Another Day, Another Walk

In this morning’s meditation circle, I find myself distracted, focusing for only two or three minutes at a time. I then spend the rest of the morning ‘cleaning up’ my office. It looks better than it did an hour into the project, but it isn’t the fantasy office of last night. But I have made a dent in the disorder.

In the early afternoon I’m ‘tech buddy’ at DBSA-Boston (Depression Bipolar Support Alliance). The facilitator directs the conversation, while I admit people from the ‘waiting room,’ watch for electronic blue hands (and lower them after the member speaks), and hang out in case there are technical problems, which there aren’t. Chuck, our president, likes to say, “We’re building the plane as we fly it.” That made someone nervous: “How about we’re building the plane in the hangar?” Doesn’t quite do it for me. Then I hear, "We’re flying the plane in the hangar." That’s exciting.

When I’m done with the Zoom group, I step out of my office and the fragrance of baking bread wafts up the stairs. Jim comes over from the coach house and soon we’re buttering fresh slices.

In the early evening, two friends from church start a conference call with me as I walk. Then R’el calls. I planned to walk an hour, but I have no desire to turn around. I walk down the Battle Road, which has become my favorite route. After about 50 minutes, it seems I really should turn around and come home. Five and a half miles. It feels so good to be outdoors and on the move.

I’ve adjusted pretty well to being at home. Being a homemaker, I’ve spent a lot of time at home. But I still haven’t adjusted to the idea that most other people are home all day. When my friends called, I had to remind myself that they’d been home all day: I just picture them at their job sites. This evening our ‘ministering brothers’ from church scheduled a meeting for 8 p.m. I came home and was in my office when Jim called at about 8:05 p.m. They were all on the video call. I was waiting for a knock on the door

A Diagon Alley, of sorts

I just spent 198 minutes (I’m tracking my time, have been for 4 years) ‘moving’ my desk.

It started with a Zoom problem. I’ve been spending a lot of time on Zoom: two weeks ago I realized I’d been on five Zoom calls that day. The last, a 2-hour DBSA-Boston support group for people with manic depression (bipolar), was too much. Thankfully, I wasn’t facilitating, so I gave my apologies and signed off for the night.

I usually join the Zoom meeting in my office, which is in the southwest corner of the second floor of our Queen Anne house. My desk had been sensibly placed facing the southern window, looking out towards a huge maple tree. To my right was the western window, looking out beyond the driveway to our ‘soccer field,’ the back part of the yard where we play soccer, frisbee, croquet, and badminton.

The problem is that the morning light from the southern window washes out my face during my weekday meditation session. The afternoon light from the western window does the same to the side of my face. I love the view of the outside, so I didn’t want to draw the blinds.

So, I moved the desk to be diagonally between the two windows. Yup, it took over three hours. The actual desk moving didn’t take that long. Moving all the stuff surrounding the desk, and ‘rewiring’ the phone, internet router, lamps, computer power supply, etc. did. And the sweeping and dusting and mopping that I can’t help but do when a heavy piece of furniture is dislodged after years of dust settling.

After I finished, and logged my time, I felt elated. (But not TOO elated. That’s a calculus I constantly have to make: am I feeling good (like a neuro-typical woman) or TOO good (like a woman in hypomania)).

And then the questions began: Did I spend too much time doing an optional activity? Will I finish the job and organize all the displaced stuff (which is currently on top of the regular clutter that has been accumulating on the guest bed in my office)? Will I follow FlyLady’s counsel and attack the clutter in 15-minute segments or will I try to clean it up all at once? Will I crash and burn then?

Those questions can wait till tomorrow. For today, I feel light and airy. I love the new view: I can see out both window better than before, with the laptop screen now covering the bare wall in front of me. I can look straight up and see David’s portrait. Maybe I’ll add a few more pictures, now that I’m facing that corner.

Jim once advised a business client to paint his office. The man was stressed with running a start-up company and stuck. By painting his office he could choose to do something within his control. He was being master of his fate.

That’s exactly how I feel.

