Shake it like Blubber

I am warning you ahead of time. I am going to talk about Lady Things. If you get squeamish at the idea of this, then don’t read. However, allow me to persuade you for a paragraph. I really don’t see what the big deal is. I am not talking about mangled hands or chopped-up heads. Just tampons. There are no explicit stories or pictures. So while I am prompting you ahead of time, I am saying you are wacked in the head -- if you do not read. Little people learn that boys have penises and girls have vaginas. If you can talk about your phlegm in your throat, or your bad ankle, what’s the difference? Just wondering. Here’s the story:

Saturday, September Something or Other. I am going to Whole Foods. I am looking for this thing called a Diva Cup that will keep me from having to use tampons. Yes, it goes “up there.” Figure it out. I am sorry if you find this embarrassing, as well, but I don’t see how a vagina is any more unmentionable than an index finger. I have one; therefore, I am going to talk about it without weirdness and feeling that I have to blush or lower my voice. I mention this because I had a pause before I wrote, and this annoying prude of a voice inside me went: “Are you SURE you want to bring this topic in here??” Uh, yes. Go away, voice. VAGINA VAGINA VAGINA. Take that, repression. I will wear The Scarlet V.

This cup is supposed to be the solution to tampons, those pesky things that women need every month. I am one of those people who gets nutty about changing tampons often. I change far more often than is necessary. I don’t like the feeling of a wet string from when I pee, I do not like the idea of something old inside me, and I don’t want Toxic Shock Syndrome, and I do not wear pads. I prefer not to feel as though I am wearing a diaper.

Back to the Toxic Shock horror story, I remember being warned about this when I came of age. The worry that I might get something bad if I left a tampon in a minute too long, stuck with me, like the scare tactic that scares boys by telling them they’ll grow hair on their palms if they masturbate. This was not my concern. Toxic Shock? Yes. I worried. I didn't know what it was, even, but I knew it would kill me. It stuck with me. The likelihood of me actually contracting this is probably very rare, but I am not taking my chances. Like the icky puddles on bathroom floors, it bothers me. That meant umpteen boxes every month. And then there is the embarrassing factor of what to do with the tampon thing when you need to get rid of it.

Last week, I had a session with someone at his house, and used the bathroom when I arrived. I removed my not-very-old tampon in order to “re-apply” and when I went to throw it out, after wrapping it obsessively with paper, so there was not even a hint of what it used to be, I looked in at the open garbage can next to the toilet. It was small and delicate. And unlike our bathroom garbage, which is a paper bag, filled with umpteen paper towels, cue tips, etc, this one had NOTHING in it. So basically, if I put the wrapped thing in there, they will KNOW it was me. It was not exactly obscure since I had wrapped it to the size of a small football. This is the kind of shit that makes my anxiety go off.

I had to tell it like it was because I couldn’t leave it in there for his wife to find or him, and for them to think, what a crass guest. (This is why I have free-floating anxiety. Too much time spent on small details.) I told him (of course, it HAD to be a man) that I had “something” to put in the trash, and did not want to put it in the trash, and could I use another COVERED trash can. He smiled, said, “I get it, I get it,” and in it went. I put it in, obviously, but all this could have been avoided. This is why I want the Diva cup.

There were lots of reasons to try it.

So I looked for this cup, which my same friend I mentioned earlier, Carolina, told me about. She knows about all sorts of things and life in general. She is very wise and tells me when I am being an ass or a martyr. Additionally, I like her because her name is close to mine, give or take an “a” instead of an “e.” I went to check the price. Almost forty bucks.

I couldn’t remember how much she said it was on Amazon. She told me all about it the other night when we were discussing periods and mentioned how she loved this Diva Cup. Sometimes she has to yell at me, because I bombard her with questions, elated comments, and explosions of silliness when she is speaking. I have a hard time shutting up at times, when I am excited. I am excited a lot.

