Anne Lamott and other thoughts

Do y'all remember when I blogged EVERY day? For four straight years, if memory serves, I submitted a quotidian offering. How did I do that? And why?

I think I thought I had to, as if daily posts were a precondition for "successful blogging." And in many ways, I am so grateful I wrote with that frequency because, having no formal writing education on which to fall back, committing something to page on such a regular basis taught me that writing is the training of a muscle as well as the fanning of a creative flame. 

It is rare now (minus the February lulls and periods of political malaise) that I sit in front of an empty page without what feels like magic starting to percolate. Even if my thoughts go nowhere or read as awfully mundane, there is some shift internally that draws me always back like moth to light, like me to sunshine.

Last night, I met a group of women at the Strathmore arts center to hear Anne Lamott talk about mercy and grace and present her newest book, Hallelujah Anyway.

I have been an enormous fan of Anne's since first reading Operating Instructions more than a decade ago. It's one of those books that legitimately made me wheeze with stomach-cramping laughter and cause Tom to repeatedly ask, "What is going on over there?" It also made me think and tear up and feel grateful that slightly-zany Anne of the smart, progressive, troubled parents found her way to writing and got clean.

Then I read Traveling Mercies and thought as deeply as I'd laughed in Operating Instructions and highlighted and notated with the mad desire to not forget the wisdom she seemed to be spilling on every page and wondered about her devout Christianity even though she explained it so well. 

Other than the timbre of her voice not sounding precisely how I'd heard it in my mind, Anne was so totally herself last night, and I found that marvelous. Barbara Kingsolver was, many years ago at the National Cathedral, not at all what I'd imagined, and I remain crushed. Because The Poisonwood Bible. 

But anyway, Anne. Her hair was lassoed with both ponytail holder and hair band, but I could nonetheless discern the wild, blond frizz she's described so many times. She talked about Pammy, and her Jesuit friend, and Sam, and Veronica, and I felt myself nodding, as if she were talking about mutual friends. She was funny and deadpan and loopy and candid. She despises Trump and teaches Sunday school and told us to care for the poor more times than I could count. She is smart and anxious and beautifully imperfect, and as through her pen, wisdom spilled from her voice.

It is both powerful and comforting to encounter such an open, authentic being. I felt the sort of gratitude that comes when you can really trust someone, not least someone who has so bravely shared her flaws and fears with the world. I am always drawn to her sort of honesty and lack of pretense. Really, it's the way I want to go about in the world. It seems both efficient and connective, and I appreciate both.

Just before she opened the floor to questions, she read a passage from Hallelujah Anyway about a friend's son committing suicide. I want to leave you with this tonight as I found it a truly profound reframing of what is often considered a heinous, selfish act and also a truly profound use of writing to teach and provoke. 

Then Ann, at peace and in grief, stood up trembling and shared the note he had left for her. Like most suicide notes, it said, I have to do this. I'm sorry. Please forgive me and release me. Don't be sad. And I love you; love you. Then she called forth Jay, in baby baths, at the beach, on a trike, at the prom, and here, smoking and resting among the flowers. She gave thanks for the gestational period of ten months they'd spent together at what turned out to be the end, for the communion and care he received and gave to Ann, for that time they had needed so badly, an intimacy most of us cannot imagine.

In the garden, where he had walked, paced, rested, we were holding him and releasing him, inside the ring of trees, ferns, rosebushes, a cherry plum. ...How could this have happened? How can such pain exist? ...How could doctors not help him, with all those meds and treatments, not help him get free of that bad brain any other way? He was at the mercy of it, of bad brain, yet he held out so long, for Ann, to help her. So mercy has claws, too, that don't easily let go.

...Every release inside us releases whatever energy inside us tethered Jay here, to this realm that was just too awful for him. We were saying, This is hard, but not as hard as it was for you here, weighed down by the anchors of so-called reality. So go now, go, unfettered.

Stunning, huh.

To bask in sunshiney warmth.

After a truly horrendous trip from D.C. to Lake Charles on Friday (twelve hours total; last flight had no water in the bathroom), we have relaxed in the most wonderful ways. 

Early morning fog over the bayou

We awoke yesterday to the most glorious cape of fog draped over the bayou's shoulders. It burned off and then the rains came. Dad and I went to the SW Louisiana garden show where we attended a fantastic session on growing herbs. Did you know that dill is a solo performer? Dill is not friendly! Plant it by itself or with at least a foot of space all around. 

When we emerged from the expo, the sun was shining, and the remainder of the day was a stunner. Dad and Oliver took the canoe out and tipped it around the bend from home. It took them a long while to bail out, and Ol later told me that he was worried the entire time that a hibernating alligator would wake up and eat him. Poor kiddo. I must say those beasts scare me too.

An enormous pelican glided down the bayou, his huge brown wings arcing out and over, tips just piercing the water's surface, a slight wake left in its path.  You don't often see pelicans around here. It was such a beauty.

The brown pelican is LA's state bird.  

It paddled back down at a rapid clip before edging out of sight. Meanwhile, a bluebird peeked out of its house and then picked through the grass for food and nest materials. A lizard sunned in full camouflage on a long amaryllis leaf, a graceful white egret fished on the shore opposite us, and a majestic blue heron swept by repeatedly.

Today was another beaut, and the warmest yet. We had a lazy morning-I spent most of it in a super comfortable reclining chaise in the yard-before being picked up by some of my parents' friends for an afternoon on their marvelous pontoon boat. I am telling y'all- this weather and natural beauty and wide open space are all desperately good for a winter-weary soul.

