I don’t know what this deep resistance to writing is, but it’s worrying me. It feels like a scary bodily symptom I’m choosing to ignore, hoping it will go away on its own.

Every time I open Instagram, there’s a chirp in my brain that whispers: Get off this now! Shut it down. This is bad for you, and I promptly ignore it.

Then, today, I saw an article in The Atlantic titled “This Is Your Brain on Short-Form Video” by Hana Kiros. 

Even before I read it, I knew how my brain on short-form video would be described: small, deformed, and sick.

Because that’s how it feels.

The author quotes actor Andrew Garfield (of old Spider-Man fame), saying his Instagram feed is full of “weird ceramics” and Japanese craftspeople.

I get it. Mine is full of rescue dogs and sourdough. And yours is full of whatever your kink of the moment might be.

Peter Garfield bemoans that he’s “given all those hours to nothing!”

Exactly how I feel.

I’m not writing.

I’m not reading. 

I’m giving all my hours to nothing, too.

So I start reading this article, hoping the science will confirm that my brain is indeed getting sick from Instagram and that this fact will scare me enough to quit.

But it doesn’t conclude this. 

It concludes that although we can feel Instagram is rotting our brains, destroying our analytical skills, and impeding memory, empathy, and conversational depth, there isn’t yet enough scientific evidence to prove it.

But I know by the time that evidence arrives, I’ll be too far gone, so I have to act now.

Here’s what I’ve decided to do: Crowd it out.

Crowding out is a technique I learned in health coaching.  It’s a dietary strategy that focuses on adding more healthy, nutrient-dense foods rather than obsessing over cutting out junk food. So instead of trying to cut out Instagram, I’m going to crowd it out with something healthier.

I noticed the other day that I’m way behind on my Goodreads Challenge to read 50 books this year.

I’m only up to 31. That means I need to read 19 books before the end of the year to hit my goal of 50. That works out to a new book every 5.5 days until the end of the year. 

So I’ve decided to Crowd Out Instagram with books. I can’t possibly read a new book every 5 days unless I’m reading in every spare moment. All the time I’m now spending on Instagram will have to be spent reading instead.

On September 29^th, there will be 100 days left in this year. 100 days isn’t a lot, but it’s a meaningful stretch to commit to something worthwhile. If you’re into streaks and projects like I am, this timeframe has a lot of appeal. What might you consider doing in the next 100 days to make you happier, healthier, or smarter?

Think about it and let me know in the comments if you decide to do something. You know how I love this stuff!

To back it up a bit, I do not love weight training. 

I do not love picking up big, heavy, metallic-smelling weights and hoisting them aloft.

I’ve been going to the gym with Linda every Thursday for a few years and using the machines, but I’m not getting any stronger.  It’s probably because I only go once a week, and the machines aren’t designed for a 5’2” woman with narrow shoulders, so I always feel like my form is “off” on them.  Plus, the weight increments are weird.  

Plus, I always just want to go home.

At home, I have dumbbells, a few kettlebells, and some resistance bands. Sometimes I’ll pick them up, but I don’t know what I’m doing.

I’ve tried looking at Instagram and YouTube for plans, but… Eh. 

A million years ago, I had a trainer, and that was great, but it was expensive, so I could only go once a week, and that’s not enough. 

Since I’m an Obliger by temperament, I need an accountability partner to do things I don’t want to do. I’ll only go to the gym if I’ve made a date to meet you there. 

Otherwise, I’ll find an excuse to stay home and read.

But I NEED to lift weights.

I heard about this app called Ladder. 

https://www.joinladder.com

Somebody I follow on Instagram uses it. I looked into it. I watched some YouTube reviews and how-tos. It got great reviews. Plus, it had a 7-day Free Trial.

You start by picking a “team” based on what you want. I wanted to do my workouts at home with dumbbells. I didn’t want to have to go to the gym.

I wanted something beginner-friendly, so Team Ignite with Coach Stevie was the best match for me.

She talks you through the whole thing. She demos everything. She’s enthusiastic and encouraging— not cringey or obnoxious. 