The brain bursts things out of it. And I “flirt,” trying to keep her entertained. This is not confined just to men, but anyone I like. So I did not listen. Therefore, I decided I should wait rather than have buyer’s remorse if I found out that it was twice as much at Whole Foods. I would look it up on-line when I had internet access. After that, I walked around and stared at food I wasn’t going to eat.

Burrata caught my eye. Uh oh. The mold factory inside me does not appreciate cheese. So I am avoiding it. But just so you know, it was the one I love, in the yogurt-type container, that tastes like marshmallow fluff. “Wake up, wake up,” my little angel said. The angel I harbor is like the one in cartoons that pops up on the shoulder of the person. I have had this little creature by my side as long as I can remember. It needs to come up often, because I am often tempted to do things that are inadvisable. “You cannot have this,” said the angel. I listened to it. Often, I don’t, but it doesn’t hold grudges, luckily.

I left and walked out to my car. Only food there with sauces. No plain meat. The hot roasted chicken looked good if I could have lifted off six plastic tops and pulled off all the skin and left the meat. Somehow, I am certain this would not be welcome.

I got back in my car and got ready to go somewhere. I had a variety of plans. But I got to staring at the leaves on the trees moving like crazy, while I was sitting in my car. I love sitting in my car. It is nothing fancy, but it is self-contained and makes me feel protected. I love to write in there, too, as I am doing now.

Back to the trees. (Brief ADD break. The image of the car spun me away from the leaves.) The leaves were all blending one into the next. They were shades of green, yellow, orange, and brown. No matter how the tree shook them, they lifted up and down, and let themselves be tossed.

I started thinking about how to let oneself be moved in adversity. When I am feeling anxious or wishful, or wanting, I wonder how I act in contrast to these leaves. They are rooted to the tree. I am rooted to life. I think I often grind down, or hold back, or rush forward. What would I look like if I were a leaf on a tree? Would I rip myself from the tree?

It didn’t seem like a struggle when I looked at the leaves. In fact, it calmed me and I could see a rhythm to the movement. I could enjoy watching from inside my protected covey. It brought me away from my own struggle, and my own life, and I was able to witness.

It was so nice to be able to watch without stepping in it, but it gave me a sense of direction. How to be moved.

It felt like when I watch the sea anemones. I can look at them forever. My husband and I went to the Monterey Aquarium a year or so ago, where they are, and he had to drag me away. It was so beautiful to watch them dancing in the tank. It was a command performance.

This is what it felt like with the trees. It felt like people in action, screaming, loving, playing, and letting themselves be shaken. Sometimes I have people I work with do all these movements, with the intention that by loosening everything from the roots, the body stops doing its tug of war. Then you can let yourself go. Shake like you got tons of blubber and everything can wiggle. And then the energy MOVES.

It excites me and inspires me to move like this when I see the leaves doing it. You can always learn by watching.

My brain calmed, and I watched until I felt the urge to close my eyes. I wasn’t departing from life, but sinking in deeper. I felt filled by watching the moves and seeing that I want this, in the way they allowed themselves to be shaken without trying to hold still. Life will not stay still. So all this filled me up.

I closed my eyes and died a little. While the leaves raged and I lay still. My body sunk and relaxed and everything softened around me. This is as good as shaking blubber. This is how I calm down. This is my medicine. Leaves float and life goes on and I can fit somewhere in between. Learn to wiggle. It’s better than vodka.

Lovely GLOB of Zen Master's stick

I woke up early this morning, and lay in bed feeling this sensation of a star, lighting and exploding inside me. I could see it with my eyes closed. It was golden and kept breaking apart like fireworks, and tiny little gold flecks went everywhere. I was alert in this state of half slumber.

When I do sleep, I am "out." You can blast a TV, throw a party, or shout in my ear, and I will tune you out and continue sleeping. But when I am awake, that's that.

Being awake is the moment I "come to" from drowsing and life is standing naked in front of me wondering how I will clothe it. I often feel like a kid on Christmas morning when my body gets “up.” You would think I would have gotten used to it by now, but I am easily entertained.

