A long shivering restlessness moves along the front of my body as I attempt to focus on configuring one of Microsoft's brain-sucking monuments to the golden calf: information.
The water outside my office window is a flawless mirror. I saw this coming.
This morning was not bad. My son - 13 -years-old with autism, was giddy and uncooperative; but he ate his breakfast and rallied to a reasoned approach. No need for the adrenalin rush of physically hauling him around. A stunningly beautiful child - he has of late been obsessed with the weather. A cloudy day can mean volcanic brooding and, possibly, objects hurled with prodigious accuracy. Relatively speaking this morning is a glide. The drive to school is uneventful. (the bus driver all but refused transport – we opted to avoid a known toxic environment: Damage Control)
He no longer attempts to dive out of the car - though I never take this for granted. The dashboard vents are still mangled from his era of relentless destructive enquiry.
I remember when I couldn't have a rear view mirror.
Consistent with the law of opposites - my 18-year-old daughter has already, seemlessly, slipped off to another well-adjusted day of intense creativity and 4.0 plus grade points.
The high school parking lot is a latent battlefield of self-involvement, SUVs and cell phones. School drop-off begins a partial respite as ceaseless vigilance slips into the background.
I nearly burst into tears every time.
Home again I slip out of my truck and walk directly to a stand of pines along the south edge of our property. Oblivious of the rain I begin work on the Bagua Circular form - there is something tremendously soothing about walking in circles. My mind wanders and, because it is new, I get lost in the few movements I know. Each time I return to the start until I keep focus all the way through. Next Yang, Shou Hou Taijiquan. More deeply engrained, these movements will carry themselves in a pinch but I allways shift the emphasis to stay engaged - mechanical movements are a waste of time. Mosquitos often dictate the speed.
A male cardinal has taken up not 20 feet away for the past few days. I work on letting the sound move through me instead of whipping a pine cone at him.
Then a few minutes of Kapalabhati pranayam - a moment of what I call 'distributed listening'. Sometimes I get to know all of my continuity as a single object. Strangely, mosquitos have yet to find me during pranayam.
The sun has come out.
Across the wet greenery to a shower and breakfast. My wetsuit whispers to me from it's drying rack in the back room; vibrating with an alien potentiality. The ice fin's clear polymer scent of Vanilla invokes a shifting, liquid, lucidity and longing. So begins my inexorable fall into the bay.
Having completed my mission of the moment the non-decision turns within me. I stop by my supervisor's office - we exchange glances and look out the window in unison - "go for it". Already gone.
An instantaneous eon later I am driving in my wetsuit. Through downtown to the Marina - my parking lot is nearly empty. Park, feed the meter. Gear in the back - packaged for optimal temporal utilization. Riffe Fin bag, Omer Shardana (personal Island). 100 yards to the railing. Total focus on each element of preparation. Uncoil the line, drop the float and secure it to the railing. Fins out and placed near the ladder. Camera tether on the left arm, left glove, camera. Water temp is almost 45 F - no ice mask needed; hood, mask and snork, right glove, secure the fin bag, fins, clip the float to my vest and down the ladder. Bleed the hood, get some water in around my ears. Face in - a moment of pain - quickly overridden by the stunning clarity of the water. Fish are still a rarity in this cold but there - sixty feet of concentrated, scintillating space away; an unexpected shimmering exhuberance of troutlings... The bay is mine.
The water outside my office window is a flawless mirror. I saw this coming.
This morning was not bad. My son - 13 -years-old with autism, was giddy and uncooperative; but he ate his breakfast and rallied to a reasoned approach. No need for the adrenalin rush of physically hauling him around. A stunningly beautiful child - he has of late been obsessed with the weather. A cloudy day can mean volcanic brooding and, possibly, objects hurled with prodigious accuracy. Relatively speaking this morning is a glide. The drive to school is uneventful. (the bus driver all but refused transport – we opted to avoid a known toxic environment: Damage Control)
He no longer attempts to dive out of the car - though I never take this for granted. The dashboard vents are still mangled from his era of relentless destructive enquiry.
I remember when I couldn't have a rear view mirror.
Consistent with the law of opposites - my 18-year-old daughter has already, seemlessly, slipped off to another well-adjusted day of intense creativity and 4.0 plus grade points.
The high school parking lot is a latent battlefield of self-involvement, SUVs and cell phones. School drop-off begins a partial respite as ceaseless vigilance slips into the background.
I nearly burst into tears every time.
Home again I slip out of my truck and walk directly to a stand of pines along the south edge of our property. Oblivious of the rain I begin work on the Bagua Circular form - there is something tremendously soothing about walking in circles. My mind wanders and, because it is new, I get lost in the few movements I know. Each time I return to the start until I keep focus all the way through. Next Yang, Shou Hou Taijiquan. More deeply engrained, these movements will carry themselves in a pinch but I allways shift the emphasis to stay engaged - mechanical movements are a waste of time. Mosquitos often dictate the speed.
A male cardinal has taken up not 20 feet away for the past few days. I work on letting the sound move through me instead of whipping a pine cone at him.
Then a few minutes of Kapalabhati pranayam - a moment of what I call 'distributed listening'. Sometimes I get to know all of my continuity as a single object. Strangely, mosquitos have yet to find me during pranayam.
The sun has come out.
Across the wet greenery to a shower and breakfast. My wetsuit whispers to me from it's drying rack in the back room; vibrating with an alien potentiality. The ice fin's clear polymer scent of Vanilla invokes a shifting, liquid, lucidity and longing. So begins my inexorable fall into the bay.
Having completed my mission of the moment the non-decision turns within me. I stop by my supervisor's office - we exchange glances and look out the window in unison - "go for it". Already gone.
An instantaneous eon later I am driving in my wetsuit. Through downtown to the Marina - my parking lot is nearly empty. Park, feed the meter. Gear in the back - packaged for optimal temporal utilization. Riffe Fin bag, Omer Shardana (personal Island). 100 yards to the railing. Total focus on each element of preparation. Uncoil the line, drop the float and secure it to the railing. Fins out and placed near the ladder. Camera tether on the left arm, left glove, camera. Water temp is almost 45 F - no ice mask needed; hood, mask and snork, right glove, secure the fin bag, fins, clip the float to my vest and down the ladder. Bleed the hood, get some water in around my ears. Face in - a moment of pain - quickly overridden by the stunning clarity of the water. Fish are still a rarity in this cold but there - sixty feet of concentrated, scintillating space away; an unexpected shimmering exhuberance of troutlings... The bay is mine.
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