FROST ON WINDOWS

Where has January gone? I know it has been here. Temperatures have been below zero and the snow squeaks. On those rare mornings when we can have coffee in bed, we play the game of what do you see in the frost pictures that form on the windows. Yesterday...it was the profile of an Indian or maybe a Pharoah. And I awoke to the smell of freshly baking bread...the aroma of my Grandmother who baked rolls to sell during the depression prior to World War 2. I'm fascinated by the smells of things that aren't there...at least not to anyone else. Where do they come from? I laid in the warmth of my bed and breathed in the heavenly smell that had to be coming from "the other side" because no bread was baking in my oven. Why today? Why baking bread? What might my grandmother have to say to me? Is it like the frost pictures on the window? Some certain clash of temperatures on a window that opens between worlds? Is that window like a membrane between realities? And does it thin out like like a cervix ready to bring a life into the world? Does it become thin when a soul is getting ready to leave the world? My Mom had a bout with pneumonia recently and she is currently having a stay at a rehab hospital. She is coming around well and she is such a good sport although the transitions into the hospital, then transfer to the rehab and the not being in her own familiar surroundings has a confusing effect on her. She has certainly learned to go with the flow during her years as an octogenarian. There is no evidence that she is hovering on the threshold as yet. But the smell of baking bread announcing my Grandmother's nearness made me wonder...and feel some anxiety about my mother's state of health. It happened the same morning as my owl dream. I dreamed...prior to the smell memory/presence...that I was hunting for my binoculars because right out in front of my house, a Great Grey Owl was performing flight acrobatics and I was all excited...in a downright tizzy. There is an old Indian belief that hearing an owl or seeing an owl can indicate the loss of one you hold dear. Owl feathers were not used as prayer feathers because they were associated with death and the mysteries of darkness. So...there is a sense that invisible reality is knock knock knocking at my window and trying to tell me something...something that has no evidence in this 3 dimensional reality. I sense and feel the messages. I hush myself to better listen. My brain insists that I'm hallucinating or making farfetched connections because there is no logic behind what I sense and feel. I am aware that I have spent my entire life shushing up my sensory perceptions that don't find validation from my current reality or from other people...but look how all the components worked together to create a state of alert in my heart. I am now hyper vigilant to Mom's health status and anticipate a trip to Salem soon...even if just to bring her my aroma...so that she knows I am nearby like Gram was to me today. I need to go peak at her through the window...and then hug her with the fragrance of my love for her. I hope I smell like snow on Balsalms...or she can see me like frost pictures on the windows.

SNOWDAY

Today there was a locals challenge race. I was scared because of fresh snow falling fast which means poor visibility and uneven amounts of accumulation. When I say scared...I mean scared shitless. I notice that I am encountering more of these moments as I get older and find my body limits going through changes. I can no longer recklessly disregard my fears. Sometimes it is very wise to listen to them and allow them to have some say in the discussions that go on in my head. Sometimes they are wise and actually an attempt to take care of me. It's not always easy to know when to listen and when to say...shush...your just my fears and I CAN do this. My very first race was my first encounter with shutting up the fearsong and dropping into the course anyway. I had built up such a reservoir of emotion that when I crossed the finish line, I bent over forward and burst into tears. It was a HUGE DRAMATIC moment for me. For everyoneelse...it was a normal everyday race day. Today I had the same experience...but it wasn't the very first. I stood in the starting gate with what felt like the norovirus in my stomach. The fearsong was banging away in my head but I also had a new song softly playing in the background...the you can do it just go slow and stay in control song...the I don't care what I look like, I'm gonna cross that finish line song...the yes you've always wimped out during snowdays but today you are gonna do it song. I hear myself laughing and joking with my teammates but deep inside, I know I am pretending. I am not feeling powerful or capable or strong or brave. I am feeling like I want to shrivel up and hide. So today...I raced. I crossed the finish line whole. I did it even though I was afraid. I did it. And with that little feather in my cap...I came home and headed out into the woods with Sadie on snowshoes. The snow was softly falling. The woods were absolute silence and there were no tracks but ours as a few inches made everything fresh and new. The silence was absolute...i could hear my thumping heart and an occaisional caw of a raven. Making fresh tracks...watching the pines being frosted...imagining the snort of a deer or the presence of other wildlife in the woods...enjoying watching Sadie leap and run like a little jack rabbit...I laughed out loud. Pushing across the border of my comfort zone...that is why I came to Maine. I moved away from all I knew to begin a life here where there is still wilderness and unbroken stretches of wild landscape to soothe my easily tangled brain. I can't even begin to explain how it is that my heart responds to the wild landscape like there is space opening up inside me. I have held back from so much living because of fear...because I've talked myself out of doing things that pushed a fear button rather than speaking up to my fear and saying shhhshhhshhh...be quiet fear...I'm just gonna do this scarey thing anyway. So..in the silence of a snow day, I heard something chirp in my heart. It was the sound of courage and it came from within myself. This is what it means to fly...it means not to be weighted down by fear but instead...to listen to the voice of encouragement and to BELIEVE.

