Suzaji’s Blog

The marsh is dry now; the creek bed and all the secret trickles of water are no more. It was hard to extricate myself—I felt sad and guilty—but I cancelled the last lesson. I felt so tired, I had to come here to replenish myself. I had to sit still on the warm ground and stare at the waving stalks—still green, but the front row already turning yellow. I had to come here and listen to the twilight symphony.

As I sat, a flock of birds flew overhead. They swooped and darted like bats—dozens of dancing black silhouettes etched against the twilight sky. I had to come here and see the sweet yellow mustard once more, for myself, before it all dries up.

It’s Sunday night, it’s June, and here I am with Honey, Nubio, and Chico. After I let them run wild they sit still, close by. I feel their animal consciousness. I watch their heads turn side to side, ears alert. I see their eyes staring . . . whatever it is, I want to see it, too. And all the while the sky grows darker and the clouds, the mist, rolls in.

The river of life has washed me ashore here. Life is not done with me yet, and I’m not done with life. But without my nature refuge the fatigue is overwhelming. I feel ready for the long sleep. I want to be a hermit. I want to hole up and write and clear my head, but I had a wake-up call. The doctor was going to open up my young niece’s crooked spine and fuse her vertebrae. It gave me a jolt and pushed me back into the teaching game. The commercial world is pulling yoga apart. I want to hide till this phase passes, but humans need to know their bodies from the inside out. So I’ll keep teaching, even if insurance doesn’t pay for it.

Now the wind is blowing. The night is falling so sweetly. The dry marsh is full of birds—more and more birds gathering for the night. Their symphony is enchanting. As the ears open you hear them calling back and forth. We are so quiet; as the land grows still, we grow even more still. We are so silent I half expect a coyote or bear to emerge from the marsh, but the very presence of my pack keeps them at bay.

Nature is releasing her secrets. The beauty is so intense it’s a tonic for all the horrors I learned of this week. My heart is still recovering from the story of the little girl who didn’t survive her “wedding night” to the tribal chief. And the harsh truths I just learned about horse racing. Man’s cruelty and perversion knows no bounds.

On this night I stayed till all the daylight was gone. It was like death—a good death. I stayed till the night grew cold, till cold winds blew over the dark landscape and pushed me back to my nice warm nest.

Tags: dogs, journal writing, nature, Ojai, outdoors, writing yoga

This entry was posted on June 3, 2013 at 7:23 am and is filed under Life in Ojai, New Memoir Chapters, Yoga Writing Memoir. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.