day 49, number numbers numbers! in homage to Kraftwerk’s calculator song

Hello, here I am again. After listening by chance to Kraftwerk’s song about the pocket calculator yesterday (on KEXP, naturally), I have been thinking about how we love numbers. LOVED THAT SONG! Loved how it mocks our imagined control over life, “I’m the Operator of my Pocket Calculator” (as if the numbers did not control us). And loved that the DJ played it on the request of a 5-year-old girl.

On April 6, I wrote to a friend: “I’ve now got 22 face mask orders which will keep me busy for weeks. I have been making all kinds of lists and counting things, to control life, I now realize, it’s sort of funny.  I started going for long solitary morning walks a while back too, and have been doing that consistently: today will be Day Nine. Not to mention that we are soon to enter Week 4 of Shelter-in-Place, and I’m on Day 18 of my blog chronicle of the crisis.  hahaha  what funny creatures we are. Makes me think of a children’s book:  Magnus Maximus, A Marvelous Measurer. Pretty cute book.”

On Numbers. PART TWO:

Today, May 7: Today’s list is up to order no. 82 and I’m working on no. 52. I’ve made 270 face masks since April 2. It is Day 40 of my walks. I no longer follow a plan, rather I’ve come to prefer Short, Steep, and Solitary. (and Sunny, if possible). Easy to find out here, since our house is on the tip of a small mountain range. We are in Week 8 of Shelter-in Place, and I’m on Day 49 of this blog chronicle of the COVID-19 crisis.

CONCLUSION:

Blah blah blah, numbers can only do so much for the spirit. Maybe that’s why Kraftwerk made their funny pocket calculator song.  Very cheerful, wryly funny and catchy! Those high-pitched beeps work like an anti-depressant.

I’m off down the hill now, to blow all those numbers out of my head. Freed of that burden, the empty head will listen instead of striving to achieve some distant goal; listen to all the sounds my world has to offer—doubtless some mechanized pounding of pile drivers or tooting boat horns coming across Elliott Bay, but also the sea lions’ barks, sea gull cries, and other “little melodies.”

Thank you Kraftwerk, for opening up the fabulous world of electronic music, and RIP Florian Schneider. Wish I’d known you earlier…but I’ll never forget your music.

P.S. yesterday’s mask production:

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day 42: T’ai chi to the rescue, again

Watching my moods darken over the past week or so, and feeling my shoulders tense and back ache from the constant face mask production, it suddenly (duh) hit me: I had stopped exercising and doing T’ai chi for a few days, and was re-entering my old way of being, focused entirely on work work work, and worries about what other people think or do. Ugh.

So I started again, and yesterday was day two of my once-habitual 90-minute workout (a series of core stretches followed by the Form, now practiced on the deck in my backyard, surrounded by hummingbirds and a friendly big dog who keeps bringing squeaky toys for me to throw, while I stand on one leg and smile).

what a difference!  Now, I hate all that cheerful blather about exercise as much as you do, so I’ll not belabor the point. I’ll just mention one tip from a favorite book: “it is imperative we keep our attention on the feet, legs, and pelvis, and use the force of gravity to source and manipulate our movement.”  (Ralston, Principles of Effortless Power, p. 15).

That’s what doing T’ai chi does for me: lowers the center of gravity, tightens the core, and pushes away non-essential thoughts… what remains is only love, and lots of it.

Here’s wishing you a day of effortless power too!

And here is yesterday’s face mask production, fyi:

 

El Dorado in the night sky

Look carefully at this picture.

Do you see the words EL DORADO perched on a translucent building across the street?

It is a phantom of the glaring glow behind it, the real building.

That seems like a metaphor for something.

It seems like a metaphor for the meaning of life–a floating symbol of perfection, situated somewhere far away and inaccessible–somewhere that we’ll never get.

If that seems bleak, focus inward instead and consider the things you can alter for the better. As Bob Klein writes, “Whatever you pay a great deal of attention to will become a pivotal point around which your life will revolve.”

He goes on to explain how things affect us from without, such as living with other people, whose lives “begin to revolve around each other” and existing within particular belief systems, where “your behavior begins to revolve around those beliefs.” [As a non-Catholic working at a Catholic school, I can certainly attest to that.]

Bob Klein recommends the pivot-like practice of T’ai Chi. T’ai Chi creates swirls of momentum around your central core, or Tan-tien, like a “biological gyroscope.” It is amazing and you finish by feeling very peppy and centered.  See video of Master Peng, in case you missed it.

Whether or not you begin practicing T’ai Chi in 2018, it is good to think about what we spend our attention on, that “pivotal point around which your life will revolve.” I’ll be doing T’ai Chi, for sure, because it is a living metaphor for my goal of peace. I aim for peace and harmony in the family (and in my own head), this year more than ever. If you knew us, you’d realize that is quite a lot! and it’s going pretty well for the first time in a long time, right now. 2018 will see my brothers and I–and our spouses–living in the same region for the first time in 34 years. With one son nearby and the other undecided where he’ll be.

2018 will see a move for our household and a new job, too, for me:  from full-time to retired professor and from business nobody to founder and CEO of HGBG!

That’s a lot!