HELLO NEW YEAR

I have to admit...it takes more than the good snowmaking at Sunday River to get me out on the hill. November is against my nature and unless Mother Nature contributes to the snow deposit, I tend to wait until after the Christmas Week to get out on the mountain. This year Mother Nature went above and beyond in her generosity and she deposited about 18 inches of wonderful snow packed by the groomers and because the temps have remained cold, the snow is hard but not icy. This year, January 1st  was my first day on skis. The wind blew hard and the wind chill was ...well,  chilling. Stephen and I skied for the morning but were happy to head in out of the bluster for the afternoon. I just got my legs under myself. And on January 2, the Locals Challenge race program got underway. Though the thermometer read 5 at 8:00 AM, the wind had waned and it was a cold day in January...just perfect for letting the wild child out for fun and frolic. I got tingles when I rode my first chair up to take my first race run and noticed I was riding alone on chair 13. Thirteen is one of my lucky numbers since I reprogrammed myself.

 Relaxing and feeling lucky are two of the zen practices that come with ski racing for me. The other practice is "letting go". The god Janus, for whom January is named sports 2 heads...one looking forward and one backward...one face to the future, the other face to the past. I have noted that 2012 was, for me a year of letting go, and everything I ever learned went into the challenges asked of me. I've always had trouble with letting go. I resisted joining the ski race challenge for years because I cared too much about how I would look to the real racers. Come to find out, all that mattered was how I looked to myself and no one else was even looking. And of course, not being able to see myself, it was clearly about how it felt...not what it looked like. I stood at the gate...I sweated. I felt nausea...I thought I might poop my pants. I got all screwed up in my head worrying about layers and layers of what ifs. And every wednesday, I would stand at the race gates looking down at the course...tell my head to shut up...and I would just do it. Forget the speed, the competition, the other people who had much more interesting things to focus on than how I performed my race...forget the results and the what ifs. For two years, ski racing with the Locals Challenge became my therapy for letting go. So that is Janus looking backward. This year Janus looks ahead and there is a feeling of anticipation...the Zen of skiing continues to educate me on the workings of my mind...and body. With the whole chair to myself, I became a swinger on Chair 13. I felt a deep relax spread through my whole body and I was filled with a sense of being soooo lucky. I thought it would bode well for my run. But I took the steep way down to the race and my legs got used to resistance. When I set out on the course, I was still working too hard. I had carried the muscle memory of my run to the course through the course. So for my second run, I approached from a different trail. I skied down Cascades and let out all the stops. Consequently, my second run was a significant improvement. And given my second day on skis...Ill take it. Racing for me is not about winning or speed or who I beat. Racing for me is resisting the exaggerated fears of aging...trusting myself and my every race goal is simply to cross the finish line with all parts intact. Yes. I'm sixty and I know it. But that doesn't mean I should deprive myself of frolic and fun. Am I taking risks? Yes. But dammit...I am a decent skier. My body knows how to do it. I love the feeling of flight on the silent snow....the wind in my face and the beauty of snow covered pines and mountaintops. I feel revitalized. Refreshed and alive. And when I cross the finish line...I feel exhilarated. I've shown up...done my team duty...skied my best even if it isn't pretty...and when I fall I get up and finish. The creative awarenesses that catch me while I'm skiing are priceless. I realize at this late age that I am a kinesthetic learner and in order to access my best self, I need to allow my whole body to report in to Head-quarters. I need to do and then assess...rather than listen to my ongoing assessment before even the first step is taken. And feeling good lets me in to the bigger braver happier person that has been kept at bay for years. So 2013...let me welcome you with my feelings...relaxed...lucky...and may skiing continue to teach me about my happy healthy self. I believe in myself. I believe my reprogramming. The wild zen of skiing is a master if I just listen.