Trailer Park Karma

For My Birthday, A Gift For You: Breath

I love my yoga instructor. Well, not that way, although he is pretty cute. He's also young enough to be my son. Like a lot of folks, though, he seems to be older on the inside than the outside. 
One of the reasons I chose to continue on with his classes after my coupon expired (you didn't think I just wandered in and paid full price, did you?!) was because of what he says in-between asanas (that's what you call a yoga pose.) Actually, he talks while we're twisted like pretzels and struggling to breathe, too. He talks a lot. But quietly, with warmth and equanimity in his voice. 

Mostly, he talks about breathing. 

Breathing is a big deal.
Just ask anyone who's ever not been able to do it.

I grew up with asthma before there were preventive medicines for it. Have I told you that before? Once a year, every year, usually during the first cold snap, I'd be bed-ridden for a week or two. Not completely debilitated, certainly not crippled, just trying to breathe. I never really thought much about my annual asthma experiences, since they were all I'd known, until a friend in 4th grade sent me a flowery get-well card. "I hope you're okay," she wrote. That got me to wondering...

Fourth grade is about the time most of us start pondering mortality, at least a little bit. By then, you've lost a gerbil (or two) to whatever kills gerbils. You've spotted a dead bird or cat or dog on the way to the bus stop. You might have even been to a funeral or at least stayed with a sitter while your folks went to one. And I was already a little too serious about everything by my 10th year. I recall the acute grief and depression that set in when I turned 10 because -- true story -- I was "a whole decade old and hadn't accomplished anything with my life yet." 

I can't make that stuff up.

So I used to lie in bed in the burbs of Swamp City, with the humidifier pumping steam from the carpeted floor next to me (you health nuts can add up that equation), doing nothing more than trying to breathe. For days. Weeks. Imagine it. You're an otherwise super healthy kid with all the energy that entails. You like school okay. You love your friends. Even your family is cool. Plenty of reasons to be up and about -- except for that pesky inability to breathe. So you lie there. Some days you can barely even stay awake to read. And this was back in the day before TVs in kids' bedrooms, but I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have managed to keep my eyes open on those days anyway. 

Heck, think about doing that now, in your old age. Kinda makes your skin crawl to imagine it, hours and hours and hours of just lying there, staring at the ceiling, listening to the radio, knowing that life was going on without you outside the room. Bless my sisters' hearts for occasionally coming in to make me laugh. Making me laugh was reason enough to make me laugh. I couldn't do it. And our funnybones were tickled as my lungs convulsed with the attempt. Remember those cartoon dogs, Muttley and Mumbley? Pretty funny, I was.

Once I got the idea from my 4th grade friend that I might possibly not be okay, and this on the heels of my Decade Despondency, a new friend entered the room with my asthma: anxiety about dying. I worried that if I let sleep overtake me during an asthma attack, I might not wake up. I never told my parents about the fear, but the thing is, if I had, they would've just lied to soothe my panic. You can't in all earnesty tell anyone that they won't die. You don't know. They don't either. I remember how floored I was as an adult when I saw the movie "The Hand That Rocks the Cradle." The scene where the innocent young mom dies, grasping for her inhaler? Yeah. I don't even remember the rest of the movie, I was too busy freaking out having seen that what I'd always feared as a child could actually happen. Nothing like a little fresh anxiety to spice up your existence, even if I'd outgrown asthma by then.

"Take in each breath as if it's your last," my yoga instructor said, "because it is the last one like that one. And let it all go in the exhale."

"Just stop thinking and do it. You have the strength." (More words of wisdom from the young yogi.)

Oh, the other reason I chose to continue with my yoga instructor? It's because he kicks our asses relentlessly. I'm well on my way to an unassisted forearm stand. Can't beat that for 51.

Another Year, Another Haircut. And A Hawk.

A year back, Burb Dawg and I headed to camp by a lake in a 1-person (+1-dog) tent in freezing temperatures. I brought a block of the best frozen chicken beer chili in the world, heated it on my camp stove, and indulged in a single Lone Star. At midnight, we watched through the tent flap as fireworks shot up over the lake. 

It was one of my fondest New Year's Eves. 




This year, I teared up a bit, remembering how just looking out any window of my little house in The Sticks could take my breath away. The views are etched into my brain, and I pull them to mind regularly. If you ever see me with a stupid smile and a faraway gaze, that's probably where I am.

I'm not a fan of driving around the amateurs on New Year's Eve. If you can't drive cross-eyed without plowing into something or somebody, those of us who've mastered the skill wish you'd stay home. So I spent the day putzing about, pondering the evening's possibilities. That afternoon, I did laundry. Dinner might have been simply enough popcorn to feed 10 (with only The Editor and me to quibble over it), but what I craved was mussels marinara. Instead of the fancy champagne drink I learned about from The Republic's fancy monthly magazine, I considered settling for a couple of leftover glasses of the cheap red wine I used to marinate beef for the old folks' lunch earlier this week. And Burb Dawg got a nice long, ball-fetchin' walk at the little league field.

That's where the hawk comes in.

Have I mentioned how stupidly giddy I get when I see a hawk? The seven-year-old Dr. Doolittle fan in me likes to think hawks appear for my benefit. And that doesn't happen in Swamp City too often (unless you live in the Burbs, like I used to...)

The first time I saw this guy, he was soaring way, way overhead as I hung laundry. Hopefully none of my neighbors witnessed my jaw drop and goofy grin. But you can believe I stopped pinnin' washrags for a minute to watch. 

I saw him again from the backyard a few weeks later, with The Editor. Just a hawk, brownish and white from way down here, soaring around over Ratville.

Then on the last day of 2011... In between tossing the slime-and-dirt-covered ball for Burb Dawg and keeping a close eye on the chain link fence for the litter of tiny pups who squeeze out from under to say hello, I was enjoying the big flocks of grackles, doves, and parrots (yes, parrots) as they meandered and waddled, squawking and cooing, over the ball fields. It's pretty great to watch them all take off when the Dawg runs near, all flashes and flutters of bright green in the air. The flock, several hundred strong, decided the treetops were a safer perch, at least until our ball throwing took us beyond their realm. 



A few minutes later, a loud ruckus arose from behind me, and I turned to see grey, black, and green wings flapping frantically against the overcast backdrop. High over the scattering birds, my hawk friend dipped and dove. Just for me.

I walked home with Burb Dawg as he valiantly carried his jingle bell ball. Then without a smidge of hesitation, I cut off seven inches of my hair.

Happy New Year.