All I needed were dumbbells and a bench. I didn’t have a bench, so I got a small foldable one on Amazon for $150

After the 7 Day Trial I bought the Pro Annual Plan for $179.99. This breaks down to $14.99 a month for a year.

The sessions are only 30 minutes long and include a warm-up and cool-down.

The app is robust. It has stuff I haven’t explored yet and might never use, like meal tracking. 

There’s a Chat room where you can get your questions answered. (Haven’t been there yet, either.) 

There’s a Journal feature where you can track your weights and monitor your progress.

There’s a feature where you can send encouraging emoji explosions to people who are working out at the same time you are. (I’ve had quite a few of these sent my way! It’s silly, but fun.)

There are Badges to earn (I earned the Labor Day Badge the other day). I’m a sucker for a badge.

After 6 weeks on a team, there is an “Open” period during which you can try out another team and coach and switch if you want. 

I have 9 workouts under my belt so far, and I really like it. But the true test will be: Can I stick with it, and what will my results be?  

Stay tuned.

At the beginning of July, I started Project Daily Yoga. 

I committed to David Swenson’s 45-minute Ashtanga Yoga Practice. I told myself, come hell or high water, I would make time to do this sequence every day.

But more than that, I wanted to do it pure. No hidden agendas like greater flexibility or more toned abs. I wanted to embrace the Zen adage: “Goal is Path. Path is Goal.” My idea was: Commit to the path. Do it every damned day. That was my only goal. I wanted to focus on the process, not the outcomes.

I’m 60 days in now, and the fact is, my flexibility gains have been minimal, and my body is no more toned than it was in early July. The mirror shows no change whatsoever, and my fancy scale says I’m actually moving in the wrong direction.

I don’t get it, and I’m getting a little depressed. 

I saw The Odyssey for the second time yesterday, and now I’m thinking this might be a test by the gods. Are they testing my resolve? Putting storms and gargoyles in my way to see if I’ll quit? 

If so, bring it, gods! I’m not quitting. Not yet, anyway. It’s only Day 60. Check back on me on Day 600. 

Back in July, I wondered if I could make this project interesting and fun. Could I do it without whining and complaining? Could I just fall in love with the process?

Apparently, the answer is:

Or not yet.

I know, at least theoretically, that the act of showing up to train, day after day, month after month, year after year is the alchemical ingredient.

Persistently, with reverence, for a long time is my mantra.

At the same time, I still want evidence of transformation. Just a little. Especially when it’s a body practice, and a hard one at that. Surely after 60 days, shouldn’t I be able to get my nose a teensy bit closer to my knees in a forward fold?

My hidden agendas are revealed in my disappointment. The goal of falling in love with the process, or falling in love with reality (Amor fati), is still in the Ideal Realm, not a reality for me. 

Yet.

Intellectually, I know that:

1. Change takes time.

2. Change takes consistency over time.

3. Change takes incremental change over time.

4. It takes time to turn the ship around.

5. While the ship is turning around, there is no visible change.

6. Persistence is the key.

So as it stands now, there are still 4 weeks left in Q3.

It’s time to refocus on just showing up, speaking more kindly to my body, lowering my expectations, and learning to love the discipline of habit change while genuinely enjoying the ride.

Onward.

 I’m not comfortable admitting how much time I spend on Instagram. But I just now checked my algorithm, and it said that lately I’m into mindful movement, resistance workouts, and being present. 

Okay. That makes me feel a bit better, and it sounds like I’m feeding my head a healthy diet, even if I am spending more time on that app than I would like.

I do like that Instagram is upfront about what they are feeding you, though. I also like that they let me curate my feed. 

If I start getting stuff I don’t like (too much politics, for example), I can change it. 

So if you, too, would like to know what your algorithm is feeding you on Insta, here’s how to do it:

Press your Profile (that circle in the bottom right with the head in it)

Then press the hamburger icon (those 3 horizontal bars) in the upper right. 

That will take you to “Settings and Activity.”

From there, scroll down to “Content Preferences,” then “Your Algorithm.” 

From there, you can add what you want to see more of and less of. 

It’s probably better to limit your time on the app, or delete it altogether, but if you’re weak like me, at least curate your feed and build in some uplifting things.

