Endurance through loss

After a week of navigating through new waters which include my mother's stroke and stay on ICU, and the final disposition of the unit at work, to be moved across town, not to mention the equally important but side note themes of dad, the bros, and my own maintenance, I have time to check in with myself.

I have tried to run through it, but mixed results; a few decent days, yesterday a really tough run which for the first time in recent memory had me lightheaded, and needing to stop every mile or so. I'm eating. I'm sleeping (and dreaming like crazy).
I'm staying in close touch with everyone. But underneath it all is the growing awareness that everything in the landscape has changed again, and the markers I had used to help me find the way have been moved or taken away.

When I watch her try to form her words around thoughts which have become loosened and knock around like renegade children, or purse her mouth refusing to eat, or scrunch her face up in sudden shock over pain or discomfort I know what she means when somewhere down deep she considers the alternative. I know what my dad means too when he says it's too overwhelming. Where do we find the endurance to cope with loss??
How do we sustain who we are while undergoing the process of change? It's one thing to add onto; add strength, mileage, capacity or speed. It's another to sustain while realizing you are not longer on your feet- at all. No longer connected to them, controlling them, directing your thoughts about them.

I may not run today. I did yoga this morning and found it restful and calming. Working on the core, increasing flexibility. I may be tanking out on mileage this week, and moving somewhat inward, but I am trusting my greater self to carry me body and soul throughout. We are in it for the long haul. And not one of us can get there alone.

Carving the Buddha

"Truthfulness is the main element of character."
-- Brian Tracy


We created him, in the arms of the celestial night. We bent down from the cups of petals in lotus flowers adrift on incense and falling water. The shine from stars was all around us, and even as we worked, we hummed and joked, dancing along in rhythm.

What does a Jupiter-Uranus sextile (the 2nd of 3 this year) offer to this process, the 21st, to open up such ambition, as to put a face to god? I have seen many, and sometimes none. What pushes us beyond the gods, to the light itself, to the formlessness of things? Pregnant possibilities and potential, all fluid, ever-flowing, picking up the petals of our seating like so many pearls, worlds on a cord around god's neck, wrist, thigh.

I have never really hoped for so much as just a meeting of my path, perfectly willing to traverse it once there. Strange to feel that the closer I get, the more faith it takes to embrace.

Global Frying

-Fire Lotus (a mandala by another artist, not me)

The core of the world, in all it's liquid heat, seems to be buckling up on itself, roiling in dry pain, taking lives, taking prisoners. Suddenly, everything appears surreal, burnt, hazy, oppressive. I felt such a strong desire to be outdoors, despite the health warnings, that I took the chance to run, and felt my throat getting raw, while my pace kept slacking as I tried to keep the rhythm. I was well on my way by 7AM, but it was already hothothot...and the sweat had begun drenching me everywhere. I stopped at each park and water fountain on the way. I took my time. I tried to get my mind off the 'catastrophic' nature of things, from work to family to Nature herself, and appreciate the movement of my body. But I felt troubled, heavy and wary...here in Florida we have not yet begun 'hurricane season' and we've been spared a few years since Wilma. Is this the year all hell breaks loose, for real??

I understand how the ancients attempted to appease their gods to take it easy on them. I can well appreciate the efforts we take to ensure a continuity in our future. I take supplements, plan class schedules for licensure, save money, all in the assumption of a steady and predictable 'tomorrow.' When I see the shots out of China, and entire cities going up in dust from the earthquake, or remember the power of Wilma attempting to knock down my windows, I know we are now in the grip of forces way outside our control. We unleashed this genie...we took power that could serve us, create new growth on sustainable levels and allowed it to take us over. There may be no going back, hard to say. We've known civilizations in the past to blow out of history on a blast of smoke, wave or other devastation. This time, as we wobble our way through the matrix of paradigm shifts, a bigger array of forces is suddenly infiltrating our narrow focus. If this is our way out, where are we going? To repeat our suffering, or to redeem ourselves into a New World?

When other beings, especially those who hold a grudge against you, abuse and harm you out of envy, you should not abandon them, but hold them as objects of your greatest compassion and take care of them.

-His Holiness the Dalai Lama

Factors beyond my Control

artwork: the death of the buddha

I THOUGHT I wasn't running yesterday, but by around 6PM, the heat had dissipated enough to make what I hoped would be a short run reasonable. So with minimal clothes and gear, I set out on Thomas with the goal of making it to the small park past 56th where the water fountain is, and back on Park, where I would have the sun- and the winds- at my back.

