These are strange times.
In 2018 I visited a woman in India who had a Ph.D. in astrology to have my birth chart read. Essentially, this woman put my birthdate, time of birth, and place of birth into some program on her computer. The program took this information and produced a birth chart. The woman, technically a doctor, read my birth chart. She didn’t give me specifics, which actually made me more inclined to take her seriously (an Indian palm-reader once told me I’d meet my soulmate, a New Zealand man named Mark, on July 21, 2012….needless to say that specific event did not occur, despite all my attempts to force it to happen. But that’s another story). This woman told me I had a ‘difficult’ childhood. (If growing up vegetarian in Mississippi isn’t difficult, I don’t know what is). “But,” she said, “I have good news for you. Things are about to change.” And that’s when my Indian Doctor of Astrology told me that 2020 would be my year.
I think it’s too late to ask for a refund.
I’d been taking a break from social media, but some good friends passed on my favorite Instagrammer’s summary of the beginning of 2020:
So yeah. That is our collective 2020. Individually, my 2020 is all the above PLUS…..
I broke my arm. My right arm. My dominant arm.
You’d think breaking bones would be at least a little harder to do with social distancing measures in place and the world on lockdown. But the universe decided to highlight my clumsiness on a walk. Walking my dog, something grabbed her attention, I fell, landing on my outstretched hand.
My physical therapy background kicked into high gear. “FOOSH! FOOSH!” I cried. (Fall On Out-Stretched Hand). I looked down at my wrist. ‘Dinner fork deformity.’ My body went into shock. Only about thirty minutes later while driving to the hospital did all the pieces come together: Colles fracture! (We can deal with how delayed this response was later. You passed me, PT Boards!)
I studied this dang fracture two years ago when I was prepping for my Sports Certified Specialist Board exam. So, ha! I have sustained an injury of elite athletes!
A closer refresh revealed that most of the sports-related causes have to do with high-impact or collision sports, or falling from a great height. My mechanism of injury, on the other hand (no pun intended), fits more with the other common demographic: elderly women with osteoporosis.
So, here I am, a (not-elderly-woman-with-osteoporosis) typing in a cast, quarantined with my parents, in my old high school room. Wondering how in the world we became the world we find ourselves in today.
These are scary times.
But one thing I’ve learned over the past year or so, is that fear can be overcome by love. That I can choose love over fear. And so I choose to find the love in the midst of all this chaos:
I let go of my pride a little more easily, reach out to people I haven’t talked to in a while, and re-connect. I remember phases of my life that shaped me into who I am today, and the badass tribe that was part of that.
I collect sunshine. I take long walks and instead of looking at my phone, or thinking about what I have to do next, I listen to the way the wind lifts the leaves off their branches. I conspire with the wildflowers, tempting the bees with fresh pollen. I feel the weight of my foot on the ground, the way my heel lands first and how I roll onto my toes.
I read sentences from books I always meant to read, before time or life got in the way. I relish these words, I take my time with them. I let them mean something.
I listen to songs in ways I never listened before. I imagine the hands that wrote the lyrics, the stories behind the chords, the riffs that happened unexpectedly. I feel the music in my bones, coursing through my veins, filling my mind. It overtakes all the anxious thoughts that have lived in my brain for these past few weeks. It soothes my soul, it creates an aching to be a part of something like this.
And in those lapses of time, when I’m fully present and engaged and outside of myself while astutely in tune with my Self…..
that is when I breathe.
In the midst of all this pain, grief, loss, anxiety, fear, I pray that you find time to breathe. However you breathe, Breathe steadily. Breathe boldly.
Breathe love.