Parasocial Relationships

I have a parasocial relationship with Isabel Klee (@simonsits) on Instagram. I wrote extensively about it back in May when Isabel’s book, Dogs, Boys, And Other Things I’ve Cried About, hit the NYTimes Bestseller List. You can read the post here:

A month ago, her beloved dog, Simon, had to be put down, and I know this sounds ridiculous, but Simon’s death hit me hard. It felt like putting my own dog down. I cried a lot. So many tears for a dog I never met, or got to see or pet. 

The internet brings a lot of shit into our lives, but it also brings real people living real lives. People who share so much of their lives that you feel you know them. It’s a little like how you feel about and care for some characters in novels, except these online people aren’t fictional characters; they’re real. And their dogs are real. And when their dogs get so sick they have to be put down, these people lay themselves bare and document, for all the world to see, their pain. 

And their vulnerability is so brave that it makes me wonder: in their shoes, would I be able to be so open about my pain? And the answer is, oh hell no, because when I am in pain, my instinct is to hide, to crawl into the proverbial hole and die. 

But what I learned watching Isabel say goodbye to her precious Simon is that by letting the world watch her suffer, she brought us all together because everyone who has ever loved a pet knows the particular ache of that pain, and it is really deep. 

And everyone online who witnessed that pain locked hearts together and cried with Isabel. Strangers, crying over a dog they loved and feeling so deeply for the woman who loved him. 

These parasocial relationships are so weirdly real. 

 So much of the time, the world can feel unreal and alienating, and then, out of the blue, you encounter these weird little pockets of authenticity and sweetness, where people are so openly brave and intimate that strangers all over the world cry together online.

This is what inspired me in August.

Yep, today was Day 45. 

The last time I completed a long, everyday yoga streak was in 2019. I did Travis Elliot’s 108 Day Yoga Challenge.

That program was so hard for me. I remember thinking every single day: When is this going to get easier?? And also: When is my body going to start looking different??

I don’t remember a time when I was completely OK with my body. There may have been a short window in my late 40s, early 50s, when I was happy when I looked at myself in the mirror.  But that window closed shortly after then, and it’s been closed ever since.

I am struggling now because even though I think not much has changed in the way I eat and the amount of exercise I get, suddenly I have, for the first time in my life, a belly. A fricken belly that sticks out, and no amount of abdominal contraction, sucking it in, and trying to do nauli will make it go away.

I am not at all reconciled to the fact that this is a natural part of aging. 

But if I am honest, even though I say my lifestyle hasn’t changed, it probably has. I have become more sedentary. I don’t run anymore, for instance. I don’t do nearly as much cardio as I used to.

Yoga took over. Especially the teaching, which sadly, crowded out my personal practice, and that’s when I decided to do that 108 Day Yoga Challenge in 2019. To get my practice back.

I remember so vividly back then, around Day 46, when I was despairing that nothing was happening and I was on the verge of quitting, that there was a sudden shift. 

On Day 46 I began to feel better and to look better. I recognized then that I just had to stay with the struggle and not give up.

46 days is just over 6 weeks. When I started this current Ashtanga streak, I said to myself: 

Just get to Day 46.  After Day 46, things will get better. You’ll feel better. You’ll start to see results.

Tomorrow is Day 46. I am not going to have my breakthrough day tomorrow, and that’s ok. 

This Ashtanga thing I’m doing isn’t about changing my body but about changing my mind. I want to come to grips with change, time, and aging.

This practice involves doing the same poses every day. Some of them I can do, but I can only approximate most. 

I use a strap for the binds. I use my wheel for half shoulderstand. I can’t grab my big toe in Triangle. I can’t rest my hand on the floor in lateral angle. Headstand used to be one of my favorite poses; now I skip it.

There’s a spot on my right knee that needs protection and could probably use a little Arnica Gel if I remember to bring it into the room.

I’m older. I’m wiser. I’m stiffer. I’m not pushing that right knee the way I might have a few years ago. I’m propping it with a bolster instead.

The “win” is that I’m doing it every day. The win is cultivating patience. Today, instead of bemoaning the lack of progress, I told myself: It hasn’t even been 2 months yet!