I think it's the smoke. Or maybe just over-exertion in general. Actually, it was a great run. By the time I hit Park, I found a nice stride and pace, and took the entire stretch in a gulp. But last night I suffered badly. I had profound aches in my body, especially my legs and back I haven't experienced before, which kept me up, and wouldn't allow me to get comfortable. I had wild dreams, scenes with Jay, work, while getting up and down all night. I wanted to at least do some yoga this morning, but preparing food put my back out even more....

Moral of the story is take it easy I suppose, not a message that I swallow well. And with Monday workday looming, and what is typically the 3-ring circus of mad chaos and confusion, it will be a while, I suppose, before I find my equilibrium amidst factors outside my control.

Recovery week

Seems we went from cool downs to melt downs. The temps have reached into the 90's, and I noticed all the grass around the complex is brown. In fact, I realized driving home from errands yesterday that MOST of the grass is brown everywhere around. I did a 10 miler after 9AM yesterday, and came to a quick decision that running at my leisure, after sunrise, after mid-morning is now out of the question. The timing of transition is ok. I messed my leg up, so I needed more recovery. No running today. But I'm thinking of starting a new schedule, and try being up at 6AM. If I don't stay up late, I can still make 7 hours of sleep weekdays. If I really needed it, I could nap before work. (Would I need that?) I can't see any other way to make sure I am out doors running before the heat becomes a factor. And there is no way to sacrifice mileage when I need to hold the base steady.

It's discouraging that one spectacular run has cost me so dearly. I can feel those connections in that right leg and hip still tender. At the pool today, I did a lot of exercises that only the water can facilitate, giving range of motion and relaxation a try. I've been focusing inward, in an effort to find the deeper places from which my endurance must come. It's been a tough go, as the rocking world pushes waves of energy over us all. On the run, it's still a stable ride. A chance to ground into the core of the earth while I reach high into the wide, trembling sky.

Navigating changes

"The five S's of sports training are: stamina, speed, strength, skill, and spirit; but the greatest of these is spirit."

-Ken Doherty (Runner's World Tips)


I tanked yesterday after that brilliant run. I could feel it all the way through my right leg and hip. I had to cut the run short and barely hobbled through the last few miles. So apparently, all that sprinting and farleking and core strenghtening, and over-confidence has over-done it. No running today.

And the kids arrived safely in China.

"When you are aware that you are the force that is Life, anything is
possible. Miracles happen all the time, because those miracles are
performed by the heart. The heart is in direct communion with the human soul,
and when the heart speaks, even with the resistance of the head,
something inside you changes; your heart opens another heart, and true love
is possible."

-- Don Miguel Ruiz

On a Roll

After record heat, the temps fell to a very comfortable, lovely chill this morning, which woke me early enough to be out on the road by 7AM. It took a while to get a rhythm. Sitting in the office, sitting in group, sitting sitting sitting....by the time I get to stretch my legs out, it's a good 3-4 miles before I untwist. As I round off Arthur to head up towards Sheridan, almost mid-point on a 9-10 miler, I found a fast stride with a tune on the ipod and went up the road practically floating, my turn-over fluid, the gait nice and tight as I rounded step by breezy step up to my stop at the water fountain at Thomas. It was a fartlek I usually reserve for finishing, and not as long. After that, it was as if all the kinks had been burned off, and the fluid, easy feel of my limbs took over. The light, the sky, the air, the warm face of the sun, it all carried me over one intersection after another, until I took the last stretch home.

I've been practicing with a yoga CD by Rodney Yee for 'Core Cross Train'; he's an Iyengar yoga guy who was a professional ballet dancer. This is HARD STUFF...and I can barely keep up. But today, I could feel where it was beneficial, from the ability to carry my arms, even to the rise of my quads towards my abdomen. It's absolutely true about core strength. And it's worth training to mitigate the strain from all the sitting I must do during the week.

If I could 'package' what I did today...and roll these out like lovely strings of pearls....

We meet to part again. I have no words to respond to this double inspiration.

-Wen Chao, The Clouds Should Know Me By Now

Mother's Day Run '08

Bloody hot this weekend!! I did 2 loops Sat and Sun, both approx. 10+ miles, and both with the heat in my face and crawling up my legs to make the air feel like molasses and the Hollywood sidewalks like furnaces. Yesterday was particularly brutal...I heard the temps reached mid-90's...and I was a bowl of jello by the time that endeavor came to an end! And yes, despite the trauma and toll it takes on me, I was right back out there today...