There is something delicious to me about the contrast between waking and sleeping. Sleeping means you are out of the world of physical bruises, and in it, life becomes whatever your dreams make it. But your waking life brings the material to the stage. To prove that I can be what I am and that what can be, is possible. This is what makes me so full of excitement upon waking.

But there is a debt to pay in recognition. Waking in this manner entails more than just putting on something to wear and staggering to the bathroom. When I am alert inside in this way, awareness hangs over me, like my eyelids over my eyes. It is immoveable even if I just want to spend my first few minutes picking clumps of old eye makeup out of my eyes and be left alone. It harps on me to see and feel. It nags at me, to live truthfully. I cannot shut it off for long before it blinks at me again. So we are stuck with each other, like two passengers sitting next to each other on a full plane. Me and that pain in the butt, awareness.

I don’t find this to be easy, because I often feel the urge to sidle from what challenges me. I would like to avoid but I see it in front of me, reminding me that I can do better. My friend Carolina, who reminds me of this laziness, as only a true friend does, will call me on it. “STOP BEING LAZY!” she writes in all capital letters. It is so true, that I always laugh when she says it. Usually, she chastises me via email chatting, because we live far away. But it makes me smile because she calls it like it is – I am a sucker for the shortcut.

I love doing it wrong, backwards, opposite to the directions. This is how I ruined my last batch of pemmican, which I am stubbornly eating anyway. I didn’t feel like measuring out equal amounts of fat and meat, so it has two times the amount of fat. I didn’t feel like taking so long to grind it, so I left it in huge chunks. Great if you have wolf teeth—not so good if you don’t. Laziness always has the last laugh because it brings awareness, like your mother noticing the new pimple on your face. Look at what you wrought, it says with a smirk.

I can look for other explanations for my doing things cockeyed. I remember learning something about it relating to my brain being “creative,” or maybe due to the fact that I am left-handed having something to do with it. Whatever the case, there is often the urge for me to make a mix of what might not mix.

I think it is partly the fault of my ADD brain. It is always looking for a reason to stay awake. I do not take medication, so I use all the little ins and outs I can get. Contrary to popular belief, the ADD/HD brain is sleepy. It looks for diversions to wake it up. I may look like a person who drinks Red Bull, but my being is always trying to figure out how to be here, without passing out. Hence it is very compelling to be engaged in life.

Who knows how much of this is personality and how much is funky genes. Regardless, I have a fascination with novelty and emerging occurrences. This is why I am a lover of watching and teaching how to observe sensations. They are always changing. Whenever I observe a reaction or sensation in myself or others—of emotion, or of some new movement in the body, an electric thrill runs through me. I am ALIVE, it shouts. HELLOOOO IN THERE. I feel it pumping inside me like the fireworks I felt this morning.

Awareness reminds me: YOU ARE HERE, with the arrow poking at me, jolting me to alertness. Even my latest issue, a sore heel has me busy observing and tying in the emotional link to the pain and devising new ways to move. I am more interested in exploring it than hurriedly “fixing” it. Everything is a science project.

My life revolves around sensations, because previously, most of it was spent trying solution after solution to stay awake. Now I can sit on my butt for hours and stay awake, thanks to my improved diet. But back when I studied Feldenkrais, a form of movement awareness that often required hours of laying around on the floor and moving slowly, I brought a giant exercise ball to sit on and bounce on to stay awake. Do NOT fall asleep, I heard my voice say. Stay awake.

When I went to conferences for my work with special needs children, I had food and things to drink with me at all times and brought my exercise ball to sit on, as well. DO NOT fall asleep, the voice said, again.

I ate non-stop, and the chewing worked to keep my frontal lobe engaged when I studied for various certifications. Stay awake. I bought funny pens and made humorous notes when at conferences that I went to for work. Anything to stay awake. I stayed up late or exercised madly, just minutes before I had to sit for hours. Or ate pounds of chocolate for the lift.