The other day, I saw one of those Before-and-After body transformation photos on Instagram, and the woman’s body was unrecognizable in the After picture. From fat and lumpy, she transformed into lean and muscular. In her video voiceover, she said: 

A lot of these Instagram transformations will tell you that you can go from THIS (fat and lumpy) to THIS (lean and muscular) in 6 months, but I’m here to tell you it took me 4 YEARS!!

I yelled at my phone, “Preach, woman! YES!!”

This was the most encouraging transformation story I had ever heard. 

Change takes time, and everyone in the social media landscape lies about this. They tell you you can transform yourself in 6 months, and that is complete and utter bullshit. Real, lasting, and meaningful transformation takes 4 years. Maybe longer. And if you buy into the 6-month lie, you buy into misery.

I see this in the yoga practice room sometimes. People will come faithfully every week for a few months (8 classes total), and then they’ll disappear. 

I don’t know why, but I’ll bet they came with some expectation of transformation—at least a little—and when it doesn’t happen after 8 tries, they give up.

But this truth that transformation takes time is especially hard to swallow when you’re no longer young.  So, let’s say this Ashtanga streak of mine extends 4 years. I will be 77 then.

Geez.  

But if I’m going to be 77 anyway, I might as well enjoy nailing that stupid bind in Ardha Baddha Padma Pascimotanasana, right?

But seriously, the bind isn’t the point. The posture is never the point. The point of the practice is going into the room, closing the door, putting on the music, changing into the clothes, tying up the hair, and spending an hour connecting to the breath, and then getting to encounter the reality and the marvel of the human body.

And encouraging it, and tending it, and testing its limits. Then, at the very end, exhausted mentally and physically, lying in a heap on the floor, feeling the body ripple, ripple, ripple, until eventually the ripples subside, and there is only…

What? 

G, Fred, and I drove up last Friday, scoring 3 seats together in the second row. Not ideal, but Friday was the only day we could go. Shows are selling out so much that they’re adding 2 AM and 6 AM shows. Our show was at 11:40 AM.

I fully expected to leave with a neck ache after staring up at a 5-story-high screen into Odysseus’s nostrils for three hours. But even though we were ridiculously close, it wasn’t bad. 

I didn’t know this at the time, but there are only 25 theaters in the entire US that have the rare equipment needed to show the film in IMAX 70mm.

If you want, check here to see if there’s one near you:

https://www.statspanda.com/blog/the-odyssey-imax-70mm-theaters

I live 2 hours from the Rochester, NY one.

Now that I’ve seen it, here’s what I’d tell anyone who wants to go: 

Number 1. 

Go with the right people. This is not a movie to go to with people who have no clue what this story is about—people who have never referenced a Trojan horse, or described themselves as caught between Scylla and Charybdis, or imagined themselves tied to a mast to resist temptation. 

At the very least, make sure your friends have Wikipedia-ed the basic plot. 

As we were walking into the theater, Fred said, “What’s this movie about, basically?

Ideally, go with someone who has read it, even if they read it a long time ago. Go with someone who has already “seen” this movie in their imaginations, someone who has seen Penelope at her loom, negotiated Scylla and Charybdis, run from the Cyclops. 

The thrill for me, who had already “seen” these things in my imagination, was to see them come to life on the screen. For me, this movie was so much better than what I had concocted in my own imagination, by like, a thousand-fold. And that is almost NEVER the case for me with books and movies. The movie is always, or mostly, a disappointment. Not this one.

Afterward, I wanted to talk about it. I wanted to compare notes with another person who had already experienced it in their imagination. 

Neither G nor Fred had read it. As we were standing in the lobby afterward, me, gobsmacked, I asked Fred what he thought. 

He thought it was all right, basically a Jason Bourne movie (apparently Matt Damon plays Jason Bourne in a series of action-adventure movies) 

I felt a kind of shock. I also felt disappointed in a crestfallen kind of way. I said nothing. 

It is totally okay to not agree or feel the same way about a movie like The Odyssey with someone, but not with someone who doesn’t recognize that all the ubiquitous cultural references to siren songs, Trojan horses, or feeling caught between Scylla and Charybdis come from this epic poem. 

Number 2.

