Under the Banyan Tree

As I sit in the dental office waiting for my son's treatment to be completed, I want to sink into my chair, place my head in my hands, close my eyes and exhale loudly. But I won't. Because while I mostly despise dentists, I think I should respect the space and remain calm -- the 10 X 10 waiting room with three faux leather chairs and one plastic treasure chest of goodies for children who successfully complete a check up without crying or asking Siri to phone 911 is not the best place for an I'm on overload breakdown. Plus, the door is made almost entirely of glass, so anyone venturing to another office in the medical building would see my sorry why-me-why-now self. So I'll remain calm. And instead I'll visit Starbuck's after the appointment and devise a plan while 80's soundtracks play on the audio system. I'll try on new perspectives, integrate a coaching technique I learned over my most recent amazing and amazingly busy weekend at CTI. First I'l...

I was going to blog about social constructs today because these constructs shape our behavior and determine much of who we are or who we think we should be, but I need, instead, to write about psychics. You know, fortune tellers. Without the fake accents and the scarves and the crystal balls but with the intensity and weirdly maternal energy. I'm pretty sure having consulted one (or two) reveals something about where I fit into one social construct or another:  female, mother, middle-class, confused, limited by design, I don't know. But there are a few things I do know. And insights I learned from the fortune-telling experience. I consulted my first psychic ten years ago, stepped, on a Tuesday night, into her single-room, house-like office that has since been sold to a tax firm whose signage is larger but less intriguing than the psychic's welcome message (I'm pretty sure those tax letters don't flash). When I knocked on the woman's door after having opened th...

I write fiction. And non-fiction. And bad poetry, which I don't feel ashamed to admit because poetry inspires, enlightens, and brings joy, but I'm no good at writing it, or at least not really. I could do it, I suppose, but I prefer fiction with its characters and colors and momentum. I enjoy what Marlon James, exquisite writer and person, identified as the arising of characters from [the writer's] need. I don't know who or what will appear when I begin crafting a story, but I know I'm ready for the arrival of anything. I'm even excited about the unknown. Yesterday during an English 1A session focused on narrative essays, I decided that life is like that. Non-fiction, despite not being imagined, is like that. Things happen and no one fully understands their occurrence. But sometimes -- not always, for sure -- we're inexplicably prepared for these moments that seem to have bubbled up from our subconscious. We haven't willed them, we probably don't e...

Some questions sound perfectly benign but hold more power than we think. Like a lot of power. I encountered one such question a week ago when I posted vacation photos on social media and a girlfriend commented, Where are you these days? I was in the Bahamas at the time and thrilled, of course, to answer the question and even extrapolate a little, adding qualifiers like amazing, stunning, inspirational. I may even have confessed, In my happy place. Upon returning home, also a wonderful place but not one as majestic and peaceful and just plain gorgeous as my favorite island, I began reflecting on the myriad areas of my life to which that question applied. Where was I, really? And why didn’t I interrogate myself more often about the figurative places I had settled into -- either by choice or misstep or neglect or comfort? I didn’t often check in with the emotional, physical, and spiritual states I was in. So how did I truly know where I was? And if I didn’t know, how could I evaluate and...

Three days before Christmas, I was standing in my kitchen looking at the center island that needed cleaning when my phone vibrated. I rarely pick up and even more rarely receive calls from anyone besides the kids' schools' administrators or spurious businesses on the East Coast. But that afternoon, when I glanced at the number, I actually responded. Then I went to my car to chat in quiet – Christmas equals busy house --  and spent forty minutes catching up with a college girlfriend, Corinna, whom I hadn't spoken with in two years. No, she hadn't butt dialed me (I asked). She sincerely wanted to know how my family and I were doing. I love talking to Corinna – after 20 years, we still laugh at the same dorky, perhaps lame, jokes and can discuss everything  from health care to education to all sorts of -isms.  That day, conversation flowed easily from family to jobs to aspirations before she had one more story to tell, an otherwise benign anecdote that truly made me s...

At 9, I wanted to be a painter, and at 10, an actress. By 16, my aspirations had shifted and I believed I could best contribute to my community by becoming a communist. Just kidding -- I wanted to be a social worker. At 16 1/2, after a conversation with my then brother-in-law during which he counseled me against the profession and did, honestly, cause me to reflect on what I truly wanted, that goal changed as well: I would study law -- fascinating, logical, respected -- and focus on family law, children's welfare. Through the judicial system, I would assist those in need. Then I went to college. And while not everything changed, everything changed. I entered studying English because succeeding in high school English classes hadn't required much effort and English seemed a solid major for a pre-law student. I had earlier disavowed math (a long, unfortunate story) so chose to study foreign language at BYU as a way of bypassing college mathematics and fulfilling a GE requirement...

I recently discovered the greatest activity in Silicon Valley, which is neither spin class at a boutique gym or happy hour after a strenuous day of programming or analyzing or otherwise engaging in technology-centric activities; it’s chill yoga, no joke. Chill yoga inspires, relaxes, and stretches adherents physically and metaphorically. No stationary bicycle or cocktail of the month can do that. I've been drawn to yoga for years. My down dog I now consider above average, and my warrior one appears simultaneously powerful and sleek. But I'm not adept at spending 60 minutes beautifully flowing from asana to asana because yoga, let's face it, is tough. I've tried to practice regularly but have easily found excuses to postpone the workout -- I'm a mom with a nearly full time job and so many essays to evaluate that even God feels sorry for me and wonders if He made a mistake when creating the desire to be an underpaid English professor. So I buy yoga mats in multiple...