Gardening after Dusk

It's after 8 p.m. when I go out, so I bring my high-powered headlamp, clippers, and trowel. I remove some more onion grass from among the sprouting irises, then move to the front stone wall and balustrade. I’ve always imagined David’s garden here. But why? To make something new and ambitious. With Jim’s help I realize that dream is self-destructive. It would require a backhoe, literally, to remove the quince roots and introduce gentler plants. I know, we tried several years ago. I hired two teen-aged boys and they dug at the roots for several hours. When their dad came to retrieve them, the hole was about two feet deep and they were standing on a thick snarl of roots. Their dad wisely pointed out, a backhoe would be needed.

This year, I will leave one quince bush, centered nicely in front of the stone wall. Our neighbor commented about it's lovely coral blossoms. I'll trim all the other starts down to the ground. Mulch and be at peace. Why does the simple way, the possible way, seem like defeat?

I’ll focus on this: David’s garden will become a reality this season.

Spring comes slowly to New England. It arrives here sooner than to central New Hampshire or Maine. But slower than to New Jersey, where I grew up. I like it that way. It gives me time to get used to it. It's nearly May, but still too early to plant tomatoes. I'm not behind yet. It’s not too late to prepare my raspberry beds. Plenty of time to improve a flower garden for our beloved son.

David's Perennial Garden

Our one-acre property has several gardens. The front lawn rolls down to the sidewalk from the 1895 Queen Anne. A stone banister leads away from the enclosed front porch towards the driveway; two azalea bushes stand as sentinels at the end of the walkway, glorious now with lavender blooms. With the cool spring weather this year, the early blossoms of azaleas, forsythias, daffodils and hyacinths are lingering.

Between the house and driveway is a large side garden of flowers and shrubs. Early in the spring of our first year, 1994, hundreds of crocuses bloomed, purple and white and yellow. One year I counted them: over 500 blossoms. In recent years, a lone crocus or two is all that appears. One fall some good friends and I planted several hundred bulbs: two plants emerged. Our local rodents, squirrels and chipmunks, had a feast that year.

The coach house stands behind the house. Beyond it is a vegetable garden with a storied past. Designed in the 1980s, its brick and stone walkways divide the ten raised vegetable beds. I had gardening dreams when we bought the house in 1993. But the reality of raising six children(ages 2 to 12 that first year) and running a busy household made large-garden management a low priority.

In 1995, we went on our famous Cross-Country trip: 48 states, three Canadian provinces, and a Mexican state. 15,900 miles. Six kids, a pop-up tent trailer, and me the sole adult for seven of the ten weeks of that summer. By fall, the garden had been taken over by weeds. We continued to garden, but year after year, uncultivated nature took over. After several years of neglect, there was a six-foot sapling with a two-inch diameter trunk in one of the beds and myriad weeds of all shapes and sizes.

All the kids had garden duty. Our David was a faithful, uncomplaining worker. He spent many hours trying to reclaim the brick pathways: their cracks were always filling with weeds.

Yesterday I planned to work in a garden. At 7 p.m., Jim told me to go, before it got dark. I donned my blue coveralls, found my gloves and trowel, and went to the side garden. I had been afraid that pulling weeds out near the sprouting irises would damage them, but it didn't.

As dusk settled, I didn’t want to stop. With the high-powered headlamp I recently bought, I could see in front of me nearly as well as in daylight. Around 9 p.m., I dumped the detritus onto our dead-weed pile, satisfied with the work of my hands.

When David died, nearly five years ago, I planned to create a memorial garden. I wanted it to be new, in front of the stone banister, and just for David. But this morning, as I surveyed the side garden, it felt right to dedicate it, which has been successful for many years, to him. There is space to plant new perennials.and everyone who visits our house will see it. I want David’s garden to bloom this summer.

Si hortum in bibliotheca habes, nihil deerit. (If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.) - Cicero 

Cottage Fruit

My phone alarm woke me up from a sound sleep this morning. Groggy and without my glasses, I saw the display: ‘Minuteman’. What? Patriots’ Day is past (and technically the men on Lexington Green in 1775 hadn't formed a minute company; they were militia). When I woke up enough to put on my glasses, I looked again: ‘Meditation’.

