Disintegration, Breves and Organic Coconut Ice Cream
sunkissed or heatstroked?
Dear friends, okay…I’m doing “yoga” again after about a month hiatus. Not doing yoga had to do, really, with wanting to be more integrated and not wanting it to be something I did, but rather some way I lived. I’ve been far from it in many ways. And because I couldn’t have it all, I opted for nothing and everyone started to worry. I, too, knew I was in danger of losing my practice altogether. So, I’ve started with Bikram, which isn’t really even yoga as it lacks a spiritual dimension that I think is important, but they have an awesome introductory price. All of the teachers are clones of one another. They say terrible things like “pull on your heels and lock your knees creating a tremendous pain sensation in the backs of your legs.” What? One guy even said “Welcome to hell.” He may have only been referring to the heat, but somehow I think they must follow the “no pain no gain” school of thought. I signed up for a month. I suppose that is about how long it takes you to become addicted which, I can see, would happen. The heat, the sweating, the way the body gets more open each time, the urging of the instructor to raise the corners of your mouth. Making you believe that its okay to live in this non integrated way, having a job that requires a snail’s pace, getting through by treating yourself to too many breves and organic ice cream and at the end of the day, working it out in 110 degrees. I’m not sure any of it leads to health. When my month is over, I’m checking out the one month introductory special over at Yoga Mountain…but for now, I lift the corners of my mouth and lick the edges for any leftover hints of sweetness as I smile artificially to myself in the mirror.
So, although my life is feeling less integrated than even, I’ve started to collect ideas for art projects. Today I was enamored with almost everything I looked at–the patterns and colors. The simplicity of everyday objects. I’ve been making patterns with beads at school with Alex and now all the other 5 year old boys want to bead. They are doing some weaving in Kat and Jessica’s class that makes me fall in love with yarn. I collected leaves one morning with my students and did some leaf rubbings. They are really awesome and I’ve been noticing a lot of very interesting ironworks that I’d like to take rubbings of. The retaining wall just beyond Morton Lane has some really lovely painted areas that I documented last weekend. I’ll leave you with a view of that.
San Anselmo Wall (painting ideas)
Ps. I love Emily Gould and if you don’t know who she is, she is the former co-editor of Gawker.com. Emily had an affair with Joshua David Stein and put it in a blog anonymously called heartbreaksoup. She is really funny and clever and sometimes I spend way too much time reading her blog, but not as much as formerly because now so many entries are password protected. I wonder if Emily would be interested in my password protected story about cyber affairs?
