Adapting to Change, or Not in Everyday Ramblings

This is Spring Break on the Portland State campus on Wednesday night at dusk.

I’ve been kind of blue this week in some ways and fine in others.

I didn’t have any students show up on Wednesday for class and that is hard to be relaxed about because I have to pay for the room no matter what. (Really I am within $14 of breaking even for the quarter so it isn’t that worrisome… apparently I just like to fret.)

Mostly I wanted to teach. I like teaching. :)

I took the opportunity to make sure I had the app working properly that allows me to play chants and music on the speakers in the yoga studio from my phone. There are many steps involved but I think I have it all operational now.

As I was waving my phone around in the room truing up the speakers this ditzy overly bright woman with hard heals on her little red boot/shoes came tromping into the studio with a container of florescent colored pens that she apparently stores there. She apologized for disturbing me but it was all awkward and weird.

Then I watched a guy sit down on the doorway step and light a cigarette and smoke it, completely oblivious to me sitting about 3 feet away watching him from behind a window. Then a fellow with some obvious problems came by to harass him for a smoke and that got him up and out of there.

At least I had my headphones with me, and a roomy hood on my jacket so I was able to listen to my History and Music audio program on the way home in the spitting rain.

The workmen need three rain free days in a row to finish the track upgrade across the street. We haven’t had three rain free days in months. There is a slight chance that early next week we might be able to string three days together without precipitation.

We have sun this afternoon though! Sun. Beautiful healing restorative sun.

My back has found a new place to be sore in. What is interesting is that this is the original place, where I had been feeling the discomfort for a couple of years that led to this whole extravaganza of physical therapy and what has turned into an awareness of a structural issue.

My hope is that this means that I have found how to address the imbalance and that I am stabilizing and strengthening the area.

Saint Joe is getting married this weekend. He is a bit of a basket case but in a good-natured way. He has his extended Irish family in from all over the place. I agonized for months about what to get him and in the end decided on a cash gift. Then there was the office gift. (I am not the only one fond of him)… I told him I had a vested interest in him having a happy home life and my gift was an investment in that… That made him laugh and smoothed over the social anxiety we were both feeling.

It is a little weird that I didn’t get invited to the wedding but I am glad I didn’t. It is in a place that is hard to get to on public transportation and though I would of course love to meet some of his family, they kept the wedding pretty small as these things go. They are getting married outside but the area is covered.

Having something so hopeful and positive to talk about and be silly around has been a nice break from the dark news. Yesterday I listened to this profoundly affecting interview with a coal miner who voted for our 45th President and what he had to say about coal mining. You can hear it here…NY Times Daily Podcast

Because I live in a place that for many many years was a livery stable I often think about how it was for people who made a living from horses and how they dealt with the change over to motor vehicles.

If they are anything like this coal miner…I would have to say…not very well. It makes my heart hurt on all sorts of levels. Change is no easy path and when it is forced on you…

Last updated March 31, 2017