Khare had asked us to bring a small snack. Cottage fruit is my name for cottage cheese mixed with fruit cocktail. We had it several times a week while I was growing up. I often mixed it for supper, in a metal mixing bowl with a thumb ring attached. For our 30th wedding anniversary, we bought our own set of bowls. They have a beauty only objects from a childhood possess.

Khare guided us in ‘mindful eating’. Slow down. Look at the food carefully. Notice texture and color. Smell it. Feel it on your lips (hot or cold, rough or smooth). Take a mouthful and savor it. Let it rest on your tongue.

It brought up nourishing memories of childhood. My children did not grow up with this humble delicacy. Cottage cheese was much more expensive than homemade yogurt made with powdered milk. Nowadays I stock it and remember my mom every time I eat it.

I have not been practicing mindful eating. I shovel things in my mouth, desperate for some quick sensory input: a full mouth. To slow down, really taste the first food of the day filled me with delight. I hope to do more mindful eating soon.

Mortified

Some dear friends are leaving our ward. For the third time in two weeks, we participated in a ‘drive-by’. For an hour our friends were outside their house, receiving visitors at six-feet distance. It’s so sad not to be able to hug, shake hands, or show a smile.

They live in Arlington Heights, near the top of the town's highest hill. After our chat, Jim drove home; I walked. We've lived within five miles of Arlington Heights for 27 years, but I still don’t have a handle on it. No one I know has ever lived in the neighborhood I walked through, and I’ve never studied a map.

I stop several times, studying the tiny GPS map, trying to make out the pale lines of streets,  follow the maze, and memorize the combination of turns that will get me to Mass Ave.

I talk to R’el until she arrives home. These days she walks home from Bellevue, which takes over an hour. Running with a face mask on is difficult.

As she arrives home, I see Trader Joe’s roof below me. Could my grandfather from western Nebraska imagine the scene? Houses stacked so that I gaze over the roof of Trader Joe's on Mass Ave from the street above? I’m in a Thomas Hardy novel. I'm Farmer Gabriel Oaks, looking down at the wagon where Bathsheba Everdeen is looking at herself in a mirror, revealing her vanity. Trader Joe is my Bathsheba.

On Mass Ave, my pace quickens. No doubt as to my route, the only navigation in the last three miles is to bear right around Captain Parker’s statue. I could do it with my eyes closed. So I start monitoring my pace electronically. When it rises above 16 min/mile, I speed up. I watch as it dips below 16, and occasionally below 14, when I push and the road is downhill. My first two miles were 18:53; my final half-mile is 15:13. I aspire to a mile at 14:59.

In five and a half miles, I see fewer than a twenty people, plus three bicycles. For the second time in my life, I’ve brought my mask. I tie it on and, when I can see no one, pull down one side below my chin. Whenever I see a person, I secure it over my nose before I get within 20 feet of them. A woman drives by with a mask on. A few people wear masks constantly outdoors.Some people wear no masks, but they considerately walk or run into the empty street to avoid me. Everyone I wave to (smiles are no longer an option) waves back, or smiles if they don’t have a mask on.

When I walked to Concord and back on Saturday (16 ½ miles), I passed within 12 feet (or more) of a woman. She shouted, You should have a mask on. I had one in my pocket, but at that point, 7 or 8 miles into my march, I hadn’t come within 6 feet of anyone. I shouted back (since she wasn’t close enough to whisper to), I’m not within 6 feet. Undeterred, she replied, You should consider other people.

I went on my way, but the conversation stuck with me. I like to please people; I like to be liked. I like to follow the rules, even if they are unnecessary. (I stop at stoplights in the middle of the night with no cars in sight.) I don’t like being told I am inconsiderate.

My son, Matt, tells me  that when he runs, some others runners will disregard the 6 foot rule and even veer toward him.

