A Tempest or a Sea Change? in Everyday Ramblings

We are having a stunning clear weekend day in spring. It usually rains through the majority of March and April so there is a festive atmosphere out there. Here are some different daffodils with a lovely blue sky.

This morning I got up and did my morning “stuff” and then grabbed the carrot starts and walked down to the garden with my watering can 1/3rd full as they don’t turn the water on at the garden until Thursday. I rolled back half the burlap and planted all the starts. The chard and beets look good but I admit, the carrot row is a bit unruly. I used my hand to measure though I did have a measuring tape with me.

I don’t know why I am so anxious about this project. I guess it is because it is new to me. And you know…old dogs…tricks. I was telling my yoga teacher compatriots this week about the handstand class and they were looking at me like I was nuts…you aren’t going to teach handstand, right???

There is a whole segment of the yoga world that does do handstands but none of them are the folks I hang out with. I do listen to podcasts of folks who do though.

I did the prep class yesterday for the first time and am functional today so that is a good sign.

The allergens this year are slamming me and looking at the video I recorded yesterday of the mat class for the students that practice with me I could see that I look tired. I am tired so there is no surprise that I look it but one hopes it is not quite so visible.

My back is so much better than it was even six months ago, so clearly what I am doing is working, the sciatica is barely an issue. I believe if I am careful and build strength over time that the handstands will actually be good for my back. Reversing the pull of gravity and all that. This isn’t just me trying to recapture a movement pattern associated with my youth.

On Monday the guy that leads my Teacher’s Call, a teacher currently in rust belt Pennsylvania, a white 45-year-old nice guy, married with two children posted a podcast interview with his first most influential yoga teacher. She has opinions, boy, does she have opinions, this whole hour plus conversation was about sex and gender and transsexuals and cancel culture and gender affirming drugs and (broadly) gender affirming medical procedures and puberty blockers. She said a lot of provocative and inflammatory things with great passion.

I think that it is important that we be allowed to have conversations about all of this. One thing that shocked me that she said, but makes sense after I calmed down, is that Planned Parenthood is offering puberty blockers to young people 16 and up with the parents or guardian’s consent. I was like…no…that can’t be true…but I did check, and it is right on their website.

Since then, I have had lively and robust conversations about all of this with Kes, Mrs. Sherlock and Charity and have been looking at my own implicit bias about the generally accepted physical characteristics of humans that have the biological makers for male and female. It comes up in class sometimes because bodies that have one set of hormones and development generally have a wider hip base than those that have another.

I realized I don’t have to gender these things, just like I don’t have to gender people that can roll their tongues and folks that can squat all the way down with their heels on the floor.

Last night I listened to a raw and unpolished podcast that was a response to the Monday podcast by two other yoga teachers, one of whom is gender fluid and in the process of deciding if to transition or not and the other who is in a bigger body and is a committed feminist.

One of the things I am discovering about being on the older side is that I have had to put up with all kinds of absolute crap and discrimination and inequality and bias and deal with it, particularly in my work life, and these young folks think this stuff is wrong and it all needs to stop and they deserve supportive and safe environments in which to live their lives.

I hope they get it!!! I would have loved not to deal with this stuff. Seriously. But there seems to be this underlying point of view that in the before-times we were okay with all this crap, performing stereotyped gender and I assure you that was not the case. But a body has to eat.

It gives just a shadow of a glimpse of what it must be like to have lived in a body that has a different skin tone than mine.

Anyway, it has been a week that has reminded me of all the drama, all the tempests in teacups of my younger days, that I am grateful are behind me, but also given me a whole heck of a lot to think about.

Last updated March 27, 2021