Tallahassee Journal by Margaret E. McColley

  Canopy When I returned to in-person teaching after lockdown but before the vaccine, I would come home and, before entering the house, I'd sit in my driveway on its warm, stony surface to unwind after work. A sit would become a stretch, and then a full lie down, a tree-gazing savasana. I would look up at the glittering leaves, the sunstream, and the blue sky behind and feel the caress of this entire arc of nature. My breath would adjust to the waves of breeze that would brush across the airscape and cause the branches to sway here and then there. In the flow of time a furbaby or two from the outdoor pack would come over and lie down near me and stretch. My movements were familiar to them--for this is how they spend hours and hours every single day. They move at the pace of the plants around them, at the speed of the breeze, deliberately yet, easily. I started to take to the driveway for daily yogic movement and lying down to gaze up at the canopy. She offered a whole new way of lo...

  Lynne is my friend, but Lynne is much more. She is bringing magic to a hurting world. The day I was unpacking my U-Haul trailer, she walked up to me and introduced herself. She was my upstairs neighbor in the new apartment building I had found by great chance, with hardwood floors and an old, Floridian flair. I knew we'd become friends, despite working in demanding jobs (full-time teacher, hospital administrator). In truth we came together because of our demanding jobs. What began as a simple greeting turned into dinner at the Mexican, then road trips to the Gulf. The rest is herstory in the making.  The smile of friends who hadn't seen eachother for months in the early 2020s. We compared notes. We found resonance. It was soothing. This is my interview in 3-questions with Lynne,  angelic friend, planner-pro, mom to interesting adult sons and high-energy shelter pups, and aspiring mahjong player if you have any Tallahassee leads... What new inspiration are you carrying ...

Diane Booth Gilliam is an extraordinary human, one whom I am grateful to have met and someone I will continue to seek out for guidance and creative inspiration. She is the creator of  Yogastrology ®, a practice that marries the lessons of ancient yogic and ayurverdic practices with knowledge rooted in Vedic and Western astrology.   To learn all about her offerings, visit: https://yogastrology.com/ . As a student and teacher of yoga, I was looking for something deep that went far beyond learning about the physical shapes the body takes in yoga. What I found was a supportive, intuitive, listening voice with whom to engage on the most gorgeous topics through which yogic practices allow us to explore and expand. Diane's curriculum is utterly unique, and allowed me to find a Home within while learning about interactions between the cosmos, the natural world, and an enhanced path to being. Here is our interview in 3 core questions:  1. How did your travels to India imp...

                                                       Sometimes when I brush my teeth at night, I look down and inspect the sink in the bedroom where my toothbrush and paste are located. And unless I've just scrubbed it down until sparkling, I have an unheimlich feeling of horror while looking. It's almost never clean enough for my ablutions, and I hear myself questioning my self worth: what have you accomplished today, anyway? Your sink is dirty. You can do better. This is when I know that I stayed up too late and my tired voice is talking to me.... At this point I try to make a b-line to bed, surrendering to the sandman, hoping that my horror will stay at the sink and the sandman will caress me gently with kinder words. It didn't occur to me until today, while talking to a new student, that maybe perfectionism was the culprit. But this isn't wha...

 Recently I was out to lunch with a dear friend when she told me to" Stop It". I had been speaking in a self-deprecating manner without realizing it. I took her words as an admonishment. I got reactive. "It's not your job to fix me,"  I returned. "I'm not trying to fix you--it just hurts me to hear you talk about yourself that way."  We got a little heated trying to flesh it out all the way. But ultimately it was a tune-up for our communications. It had been building up for a long time... years? Prior to this lunch date I had already been reflecting on the Art of Misunderstanding.  It seems to me that so much of life is filled with misunderstandings that there should be a play-book for how to make them turn into a growth moment.  But the fact is, life moves so quickly at times, and we have so many communications within a day (and this is ofcourse variable, depending on one's circumstances), that they aren't that easy to track and revise in-...

 Hunkering down with the Ferals, and what They are teaching me. fe·ral /ˈferəl,ˈfirəl/ adjective (especially of an animal) in a wild state, especially after escape from captivity or domestication. "a feral cat" I provide some food and shelter for a family of feral kitties living in the cul-de-sac.  This is what I'm observing, and learning: 1. They take turns being sentinals for eachother (protection, sharing). 2. They eat their food delicately, even when they are very hungry (non-dominance, non-greed). 3. They keep eachother warm (sharing heat). 4. They greet eachother by bumping into one another with purpose, shoulder-to-hip, in a side-swipe (recognition, hospitality). 5. The pack is a matriarchy, and she eats first (respect for the mother, for elders). 6. They are more comfortable when I hunker down at their level (equality, meeting them at their level). 7. They have sensitive hearing (vigilance, awareness of surroundings). 8. They like sleeping on leaves (naturally-lea...

  This is where they walked, swam hunted danced and sang, Take a picture here; Take a souvenir. Cuyahoga, R.E.M.   Sometimes words swim around in our minds, sinking into the inner layers until they embed, planting new life in our neurological bedrock.  ~~~S y l a c a u g a~~~ A few days ago, my swimming word was a name-place: a small, hilly town in Alabama, where once tread the Shawnee, until they were forced to move west of the Mississippi through the Indian Removal Act. Sylacauga looped around like a river otter in my ear.  Chalakagay was a Shawnee settlement prior to the expelling of native Americans both more and less itinerant (the Creek were established in this area before the arrival of the Shawnee, who were refugees). The lay of the land is gentle here; one can see why it made such a compelling place to rest, with its hills, forests, and lakes coming together, forging ecosystems. See: https://digitalalabama.com/alabama-cities/sylacauga-alabama/2543...