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    Taking a Better Look

    ByElizabeth

    When I was walking to work yesterday, I was delighting in watching a pair of red-headed finches cavorting at the very top of a newly blooming cherry tree just outside the Friends Committee on National Legislation’s building, which is across the street from the Hart Senate building.  An impeccably suited man in a suit who was walking towards the Hart building said to me, “it is wonderful to see everything starting to bloom, isn’t it?”

    “Yes, it is indeed,” I replied, and pointed out the finches.

    “I hadn’t noticed them; good eye,” the man said, “look, they’re eating the blossoms.”  The finches were tearing blossoms off the tree and singing with great enthusiasm.

    “You can see them even better from the other side of the tree, because the sun is lighting them up instead of shadowing them,” I added.

    “I’ll have to go back and take a look,” he said and walked back to the other side of the tree to watch the birds as I headed on to work, with my day brightened by this interchange.

    I often get caught looking at the birds or the trees or the sky when walking around town.  When there is an opening, I talk to others about what I am seeing to invite them to pause and delight along with me.  It is a rare day, though, to hear from someone who is clearly busy and has important work to say, “I’ll have to take a better look.”  It is so important to me, and for all of us, to pause and wonder, to remember and recognize the beauty as we go about our day.

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    Excellent Blog on Community Gardening in DC

    ByElizabeth

    I was just led to this blog entry on community gardening in DC  from the DC Urban Gardeners‘ list serve’s daily digest.  The blog entry was originally posted last spring, but still has helpful information, and the service provided by the blogger looks interesting too.

    If you have been thinking about getting into a garden, now may be a better time to get on a waiting list than the start of the growing season.  Now is the time that novices have realized that they don’t take care of their plots, and they are better off supporting the local farmers’ markets.  If you cannot get into a garden, why not be the fantastic neighbor that starts a new garden?

    In the interest of full disclosure, after a few years at the garden nearest to my house, I decided to restructure my tiny backyard to add three 3’X3′ beds.  This gave me as much space as I had in the community garden.  I would love to have both spaces or more, but since there was a long waiting list at the garden, I ceded my space.  Currently most productive in my garden:  cucumbers, hot peppers, and all sorts of herbs.  Tomatoes aren’t doing too well, but I’ve gotten a few eggplants and my first big butternut squash.  Yum!

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    Teaching Less to Practice More

    ByElizabeth

    This morning is the last Saturday in the foreseeable future when, even waking up before dawn, I have to cut short my morning practice to get on the metro to go teach. I have a strong memory of a relatively novice teacher telling me, before I started teaching, that she was going to stop teaching indefinitely because she needed more time for her own practice. At times over the years, when my other job was at its most demanding, I would think about that statement. Mostly, though, I have circumscribed other activities to fit in time for work, teaching, and a full practice.

    It came time to admit, though, after nearly two years of steady study with 0Paul Muller-Ortega, which expanded my meditation practice from 25-30 minutes a day, in addition to asana practice and studying, to an hour a day plus additional practices and more studying, that there are not enough hours in a day for all I want to do.

    I have been teaching on Saturday mornings for a number of years now. I love my Saturday morning students and have embraced the discipline of getting to class to teach.

    The energies have shifted. I will still teach my noon class on Saturday and my weeknight classes, but I will have more time for a full practice and perhaps some extra garden time from this shift. I expect that this time to deeper into my own path will bring new energy and light to my teaching. I hope trust I will see my Saturday morning students at other classes and workshops, both when I am teaching and taking class together at Willow Street.

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