IN BLOOM I

Spring in Oregon is truly a wild thing.  Wildly flowery, it’s not uncommon for it to rain both water and petals this time of year.  End of Winter wind raucously blowing the petals all around and everywhere, they stick to vehicles, roads, sidewalks, and the bottom of your shoes.

The sun making it’s hesitant presence every four days or so.  At the end of Winter, we will it to stay out a little longer.

Those stubborn little soldiers, daffodils, popping out of the ground first.  You’ll see daffodils everywhere here.  Along the sides of country roads, in people’s front yards, springing up in a grassy area at a country gas station.

My parents took H to California to visit my parents.  The silence is deafening.  Things stay where I leave them.  There are no steady stream of tiny messes to clean up.  I feel as though I’m missing a limb, I miss him terribly.  We’ve been Facetiming each morning, but it’s not the same as hearing, Mama, mama, when you wake up and being able to give him a squeeze.

I went to yoga, I went out with some AAers on Saturday night, I bought my dinner at a local farm/co-op.

Blooms & blooms everywhere.

I went to a barre class, have any of you gone to those?  Wow, what a great work out!  Plus, I really thought I would die or fall over a couple of times.  I’m not sure if it will be a regular thing or not.  They offer child care too, which is a game changer for us mamas.  I thought during the class, this is hard but maybe I could teach this too?  They happened to have a teacher informational class set up for the next day so I went.  They talked with us a bit, gently telling us about what it takes to be a barre teacher, the reasons why we wouldn’t get chosen, and that we weren’t in competition with each other.  I was surprised by this, I assumed anyone would be able to train to teach, whether or not you get ultimately hired, that’s a whole other story, I know this well from going through yoga teacher training and then pounding the pavement for a job.

After they spoke to us they had us take a half hour class while one teacher observed.  About half way through I really believed I might pass out, but the willfulness within me wouldn’t let me step away from the bar (not the first bar I should have walked away from sooner than later, hehe).  At that point I realized that teaching/doing barre may take much time and be a lot harder than it looks!  I got a really polite email that very night informing me that it wasn’t yet meant to be.  The whole experience made me think.  They alluded during that class that some women present had come back again, which lets me know that these women had gotten that same email but still managed to work hard and come back.

And it makes me think about that HP’s will.  Like when to kick the door down or not.  I’ve heard it said that if you feel scared or uncomfortable, then it’s an indicator that you are walking in your HP’s will.  I’ve heard it said the opposite way too.  Sometimes it’s hard to know which one to believe.  Lately I’ve been feeling an itch, to go to another training, to possibly pursue prenatal yoga.  The barre adventure was an extension of this urge.  I also have a grounded desire to let things be as they are for now since we’re coming up on Summer and different vacations.  When I first got sober I was so scared to take different steps, convinced I would drink again if I took the wrong one.  I feel way more peaceful about it now, I know from experience that if I am willing to take a chance and make a big mistake I will be the one to suffer the consequences.  Some parts of being sober and living a good life are easy.  We sometimes choose the better path because we don’t want to get kicked in the booty.  Very scientific explanation, I know.

In other news, my old cat died.  He came from another life, when I was married, before I knew more about things like the will of a higher power (looking forward to learning much more about that, of course).  I remember the day I went to the shelter to get him.  I wanted two cats to keep each other company.  I was immediately drawn to a grey female, but her brother, a black and white colored male locked eyes with me and stepped over his brothers and sisters to walk towards me.  That was enough confirmation.  Hendrix, named after that great musician.  His liver failed two nights ago, in his new home back in Long Beach.  I had always wanted to build a lattice type of wall on a porch as they were in door cats.  His last owner lives in a high rise loft.  Windows and porch open in good weather, which is always generally good in SoCal, he could come and go as he pleased.  I did get anxious about him jumping, but he never did.  RIP Hendrix.  You knocked over my water always when I least expected it, you terrorized large dogs and raccoons, but you were the best cuddler I ever met.  You were such a cool cat.

Wishing you all fresh blooms physical & spiritual.

~Namaste