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Another Coffee Musing on a Monday Morning and a Poem

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Another Coffee Musing on a Monday Morning and a Poem

This week I happened upon two outstanding cups of coffee, the sun cleaved breaks through days of rain, and the solstice declared it summertime, finally. Besides a good kiss and an intoxicating conversation—what else is there? Until that sweet spot in autumn—or the elusive golden hour of evening where everyone is cast in that enchanting movie glow—this is it. The now. I often write about being in the present because it’s something I have to practice. I close my eyes for the ohm, and a minute or two in I hear ohm-ma-God—I have to do this today and that today and it takes work to bring it back to center. I love the improvisational acting mantra of “Yes…and.”, where you accept what has been given to you—or what is—and then decide how to proceed from there. So I am gentle in acknowledging my laundry list of to-dos and telling myself I will get to them later—but first I need to free my mind. I know that I will never achieve perfect Zen (mostly because I have already decided that!)—but I am grateful for the quiet moments. I am after all, a Type A personality (notice the Bold and Capital “A”). I don’t love labels for anything—but I know who I am. I am strung tight and a mile-a-minute. I solve problems before they occur—thereby sometimes creating them! Ha! But I’m learning how to shut it down in lotus position and in 20-minute increments, and that has given me handfuls of peace here and there. On that, I’ll share a poem about being.

I am Not a Runner

I am not a runner.

There is nowhere I need to be

That quickly

I don’t need to twist my knees

and pound my sneakers on the asphalt

Keeping time in huffs and puffs

Watching the world in a smear in my peripheral

Engrossed with the noisy buds in my ears

instead of the bud in the garden—

the one with the circling bee

I like to take my time. Take it slow. Take it easy.

Flow.

I like to close my eyes when I move

and inhale silence

and exhale “peace”.

When I move…

I am the tree.

And all the things

I would see in a smear

from the corner of my eye

If I were a runner.

Coffee Musings on a Monday Morning

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Coffee Musings on a Monday Morning

Of course I just plunked into a soggy patio chair, unawares of the midnight rain.

But isn’t that the way it goes as of late?

And shouldn’t I always look before I sit? Being a teacher?

The good thing is that it’s supposed to be sunshine for days now. Or so they say.

That would be nice because somewhere between January and April–

I got old.

Somewhere between that cramp in my ring finger and the tension in my back and limbs—

I got old!

With another birthday driving around the bend and due here in a week or less—I shouldn’t be surprised about this new pain and that on some days I don’t feel spry.

Like when it rains.

But most of the days I’m still 25.

I’m fudging with loose-leaf paper now (not even notebook), because that is what I found first thing. And when the writing is important it doesn’t matter if it’s loose-leaf or bar-napkin, or toilet paper.

Also the loose-leaf– because I hate my computer, on account of what I think it did to my finger and back and to my mental age.

Yes, I think my iMac is plotting to push me over (and rolling down) the famous hill that decides when it’s time for black balloons at our birthday parties.

Well I’m not going over it (or rolling down it).

Not today!

I’m enjoying the deck and trying to survey the vista: the park; the community garden; the pets and their people on the walking trail.

But I can’t.

The top 6-8 inches of the deck is my sightline and no matter how I camber or crane, I cannot see what is in front of me or even on the horizon.

I am forced to sit with sounds.

There is a persistent bird in a two-house-down Oak—which I wish I knew the name for. She’s probably squawking about why he never called and how she thought this one was surely different—and how she’s ten seconds from taking up with a lady bird.

Or maybe that’s just me.

I decide to look up and I am forced to make out what I can through squints and sunbeams.

Hey! There is a Southwest flight outbound for somewhere good probably.

And then moments later an inbound Delta, to here.

I am bored with planes.

Just in time, Cardinals and Bluejays appear. They take their turns politely on my neighbor’s rooftop. One almost curtsies to the other as it leaves before the next one comes to do the hop, hop and peck peck dance on the shingles.

Then they are gone.

The crown of a shimmying Cherry tree is the last thing I straighten my spine to see before I close my eyes and let the presiding sun bake my aches and random musings gone.

And I am feeling the right now–

My damp bottom beginning to dry out—

The dead weight of my coffee mug in my palm—

The pleasant day ahead that I’ll will into being.

I open my eyes to grab at a piece of rogue loose-leaf,when my daughter awakens and comes out to ask how the book is going—in almost a threatening tone.

I tell her that I’m writing something else right now, that I’m still stuck on page 40 and that I have been avoiding the book for months and reasons…”oh—that you wouldn’t understand, sweetie.”

She says, “Writing is just hard, huh?” And I remember that she’s ever-wise.

We chat about her book, Lilly and the Little Girl Dog, and as I get up to pour her cereal and listen to this 7-year-old author, I realize-

That we are sisters.

She plops into the soggy patio chair before I can prevent it, immediately springs up, muttering something benign but seemingly miffed, and she says she’ll be back in a minute.

With a piece of loose-leafed paper.