the little momma

I just want to take a moment to honor the intense love that I feel for the kids in my primary group at school. Sure, Jason is biting out of anger, Rachel only says "no" these days, and Serina general disposition is that of a premenstral teenager, but oh, oh, oh do I love those little ones.

Jason and I have so many little secretive smile moments. Like when I sit down on the little childsize couch and we smile at each other and he runs to the books shelf, knowing we are going to sit together and read our favorites (he is two! love of literacy!). or when he tries to swing his foot into the sink when I am washing his hands. or when I repeat his "no monkey" gibberish that he says every time he gets a new diaper (?), or when his mom picks him up and he runs back and forth between us giving us hugs, or when he comes and finds me and hugs my legs and looks up at me signaling he wants me to hold him, or when he says "tinese" because he wants to hear the Chinese version of a song. And that's just Jason.

Serina is a beautiful, round little girl with big brown eyes, full cheeks and a doll-like little mouth. Oh, and the smiles she gives, and the hugs. Rachel has huge blue eyes, and squeezes her shoulders up to her ears shyly when she smiles. I'm not going to give the girls as many words but I love them just as much. Most of the time. Me and J have really run the laps. One thing I know, I would have no trouble bonding with a child of another ethnicity (my group is a mix of asian, hispanic and russian/jewish), or with an adopted child. Oh but I would want to be pregnant at some point in time. The idea of carrying a child of me and someone I love - wow. Wow. And honestly, even if I were raped, I would still not give up that child. I don't think I could bear the idea of a child of mine growing up separate from me. Tapering out on a serious note! Hasta.

Documenting flirting, sunning and new learning

None of these is worth an independent post, so this may seem random. And I am never random, so I thought I'd better warn you...

1. A friend of mine asked me why, even though multiple guys have told her she is beautiful, none of them have actually walked the plank and....gasp!...asked her out. This is the Christian genus of Homo sapien males to which we were refering, in case that was not utterly obvious. (This is not going to be a man-bashing session.) We were at a Christian screening of short films, and there were multiple presumably Christian males around, and my friend was ever so slightly distracted by all the new choices. My response at time was to smile and shrug my shoulders. But now that I have done my signature mulling, I say that Talk is Cheap. And I don't mean that dismissively. I just mean that guys flirt with a girl for multiple reasons: because they can, because they enjoy it, and maybe, just maybe, to try to discern if she is a good match. but that is rare. maybe we girls tend to take flirting as a green light when really we should be checking them out just as much as they are checking us out. That's fun, right? Why do the submission thing before the vows, right? No need to rush things.

2. While sunning myself in the backyard in my bathing suit to get a little base tan for HI, I thought about how my grandpa used to religiously sun himself for about a half hour every warm day. He would lie on a blanket, stark naked save a small towel, on the side of the house where the daffodils grew. What a funny memory that is! I think he believed in the rejuvanitive power of the sun. I think I do too.

3. Lately I have been studying my yoga anatomy book. Oh, I love that stuff. I love all the terminology and the illustrations. Such a cool book. I keep thinking about all the deep adductor and abductors in the hips, the swoop of the sartorius, the lengthy gracilis. whole new level of appreciation for how the body functions.

Sorry. I'm not on the writing ball today. It's just not flowing but I feel like I won't be able to think past it till I get it out somewhere, you lucky reader you. And I am sligthly confused in general right now, so please, lower those expectations!

Spinning Like a Top

There was an analogy in one of the yoga books on my required reading list that had a little metaphor in it that I am stealing to apply to my life. The metaphor was of a top (or the holistic human) spinning freely because every part of it (heart, mind, spirit, body) was all moving in the same direction with no resistence. I think I see a little of that in my life. I feel so lucky to be in a career and school-path that I can pour so much passion into daily. For the most part, I experience a supreme unity of employment, religious conviction, and education - all of it converging and moving in a unified direction. If only I could convince myself to be a good girl and find my rest and sanctuary in God instead of the TV and food when I am exhausted. Now then I'd really be efficient and spinning faster. Even the yoga and the shiatsu massage schooling that I want to go to - I see all of it as part of a unified life goal. I may get to the final goal (not sure what that is) a little slower because I am pursuing the physical/mental wellness stuff alongside the education/structural work with children and families, but I'll take it as it comes.

