Solstice Rambling
The warmth of the sun shines through my office window, and I peer through it from beneath my glasses. It warms me. It’s the Winter Solstice, my favorite holiday to celebrate in a lot of ways. It’s a harsh journey to get here, to get to this day. The longest night of the year, the light waning and it feels so chilly. The clouds so grey and dull, blanketing my Seattle area world like a warm knitted scarf.
All year long I watched the wheel of the year turn, slowly, quickly, simultaneously. Life really has been something else this year. I don’t really say that every year. I had several years where life was not so exciting. Not so pivotal. Suddenly I understand the worth of those years. The worth that I thought was nothing but a source of frustration, was beyond measure and I would only come to see that now. When the converse is happening.
Change. It’s happening all over the place, it probably always is. But the last quarter of this year it has been anything but subtle for me. I started out the end of 2011 beginning my Bikram Yoga Teaching Journey. All caps to each word. I don’t even know what to say about this journey. Littered with joy and heart break. Littered with growth and things I have yet to understand about why and how it is done, what this process truly is.
I started 2012 without any clue of what was awaiting me. Friendships changed. My Grandma’s End Times started early in the year. My brother came back to the family and is finishing up the year divorcing the woman who separated him from the family. Grandma brought him back, as her last major deed, into the family again.
Court, a family divide and drama - bad people, good people. Elder abuse over the sake of money.
Walking through that door finding grandma in a state that none of us will ever forget.
That day after I taught a class Renton, we all met up for a well fare check. Ambulance ride to the hospital. I would put words to this, but I don’t think you all really need to know the nasty details. She was okay - kind of. She was never the same.
She was going to die, but that was not how it was supposed to be. Not in neglect and horror. And she didn’t die. Hardy woman. Worse yet - that Grandpa saw his wife of 60 years in this state and felt helpless to it. There no words for this kind of tragedy. But it passed, it was seen in 2012, it happened. And she recovered for a while. We kept her safe, we pulled some magic with Jill and Jeff and the court house and ingenuity and desperation to protect those who needed protection. The nasty rotting filth that found its way into the family, wormed its way into our close knit, beautiful family… well, it was dealt with. Money I had intended on going towards TT debt repayment, along with money from the Marysville people… went towards fighting this nasty, dreadful cause. Them more than me, but I did what I could.
More my time an energy would soon be drawn towards being the one that the responsibility of management of those once-stolen funds would fall into my lap. Ready or not, It was Me.
And Grandma died.
At the right time.
She was amazing until the very end. And I got to say everything - everything I wanted to say to her, before she went.
She knew what I was saying. Felt it, returned it.
"I love you more than you know," she said. An absurd woman at times, she was a gift of a human, deeply generous, spirited, beautiful. Impossible to forget her Essence, her Energy, her Love.
And this Samhain I was too busy to honor my Sacred Dead. And yet - it's better to honor them all year long, isn't it?
And then...
Being a new teacher of Bikram Yoga isn’t a picnic. Juggling it on the side of my 40 hour work week and everything else…
Whatever the case, I knew I wanted to be involved in Rite of Sol. I made it my goal. Even if I mopped the floors instead of partied on the cast. I didn’t care. I wanted to be involved this time. I sought the best person ever for my audition, Amanda. And she pulled my talent straight out of me and we made an audition. Bless her heart.
They put me on the cast. And began my journey into change. More change. The family settled. I continued to teach. I found different studios and continued to teach. My practice waned. I built a relationship with my cast mates in Rite of Sol. The Sun Shone on me. Every week I was in love with the work, but scared and unsure of myself. Always scared and unsure of me.
Regardless, I worked and learned on that show with the people who had done it before, and some of those who have not. I met new people and fell deeply fond of them.
And then we performed in the show and it was an experience that I never had before. I would go into all of it, I really would… but there’s not enough time to do that just yet. And for that period of time those people were my special family. On stage, back stage. We shared so much. Magic.
And after the show, my life was never the same. An exhausting endeavor as I took no time off work and spent the week of tech week in the theater until 10pm every day. Then the show. Then after the show, I had no lag between a double schedule of teaching.
The following 3 weeks nearly killed me. I had an ongoing cold that had caught me pretty much after August and continued through the end November. In December, finally my body fought it off. It made teaching and working and living and sorting my life so hard and draining. Coughing constantly. Stuff in my throat. And early on, losing my voice.
I didn’t feel like myself with the weird cold morphing and morphing and not getting any better.
My men had it before me, but it did seem to linger and pass along to the cast from all over. Who knows.
Goodness only knows. I had a system, a life, it worked. And then the show happened.
I wish I could write more, but perhaps not publicly, about what changed. What’s happening? But suffice to say; step by step I let life open itself up. Moment by moment I live. I just know nothing will ever be the same in my life and I am beginning to accept that change doesn't have to be a bad thing. It can be in and of itself for the best even if it means a little bud into bloom pain.
The things we aren’t looking for, are the ones we need? I wasn't looking for you, MSH.