Do a brief refresh of the plot line. Even though I read it in college and again when the Emily Wilson translation came out in 2017, I had forgotten much of it. Like, why did he need to sack Troy? Just because Helen cheated on Menelaus with Paris? How could adultery cause all this violence and slaughter?

But when I checked when I got home, yup, that was it. 

Man, it was so violent. It was also so fucking loud. At moments, I thought to myself: “This is a boy’s movie. This is the kind of violence boys like to watch: people’s heads getting lopped off, people being impaled on swords.”

 I really hate those kinds of movies.

But that being said, it was the sacking of Troy that revealed Odysseus’s character.

Odyseus, as it turns out, is no hero. He’s not noble. He’s a piece of shit, really. I felt sorry for him only when I recognized he had PTSD. What he did to Troy ruined him. But not enough. I found him more pathetic than heroic. 

Number 3.

Don’t get distracted by the reviews. It’s a movie, for cryin’ out loud.

The whole flap doodle with Emily Wilson is boring to me. Yeah, he (Nolan) took tons of liberties with her translation. Yeah, he got a lot “wrong.” Yeah, his portrayal of Circe was stingy and narrow, but he got so much right. 

It was a masterpiece of cinematic art. He didn’t use CGI. It was shot on film. It wasn’t a book. It was a movie. And a fucking masterful one.

The casting was brilliant, IMHO. 

Ever since I saw it last Friday, it’s all I can think about, but not in some ruminative, intellectual way. I see scenes: Calypso on the beach, Odysseus surrendering to the sea in a raft, Circe saying, “Return to your disguises” as she turns the pigs back to men. The dog Argus and his tail. Penelope telling Telemachus that she deserved the throne! (Damn straight she did!) The scene inside the horse. The whirlpool, the dead rising from the black dirt.

So many scenes! They emerge in my dreams and I entertain them. I want to think about them.

I want to see it again, and I’m going to, on September 2^nd. This time I’m going with Ira, who is reading it now (he’s more an Iliad fan. I don’t think he’s read The Odyssey.)

I’m also rereading the Wilson translation again. Not to compare the book to the movie, but for the pure pleasure of it.

Lots of commentators, whether they love the movie or not, are all agreeing that its emphasis on The Law of Zeus, which is to welcome the stranger, is what our society needs to focus on right now. 

Also, if this movie makes people curious to read this epic poem, that is amazing. 

If you can see it, I think you should. If it makes you want to read it, even better.

Five stars.

It’s a popular wall where people congregate. It’s up near the cash register.

I dragged Em over to it because I wanted her opinion on a few titles that I know she’s read (from following her on Goodreads) and I wanted to ask her about them. 

Strangers, for one. It’s getting a lot of buzz and I’ve been considering it. “No,” she said. She hated it. “She’s too rich and entitled.”

What about The God of the Woods? “Yes, loved it.”

Pachinko? “Mom! You haven’t read that??!!” You have to. Yes.”

So it was going like this. She telling me what she liked, me telling her what I liked. 

In the middle of this, a woman with an employee badge joined our conversation.

“Have you read Mad Mabel? We both say no. And at this point,  another customer, overhearing her, chimes in, “Oh! I’m reading Mad Mabel now, and I just love it!”

We have now become a clump, a little clog of opinionated readers, doing one-sentence reviews in front of the Best Seller wall.

Kirsten asks us what we’re reading now. 

Later, both Em and I remark that no bookstore employee has ever asked us what we were reading.

I tell her, John of John. Kirsten says that’s on her list, and asks what I think of it. I say, “Not a beach read. Maybe wait till winter.”

Em says she just finished The Loneliness of Sonja and Sunny.

People are now jostling to get in front of the wall. I gently herd us off to the side. I don’t want this convo to end, though. None of us does.

Kirsten points to a line of books on the wall. “These are my favorites now,” she says.

Hers is the line of books that begins with Wild Dark Shore. I notice Strangers is on her list, the book Em didn’t like, and The God of the Woods, which I’ve been eyeing, and which Em liked, and Mad Mabel, which sounds outrageous. (Mabel is an 81-year-old narrator and is a “hoot,” according to the other customer who is reading it now.)

