright-walking temple to Her. I myself am a form of worship, as is each creature who shares the gift of Life: we are an hommage to our sacred origins. We've been creating ourselves and each other in Her image since before time began.
And we're gonna keep on doin' it! Yeah!!!!
2009-01-18
Inside Outside Upside-Down
This is the first of what could potentially be a series of really strange posts, because I am doing really strange things in a really strange place.
I'm at Yasodhara Ashram on the shores of Kootenay Lake, British Columbia. I've signed on for a three-month course called the Yoga Development Course (YDC). This is something I've been wanting and planning to do for myself this winter for the last three years, ever since I was exposed to the teachings of the ashram's founder, Swami Sivananda Radha, at their outreach centre in Vancouver. I almost didn't make it, but I am here now, hopefully for the full three months of the course.
So what is so strange about this place and the things I am doing here?
Before I made the journey (it is easier to get to China from my hometown than it is to get here, by the way - I haven't felt this far from home since my first night in Shanghai almost 9 years ago), I was told by a wise wizard that "the energy in this area is really intense." I'd also heard from past YDC participants who I know in Vancouver that the energy at the ashram, specifically, was, again, "intense" and that "strange things" happen here. And indeed, strange things started happening as soon as I arrived. Twenty minutes after arriving, actually!
The first strange thing happened at lunch time in the dining room. Yay, after my epic 24-hour journey, I was here in time for lunch! All meals (delicious whole foods, mainly veg, organic, and local) are served buffet-style and we are all free to help ourselves. I didn't mean to dish myself up so much food, but by the time I had added a bit of this, a bit of that, and ooh there's that too? Some of that! And oh my, some of this one as well... can't pass up my opportunity for a muffin!... and brought my plate to a table where I could sit and eat the bounty, the table had turned into a toadstool and all the people had become little elves in red caps with carrots for noses.
Just kidding!
Ok, the strange thing that really happened was that as I began to eat, I briefly worried about whether I'd have trouble finishing it, and thought to myself: "I'm going to have to stop taking so much food on my plate, and then I won't have to worry about how I will get it all in." Those who know my gluttonous nature will find this thought strange indeed, but even stranger was what then happened to my thought... it spontaneously opened into another dimension!
What am I talking about? Ok, you know when you see a line painted on the wall of a building in the distance, but then you take a couple of steps forward, and it turns out that the line was actually the thin edge of a freestanding three-dimensional object not attached to the building at all? And that your depth perception just hadn't picked it up because it was foreshortened in your line of sight? Or when you take mushrooms and the moss under your feet suddenly has all this extra depth to it, and you realize that patterning was really there all along? Well the same thing happened spontaneously to my thought. It expanded outward into wider dimensions of my life: "I'm going to have to stop taking on so much, and then I won't have to worry about how I will get it all in."
Ping! Wow, could my gluttonous appetite really be the same thing as my constant "hunger" for more, more, more? My habit of taking on ridiculous amounts of plans and activities, having too much "on my plate" and then wearing myself thin trying desperately to get them all in? Pong pong pong! And that was just after being here for twenty minutes!
It happens constantly with everything. Another example is that a couple of days later, when the cold I'd caught from Seb finally kicked in, I didn't go to hatha class and kept sleeping instead. When I woke up I felt awful. Ugh, I really need to stay alone today, said my body, and so I didn't go to my other class either. Later, I learned that the assignment for that day revolved around "being with yourself" and that my classmates had been pondering the questions, "What do you do when you need to be with yourself? How do you know when you need to be with yourself? How do you create a space for being with yourself?" Ha, ha, ha... I don't! I just go and go until I get sick! Often I am not calibrated with enough precision-engineered sensitivity to detect a need to be alone, unless of course the symptoms are bold and in-my-face (literally, in-my-sinues, making it physically uncomfortable to talk to people). Just like that very day! Mere coincidence, or Coincidence?
It's like I'm living in a hall of mirrors inside my head and body and heart. Everywhere I look, reality is so vivid and jumping out at me. Oh, and did I say there are no drugs here of any kind (except coffee which I'm staying away from so far)? So I'm not high or anything. The river running under the bridge, formed of melting snow, was happening because my rigid, overintellectualizing side (symbolized by the hard, cold, frozen snow) has to "melt" and make room for my body-heart-feeling side (symbolized by the flowing water of emotions) to express its true nature in my life (what could be truer than obeying gravity and flowing downhill into Kootenay Lake... just like the stone rolling down THIS VERY HILL after me in the dream I had three years ago before even seeing this hill with the mouse who said to me, "Can't you just accept that god exists?").