Yesterday, Jim and I walked to the post office a half mile away. As we passed Stop & Shop, I saw a masked man several yards away. He had moved off the sidewalk into a driveway, obviously waiting for us to pass. I was mortified: I had left my mask at home. The day before was the my first venture into public for 41 days; I had no habit of mask wearing. Here we were, heading to the post office with no masks. I had pictured that we would use the automatic machine and not stand in line, but I realized that there was no guarantee that we could keep 6 feet distance: there might be a line for the machine; the machine might be out of order (a not infrequent occurrence). I decided to turn around and we walked home, then Jim drove there.

It’s a strange time. I can’t imagine how I could be infected. I literally had not been within six feet of anyone but Jim for 41 days. At the grocery store, I stayed a safe distance, wore a mask, and observed that everyone else had masks on. I understand the impulse to have everyone wear masks and I’m willing to do that, to learn a new habit. It’s a show of solidarity. There is no way for a stranger, or even a friend, to know what risk I pose. So I wear a mask. And I can’t smile at my friends as they leave, perhaps forever.

Purple Passion Plant

A few months ago, I moved my purple passion plants to the sunniest window in our house. Peeking over my laptop screen, they make me happy.

Purple has always been my favorite color (In grade school I was known as the Purple Phantom.). I kept a purple passion plant in my dorm room in college. I love the deep purple fur on the dark green leaves. The deep purple intensifies in strong sunlight.

In 2003, I ended up in a locked psychiatric unit. When I returned to sanity, I attended group therapy sessions in a dayroom with a small greenhouse. I came home with cuttings from a purple passion plant and a saintpaulia, a type of African violet, with small downy leaves and lavender flowers.

As I put these little purple houseplants in a sunny window, and watered and pruned them, they reminded me to nurture myself. Keeping them alive symbolized my pledge to do the hard work of healing my mind.

Somewhere along the way, the saintpaulia died. I neglected it a little too long one too many times. The purple passion plant is hardier. Even when the main plant is neglected, I’ve been able to preserve a few tender tips and grow a new plant. Some mistakes in life come with a second chance.

A few months ago, Jim received a bonsai tree. We kept it near a window in our kitchen, but the new leaves came in progressively bigger and paler. I learned that large leaves are a symptom of light starvation. I moved the tiny tree to a sunny window. As it recovered, I gradually trimmed off the larger leaves. New leaves came in, tiny, shiny, and dark green.

My plants and I can survive neglect, but to be vibrant, intense, and truly alive takes care.

Talking to a Stranger

It’s 9:35 p.m. and I am determined to fulfill my pledge and post today. I’m also determined to go to bed before 11:00 p.m. So, this is not going to be deathless prose.

The last time I was in a store was March 11th.

For the past 41 days, I’ve been experimenting with eating from the food storage we’ve maintained for the last 40 years. When the lockdown began, I resolved to delay a grocery trip. Jim decided that seven weeks would be a sufficient test and a few weeks ago he made a date with me to shop on April 21. I persuaded him to get up before 6 a.m. for “Senior Hour” at Market Basket. For the first time, I saw upended grocery carriages festooned with yellow hazard tape to mark the waiting line outside the store. For about 20 minutes, we waited six feet behind a man with a scarf around his face. Jim and I sported the hand-made facemasks our friend Ellen sewed.

125 people were allowed in the store at once. My carefully-crafted grocery list was in store-aisle order. About two aisles into our trip, we noticed that all the aisles had ‘one-way’ signs. Oops! Later I gently told an errant shopper or two, “You didn’t notice, but the aisles are all one-way.” I loved being in the know.

In the checkout line, it was my turn to make a mistake. I obediently stood behind the broad blue-tape line on the floor, six feet away from the conveyor belt. But when the previous order was rung up and the belt empty, I started to place my order, keeping more than six feet away from the other customer. The cashier quickly told me to take my items off the belt: I had to wait until the previous order was completely packed up and the customer moving away before starting to load the belt.

Slightly embarrassed, I explained to the customer, “This is the first time I’ve shopped for over a month; I didn’t know the procedure.”

He smiled and remarked that I must have a lot of food at home.

“Yes, we store food, like rice and beans.”

“That’s a lot of rice and beans.”

We laughed together.

