Transitions
When you were in composition class in school do you remember how much everyone was so hooked on transitions. You need to transition from this thought to this one. No non sequitors allowed! Then I did a little comp teaching and that’s all I wrote, transition. And in fiction writing workshops – transitions.
I’m paying attention to transitions because I’m not good at them – I’m a bull in a china closet steamrolling through life and I’m trying to stop and make time for transitions.
T said that the principal at the Montessori school opened a drawer and showed her a stack of hankies. She said that American mothers are always rushing around like nutballs and that she wants the kids to transition to a calm environment so the first thing they do when they arrive is a get a hankie, fold it over just so, and they dust. They all dust and they calm down. They transition.
Similarly, I have my meditation now when I arrive at my desk. My transition from downstairs to upstairs, from personal to professional, I stand at my writing table, light incense (nag champa), put on Purnamadah, close my eyes and breathe deep into my stomach, then chest, then clavicle and then breathe out the same way. When I’m done, I ring the bell my colleague brought me from India. Ready to turn on my jet engines.