I will write about 2013 and my focus in another post. For now I will simply say I have one philosophy, outside of BALANCE - that I intend to employ for the beginning of 2013:
• I love you.
• I'm sorry.
• Please forgive me.
• Thank you.
-Angela
All year long I watched the wheel of the year turn, slowly, quickly, simultaneously. Life really has been something else this year. I don’t really say that every year. I had several years where life was not so exciting. Not so pivotal. Suddenly I understand the worth of those years. The worth that I thought was nothing but a source of frustration, was beyond measure and I would only come to see that now. When the converse is happening.
Change. It’s happening all over the place, it probably always is. But the last quarter of this year it has been anything but subtle for me. I started out the end of 2011 beginning my Bikram Yoga Teaching Journey. All caps to each word. I don’t even know what to say about this journey. Littered with joy and heart break. Littered with growth and things I have yet to understand about why and how it is done, what this process truly is.
I started 2012 without any clue of what was awaiting me. Friendships changed. My Grandma’s End Times started early in the year. My brother came back to the family and is finishing up the year divorcing the woman who separated him from the family. Grandma brought him back, as her last major deed, into the family again.
Court, a family divide and drama - bad people, good people. Elder abuse over the sake of money.
Walking through that door finding grandma in a state that none of us will ever forget.
That day after I taught a class Renton, we all met up for a well fare check. Ambulance ride to the hospital. I would put words to this, but I don’t think you all really need to know the nasty details. She was okay - kind of. She was never the same.
She was going to die, but that was not how it was supposed to be. Not in neglect and horror. And she didn’t die. Hardy woman. Worse yet - that Grandpa saw his wife of 60 years in this state and felt helpless to it. There no words for this kind of tragedy. But it passed, it was seen in 2012, it happened. And she recovered for a while. We kept her safe, we pulled some magic with Jill and Jeff and the court house and ingenuity and desperation to protect those who needed protection. The nasty rotting filth that found its way into the family, wormed its way into our close knit, beautiful family… well, it was dealt with. Money I had intended on going towards TT debt repayment, along with money from the Marysville people… went towards fighting this nasty, dreadful cause. Them more than me, but I did what I could.
More my time an energy would soon be drawn towards being the one that the responsibility of management of those once-stolen funds would fall into my lap. Ready or not, It was Me.
And Grandma died.
At the right time.
She was amazing until the very end. And I got to say everything - everything I wanted to say to her, before she went.
She knew what I was saying. Felt it, returned it.
"I love you more than you know," she said. An absurd woman at times, she was a gift of a human, deeply generous, spirited, beautiful. Impossible to forget her Essence, her Energy, her Love.
And this Samhain I was too busy to honor my Sacred Dead. And yet - it's better to honor them all year long, isn't it?
And then...
Being a new teacher of Bikram Yoga isn’t a picnic. Juggling it on the side of my 40 hour work week and everything else…
Whatever the case, I knew I wanted to be involved in Rite of Sol. I made it my goal. Even if I mopped the floors instead of partied on the cast. I didn’t care. I wanted to be involved this time. I sought the best person ever for my audition, Amanda. And she pulled my talent straight out of me and we made an audition. Bless her heart.
They put me on the cast. And began my journey into change. More change. The family settled. I continued to teach. I found different studios and continued to teach. My practice waned. I built a relationship with my cast mates in Rite of Sol. The Sun Shone on me. Every week I was in love with the work, but scared and unsure of myself. Always scared and unsure of me.
Regardless, I worked and learned on that show with the people who had done it before, and some of those who have not. I met new people and fell deeply fond of them.
And then we performed in the show and it was an experience that I never had before. I would go into all of it, I really would… but there’s not enough time to do that just yet. And for that period of time those people were my special family. On stage, back stage. We shared so much. Magic.
And after the show, my life was never the same. An exhausting endeavor as I took no time off work and spent the week of tech week in the theater until 10pm every day. Then the show. Then after the show, I had no lag between a double schedule of teaching.
The following 3 weeks nearly killed me. I had an ongoing cold that had caught me pretty much after August and continued through the end November. In December, finally my body fought it off. It made teaching and working and living and sorting my life so hard and draining. Coughing constantly. Stuff in my throat. And early on, losing my voice.
I didn’t feel like myself with the weird cold morphing and morphing and not getting any better.
My men had it before me, but it did seem to linger and pass along to the cast from all over. Who knows.
Goodness only knows. I had a system, a life, it worked. And then the show happened.
I wish I could write more, but perhaps not publicly, about what changed. What’s happening? But suffice to say; step by step I let life open itself up. Moment by moment I live. I just know nothing will ever be the same in my life and I am beginning to accept that change doesn't have to be a bad thing. It can be in and of itself for the best even if it means a little bud into bloom pain.
The things we aren’t looking for, are the ones we need? I wasn't looking for you, MSH.
I will write about 2013 and my focus in another post. For now I will simply say I have one philosophy, outside of BALANCE - that I intend to employ for the beginning of 2013:
• I love you.
• I'm sorry.
• Please forgive me.
• Thank you.
-Angela