The wise wizard was right... I'm just going to give up and talk like a trippy hippie myself now. The energy here is so intense, man!
I'm at Yasodhara Ashram on the shores of Kootenay Lake, British Columbia. I've signed on for a three-month course called the Yoga Development Course (YDC). This is something I've been wanting and planning to do for myself this winter for the last three years, ever since I was exposed to the teachings of the ashram's founder, Swami Sivananda Radha, at their outreach centre in Vancouver. I almost didn't make it, but I am here now, hopefully for the full three months of the course.
So what is so strange about this place and the things I am doing here?
Before I made the journey (it is easier to get to China from my hometown than it is to get here, by the way - I haven't felt this far from home since my first night in Shanghai almost 9 years ago), I was told by a wise wizard that "the energy in this area is really intense." I'd also heard from past YDC participants who I know in Vancouver that the energy at the ashram, specifically, was, again, "intense" and that "strange things" happen here. And indeed, strange things started happening as soon as I arrived. Twenty minutes after arriving, actually!
The first strange thing happened at lunch time in the dining room. Yay, after my epic 24-hour journey, I was here in time for lunch! All meals (delicious whole foods, mainly veg, organic, and local) are served buffet-style and we are all free to help ourselves. I didn't mean to dish myself up so much food, but by the time I had added a bit of this, a bit of that, and ooh there's that too? Some of that! And oh my, some of this one as well... can't pass up my opportunity for a muffin!... and brought my plate to a table where I could sit and eat the bounty, the table had turned into a toadstool and all the people had become little elves in red caps with carrots for noses.
Just kidding!
Ok, the strange thing that really happened was that as I began to eat, I briefly worried about whether I'd have trouble finishing it, and thought to myself: "I'm going to have to stop taking so much food on my plate, and then I won't have to worry about how I will get it all in." Those who know my gluttonous nature will find this thought strange indeed, but even stranger was what then happened to my thought... it spontaneously opened into another dimension!
What am I talking about? Ok, you know when you see a line painted on the wall of a building in the distance, but then you take a couple of steps forward, and it turns out that the line was actually the thin edge of a freestanding three-dimensional object not attached to the building at all? And that your depth perception just hadn't picked it up because it was foreshortened in your line of sight? Or when you take mushrooms and the moss under your feet suddenly has all this extra depth to it, and you realize that patterning was really there all along? Well the same thing happened spontaneously to my thought. It expanded outward into wider dimensions of my life: "I'm going to have to stop taking on so much, and then I won't have to worry about how I will get it all in."
Ping! Wow, could my gluttonous appetite really be the same thing as my constant "hunger" for more, more, more? My habit of taking on ridiculous amounts of plans and activities, having too much "on my plate" and then wearing myself thin trying desperately to get them all in? Pong pong pong! And that was just after being here for twenty minutes!
It happens constantly with everything. Another example is that a couple of days later, when the cold I'd caught from Seb finally kicked in, I didn't go to hatha class and kept sleeping instead. When I woke up I felt awful. Ugh, I really need to stay alone today, said my body, and so I didn't go to my other class either. Later, I learned that the assignment for that day revolved around "being with yourself" and that my classmates had been pondering the questions, "What do you do when you need to be with yourself? How do you know when you need to be with yourself? How do you create a space for being with yourself?" Ha, ha, ha... I don't! I just go and go until I get sick! Often I am not calibrated with enough precision-engineered sensitivity to detect a need to be alone, unless of course the symptoms are bold and in-my-face (literally, in-my-sinues, making it physically uncomfortable to talk to people). Just like that very day! Mere coincidence, or Coincidence?
It's like I'm living in a hall of mirrors inside my head and body and heart. Everywhere I look, reality is so vivid and jumping out at me. Oh, and did I say there are no drugs here of any kind (except coffee which I'm staying away from so far)? So I'm not high or anything. The river running under the bridge, formed of melting snow, was happening because my rigid, overintellectualizing side (symbolized by the hard, cold, frozen snow) has to "melt" and make room for my body-heart-feeling side (symbolized by the flowing water of emotions) to express its true nature in my life (what could be truer than obeying gravity and flowing downhill into Kootenay Lake... just like the stone rolling down THIS VERY HILL after me in the dream I had three years ago before even seeing this hill with the mouse who said to me, "Can't you just accept that god exists?").
