I forgive Ann Coulter

This morning I was laying in savasana (corpse pose, like as if you were dead on your back with eyes closed), thinking about someone that really pissed me off, one of those people in your life who just won’t stop being annoying or manipulative no matter how much time passes and I have to say it took everything I had not to scream at said person with skill and self-righteous vigor.

Deep breath.

So I’m laying there, trying to feel peaceful and spiritual but of course I can’t because as soon as one thing gets under my skin then it’s caged veal calves and people dying in Iraq and MRSA and damn that Mark Morford for writing about that huge plastic “continent” in the Pacific Ocean and Ann Coulter is just so, so unbelievably unbelievable (sorry, I just can’t waste brain power on an adjective for her). So I am very far from breathing peacefully and connecting with my angels and guides and my stomach is churning and…and…and…

A quote from Jack Kornfield flickers in my consciousness like a feeble candle All thoughtless actions are the result of ignorance and blindness (I’m probably quoting it wrong, but it’s something like that). He tells a story about a man that got really upset that a woman knocked into him and spilled his groceries everywhere; as he was about to yell at her, she turned and he saw that she was blind. His heart melted.

So as I’m laying there, breathing in corpse pose with one hand on my chest and another on my belly, I think of all of those instigators with black Stevie Wonder sunglasses on and my heart melts.

Going with the Flow

I wake up today and I realize I’m dreaming and I’m not really working as a housekeeper. I think I got stuck on that because I went to sleep longing for one…

Scirocco bounced in on me this morning, Tigger-style, ready to get up and out. I, needing coffee and a hot shower, am a little slower to get vertical. Thus, she is one minute late to school.

This is an old pattern.

I comfort myself with the fact that she has had a good breakfast and has a good lunch and is dressed in clean clothes and has brushed teeth.

These are minor miracles, but fulfilling, especially when they happen all at once.

I long for coffee, but my car has seemingly driven itself to my house and parked in the driveway. I don’t really want to go to yoga class, so I sit in my car and listen to KPFA and eat the popcorn that I popped for said daughter to bring to school to share with her friends. I make it inside, look at my email, The Huffington Post, Salon…I shower. I go to yoga. Because my friend Nubia is teaching, I decide I am going to be early and forgo coffee. As a result, I move through class like an underwater creature.

After class, Yoga Garden owner Janice Gates and I chat, she’s going to write a piece for Yogi Times on Yoga and Vipassana Meditation. She’s the author of an incredible book, Yogini.

I drive Nubia home and she (thank God) makes me coffee…her husband Jai Uttal greets us in sweats with a big smile and his hair all ruffled. He’s a musician, so his internal clock is set to wake up a little later. We sit in their kitchen, overflowing with their son’s toys…we discuss the importance of taking care of ourselves and not doing too much…there’s a knock at the door and soon Jai’s music partner, Ben Leinbach and his wife Elizabeth and their two sons, Hugo and newborn Axel, are gathered inside. We all sprawl out on the floor laughing and talking. The girls about Waldorf philosophy and weaning…the boys reading “Is Your Mama a Lama?” to Hugo…Nubia’s eating tempeh and veggies, Jai, Ben and Hugo eat burritos, I silently thank the coffee gods.

Then we all disperse into our day…Jai and Ben into the recording studio to work on their new CD, Nubia to dance class, Elizabeth to play with her two boys, and me, back to my desk to decipher blogging…where has the day gone…