A quiet place

Amazing how my world has been altered so profoundly. My life of as a midwife required much of me. And my life as a wife and mama requires even more. At this moment my husband is asleep on the couch. Our son was asleep, but just as I had the thought of writing he stirred. Given that the iPhone is so portable and our only Internet in the house, here I am giving nourishment to my baby and words to my world. Before Child (BC) I had many quiet ways of being in my life. The most obvious, the hours of yoga and mediation, have taken on new forms. As a midwife I often said "the only people who work harder then midwives are mothers" and now I know for sure this is true.

Baby and I went to yoga class this morning. He is quite the yogi. It is so fun to get creative; triangle with him on my hip, tree pose with him in the sling, sun-salutations with him on the mat under me (he giggles as my head gets closer). Nicely at the studio near our home baby is welcome at all classes with me!!! Mostly this has gone very well.

Meditation has presented different challenges. One monk said that "the only real excuses for not meditating as much as you know to, are shark bites and children under five". Some mornings we sit just as we did BC but even more often I find the spaces between, to be quietly alive. Yesterday my quiet moment was with my head under water, in the bath, chanting. This made it impossible to hear fussy baby who was being well cared for by daddyman. Thankfully there have only been a few times like this in the last 3.5 months. Not wanting to "take over" when there really is nothing more I can offer, submerging my head worked very well. It was quite the kufu, as we say in Japanese. (kufu means 'a creative solution to a problem').