I never tire of Spanish moss. 

I'm in bed already, tuckered out in the best way after two full days of sunshine and family. Hope y'all are well!!

On and off the mat

I know I’m supposed to settle zen-like into any spot, but every Wednesday, I subtly scan the studio while getting my mats and blocks and the strap I hate, trying to ascertain which of the remaining openings will best allow me to work and breathe and flow.

Mouth breathers and moaners try my nerves as do the chatterbugs. Except for the teacher’s even voice and some swishing as positions are adjusted, yoga should be silent. That is one reason I go. To work hard and practice mindfulness and revel in some damn peace and quiet.

I choose the spot near the door and under the fire alarm, stacking my props neatly behind me in the space between mat and wall. When I’ve acclimated to the warmer room, I bunch my socks into a tiny parcel, and tuck them under the folded-four-times blanket.

I find, in yoga, that different moods during different weeks draw me to different blanket colors. Today I choose the festive new orange and green one, both shades bright but not obnoxious. Happy and soothing like fiesta decor or sun-kissed Greek facades.

I brought some fiery red angst into class with me this morning. Fresh off of a Facebook joust with an acquaintance of my sister, I’d gone through Trump’s proposed budget cuts and stood up for the arts, LGBTQ rights at the federal versus state levels, public transportation, and effective anti-poverty measures before 9am. The acquaintance values none of those things and cares not if they are tossed out with the bathwater.

I cannot see how we can be in community with others who only wish to support and fund the exact things THEY care for while refusing space for any other values or passions to enter the mix. That is not community. That is a bunch of exclusionary islands, all sharp angles and squared corners, bashing into each other before settling at cool distances, no unity in sight. 

I am ten minutes early to class and so, after unrolling my two mats-two because of my bony back body-I lie down and shut my eyes, exhaling the ugly parry and inhaling Om. The sizzle in my chest is quieting when my hair is brushed aside by the ungainly tossing down of mats, blocks, straps, and Grip-Itz next door: that last spot has been claimed by someone with a generous array of accoutrements.

The intrusion into my limited rectangle of personal space continues for the next 75 minutes. I take this as a yogic challenge. 24" x 68" plus change is plenty, isn’t it? Is it?

My minds sweeps back to a book I first read more than a decade ago: Appetites. It is profound in many ways, changing and helping me evolve each and every time I make my way through the now worn, notated, fading pages. In it the author, Caroline Knapp, discusses how we, especially women, do not feel our appetites, our desires, are worthy. And so we rein them in, mashing and folding and constraining them into the tiniest boxes possible, regardless of the costs of doing so. Which are usually great.

I think about how I’ve so neatly and thoughtfully tucked my props behind me, not wanting to intrude into or steal from my wing-women’s spaces. And yet the mate on my port side does just that. Does she notice? Care? Should I applaud her? I don’t. I’m annoyed. And as class unfolds, I casually, gently, forcefully push her strap off of my mat, her blankets away from my thigh, her panoply of blocks away, away, away.

Should I then applaud myself? For claiming my meager space in this studio? For having stood up to a white guy who hates the arts and thinks the EPA and the Department of Ed should be abolished and who’s irritated by funding public transportation (because “no one subsidizes my commute”) but supports the building of a huge fucking wall on our southern border? Why should I subsidize his fear and bigotry?

Class is underway, and I square my hips toward the front wall as I am instructed. I think about how often I so neatly and thoughtfully tuck myself around others and what they want and need, most always leaving the bitty leftovers to fill in my own contours. I am hypermobile and must balance my Gumby tendencies with more demure positions that “protect and further” my stability. This irritates me, and I consider it a second yogic challenge: how can I be so open and flexible in some respects while so rigid in others?

I consider again my body, front and back, the boundaries, the extent of my skin, my breath, my arms in various positions: robot, cactus, T (for which there is no space today). Are my ribs constrained by my hands taking in their extension and shrinkage? Or are they limited by fascia and physiology over which I have no dominion? Or both?

Can I feel as if I’m lying flat on the mat but still melt more? Like butter through a grate? Can I extend beyond my bit of space without shrugging into what I want versus what I deserve? Is it worth sternal friction to try in some way, any way, to stand up for the values I think are right for this country?  For myself? Those that are most inclusionary and expansive? Those that feel selfish but are anything but?

On Friday, I am taking my boys to my homeland: Louisiana. Door to door, from my house to my parents’, it’s about eight hours and includes two plane rides. The kids are great travelers, but we are leaving the house well before 6am, and this week has been many things. Easy is not one of them.

I am tired. My interest in Minecraft and made-up story lines is waning, but I am forever the literal, rule-oriented mother aware of both optimal screen time and the direction towards which my toes and knees should be pointing. This elicits what could be called yogic challenge 3: the degrees to which my borders and boundaries should be malleable and are versus aren't.

Being a hypermobile person, I have experienced rubber band ligaments as well as silly putty bounds. I have learned that while both feel quite nice, neither is actually too healthy. I consider that consistently stable positionality is a worthy goal. Even when it pushes the tide against my bow and is uncomfortable and frustrating. It is possible that more stringent limits might actually lead to greater liberation. Of self. In life.

And perhaps that’s really the constraint and emancipation offered by the mat. What seems to be a bounded bit of rubber is in fact only the launch pad. But before lift-off, you must stand up for but question yourself, set boundaries but accept some overreach and erosion of them, stretch but focus on a stable core. Otherwise? The noise muffles the peace, and the middle doesn't hold.