6/16/2004 10:47:48 PM

I was waiting to write until something positive happened and renewed (some) of my faith in being home.
Today as I was rushing, (not as before, but more than I have been) to meet my friend and her kids at the park after yoga, I dived hungrily into Balthazaar Bakery. Only after ordering did I realize that I didn't have enough cash. The fellow ahead of me, with whom I had been chatting, bought me breakfast. "Add her order to mine," he told the cashier. She arched her eyebrow and repeated, "Add her order to yours?" Meanwhile I was stuttering and trying to articulate my gratitude. I was dumbfounded. "That's very kind, thank you so much. Uh, I could run to the ATM.....". "No, you don't have to do that, I'm sure we'll see each other again." "OK, that's so nice, thank you." We shook hands and smiled and then I dashed out and jumped into a cab. Yes, NYC can be like that. People can be nice, and generous and enjoy being that way. Not that it can't happen anywhere, but despite my (still) overshadowing doubts about the modus operandi of this too busy of a city, a ray of sunshine appeared.

Still...a couple times a day I figure out what time it is in India. I miss the cows wandering around, even miss being asked, 'where you from?' I really miss the cost of things there, the Alphonse mangoes (though the ones here aren't too bad right now), chai, saris, packs of schoolchildren crammed into autorickshaws, and the lack of exposed skin. Sometimes I just want to say (mostly to women), 'put some clothes on!' It dulls the senses, it goes beyond sexy to explicit. Too much information! The excess of everything gets to me. There is too much to buy, too many buildings, too many restaurants, too many people, too many cars, most of them way too big. The five percent rule applies here. What if it was 5% less everything? Would it make NYC more liveable, more human? It might have to go up to 12% to make any difference. Can I apply the 5% to me being more tolerant? I dunno.

I dunno a lot of things right now. I have plans, but I don't know about work or how things will evolve with having been away. What the effects will be of a different sensibility having washed over me. Unwittingly I have learned about devotion and patience and saying less and doing less. Despite my grumpiness, I am happy, in a quiet, more internal way. I love having my comfy bed and kitties, the easy access to toilet paper and my computer. Having Eddie's shala to go practice in, to be assisted in backbends and even binding (with lots of assistance) in Marichyasana D! The gatekeeper pose that had been my nemesis. The picture attatched here is Guruji lying on top of me with my face in my knees. It is the counter pose to backbending (which opens the heart). Forward bends is a way of opening to surrender. That is where I am now. It is no different than when I had to surrender to India. It's not India or NYC, it's surrendering to mySELF...the greater part, beyond the physical or mental. This can be difficult or not wherever you are. As they say, wherever you go there you are. So here I am.
Me & Guruji

Thanks to my dear sweet pal Debra Kellner for the photo. You can see some of her amazing photos at:
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0009/feature3/index.html
(as well as pix by her lovely & talented husband Eric)



6/08/2004 05:45:41 PM

The first thing I noticed driving back from the airport is how clean it was. Yes, really. How everyone stayed in their lanes on the highway, how rarely anyone used the horn.

When I opened the door to my apartment and looked around, I thought, 'Hmmm, I use to know the person who lived here, quite well, actually.' It's kind of been like that. What is all this 'stuff'? Instead of unpacking, I'm cleaning out my closets, the spring cleaning in the material world. The real deep clean happened in the Himalayas, on an island in Thailand, doing backbends, drinking coconut water, taking overnight trains in India. BTW-The clothing, etc., will either go to friends or a woman's shelter. The swept up area in my head will assist with living the rest of my life.

Being back....hmmm....Well, it's different than I remembered or it seems different. Looking at life here with fresh eyes.

