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Recently Ordered Stamps
There are some really beautiful ones. Have you supported the USPS in recent weeks? In addition to making clear to your elected representatives how important it is?

Foster Cats
On Saturday night, two foster cats were delivered to my house. I have been living without any pets for almost a year. I have only spent six years of my life — three of my college years, two of my law school years, and this past year after my cats of 21 and 18 whom I had adopted in 1988 left their bodies — without a cat or dog (or gerbil, hamster, rabbit) in the house. Early in the year I was grieving. As the year progressed, I came up with different reasons why I wasn’t ready to, or shouldn’t get another cat. In the last month or two, I noticed that I had not gotten a cold since Becky passed. I was starting to think that maybe I had a choice between feeling somewhat empty for the absence of pet energy or being sick.
On Wednesday, I responded rather casually to a plea to find foster home for two adult cats who needed a home because their current home-maker was suffering from cancer and would not be able to keep them. If they did not find a foster place here right away, they were going to be shipped to Iowa in the cargo hold. They had already been adopted from a shelter once, and are not a good age for easy adoption at a shelter. So I have taken them in, theoretically on a temporary basis, but they are growing on me fast.
Agni (the fire element)
Agni or fire is the third of the mahabhutas. Fire does not just give us warmth and light. It also transforms. Just think of what happens to the humble ingredients of flour, water, yeast, and salt when they are baked. When working with agni in our asana practice, using the Anusara principles of alignment, I have drawn on the intersection of pelvic loop and kidney loop (which together create the action of uddiyana bandha, using these principles as I understand them to activate and strengthen my core.
One of the niyamas of Patanjali’s eight-fold path is tapas, which means heat or austerity. We are exhorted to bring fire or fervor to our practice to experience bliss, to know true consciousness.
Fire without balance, without a sense of detachment or surrender, though, will burn us up. We must be careful how we work with agni as the element.
Note: Agni is also the name of the god of fire. Not only do we need to be careful how we draw on the fire element — this town’s culture places perhaps too much value on “fire in the belly,” but we should be wary of how we invoke the gods: India’s nuclear missile program is named “Agni.” Of that invocation of the gods and of fire, I am afraid.