Back then, there was always a scheme to stay "awake." So it is not a big surprise that I was drawn to meditation. For me, meditation is not about seeming holy and ascetic. It is true, that I don’t fall asleep in these ways anymore, but I also prefer not to walk through life in a waking trance. Meditation is like swimming in cold water. It opens my eyes.

Life is changing faster than you can snap your finger, and when you get this, (and this comes and goes) you know you are swimming in the world of the unknown. This is exciting. So even checking to see what my breathing is doing at the moment is thrilling to me and makes me feel that I am on that proverbial edge of life’s seat. And it makes me awake.

People have elaborate ideas about all the wonderful things meditation will do for them. Suddenly, they will be neat or nice or won’t fart. Well, I am not perfected and do not plan on becoming anything of the sort. This is not the point of my meditation. I am not going for “holy” any time soon, unless it is on a good cashmere sweater that is on sale for this very reason.

Being awake now, means feeling what I am doing. And it means feeling the love and blood coursing through my body. I don’t have a separate container for emotions and body. It is all congealed into one lovely glob for me to watch.

Waking is stumbling into the bathroom, and venturing into the unknown of today. Nothing is more enlivening to me than being awake while awake. The Zen master smacks my awareness with his stick. Whack, whack, it says to me. Come back!

Wake up! YOU ARE HERE.

The Crest of Wanting

There is an ache to wanting. It starts in my throat, and I feel this sweeping motion moving through me. It is like a wave that comes over me, and then instead of release, it sinks back down again. So this is what makes it "wanting" and not "completion." The wave lifts and sinks and lifts and sinks. It gets me riled in the same way you can get a dog worked up by running around and around until they begin to jump up and down, nip at you. They are expecting something.

What's next? That is what they are expecting. That you will throw the ball, roll on the floor with them, shake things up. And this is the same aspect that keeps this wanting a frustrated, unclaimed passion that hints at bursting, but sinks just before the final moment.

And what do I do then without release? Find something else that interests me. Let my fingers fly on the keys. Press my feet into the ground and lift my arms and shake my body around. Open up my mind and let beauty and excitement and something live or maybe creepy pour out. It is a good feeling to be excited and know that I have a pulse. I prefer excitement to staring blankly without the joy or the effort. But sometimes, there is so much of it in me, and so little idea of what to do with it all.

Watching Things Pass

Anger.

When I feel anger inside me, it is the most uncomfortable thing imaginable. It feels too strong, like too much hot sauce on your food. It's not like boredom, which buzzes silently so you can almost feel something. You can ignore it. But anger...I don't like that I can't ignore it. The feeling is not like the joy from seeing someone connect with their body and realize something. Or a moment of just being there without noticing one way or the other.

Anger is the loudmouth in the room who has to get noticed.

I have an addiction. It's all about feeling good. And I'm a junkie for it. The "strongness" of the feeling of "bad" is what bothers me. If I didn't feel that hard lump in my throat, it would be better. It's the hard lump that bothers me. It's like a nut stuck there in its shell that sits there uncracked.

It's easy to understand the words "don't be angry." If I'm not angry, then I'm not angry. But when I am...the worst part is the effects of it. It's this torrent in my body moving the opposite way of everything else, like a vacuum cleaner picking up everything in its midst. You know how if you vacuum and you forget to move certain rugs, the vacuum will just start sucking it up, crunching it and making a horrible whine? Well, that's what anger feels like inside me. I don't like it one bit.

Although, at this moment, when I describe it, I notice the nut went from being a giant one, about the size of a golf ball, to the size of a circle you could make if you curled your index finger all the way into the base of the thumb. And now the vibrations are getting softer. The vibrations are the ping pong ping of mad. And they are getting softer. Now I am having to look harder and harder. It is just a bit of an uncomfortable feeling now--like the size of a marble.

And I am breathing again. This is a good sign. I always know I am coming out of it when I begin to breathe again. The jaw is unclenching. I will watch it pass.