I wonder if this fervor will die out. I see my career purpose as running so deeply parallel to my spiritual purpose, that potentially a catastrophe in one arena could submerge the other. It's not a direct link, but it's pretty close. But honestly, I think that my summer of atheism has nullified my fear that one day i will look at a blade of grass too closely and my faith in God will fall away. The other day on a walk I sat under an oak tree and watched the lush spring grass blowing in the wind and was so overcome with thankfulness over the fact that when I see beauty, I know to praise God. So thankful that being aware of my nearness to God is so close to the surface. For some, there is just an empty vacuum behind nature's beauty, a false freedom chilly as wind on a snowy mountian. I just don't think that I will ever doubt God to that degree again. I think the Lord used it (or engineered it) to clear up all the lingering doubts and petty contentions that always caught in the back of my thinking.

Oh, spring is beautiful this year. You may hear more about the lushness of this grass, how the utter extravagance of its weight forces it to fold back to the earth, that raw green that the sun so easily illuminates from within. It will all too soon dry out and leave a pith of stringy fiber. I hope to make it to the upper meadow in the next couple days to see if it's gone green too.

Santa Cruz Island

THIS past weekend, my friend and I spent the night out on Santa Cruz Island, the largest of the Channel Islands. We woke up early, took the boat out, and packed up to the Del Norte backcountry campground. And it was very quiet. We met a really neat ecologist on the boat ride over, who I was really clicking well with - I think we may not have lined up on a lot of issues, but boy would we have a lot in common in terms of thinking styles. I think we both were in a position of being able to easily appreciate the other. Anyhow, as luck would have it, we never saw him again. He was off to backpack in other parts of the island to check up on the bird population. Instead, we camped next to three other "boys" ("Two doctors and an engineer" to be precise). These were our lone companions in the sparse, desolate part of the island.

One of the doctors was a pretty nice, ethical sort of guy. The other one (the engineer, ohh, i'm so impressed) was too young and cocky to be taken seriously. The other doctor was, as I told my mother when I got back, smarmy. I'm not sure if this is a real word, but you know exactly what it means, huh? Maybe I'm repeating this, but for now I am going to give myself full credit for inventing this masterful word. Anyhow, both these docs were in the process of becoming anasthesiologist, and the smarmy one described going under as this: First, you give the patient and overdose of HEROIN; then you keep them as close to death as possible by having them breathe DRY CLEANING FUMES. And he described it in a really calm, cold sounding voice. I can just picture him being a cold-blooded killer, or peeling skin off of people. From the moment I sat down at their picnic table I felt my low back tensed in defensiveness. And then I narrowed it down to just the smarmy one.

The trip was good. We saw a few pig carcassas, remnants of the old days when wild boars roamed freely. We saw some nice wide stretches of ocean, and blessed a few moments of pure sunshine that broke up the otherwise overcast weather. There was lots of new spring green grass, and tons of clovers and licorice plants. There were also beautiful bright yellow flowers, and butterflies. The pack was weighing about 30, and I was feeling pretty good with it. The new walking poles and the new boots are awesome. We're going to be in some good shape to enjoy Kauai, come April!

Further thoughts on "things"

I have a bit more focus now on my prior "rant."

Sometimes I babysit for a Russian family from school. Both parents have a lot of education and have good jobs at countrywide. The father also has two other jobs, one of which is his own consulting business. My point: They have plenty of money. But you would never know it from their house. EVERYTHING in their house looks like it has been bought second hand. They haven't remodeled the old cupboards, or replaced the rickety screen doors, or bought a bunch of furniture (beds are all on the floor) or put up curtains. Their home is decidedly spartan. There is no attempt at making anything match, but then they don't really have much to match. But they don't mind paying me to come help the wife when the husband is away - and they only have two kids, so it isn't a necessity.

I think what I like about this is that there is no temptation for them to get their "identity" from the things around them. It is so tempting to do that. I do it. For example, my perky little plaid green scarf that instantly makes me feel so put together. Even when I change my pony tail from a high on to a low one, it's like the chemistry of my brain changes, and the tone of my thoughts change. I see it in others too. The nice car that gives their ego a boost. Or the fact that the majority of their confidence is coming from the sleek little phone in their hand, or the bud in their ear, or the fashionable shirt. Ahh, the tyranny of things! (Is that Tozer who says that?)

I don't know. I still don't feel like what I'm trying to say is actually being said, but maybe soon it will be.