hip opener

making contact & microcosms that move everything

Autumn intention stars, amidst the twinkle and J. Sullivan’s salt/mustache poem.

Happy autumn equinox week! To those who observe and also to those who don’t because those of us who love you and are into that shit will cast spells for you either way. I can’t stop thinking about how September is about ritual, returning to something, most likely ourselves.

It’s about the littles. And something that I’m trying my best to believe in is that daily littles are required for the once-in-a-lifetime leaps. You see, in my 20s I was more leap than littles, and it worked for awhile. Until I slowed down just long enough to realize everything I’d been outrunning for years could continue keeping its 7 minute mile pace inside my head, meanwhile I needed to walk. You can’t outrun yourself. It’s cliche, but I’m writing this on a Monday and all of Monday feels like a cliche. I’m still walking.

One of my writing teachers and editor, Yoda, often reminds me of the importance of building momentum. She’s all about the littles. And I love working with her because I really believe that the littles are what make a life. My September mantra has been make contact. For me, that means touching writing every day in some way, but I’m realizing it could apply to many other practices too. I don’t know what these things look like for you, but lately for me it’s been things like my Monday morning writing group, and editing old poems—if even for fifteen minutes—as close to daily as possible. I like to do this early in the day because the darker mornings feel enchanting and sometimes I light candles to really lean into that.

Depending on who you ask, you’ll be told a range of numbers for how many days it takes to build a habit. Turns out, if habits make your life better, if you benefit from them enough, this wild thing happens where all of sudden you end up craving them. Great, right? Yes, but as my friend Nicole (from Monday writing group) says “the things we need to do most are always simple, but not easy.”

I now start craving my Monday morning routine to the point where I get giddy starting on Sunday, so it makes my Monday better AND my Sunday far less scary. As a result of this group meeting at 9:00 a.m., I’ve finally pushed myself to get to the 7:00 a.m. yoga class I’ve been wanting to go to. Littles lead to more littles. And I think that’s how I would define momentum.

The yoga instructor who teaches the 7:00 a.m. class always speaks in beautiful metaphors about sand and clay and Care Bears and rivers and the sun (masculine) and luna (feminine). Her poetic language not only helps me make sense of the poses, it helps me make sense of everything. And I’m often inspired to write afterwards. For me, any little that excites me to write, I deem as a major, momentous, making-contact-microcosmns-move-everything little.

Last week, I was so into my Monday yoga class that I decided to go again on Tuesday. Same instructor. Tuesday was the full moon lunar eclipse in Pisces, and while on Tuesdays I usually love going to the gym and lifting weights to loud electronic or hip hop with some of my friends, I was being pulled back to metaphor yoga teacher. It felt more full moon in Pisces energy to me, and let me tell you what friends, it was the right call. Downloads, time travel, everything clicked in a psychedelic state. Everything that didn’t click, those unanswerable questions, I truly believed I could one day accept. I love yoga and poetry for just that — a place for the unacceptable to breathe.

Our life practices don’t always give us answers, but they can give us revelation. And that’s the point, that feeling you get when you read a poem and you don’t know exactly what a sentence means but you know what it feels like. Those are my favorite poems. God I love those poems, they’re like a hip opener, but for every joint. For every past life and new life we’re scheming. I love anything in life that lets me feel that.

Once we reached Shavasana—the final pose where you lie down on your mat and actively chill (Yeah, it’s weird, but actively chilling is a thing sometimes)— we were instructed to place our hands on our pelvis. Immediately after hearing the instructor say pelvis my own voice inside my head said womb, womb, womb. I then whispered, you’re OK, you’re OK, you’re OK. I’m not sure why I was soothing myself in this way. What’s wrong with my womb anyway?

The night prior I had a dream I’ve been having for a few years now. Same person always shows up. From their mouth — breath of dragon, all fire, no time in the room even for smoke. It’s as though I’m picking up where the dream left off in the middle of Shavasana. As I’m lying there (and this is what I mean by actively chilling) I see my grandmother’s face. I forgive you. Grandfather’s forehead, lines so deep. I want to forgive you. Then naturally I move onto the other half of my DNA. I really forgive you. Then onto the greats. On my mother’s side I see a few faces I can make out. Faces I remember. On my father’s, no faces, not from photograph or real life skin I once knew. But I hear a name, a name I secretly wished would have been given to me somehow. A name never spoken to me until very recently.

And then, the dam widened open. A downpour of questions ensued. I suppose when hips open on a lunar eclipse it’s to be expected.

Should I have a baby? Just to give someone great this name? Should I have a baby? Just to right this line once and for all? Maybe I’ll get another cat, name her Florence, call her Flo? No…

I will write this line. I will write it all until there’s nowhere left to go.

French toast, another little that’s been keeping my creative coals rolling. I have been putting cardamom in the batter (french toast fairy dust).

I would love to know what littles you’ve been leaning into as we tilt from summer towards autumn. Share the ways you’re making contact and building momentum. Let me know what microcosms in your life help you move everything a little more easily. Drop a comment or if you know me in real life, send me a text would ya? Happy equinox to all the darker day freaks!