From the archives — Growing up
What do you want to be when you grow up? Out of time, with some rhyme.
A grandmother. A writer. A dancer. A teacher. A partner. A traveler.
Always, a traveler.
There is a warm kitchen, with a huge table covered in flour. Dough is being made. Little one and a dog are scurrying underfoot; chasing each other’s tails, inhaling the warm smells of sweet and savory in the air. One pie is already in the oven, rising and preparing its assent on the family hunger. The other pie is being kneaded and formed, carefully sculpted into art by my hands, covered up to the elbow in flour. I have finally learned how to bake. I no longer worry about my own waistline. I indulge in being able to spoil through mountains of food and I have a whole afternoon to devote to preparing a lavish family meal. They will all gather around the table soon, but the little one will get the first warm delicious bite of his choosing because I am a grandmother and my job is to warmly love and yes, spoil to my heart’s content. The dog and the child play at my feet as the sun goes down.
There is a simple writing desk with books, a laptop, a hutch and no drawer. It is perfect, ergonomic, shaped for my fingers to lovingly glide across the keys and pages for hours, without a cramp or tingle in the fingertips (eradicated with modern medicine miracles). There is a small black notebook and a pen, one that is mostly in my purse because there must always be a notebook and pen within reach. The editor is waiting on the next draft, her comments cutting through the seeming fog of first thoughts that are like vapor, on paper. As much as I hate drafting and re-reading my work, I know that through the process I will get more clear, more crystal on what I am trying to express. It will pour out of me onto the page and leave an emptiness to be filled with more wonder, more understanding and more desire to experience life in its subtle, quiet moments of awe.
There is a red flowing scarf, anchored by my neck, following the movement of a tall slender figure in a black flowing dress. The remains of party makeup, slightly smeared by sweat, feet light, probingly glide and slide across the living room floor. Music comes on, strange in the late ungodly hour, but the energy still bubbles and bursts, pushing it’s way up and out, first through the corners of the mouth as they fully smile, together with the corners of the eyes. Soon the hands are involved, they take off the scarf and make it a dance partner. The feet continue to glide, the body starts to weave and turn over the notes as thought they were physically present, tangible. The music flows straight into the heart, which fills,expands, stealing the breath away from the body. The union of it all continues to sway and bend, as the red scarf and black dress dance around the pointed toes, the flowing fingers, the quick lift of the heels, the undulating hips, the arching back and bounce of the curls. Eyes closed.
The mats are stretched out in front of mine, bodies struggling to compose themselves, align, refine, and define their movement in the moment. I speak, lead, flow and watch. I connect to the music of the soundtrack created for the class, to the need for movement, the joy of the muscles contracting and stretching, the bodies in their peaceful struggle for connection of the mind to the body to the mat to the moment. I walk around the room, place hands on hips, backs, legs, and necks. Sometimes it is to smooth out, sometimes it is to elongate, to twist, and to bring about a different connection to the pose, the breath, in the moment. Releasing all thought I flow in the rhythm of the co-created movement. I lead, they follow, and we flow together towards connection to ourselves. I connect to a self that is outside of my day, outside of my role as lover, daughter, sister, marketer, writer, friend and partner. I am a conduit of peace, of flow, of joy in movement, calm and collected.
There is the feeling of uneasiness in looking into the eyes across and then the deep comfort of being able to gaze into them, knowing the mood evoked without the need to speak. There is it the gentle glide of fingertips against fingertips, a flutter of butterflies somewhere down deep. At first, an unfamiliar feeling of skin as the touch learns the face, and then the free movement of hands across the parts that need comfort, support, and grace — whether it is to soothe or excite, to extinguish or ignite — and knowing that, wanting that, needing that, beyond self. It starts there, and then it grows into flowers whose blossoms vary in their array of colors, shapes and sizes. Perhaps some are bright with emotion and ecstasy of the pleasure of a shared joke or laugh, a discovery and indulgence of a common interest, or of two bodies coming together in the pleasure of one another. Some flowers are a pleasing soft color of being a vessels of joy for another, each other, whether through surrender of a languid weekend morning with breakfast in bed, the surrender of a body for what-you-will vignette, the comfort of a shoulder to cry on, and a hand to hold when everything else around grows tired, difficult and old. Some flowers are dull and gray, of being one another’s respite in silence after a long hard day. Some flowers bloom in lively colors of toil, of creating turmoil in one another’s lives, of throwing the orderly pieces up in the air, in flight, and then re-arranging together, with symbiotic care and might. Perhaps deeper tones blossom with time, if life is created thought pain and pleasure of shared goals, genetically intertwined. A partnership rises, in garlands and wreaths. The careful and patient gardener is inspired to constantly water, weed and rake fallen leaves. The gardening slowly changes gardeners (there are two) and shapes the way a water molds stones. As years pass, their flowers blossom, wither and grow. They start to climb fences, wear away defenses, grow tall and intertwine, creating a canopy of color, shared rhythm and time. Sometimes, the two gardeners are afforded moments of curling underneath its shade in rest, protected and cradled for a shared moment, before rising up together to challenge another one of life’s changing tests.
The traveler cannot help but change. The road stretches and curves between these states, her destinations await. Some states have been visited, re-visited, re-imagines and re-ignited. Others transpire, inspire, on the horizon. The road can be lonely, but perhaps it does not have to be. For the traveler, her destinations are imagined best from the space in between. The white clouds, a space out of time, the in-flight limbo of rhythm and rhyme.
