Pranayama

It's raining again. I haven't done much work yet today, but I've been busy. Amazing how I can fill my days :-).

I started off with another ashtanga class, though I was a little wary about whether I was a little too fatigued after running/yogaing every day since I got here. I was right -- I *was* too fatigued -- and basically stuttered my way through the class -- but it felt good to do it.

I treated myself to a diner breakfast after that, a warm, crammed little place with stools at counters and classic diner food. The place was crowded, and after a few place switches to accommodate people who wanted to sit together, I ended up in a freewheeling conversation with a gastroenterologist, originally from Manhattan, for about an hour. We rolled over politics, urban life, poutine, near death experiences, levels of consciousness, mechanistic models of health and how societies make decisions. It was such a good conversation it made me want to track him down and ask him to go for a beer. But that might look a lot like *stalking*, so I'll probably refrain.

Hummed myself home, started doing some work, got distracted by this and that, and decided that it was sunny and I wasn't being productive, so it was the perfect time to go on my Beverly Cleary quest. After some poking around online, I went off on a little Amazing-Race-like task to get myself somewhere I couldn't quite visualize. It goes against my deepest grain to ask for directions -- I have such a *weird* thing about people knowing my business -- but the bus drivers were very helpful.

One little moment on the bus was thumpingly sad. When I got on the second bus, there was a woman speaking so loudly I couldn't hear the soft-spoken driver. My first reaction was "jeez, does she have to be so LOUD?" -- but then I realized what she was saying. She had two little boys with her, and was talking to a woman a few seats away, who apparently didn't know her but had some personal connection with her story. I slowly pieced together that this woman's husband had been in a coma since a car crash 3 years ago. The other woman on the bus had gone to high school with the other driver, who was, maybe, drunk? The crash was in 2003, on a bridge, and this poor woman -- who, I surmise, was Haitian, based on her accent and the fact that she kept slipping in french phrases -- had been left with 4 kids and six weeks pregnant. So now, five. She looked a little beaten down by life but with a raw, robust momentum to just keep going.

The park with the Cleary statues was a luscious lovely place, very welcoming, near a high school with very un-Cleary-like kids. (Lots of SHIT and ipods and loud pushing). I loved the idea of the tribute, found the actual manifestations a little lacking. Ramona looks weirdly simple-minded and Henry looks like a WWI doughboy. But Ribsy was effective (at Matt's behest, I made a passing young mom with a stroller take my picture sitting on him), and I found it delightful to realize that there is a *real* Klickitat St. It's about the most perfect residential street in the world -- lush flower beds, blooming lilacs, warm full trees, sweet houses in different west-coast colours. A little more *grand* than I imagined the Quimbys and Hugganses living on, but the mood was absolutely right.

Took a wild reckless risk and jumped on a little streetcar to return home, even though I wasn't sure where it went. I like this kind of unfettered wandering. Ended up at Nordstroms where I tried on a couple of fancy dresses for Beth's wedding (couldn't find anything) and came home, tuckered out. I think tomorrow has to be completely focused on working -- my little holiday is over -- but it was a lovely day.