Category: Self-Improvement

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Yoga

Yoga

eleven minutes

I made it half the set time

before collapsing

Let’s just say I have some work to do. Some stamina to build. Some endurance to increase.

On the heels of walking one mile this morning, I squeezed into my yoga pants, rolled out my mat, and clicked on the Yoga With Adriene YouTube channel my daughter recommended, determined to feel the Namaste vibe and increase my elasticity of muscles and ease of mobility. After half of the session time, after coming back to my knees from Downward Dog and stretching an arm upward and behind me, I keeled over like a waterlogged canoe and gave up on the quest for deep inner peace through slow movement and bodily stretching for the morning.

I have a long list of all the things I want to learn, do, and try. Yoga is one new practice that I’m determined to stick with, and as I go through the steps of learning new and different things, I am reminded in powerful ways as a recently retired educator that learning, no matter the age and stage of life, is a process. I’m also convinced that you can teach and old dog new tricks.

This Old Downward Dog is looking forward to the challenge of growing and keeping the learning and living going full steam ahead. As they say: a body in motion stays in motion. And I’m determined to keep my canoe upright.

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Mahjongg 101

I have a looonnnnngggg list of things I want to learn and do in retirement. One is learning to play Mahjongg, a classic Chinese tile game sweeping the nation in popularity as it experiences a resurgence in its American form. I’ve seen groups playing it everywhere, including inside a Chicken Salad Chick fast food restaurant when I went in for lunch one afternoon. I’ve played a version of the game on my phone, but I’ve never learned the traditional tile game.

Until yesterday.

My friend and former teaching colleague Christian and I went together to the Griffin-Spalding County Library to take part in an introductory class taught by two ladies who came all the way from Augusta to teach beginners. They will be returning in a couple of weeks for the next session, and after two hours of strategy and rules in this new adventure, we both hurried to the counter to sign up for the next session.

We’ve caught Mahjongg Fever.

Mahjongg 101 Students

we both just retired

former teammates, always friends

learning a new game

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August Retirement: Firing up the Treadmill

One of my goals in retirement is to exercise for 20 minutes at least 3 times a week. They say a body in motion stays in motion….so I’m heeding the words of all the wellness experts and listening closely to their sage wisdom. This morning, I walked a mile on the inheritance treadmill Dad pulled from the river house rubble a decade ago. No injuries happened in the walking of this mile, and if my children are reading, I’d like it to be noted that I held on to the handrails and double-knotted my Hokas.

Firing Up the Treadmill

I pulled it out from

its corner on the porch

turned on the overhead fan

wiped it down

plugged it in

fired it up

stepped out

put one foot in front of the other

and began the journey

with a single step

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All of the Above: A Journey of Next Steps

Glenda Funk of Idaho is our host today at www.ethicalela.com for the second day of the July Open Write. She inspires us to write poems featuring our chosen meaning of the word wave after looking at all the definitions of the word. I chose the traditional hand wave. I’m about to give a big one.

Waving from the Wayfarer

everyone keeps asking me

what I’m going to do in retirement

when maybe the question

should be what I’m

not going to do……

because I’m choosing

Answer D: all of the above

I’m going to do it all

waving from the Wayfarer as I go

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Journey to Knowing

We’ve all heard it said that love is blind, and I’ve sure been a champion and a victim of that a time or two. But when it comes to our own family members and their relationships, it hits home in deeper ways. Someone I care about has recently broken off a year-and-a-half engagement. I’d had my suspicions about things when the wedding planning never got started and there was a wrinkle or two of bickering for a week or so another time, but I kept praying that things would work out as they should. And they did. The one who said, “I didn’t break it off sooner because I just kept hoping it would all work out” has experienced that rocky road of discovery where we must accept that even love that is blind can still see the truth when it has looked long enough.

Journey to Knowing Another Person

who we see is

who we choose to see

who we want to see

who we believe we see

…but are we ever really right?

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Embarking on Retirement: The Next Journey

Retirement

I’ve found the door

started looking last year

made my way through the room

straightening my files

smoothing my skirt

changing shoes

grabbing my hat and sunglasses

moving toward the portal

reaching, turning, pushing

toward the next chapter

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Traveling the Journey


Looking in the Mirror

I look in the mirror

see the gray hair

see the neck wrinkles

see the crow’s feet

see the lazy thyroid laying down on the job

and thank God I’m here to show the wear

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Do You Want to go Walk in the Woods?

The question came from a fellow Georgian, a member of The Stafford Challenge at Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon on the last day of our poetry conference.

Do you want to go walk in the woods? one called out.

Seven of us set out to walk in the woods together on an adventure to see the world in the forest floor in the cloud-shadows of Mount Hood. And this is how we made friends.

Into the Woods

Into the woods, we go, we go

Into the woods we go!

When strangers set out on a walk in the woods

They return with new friends they know.

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Family Pictures: Christmas Flower Show

Sometimes the picture speaks in ways we cannot. I’ve been sifting through tubs and tubs of family photos, digitizing them and organizing them in folders to share with family members who, like me, would rather have them on a flash drive than taking up prime real estate in photo albums in the back of the attic. In some cases, I’m sharing via Facebook Messenger if I find those taken with friends who would enjoy the throwback. On a random weekday morning last week, I sent this one to my childhood friend Nancy so we could both remember the years we created floral arrangements with the help of our mothers as we competed in the annual Garden Club’s Christmas Flower Shows.

My friend Nancy (right) and me at the annual Garden Club’s Christmas Flower Show, early 1970s

I wasn’t expecting this response, and it showed me how the power of the photograph can often reach back through the years and find the places that older generations can remember – – like trying to scratch an itch that you never quite can find, and then suddenly you find the sweet spot of relief. This is Nancy’s reply:

Screenshot

How to Make it Count

you’ve bought the shoes

you’ve worn the dress

you’ve taken the trip

now….

send the picture

tell the story

share the memories

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Family Pictures: Wagon “Wreckage”

Mallory on her first wagon ride, January 1988

What the Wagon Taught Me

I was practicing being that mama

the one who didn’t panic ~

who let the kid cry first when things happen

to be sure it was even

something to cry about

instead of rushing in to comfort

and soothe

whatever may not be broken or bruised

like on her first birthday

after the party

with her new bears in her new wagon

taking the first wagon ride

she was back-end-loaded

so when I pulled

the wagon up-ended

left her flat on her back

staring at the sky

enjoying the view

like this was how a wagon ride

was supposed to go

so instead of reacting in panic

I snapped pictures

and laughed

and still today

I think of that wagon

when things don’t go

as I’d planned