Initially I felt I was in a bad Dick Tracy cartoon. All these characters, overblown, vying for attention. 'Look at me', they almost seemed to shout. 'I'm so busy, that makes me so important. Can't you see that I'm on the phone? Do you know that I am making the deal of the century? My book has been optioned for a film deal? I am talking to my millionaire boyfriend about our vacation plans?' Well that's how it seems to me. The ambition, the striving is palatable. Just watching how people walk down the street here is different. People are walking towards a goal, they aren't just crossing the street, they made it to the other side and are therefore winning/achieving/accomplishing! On the flip side, I sense people as they look in the store windows thinking, 'Oh maybe that will make me more appealing. If I wear that then I can get... the cute guy to look at me/ that promotion/ that role....the sense of ego and showing off with the underlying fear of inadequacy; desperately trying to quench that thirst with something outside of themselves. Perhaps I'm getting too psychological.

Seeing all this makes me familiar again with that person I use to know, namely me. What had motivated or scared me in the past. It makes me wonder if I will cave. Will 'superman' (me) weaken in this land of kryptonite (NYC). Maybe it's just a matter of readjustment, tweaking. I know I need to 'come home' and be here. Not geographically so much as to be present. For the first time since I was a small child (or even younger, like in the womb) I am enjoying not doing anything. Not doing busy things that look like I'm doing something: reading book reviews on amazon.com or walking around shopping for things I don't really need or trying to 'multi task' just to see how thin I can stretch or anything. It feels good. Will this bubble burst ? Is it a bubble? Or is there a way to integrate this 'Winnie the Pooh sensibility' into my life here in busy ambitious NY? I dread the thought of some future date when a well meaning friend says, " Gee when you came back from India you were so relaxed..." . Dread is something to drop.

I think I need to live away from NYC more than I have in the past. I don't quite know how much away or how to accomplish that, but I believe if you aim yourself towards an idea then things have a way of moving that way, kind of like the traffic patterns in India.



6/04/2004 07:45:14 PM

Leaving London for a brief trip to the continent, Paris to be exact, I took the 'Eurostar' the train that goes through the 'chunnel'. Very nice, quick and convenient. Coming into the Gare du Nord and everybody is speaking french! How novel! I even understood some of it and could make myself understood. You have no idea how refreshing it is to make myself understood in a foreign language no less. In India I would ask for curd (yogurt) and the waiter was totally mystified by my request. Finally after repeating several times..."Oh curd! Yes madame."
*sigh*

Through the metro, I navigated to almost the right stop and finally arrived at Rue de Pointoise. Nobody home, not back from the weekend wedding party. Hoof it to a café on the Boul St. Germain have a salade and café au lait and wait, taking in the local color. Ahhh....it was nice. The weather was good, the Parisians were dour and the salade was delicious. It was so nice to have vegetables with crunch. BTW-guess what kind of toilets? Yup, squat. It's not just a third world thing. Went back to the house and there they all were. It was wonderful to see Debra again and Grace and Eric and Aurel and Camila!!! It made 'the west' so much more palatable and familiar aside from sidewalks, toilet paper and take away food. I had croissants from one of the best bakeries, Keyser, in Paris (a few blocks away) and a lovely cous cous tangine. It was great. Besides all this, spending time with Debra was a tonic. Walking around the neighborhood, past Notre Dame with the bells ringing on a lovely sunday afternoon with beautiful clouds rolling around. Still those dour sour Parisians. The waiters are a subset,they are surly sourpusses (no news). How such a joyless group can have such a lovely humanistic city and create such delicious food (the fruit tartes are a near religious experience) is quite a paradox. I had forgotten how much I liked Paris, it had been 14 years since my last visit.

It was such a condensed visit. On my last day (my second day) I had gone to Phillipe, zee hairdresser, and had my hair done....tres Parisian and tres cher, but c'etait mervillieux! I felt like a fairy princess. Later running around with my overnight bag in the rain, it was Cinderella after midnight. Now I was a sherpa. Extreme range of experience isn't just for India.

Then it was over. Back on the 'Eurostar' with my takeaway salade platter and gateaux, lengthening the experience just a little more and poof...back in London. It was still colorless and alientating, but I was leaving early the next morning. Onto the adventure of returning home.