As we talk, we learn more about Kirsten, who lives in Annapolis but spends part of the week here in Rehoboth. She reads two books a week.

She learns about us, too. She learns that Em’s from Portland, home of Powell’s; and I’m from PA.

Browseabout is a very busy store, especially in summer. In addition to books, they sell toys and puzzles, home decor, and greeting cards, all tastefully curated.

But the whole time we’re talking to Kirsten, I keep wondering what the store manager is thinking about her having this extensive conversation with us in front of the Best Seller wall

I keep worrying about her getting in trouble for talking to us for so long, even though it was the most interesting and meaningful conversation with a stranger in a store I’d had all week, and a true moment of connection. I truly did not want it to end, but I worried that she might get fired for it. How sad is that?

I went back the next day by myself to look for her, but she wasn’t there. I didn’t know what I wanted to say to her, really, maybe just tell her how much I appreciated our book talk. 

The fact that she wasn’t there, worried me a bit, but it could have just been her day off. Still, I worried she might have been fired, been told a bookstore wasn’t a book club, and that she needed to direct people to books so that they could buy them, not discuss them.

I hope I am wrong. 

But I think what I’m trying to say here is that when you are in a business where you are trying to sell something, whether it is books, or cars, or clothing, you are selling your thing to a person first. The book, car, or shirt is secondary.  The primary transaction is person-to-person.  

When Kirsten asked us what we were reading, I felt an instant connection to her. I felt she wanted to know about my inner life, what things captured my imagination, and if she could connect her imaginative life with mine.  

It made me feel like I wasn’t just a customer. Actually, I didn’t feel like a customer at all. She made me feel like an interesting person. 

I’d buy anything from her. I hope our conversation didn’t get her fired.

It’s hard. 

Ashtanga streak. Check.

Meditation, Day 24.  Check.

Both of these are new and very fragile, but holding. 

This blog takes the most time, so it’s tempting to let it go but I can’t break a 3-and-a-half-year streak just because I want to go boogie boarding, play Muffin Pan Mania, ride bumper cars, and eat ice cream.

No. 

I will be like Odysseus and plug my ears to the sounds of the Sirens. Or the sound of texts.

Ding. 

Another one, 

Now another one. 

They are trying to lure me down.

Omg. This one just landed with an attachment:

That’s Sylvan. She just won a giant walrus playing Ring Toss.

The other night Obie won this:

This is me, caught enjoying bumper cars:

Emily with a fish:

G also got a fish. With one arm.

Tonight is the OG dinner. Ira, Emily, and I. This is the one in which we leave G with the kids while we have a nice family dinner, just the three of us. We’re trying a new place tonight. This one:

Okay.  Mission accomplished! See you next week!

Love, Kath

No. I am procrastinating because…I don’t know why, actually.    

But it’s not because I don’t know how to pack or what to pack. I know exactly how to make the proper clothing selections.    

I know because I know my style. I know because my clothing has been edited down to just those things that:

•     Fit me.
• Are comfortable.
•     All work with each other.
• And because I now know how clothes work, what they do, and how they function. And I’ve edited all my clothes down to just the things that I love.    

It all started two years ago when I went to Paris with Emily to see the Rothko exhibit.

I was so incredibly impressed with how people dressed there. Both women and men. The wool coats. Omg, the wool coats. And the scarves. And the flair. Everyone had flair. I wanted flair. So when I got home, I became obsessed.     

    I started reading about capsule wardrobes, and looking at Pinterest boards, and hoeing through all my clothes and lugging bags of really nice stuff to the local thrift store.    

It got to the point where everything left in my closet was something I really liked.

But I still didn’t know how to figure out my own personal style.    

So I started following Instagram style influencers, and looking at Pinterest boards, and taking style quizzes.    

I was told to notice the stores I gravitated towards, and the ones that didn’t.    

Banana Republic, J.Crew, yes.    

Anthropologie, no.

I tended toward preppy, but not full-blown Ralph Lauren preppy.    

Preppy, with a can of graffiti spray paint stashed in the tote. Pinstriped trousers maybe, but paired with red sneakers and a boho necktie.

It took me a while to study all this. I had to buy things to fill in gaps. Many gaps. It felt insane to spend so much money on clothes.    