I had to run to salute the very earth I traveled. To thank Her for her amazing hospitality and kindness, for the constant sense of adventure I have every time I go out, for the wide Florida skies, the high winds, the moist heat of day baking through my skin.

I had to run for the mothers in parts of the world veiled behind burkas, wrapped in dark shades of poverty and repression who never think to stretch their minds, their souls, let alone their legs, who search for the means and ways to keep 'women's wisdom' and healing alive in the middle of the patriarch's manufactured hell.

I had to run for Aunt Rose, and for my Mom, the 2 women who nurtured me and no matter what were always present with faces of compassion and hearts full of love to embrace me. The elder women teach me about endurance, and faith, and how to live through difficult times and trials. The experience of having my Mom glow up to me as I show off my running, or any other aspect of my life is a great mark of respect from one generation to the next. I honor her longevity, and her ability to wake each day and say 'yes' to this world; I know for her it is never easy.

I had to run for Michael. To honor the experience that I was granted to be a mother to a soul so amazing, unusual and beautiful. I thought about many scenes from our lives together; from creating cities in sand at age 3, to navigating the chronic challenges and changes in our lives through divorce and separation, depressive episodes, traveling tales and wonders and the blessing of bringing lovely Yu into his and our lives. I am a Mom to a son who honors me with his humor, sharp intelligence and fearlessness. He is inventive, introspective, influenced by little outside his own good sense. A true chip off the ol' block, to be sure!

I had to run for myself; deep within, the same power which ignited my spiritual quest early in life, my creative curiosity, my ability to give birth, to conquer an odd array of physical and emotional challenges, and to give back to the world propels me on my feet 5 out of 7 days of the week or more. I honor the spirit and energy of the Deep Feminine which, through warriors past and present, continues to battle for it's own true resurrection in the shift of tides and times. I know I have within me the strength that runs through, adapts and wins the day, if only to take us all one step closer to Her infinite Love.

Reaching for the Rainbow Road

"We need to keep breaking down the myths about what women can't do. It hasn't been that long since women were first allowed to run the marathon in the Olympics. It's important to keep expressing ourselves physically."

Ann Bancroft, first woman to reach the North Pole


The many colored veils which make up the Rainbow people of our circle, our group, and the medicine people who stretch back into the cycles of time are empowered by the strength and beauty of feminine energy. Chaos/beauty, strength/vulnerability, endurance and attention to the moment are all the inconclusive paradoxes we carry. There is nothing a woman, who is in possession of her Self, can't undertake in her quest to unfold her nature.

I have a day to address things other than work today, then later, a chance to catch a run in the low light of early evening, if I want. A chance to catch up to myself, to run into my own shadows and light cast upon the long ribbon of roads that wind around the wide sky of my dreams.

...from Beliefnet

"Change Demons Are a Healthy Part of Change

Change Demons are disempowering feelings that arise during any change. These emotions--fear, doubt, impatience, shame, blame, and guilt--can wreak havoc with your self-esteem and destroy hope. But they also remind you how you don't want to feel during change so you can return to how you do want to feel.

When Change Demons visit, remember: 1) they are temporary; 2) they encourage you to make a choice--you can choose to feel better or worse than the emotion you are currently experiencing; and 3) they can be replaced with better, brighter emotions that will help you move through change with ease and grace. Faith, patience, endurance, and honesty are some positive emotions that can replace Change Demons."

I choose to empower my feet, heart, hands, and the voice that carries my intent into the world with faith in a Big Picture. I dreamt last night of tiles, something the size of dominoes...each one a miniature piece of art, figurative in black and white, reminiscent of my early work, very Matisse-ish. Somehow the message was, not only can one be 'chosen' at any time, being completely unique, but they also stood in for both people and the potentialities of people, as well as my own perceptions and imaginations. They were beautiful, and endless. Within each small rectangle, a perfect composition of elements created the figure.

May mornings...the most beautiful of weather, heat and breezes, a long 8+ miles....easy and fluid....

The Practice of Steps

As we practice steps to keep our energy flowing freely and without obstruction, we shine our light brightly, illuminating our own paths and making the world around us glow as well.

-from Daily Om

Smoke and mirrors

Despite sleeplessness, brought on by the upset of negative crap shot at me from clients at work, and again from a more unexpected and personal corner, I was determined to get out this morning to run it through. The client who has it in his mind to use me as his excuse to vent his resentments and anger for lack of positive outcomes, and the failed attempt in a relationship along similar lines is a hard hard hit. People are tricky creatures, alright. It is all perceptions, projections, misaligned and reinvented, permutated along a thousand potential pathways until we are in a big, tangled mess of energy going.....?