As my order was being bagged, the man behind me started filling the conveyor belt. Again, the cashier warned. I smiled, “Oh, I’m so glad I’m not the only one who doesn’t know.”

When we got home, Jim loaded the kitchen porch with the paper grocery bags (reusable shopping bags are prohibited in Massachusetts) while I stored the snow shovels and sand buckets in the garage to make room. We stood on the porch, searching the web for safe practices in unpacking groceries. Then we went in, washed our hands, and I wiped down packages and rearranged the fridge. We left the non-perishables on the porch to age overnight.

Such a simple pleasure, to go to a grocery store and talk to a stranger.

Grief and Guilt

I’ll come clean. On the night David died, while he lay dying, I was engrossed in a Humphrey Bogart movie. It was gripping and intense.

At a crucial point in the movie, Matt said something about David. We stopped the movie and went over to his hospital bed. He wasn’t breathing.

Our family room, where the tv and couches are, adjoins the dining room, where David’s hospital bed and medical supplies had taken over. It has 1895-era pocket doors: fine doors of dark wood that slide into the walls and create a large doorway, six feet wide. A friend remarked, when I was admitting my guilty secret, “You were in the room when David died.”

In her March 30, 2020, Dear Therapist column for Atlantic.com, Lori Gottlieb tells of her father’s recent death. He died of complications after years of congestive heart disease, during the covid-19 outbreak. She states, “I was there to kiss his cheeks and massage his forehead, to hold his hand and say goodbye. I was at his bedside when he took his last breath.”. I’m attuned to such statements in all their nuance. She paints a vivid picture. Well, she doesn’t SAY she wasn’t watching Bogart, but at least she was holding her dad’s hand.

But Gottlieb continues her narrative. Five days before he died, she developed a cough and decided to stop visiting. They spoke every day, except Saturday, when she was busy gathering supplies for the lockdown. The next day he could barely talk and just said, “I love you,” before losing consciousness. The next day, he died.

Gottlieb was wracked with guilt. Had she been in denial, even though they had talked about his impending death? Had she failed him?

A few days ago, early in the morning. I read her column.. I lie in bed, scrolling down on my phone, tears streaming down my temples onto the pillow as I squeezed my eyes shut to clear my vision. Jim woke up and I handed him the phone to read. He observed that we all focus on what we regret, what we didn't do. She had spent every day with her dying father and was protecting him from the infection she had, even if it wasn’t covid-19. Had she donned a mask and gown and visited, and he’d gotten sick, she’d feel bad. Perhaps there was no way not to feel bad.

In her book, Maybe You Should Talk to Someone, she asks, Is it ever enough? No, it’s not. Can we make it enough? I hope so.

I’m tired of keeping this secret. Perhaps someone out there also feels guilty for not orchestrating the perfect death scene. Death isn’t pretty, picturesque, or neat. It’s ugly; it’s brutal; it’s gut-wrenching.

That evening, I took a walk with R’el. Once a week, as she is leaving work (she’s a psychiatrist at Bellevue in Manhattan), she phones and we walk together, 210 miles apart. She remarked that David was a very private person. It might have comforted me to sit by his side and hold his hand as he breathed his last. It would not have pleased him.

Thanks, R’el.

Gratitude for Soles

I am grateful for my soles.

I wish you could hear the sleep meditations I listen to. There are five of them, each fifteen or twenty minutes long. I choose among them every night. They all include variations on the standard meditation fare: mindful breathing, an affirmation or two, visualizations, and a body scan, “I will name a body part. Focus your mind on that body part. You will remain completely still: only your mind will move.”

I wish you could hear her describe the soles of my feet, how they carry me around from place to place and bear up soooo much. She puts such empathy into describing those neglected, unappreciated feet.

I walked sixteen and a half miles yesterday. It was glorious. Around mile ten, I became aware of a rubbing on the pad of my right foot. About a mile later, my left foot developed the same slightly painful sensation. Since it had been snowing that morning when I left home, I had worn my hiking boots, instead of sneakers, and thick synthetic sox. I regretted the sox, but I don’t own woolen ones (yet.). I trudged through the woods for six miles walking more and more gingerly. By the time I made it home, I could barely walk up the exterior stairs to Jim's office.

