Flaming Trees and Anxiety in Everyday Ramblings

The clothes dryer here hasn’t been operational for about 10 days. I realize that many of you don’t have dryers but here pretty much everyone has them and we are not used to line or rack drying. The guy finally came this morning, pulled off one of the knobs, showed me it was broken and pulled another knob off my washer, one I don’t use and put that where the broken one was, handed the broken one to me and left.

I was all excited and put some soap in the washer and went to turn it on and…nothing. It took me a bunch of fretting to remember that I got a water shut off notice yesterday for other work going on in the building. That lasted about five hours. The washer and dryer are now both operational and running.

It is raining. Yesterday, in my own way I put the garden to bed, taking up the last of the annuals and bringing the support structures home. Mulched with the last of the colorful Oregon Maple leaves and straw. That is an Oregon Maple there in the picture from Monday. This one just slightly out of range of my windows but the trees across the street are the same brilliant colors.

Although I feel sad to say goodbye to the garden for now, (I still need to plant the rest of the tulips in pots here) it is a relief in a way. I will have more time for other things. And it will only be a few short months before I will be starting seedlings.

The recovery from this latest dental procedure hasn’t been hard at all. I stopped taking Tylenol on Monday. I still have a few more days of antibiotic. The cool thing is that I can almost eat like a normal person, albeit on one side of my mouth and nothing hard or sharp but still…yay.

And they double booked me in for a week from tomorrow to get the stitches out. My doctor didn’t want to wait so somehow, they are going to make it work. I am going to bring something to read in case I need to wait. We are now rooting for all the stitches to come out then. Then I can return to regularly scheduled programming and make plans for my niece’s surgery.

Fingers crossed my regular cat sitter is available.

I have become a bit of a homebody. This will stretch me a bit. That will most likely be a good thing. Heck, Carlo was insecure having the dryer guy in here, it will be good for both of us to have a little break as he has become quite demanding especially having me napping and reading these last few days.

It is funny, last week I was all frustrated that I was not going to the gym and my strength training was on hold but this week I am much more realistic about it. I will get back on that horse shortly. I want to stay strong enough to do the things I want and need to do but I don’t have anything to prove.

It is a transition I think, a slow unfolding. My students were teasing me this morning about being a bit hmm, non-conformist. One of them was experiencing a specific kind of discomfort in her side lower back and I modified the practice for everyone to make sure she could move with ease without it being a big deal.

This is what I do. It is a bit improvisational. I have a plan; I always have the bones of a structure going into a practice but then I modify and adapt. It seems to work.

One of my students referred a friend this week to my morning classes and it turns out she is a long-time yoga teacher that has recently had hernia surgery and is 78. She is looking for a gentle way to return to a regular practice. Although I have had other teachers in class, I am most interested in if my slightly unorthodox approach works for her.

As the friend that referred her is quite literary, I suspect this new person is as well.

The anxiety about the upcoming election is kind of crazy making. I think next week the structure I will hang my classes on is settling and calming the nervous system and hopefully finding a calm place within. That grounded still point where for even just a moment we can feel safe, cared for, that we belong and that our fellow humans are capable of being kind and generous… we all know a small part of our lives where this is true. We do.

Might as well start that now.