I point myself in a direction, hugging the side of the road and my feet are able to take me where I need to go. I am so grateful for this rock solid reality. I am full of love for my heart when it melts into the sky, and the drum-beat rhythm takes hold, flowing up and into my lungs with every set of breaths, in and out, in and out. I adore the light as it caresses my face and the drops of sweat swinging off my lip. And as I tire, I embrace the light/leaden feeling of release that comes with putting every ounce of effort into the pace before I slow it down....

The earth will not abandon me, not as long as I stay with Her. My run is my love-affair with all She offers me. Those in my life who are rock solid are like Her, they do not blow off with the seasons, though they change. They do not look away when I stumble, fall or cry in frustration. They carry me through every which way I go.
For all of you, and you know who you are, my love, always, goes with you.

Night and Day

In the bright white light of midday, I ran 10-12 miles up A1A in Boca Sunday. The last time I was on that route was for the 30K in October, run in what seemed the middle of the night in windy, cold conditions. Yesterday, I took the challenge of the heat, which permeated up from the asphalt, and the distance, as long as I could stand it, with some pride, as I tipped my total for the week to nearly 50 miles. Of course I pay for it now. David works on the whole picture. I feel places deep within the tissue scream under his touch. There are years and traumas under those places, pent up like silent bombs, like torch-flames which want to consume me in their constant, edgy discomfort. I don't want to acknowledge them; I want to run through them. I don't like feeling their tired, fierce weight- I just want to forget I have them.

The night was long, but not long enough to hide in my dreams. The book I was making in one of them, related to work, was ready for it's next chapter, called "Synopsis". If this is a 'summary' or abstract, as its defined, then what am I summarizing??
What do I need to recap in order to move forward with new material? Is what exists under these hot spots the verses of my love, hardship won through loss, heartache felt from feeling the rift of time and distance and desire?

I can't wait to be out again tomorrow. It was a nightmare day at work. The faces of frustration, blame and hatred were at me, and I had little defense. The need to run is the need to control something....to give myself over to a rhythm inside of me that belongs strictly to me, to me and the earth I run upon, the sky I run into, the wide sun who carries me into the day.

"You have to decide what your highest priorities are and have the courage -- pleasantly, smilingly, non-apologetically -- to say 'no' to other things. And the way you do that is by having a bigger 'yes' burning inside. The enemy of the 'best' is often the 'good.'" -- Stephen Covey

Focus, balance and yes, love&light

May Day brings a glorious crisp morning full of bright sun, the air warm around the edges strewn with chaffs of breezes pushing off the ocean. The whole atmosphere swirls around me as I start out this morning, taking the long loop over the interstate and back around west. Coming up to 46th, a pair of puppies, loose from their owner, come crashing into me; they are a matching pair of black and white, except for their faces, happy to run with me, slobber all over me and jump into my way with big happy kisses and tongues lolling out. Their owner finally comes round the corner for them, and I'm back to the rhythm. But for a minute it was nice to be reminded of Life's play, and the energy of the animal/natural world.

Between Jesse the chiropractor and David the master/healer (I know he cringes when I say that...LOL), there are spaces in the structure of things inside I haven't felt before. What was tight and contracted, pulled up in pain, feels loose and fluid. The aches and soreness seem more muscle related, but once in awhile I feel the old familiar weaknesses, the vulnerable spots not yet as strong as they can be. With any luck, I'll put away about 40 miles this week by Sunday. This is a good base to sustain until mid-summer, when I would like to begin long runs of at least 15-20. If I decide to do Marine Corp marathon in Oct., it will be time to prepare....

Keeping focus and balance in the love and light of Universal Oneness is the key. As work continues to drift into system's chaos, and more clients revert to old behaviors and emotional patterns to cope, the demands on me as an 'interventionist' grow. I am vulnerable to the stress, as usual, feeling the imprint of their pain. The shield of light is not so much to protect me as it is to be a channel for influence; to permeate the connections of patterns they navigate, and I seek to augment with my 'push', my purpose. The form of healing is never known....it is hard going before it gets any better, as the toxic and destructive forces are released. This I know. But as the light pushes us all to wholeness, I am reminded by those who love me that we continue to choose our place, not just with each other, but with the One Love of our Togetherness in the place of peace.