But I also went crazy in thrift stores. Omg, the “Everything $4.50” baskets I pawed through. But by the same token: Holy shit, the gold I found!

So I guess I’d say my style now is one-third Banana Republic, one-third Anthropologie-esque, and one-third thrift store.    

I have always been a person with obsessions. I go on crazy jags. My mother used to call my jags my “enthusiasms.” I was known for them: tree-climbing enthusiasms, roller-skating enthusiasms, reading enthusiasms.    

Now it’s stuff like Ashtanga, intermittent fasting, sourdough, protein.    

They all last a while, then fade.

But today, as I sit here procrastinating about packing for the beach, I’m thinking that my “fashion/style/capsule wardrobe enthusiasm,” while over, is still paying hefty dividends to this day.

If you’ve been reading me for a while, you know. But just for fun, here are some pics from those days.    

That blazer was $4.50

Black sunnies, black bag, black sandals. Sister items.

An early “hoe out” of yoga clothes

Good times.

But now, I gotta pack. Beach week! Yeah!

I am stuck inside on this July day because wildfire smoke from Canada is making the air dangerous to breathe and the sky orange.

The air filters we ran during Covid to trap the deadly aerosols are now up from the basement, dusted, and running.

We were planning on going blueberry picking this afternoon, but instead G went to the blueberry place and bought already-picked ones and a teeny-tiny blueberry pie, and we ate it with vanilla ice cream and ruined our dinner.

The joys of July.

Outfit:

Day 10 of my Ashtanga commitment is in the books. A streak has begun. Each day I put on the same mandala Yogaz pants, a Lulu fitted tee, and tie my hair up in a bandeau headband. I stand in front of a full-length mirror, greet my image, and begin.

When I’m finished, I set the Insight Timer app for 10 minutes. A Basu bell begins and ends the practice, and a woodblock clacks at the halfway point.

After that, I open the Breathe app and do 10 minutes of 5:5:5:5 Box breathing, guided by Female Voice #2.

After that, I pick a short arm workout from betterdays.fitness that I downloaded from Instagram into my Notes app. I do this 5-minute routine 2 times. 

Something is better than nothing. Path is goal, goal is path. 

A potential T-shirt.

This virtue cascade starts with the yoga commitment, and everything that follows is extra dominoes. 

I switch into shorts and a tee and take the dogs. Bella takes a dirt bath in a pile of soft silt on the path. When we get to the top of the hill, my eyes start to water and the dogs are panting harder than usual.  We turn back. Too much for my eyes and little dog lungs.

I settle in for the write. Purple ink over pages and pages, hoping something will spark. I dig out my entry from this day last year: G took herself out of the running for A.D.

I read some Substacks, hoping to jumpstart my idea battery.

I like to read Substacks. All kinds. People write everything from how their dog died last night, to how they make bouquets from their garden and put them in jars in front of their house for free.

Little moments.

Sad little moments and happy little moments. People write about what they worry about: 

51% of people read 0 books last year. 

And what they amuse themselves with:

A notebook just for doodles, lists, and random thoughts. They post pics.

I read all these writers and get something from all of them. Sometimes it’s good news (the flowers) and sometimes it’s disturbing (the books, ugh).  But if the writing is coherent and lively, I like that. I’m their audience.

But “audience” is the wrong word. I’m not a head in a dark auditorium with a crowd of other heads. Rather, I’m in their head with them, wondering with them, curious with them, listening in on their meditation, training my ear to their thoughts, trying them on. Like an outfit. 

Do I like their style? Do I like how they put their thoughts together? Do they have flair? Taste? What are they signaling?

After this, I come back to the purple ink. I try to imagine Future Kath. Kath a year from today, looking back at today. 

Future Kath has been practicing every day for a year, doing the yoga, the writing, the weights. She’d been reading the books, posting the blog. She’s not worrying about her voice, her audience, her niche.

She’s not shaming or blaming herself for never keeping her commitments. 

Along the path, she found breath and the words to match. She found that the weights strengthened both her soul and her biceps. She learned how to write meditations in the soul’s gym.

Meditations on an orange sky.

Meditations on a blueberry pie.

Meditations on a day in July.