The wise wizard was right... I'm just going to give up and talk like a trippy hippie myself now. The energy here is so intense, man!
2009-01-16
Brent's House: Catching Up
So before leaving my hometown yet again, I really wanted to see Brent's house.
Brent is an old friend of mine. Actually, that's a bit of an understatement... "old friend" doesn't fully express it. Brent was my best friend for seven years! He was also my lover for most of that time (with a few breaks here and there), and we lived together in three different cities. Brent was also the person in my life who broke my heart the worst: he and a mutual friend secretly started a romance together when I still thought we were "lifers"! The suffering I went through at that time (and created for myself, partly) was one of the most difficult, painful, and dangerous episodes of myself I have seen.
Of course, time passes. My debts are paid off, my heart is no longer broken, and Brent is still a great guy. Our mutal friend (who I didn't know quite so well at the time) must be great too, because she is now his wife and they just bought a new house!
My mom thougth I was crazy to want to visit them, and wondered why I wanted to see them at all, as if it would be like re-opening an old wound. I didn't talk to Mark about it but from things he has said in the past, he probably would have said "Ugh, you don't need those jerks!" Seb, ever the balanced perspective, said, "Hmmm, sounds awkward."
I don't know why I didn't see it that way myself. I just wanted to see Brent's house! I wanted to meet his dog, Astro, whose legendary cuteness I'd so far only witnessed in pictures. It seemed so exciting to me that he had a house and a dog and a wife. I mean, how different can you get from the path I've taken? And I wanted to see Kaisha too, because even though I never knew her very well, I did really like her at first. Plus, I have kept in touch with her over the years and I've enjoyed how both of us have deepened our involvement with yoga over time. So I thought it would be a nice way to spend a couple of hours, a fun thing to do. I thought I would feel glad to see them.
"Glad" is not a strong enough term!
I felt like I was over the moon as soon as Kaisha opened the door. She was the one I remembered, the super nice one from when I first met her, and not the kind-of-mean one from later when (I now realize) she was probably just uncomfortable with me because of her desire for my at-the-time partner. She was smiley and sweet, the same girl who invited me to an Easter Egg Hunt and took me to her stitch-n-bitch group and went to see Nardwuar with me and introduced me to her vegan celebrity friend and played badminton with me at the beach and just CARED about me all those years ago.
Brent is still the same soft-spoken, kind, unassuming, intelligent, great conversationalist he was when I first met him. A bit tubbier now, and not as shy, but overall, he's the same nice guy I was best friends with for such a long time. I think he might have been a little bit shy of me from not seeing me in so long, because I ended up exchanging more words with Kaisha than with him - but then again, Kaisha (like me) talks a lot, while Brent has always been a man of few words. When he does speak, it's like Silent Bob: meaningful and to the point! I'd really like to hang out with Brent again when I go back to Victoria, maybe one-on-one, so we can have the kind of rational-mind-on-overdrive philosophical conversations about life he's so good for, as opposed to one of the stoned philosophical conversations about life I'm good for!
Their son (oops I mean dog) Astro is as I expected. Brent and Kaisha are both serious dog lovers, and Brent in particular has an amazing affinity for animals. He is able to understand dogs' thoughts and feelings and communicate effectively with them. In fact, Brent's interactions with humans are often guided by what he has learned from interacting with dogs. (When I first met him, he modeled his interactions with me after his interactions with his childhood dog, Amber. "I could rub your tummy all night" was one of the things he said our first night together. I didn't bark.) So I was sure his dog would be well-trained... and he is. Astro did tricks casually that are far beyond other dogs' mastery. And I heard, but have yet to see, that he is an almost Olympic-calibre frisbee catcher. Apparently Brent plays frisbee with Astro every day... just like he used to do with me!
And their house is perfect. It's a cute small fixer-upper in Fernwood and they are doing a great job with the renovations, aided of course by Brian (Brent's handyman dad who I've often missed, even more than I've missed Brent). Their plans for the house sound great to me.
It was a real trip to hear their updates on people once familiar to me but now strangers: Tom Godfrey, a guy I dated briefly in first year and Brent's great friend since elementary school, is now married to a Chinese girl. Wesley has a baby. Brent's mom Gabi's MS has acted up and she uses a scooter now. All the news brought tears to my eyes, either of joy or of sadness.
