The 40 year old shoulder, aka my excuses for not blogging lately

 A post is long overdue.  During the summer, when I didn't have a "day job" and was focusing on teaching yoga and developing my career, social media upkeep was higher on my priority list.  But now that I'm back at work plus teaching classes, I just haven't had the time.  I guess it's really only been a couple of weeks, but it feels like forever since I've sat with my laptop at the coffee shop and just typed typed typed away.  I miss it.

I got primal on my birthday

There are other contributing factors to my recent dip in devotion to blogging.  One is that I was busy trying to figure out what to do for my 40th birthday.  I am not a person who is disturbed with my own process of aging, in fact, I'm pretty fascinated by it.  I could live without some of the side-effects like memory loss, achey body parts, and changes in skin elasticity, but overall, it doesn't bother me.  I think I'm aging naturally pretty well and I'm thankful for that. However, now that I've crossed that 40 threshold, I have noticed that life feels slightly different.  Like any major life change such as losing a parent, getting married, getting divorced, moving across the country, starting a new career (all of which I have experienced, some more than once), it's one of those happenings that you can't just ignore and pretend hasn't happened.  For better or for worse, things are just kind of different.

 I hadn't really considered this to be a "major" birthday for me until about a month before the day.  I like birthdays, and tend to celebrate for days. Because I didn't feel like this year was a big deal -yet everyone around me seemed to think it was and wanted to talk about it- I felt disconnected from the idea of the event.  Why didn't I have any strong feelings about it? What was there to talk about?  It's a birthday.  I started to feel very introspective. Then, all of a sudden it kind of hit me and I was pretty emotional in the days leading up to August 29th.  It grew to be a big-ish deal in my head. I was thinking about my life and 40 and "am I where I want to be" and "what do I really want out of life" "I'm so lucky to have this and be that" business.  I started thinking about aging and where will I be 20 years from now, and will I be healthy?
Will I be broke?
Will I be single?
Will I still be interested in having sex? (I think I know the answer to that one)
Will I still be in Brooklyn?  If so, will I like it?

morning glory or tiny universe?

Will I have a roommate? be shacked up? be homeless?
Will I have a pet? what about kids?
Will I have a garden?
Will I still be teaching yoga? doing costumes?
Will I have a place in the country?
...and more related questions.  Of course, I won't know the answers until 20 years from now, if I'm still alive and coherent. But it's nice for me to be preoccupied with thoughts about the big picture of my life, to check in with myself again at this stage and to experience the emotions that come up with this kind of self-reflection.  It's also nice to let all of that go.

 For the record, I had a wonderfully decadent birthday celebration in the country with sweet friends.  I ate lots of butter and sweets, drank coffee, booze, played scrabble, drew pictures, cooked, chatted, wandered,  wondered, joked, picked fruit, fed a horse from the palm of my hand, slept in, socialized and more. It was perfect.

drawing of sumac. it's poisonous and powerful

Anyway, another reason I've been dropping the ball on blogging is because I have gone full force crazy time with my effort to heal my rotator cuff injury. I reached a point of supreme annoyance, sadness, frustration, etc. about being in pain.  Though it's not severe, it's chronic and I don't want to live like this anymore so I'm kicking my shoulder's ass and taking it's name.  My wholistic prescription:
1)acupuncture 2X a week
2)lots of epsom salt baths
3)heating pad at night
4)anti-inflammatory meds
5)being more mindful in the ways I use my arm
6)doing my PT stretches
7)doing my PT strengthening exercises
8)doing some yoga daily, but avoiding shoulder
9)taking time to relax by cutting down on my socializing and projects/not over-busying myself.
10)***practicing the art of patience***

All of those things take time too, which takes time away from blogging, unfortunately. 

So far, it seems my shoulder is starting to feel a little better.  I have committed to doing all of these things for at least 6 weeks before I decide it's hopeless and I'll never heal and I hate my rotator cuff forever. I know I'd never really do that, because I have learned not to hate any part of myself and to only love myself (thanks 40!) But sometimes it helps me to toy with the idea of playing out the dramatic option, even though I know I won't do that. So that I can remind myself that I am making good choices....

But for now, I'll focus most of my efforts on #10 while I heal and reflect on my path in this life, today.