What are you seeing off in the distance in 2018? What do you hope for? Will it be money, like in Reno, Nevada where I took that picture of the El Dorado Hotel?  Or do you deserve fame, at last? Or perhaps you’re thinking of living off the grid, and cultivating cyber-invisibility.  Whatever it is, hope of some kind would be good. Pass it on, if you’ve got something good!

 

 

flu symptoms and t’ai chi: to do or not to do?

Another day of feeling out of sorts. Made it to morning class but was showing flu symptoms by 2pm or so. Canceled a meeting to go home and rest. On the way home I felt sorry for myself, thinking, “I feel crappy. This is what I feel at this time of year every year, when the students get sick and then we all get sick and I hate the end of the semester, and I always get sick at Christmas, what a drag it all is, blah blah blah blah blah blah.”

And I thought, “God, are you boring. Shut up. This is today. The only today I’ve got. This is no longer those other years. What if I try the morning routine even though I feel crappy? Maybe my body would feel better. I can always stop and lie down if it doesn’t work out.”

So I did.

First the standing meditation, looking out the window from our son’s room here. Gazing at those colorful leaves gently moving in the wind, it was easy to practice the “fuzzy thinking” of Zen contemplation. With my hips more open from the V stance, the tightness and aches around my lower back faded away. With my mind peaceful and calm, I remembered the many fabulous things that are happening these days, and how lucky we are to be here in this pretty house. Then, the T’ai chi sequence as usual, in the other son’s room with the shades drawn shut. (Master Peng told us to practice it that way. It is very calming.) And as I moved to the sinuous sequence of Yang long style 108, it seemed like my inner torso of organs was loosening up from the grasp of nerves and tension. Being very attuned to my queasy stomach and stuffy head, I observed as the symptoms drifted away. Doing that long twisty sequence, I felt like I was becoming animal-like, agile and fluid. I felt happy. I was smiling. I smiled for several minutes and ended in a state of alert calm.

So I thought I’d describe that to you.

It appears flu symptoms can subside under the impact of what the Chinese call chi or vital energy. It is chi that circulates in the body up the spine. I often look at the kind of strange pictures (below) that Master Peng gave us last summer. One is a Chinese myth of a journey that begins at the bottom of the spine and moves its way up to the head and enlightenment. The chi is symbolized by the ball of white fire at the navel. The goal of Tai chi being to move that ball of white fire up as far as you can while you move.

These pictures inspire me to describe the experience in metaphor instead of science.  If anybody wants to explain to the blog how T’ai chi works scientifically, that is fine with me; please do! (I’m no M.D.; I’ve got a degree in French lit!)

In his wise and funny books, Bob Klein warns practitioners of T’ai chi that everybody will think you’re crazy if you start talking about it. But with all the miserable people I see around the campus and city and country and world, and all the colleagues, neighbors, friends and relatives I have who seem to be getting decrepit, sad, and old before their time, I feel it is urgent to let people know that T’ai chi exists. And it still works, just as it did in Ancient China. I am living proof of it. I feel pretty good tonight!

morning routine

Dear readers,

Today is the six-month anniversary of a morning routine I began in a tiny apartment in Paris last May. I have done it every day without fail: in people’s guest rooms, in a log cabin on the Olympic Peninsula, in a Reno hotel room looking out over neon lights, and in my home in South Bend.*  You can do it anywhere.

I have lived for more than five decades and have tried all kinds of exercise routines in my life—jogging, aerobics, gym machines—yet I have never been able to stick to a routine this long. Nor have I ever felt so good, consistently, over such a long period of time. So I think there’s something special about it.

Here it is, with warm wishes for good health—in mind and body—to all.

Morning routine

1. Get up two and a half hours before departure time. (For a 7:30 departure, get up at 5:00).
2. Enjoy your favorite warm beverage and a light breakfast (I have cappuccino with two shots of espresso and 2% milk, and a sliced banana in plain yogurt)
3. Choose a pretty window and pull back the curtain. If you’re rushed, you can enjoy your breakfast while doing this. Stand in front of the window, with your heels touching, knees flexible, and feet set at a 90 degree angle. Hold that position for 30 minutes, with head up, eyes roaming around, ears listening, and shoulders relaxed. The hands and arms can cup each other, hang loose, or stretch. It is important to hold the pelvic basin tucked underneath your torso, so that the spine is straight (as if you were suspended from the ceiling with a silver chain).
4. Walk around a little to stretch out your legs. Put on cooler clothes.
5. Begin one-hour exercise session:   a. Do five deep knee squats, as slowly as possible, and hold the deep squat for a count of five seconds, each time.  Hands are pressed against each other in a prayerful position, back is straight, pelvis pulled in.   b. Do twenty push-ups with legs tightly balanced on toes (man-style).  c. Walk around a little, breathe, have a sip of water.  d.  Repeat a. and b.
6. Do a full session of Yang long style T’ai chi! Follow the video of Master Peng’s T’ai chi class, all sessions 1 – 9.
7. Take a shower and get dressed, including flat shoes or boots (no high heels).
8. Get your work in order and step out to meet the world, knowing you have the power to feel strong, balanced and calm, all day long!

*According to Master Peng, you can take a day off from T’ai chi once a week. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t.