Now, as if the house, dog, and wife weren't enough... Brent offered me a ride to the bus stop in his car! These people are real adults, man, they even have a car! The way he casually offered made my jaw drop. "You have a drivers' license?" I asked, incredulous. Brent had failed his drivers' test multiple times back when he and I were together. Brent laughed. He still hasn't passed! Kaisha drove.
Overall, I felt like I was reconnecting with my great friends. It felt SO GOOD to be with Brent and Kaisha again! It has been years, and I don't think I really knew how much I missed them in a just-hanging-out way until I went to their house. I feel so much love for those two people and I was almost overwhelmed by the warmth of my emotions when I realized that I was reunited with people who are still, after everything, my friends. Yes, that's just what it was - I felt like I was seeing my dear and much-missed close friends after a seperation of years.
Thanks for the visit Brent and Kaisha! I won't be back in Victoria until April but when I come back, I sure hope to see you again. Let's not be strangers anymore!
Brent is an old friend of mine. Actually, that's a bit of an understatement... "old friend" doesn't fully express it. Brent was my best friend for seven years! He was also my lover for most of that time (with a few breaks here and there), and we lived together in three different cities. Brent was also the person in my life who broke my heart the worst: he and a mutual friend secretly started a romance together when I still thought we were "lifers"! The suffering I went through at that time (and created for myself, partly) was one of the most difficult, painful, and dangerous episodes of myself I have seen.
Of course, time passes. My debts are paid off, my heart is no longer broken, and Brent is still a great guy. Our mutal friend (who I didn't know quite so well at the time) must be great too, because she is now his wife and they just bought a new house!
My mom thougth I was crazy to want to visit them, and wondered why I wanted to see them at all, as if it would be like re-opening an old wound. I didn't talk to Mark about it but from things he has said in the past, he probably would have said "Ugh, you don't need those jerks!" Seb, ever the balanced perspective, said, "Hmmm, sounds awkward."
I don't know why I didn't see it that way myself. I just wanted to see Brent's house! I wanted to meet his dog, Astro, whose legendary cuteness I'd so far only witnessed in pictures. It seemed so exciting to me that he had a house and a dog and a wife. I mean, how different can you get from the path I've taken? And I wanted to see Kaisha too, because even though I never knew her very well, I did really like her at first. Plus, I have kept in touch with her over the years and I've enjoyed how both of us have deepened our involvement with yoga over time. So I thought it would be a nice way to spend a couple of hours, a fun thing to do. I thought I would feel glad to see them.
"Glad" is not a strong enough term!
I felt like I was over the moon as soon as Kaisha opened the door. She was the one I remembered, the super nice one from when I first met her, and not the kind-of-mean one from later when (I now realize) she was probably just uncomfortable with me because of her desire for my at-the-time partner. She was smiley and sweet, the same girl who invited me to an Easter Egg Hunt and took me to her stitch-n-bitch group and went to see Nardwuar with me and introduced me to her vegan celebrity friend and played badminton with me at the beach and just CARED about me all those years ago.
Brent is still the same soft-spoken, kind, unassuming, intelligent, great conversationalist he was when I first met him. A bit tubbier now, and not as shy, but overall, he's the same nice guy I was best friends with for such a long time. I think he might have been a little bit shy of me from not seeing me in so long, because I ended up exchanging more words with Kaisha than with him - but then again, Kaisha (like me) talks a lot, while Brent has always been a man of few words. When he does speak, it's like Silent Bob: meaningful and to the point! I'd really like to hang out with Brent again when I go back to Victoria, maybe one-on-one, so we can have the kind of rational-mind-on-overdrive philosophical conversations about life he's so good for, as opposed to one of the stoned philosophical conversations about life I'm good for!
Their son (oops I mean dog) Astro is as I expected. Brent and Kaisha are both serious dog lovers, and Brent in particular has an amazing affinity for animals. He is able to understand dogs' thoughts and feelings and communicate effectively with them. In fact, Brent's interactions with humans are often guided by what he has learned from interacting with dogs. (When I first met him, he modeled his interactions with me after his interactions with his childhood dog, Amber. "I could rub your tummy all night" was one of the things he said our first night together. I didn't bark.) So I was sure his dog would be well-trained... and he is. Astro did tricks casually that are far beyond other dogs' mastery. And I heard, but have yet to see, that he is an almost Olympic-calibre frisbee catcher. Apparently Brent plays frisbee with Astro every day... just like he used to do with me!
And their house is perfect. It's a cute small fixer-upper in Fernwood and they are doing a great job with the renovations, aided of course by Brian (Brent's handyman dad who I've often missed, even more than I've missed Brent). Their plans for the house sound great to me.
It was a real trip to hear their updates on people once familiar to me but now strangers: Tom Godfrey, a guy I dated briefly in first year and Brent's great friend since elementary school, is now married to a Chinese girl. Wesley has a baby. Brent's mom Gabi's MS has acted up and she uses a scooter now. All the news brought tears to my eyes, either of joy or of sadness.
Now, as if the house, dog, and wife weren't enough... Brent offered me a ride to the bus stop in his car! These people are real adults, man, they even have a car! The way he casually offered made my jaw drop. "You have a drivers' license?" I asked, incredulous. Brent had failed his drivers' test multiple times back when he and I were together. Brent laughed. He still hasn't passed! Kaisha drove.
Overall, I felt like I was reconnecting with my great friends. It felt SO GOOD to be with Brent and Kaisha again! It has been years, and I don't think I really knew how much I missed them in a just-hanging-out way until I went to their house. I feel so much love for those two people and I was almost overwhelmed by the warmth of my emotions when I realized that I was reunited with people who are still, after everything, my friends. Yes, that's just what it was - I felt like I was seeing my dear and much-missed close friends after a seperation of years.
Thanks for the visit Brent and Kaisha! I won't be back in Victoria until April but when I come back, I sure hope to see you again. Let's not be strangers anymore!
2009-01-02
Old Poetry Scavenger Hunt
I've scanvenged some old poetry from my old laptop. Here are three poems together for you to read.
this first one is my haiku from a new moon monday in august two years ago. it was a very special morning with very special substances involved.
monday morning
plump woodbug
explorer of the grass
becomes my guide.
soft green blades
below my hand rest
then tower
suddenly
swaying in the lawn
patterning
Bottled By Cierra D.
I want to personally encapsulate
a whole summer day
in billions of little grains of sand
and put them all in bottles
and carry one with me
and open the cap whenever I smile
and let people inhale the vapor
and I’ll sell the rest to the rest of the world
not expensive, and I’ll sign them for free
and everyone will know they came from me
somehow, roundabout
secondhand, but still -
you got it from me
and you get it every time you open the bottle
This one is also from a couple of years ago. This is what happens to cynical students when they grow up into cynical adults who still don't trust school principals.
Education
Let Education
shape our tongues
and mold our speech
into confined boxes
stunt our bodies
stuff us into desks
and strain our eyes
as we turn page after page
of state-sponsored lies.
train my pen
and choose words that
teachers want to read
stifle my thinking
strangle my breath
and stop my mind
as I comply day after day
leaving my self behind.
Someday let Me
stick it to these bastards
and tell them what I
was too small to say,
too trusting to know:
you’ve wasted my time
enough already
so leave me the fuck alone
I’m going outside to play.
Magnetic Woman
This is another one from my old laptop.
My mother is a magnetic woman, just like a comic book superhero.
When I was a child she used to rub herself down with Coppertone number 8, put on her bathing suit, and go out in the backyard to lie under the sun on her lawn chair. Without even trying, she would attract every butterfly in the yard. She could have four or five butterflies sitting on her: on her wrist, on her shoulder, on her ankle, on her thigh… She could reach out her hand and a butterfly would land on her finger.
My mother can also attract birds. She had always put birdseed out from fall to spring, for those birds overwintering in the yard, but when she decided to take up “birding” as a hobby, her magnetism really took over. All she had to do in order to attract species of birds that had never been seen in our yard was to sit by the window with her binoculars, look them up in her bird book, and announce her intention to see them. She’d raise her head, and there they’d be. In this way, she attracted Rufus Hummingbirds, Yellow Grosbeaks, American Goldfinches, and a whole flock of 12 white doves.
Men can’t get enough of my mother. Neither can lesbians. My mother barely needs to look at someone, and he or she is smitten. She has this effect on people of every race and creed and it has always been this way. She could be wearing anything, makeup done or not, hair long or short, bleached or dyed, spiked or smooth, carrying extra weight or super-model slim. Just one glance from her humongous owl eyes and whoever is at the receiving end starts sending her flowers at work and buying her gifts, telephoning at all hours and showing up unexpectedly.
Parking spots are also magnetically drawn to my mother, usually just outside the door of wherever she’s going, or in the shade if it’s a hot day. Mom never has to circle the block looking for a spot to park. The spots always come to her.
Jobs and are this way too. A long job search has never happened. Interviews always lead to employment. It seems she attracts the exact interview questions that her own life uniquely qualify her to answer perfectly. It was also this way when she went back to school. She was shortlisted for the School of Social Work right away and in the panel interview she got a question that, as a mature student, she was able to answer much more easily than the other, younger applicants.
Of course not all of this magnetism is a good thing. Mom has attracted her share of headaches, disillusionments, and disasters. Still, though, the solutions always collect like iron filings around a bar magnet.
My mother is a magnetic woman, just like a comic book superhero.
When I was a child she used to rub herself down with Coppertone number 8, put on her bathing suit, and go out in the backyard to lie under the sun on her lawn chair. Without even trying, she would attract every butterfly in the yard. She could have four or five butterflies sitting on her: on her wrist, on her shoulder, on her ankle, on her thigh… She could reach out her hand and a butterfly would land on her finger.
My mother can also attract birds. She had always put birdseed out from fall to spring, for those birds overwintering in the yard, but when she decided to take up “birding” as a hobby, her magnetism really took over. All she had to do in order to attract species of birds that had never been seen in our yard was to sit by the window with her binoculars, look them up in her bird book, and announce her intention to see them. She’d raise her head, and there they’d be. In this way, she attracted Rufus Hummingbirds, Yellow Grosbeaks, American Goldfinches, and a whole flock of 12 white doves.
Men can’t get enough of my mother. Neither can lesbians. My mother barely needs to look at someone, and he or she is smitten. She has this effect on people of every race and creed and it has always been this way. She could be wearing anything, makeup done or not, hair long or short, bleached or dyed, spiked or smooth, carrying extra weight or super-model slim. Just one glance from her humongous owl eyes and whoever is at the receiving end starts sending her flowers at work and buying her gifts, telephoning at all hours and showing up unexpectedly.
Parking spots are also magnetically drawn to my mother, usually just outside the door of wherever she’s going, or in the shade if it’s a hot day. Mom never has to circle the block looking for a spot to park. The spots always come to her.
Jobs and are this way too. A long job search has never happened. Interviews always lead to employment. It seems she attracts the exact interview questions that her own life uniquely qualify her to answer perfectly. It was also this way when she went back to school. She was shortlisted for the School of Social Work right away and in the panel interview she got a question that, as a mature student, she was able to answer much more easily than the other, younger applicants.
Of course not all of this magnetism is a good thing. Mom has attracted her share of headaches, disillusionments, and disasters. Still, though, the solutions always collect like iron filings around a bar magnet.
Chinese Guys Wrestling
I am reading a bunch of crazy old shit from my old laptop today. Here is something from China in 2002. Definitely pre-Olympics... these days it would not have been this sweet and innocent. It's also nice to see that the status of naked skinny guys on television seems to have changed, at least from the impression I give in this paragraph. Or maybe it's me who has changed?
Channel Surfing Finally Pays Off
They are fighting in a 6-sided ring sponsored by Red Bull and when they kick each other in the groin the commentators keep saying stuff like, “That was beautiful! Beautiful!” I can’t even tell what kind of sport this is supposed to be: they are dressed like boxers, with boxing gloves and everything, but on the other hand I see some wrestling moves, and that is definitely soccer they are trying to play with each other’s nuts. Typical, shy-looking, slender-bodied Chinese guys… sweating, half-naked, and grunting at each other. God this is novel. A bit of aggression at all is almost shocking, but along with bare skin? Shiver! My favourite part is where they hug each other after each, what, match? Yeah, the part where they hug each other, that smooth, skin-to-skin contact. I am definitely enjoying this program too much. And I love how the commentators keep going over the age and marital status of the models, er, I mean athletes. You can see up the legs of their shorts when they fall down, backs to the mat. After each match, they have close-up shots of the guys’ chests and backs as they walk off the ring, cuts and scrapes and new pink bruises glistening on their sweaty golden skin. These guys are so solid looking. In
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