Upon examination, I discovered that the blisters were not serious and my feet feel much better today. But last night I hobbled around, not able to put any weight on the blisters. Walking up or down my flight of stairs took several minutes. Unfortunately, I had to use the stairs several times last night. I was relieved that I wouldn’t have to go to church, since all meetings are video-conferences right now. I couldn’t imagine walking from the parking lot to the chapel.

It’s a little thing, really, soles without blisters. So easy to ignore, take for granted. How often do I think about them?  Rarely. But today I am truly grateful for them. Blisters are a minor inconvenience, even in the not-so-grand scheme of things.

I just want to say, I’m grateful for my soles.

Sixteen-mile March Before Patriots' Day

Early this morning, in a light but steady snowfall, I turned out of my driveway and headed for the Minuteman Bike Path. The lawns were covered with two inches of clean white snow. In the forest (as my Viennese friend calls it) the the brilliant white snow clung to the maple and oak branches spreading out in all directions. The long-needled pines drooped: a gingerbread village scene.

For the first three miles, I passed three people. I nodded and smiled at the first man I met, and said, it’s magical. He smiled warmly and agreed. Blessed solitude. I eschewed my ubiquitous audio-books and walked in silent contentment.

The bike path ends at the old Bedford Depot. A large weatherproof map shows the two trailheads nearby. I thought I knew where the trail to Concord began and walked about a tenth of a mile in the wrong direction. I returned to study the map again and found Railroad Avenue. At Elm Brook Park there was no indication of the identity of the trail. As I struggled to see my GPS, my glasses fogged. I could hardly read the tiny map.

A mile along, I called out to an approaching bicyclist. Is this the Reformatory Branch Trail? I was mortified when he skidded to a stop just past me. What did you say? Aghast, I ask again. He cheerfully affirmed and added helpfully that it goes into Concord Center. I was grateful but embarrassed.

Three tricorn hats and two American flags jogged down the path. Happy Patriots' Day, the father called. It is a strange April. All Patriots Day activities have been cancelled. No breakfast for 200. No muskets firing on the Green. No young man in Bedford scaling a twenty-foot liberty pole to place his red cap on top. No Marathon.

Once in Concord, I glanced to my right and saw the forest give way to a huge expanse of golden grasses, with a large pond in the distance: The Great Meadow National Wildlife Refuge.  Wonder filled me.

At Concord Center I turned towards Lincoln and later onto the Battle Road. Perched on a granite boulder, a perky snow bunny stared at me. My Runkeeper read 13.15 miles: a half marathon.

The going got rougher as my feet developed blisters and my hips stiffened. My first mile was a 16:38 minute-mile. By my last (mile 16) I was barely clocking a 25-minute mile.

Gingerly climbing the exterior stairs to Jim’s coachhouse office, I joined the video-conference call with R’el and Matt. This was our virtual finish line after completing the Conquer covid-19 virtual race. Jim and I tapped the laptop screen with cold diet sodas and we all toasted each other. Then I slowly moved back down the stairs, into the house, and up more stairs to take a soothing hot bath.

Flagpoles and Spines

I apologize for being AWOL (absent without leave) for four months.

Today I read a ‘morning musing’ email from  FlyLady Marla Cilley: "You Might Be a Perfectionist If..." I’ve been a perfectionist about my blog. If I can’t dedicate several hours to it, I don’t post. So, here’s an experiment: I pledge to post here daily, by 9 p.m. through April. I just changed my email signature:

Blog “updated DAILY in April”.

I am a proud member of DBSA-Boston (Depression Bipolar Support Alliance). When Jim and I started self-isolation on March 13, I felt secret relief that my volunteer commitments, including facilitating at DBSA once or twice a week, would halt and I could re-set. I felt overbooked but unwilling to give anything up. To my dismay, The DBSA Board swung into action. They met in video-conference each day for over two weeks and launched online support groups for people with mood disorders and their family and friends. It was an intense experience for me, in fact, I started going hypomanic for the first time in many years. Now that the online program is in place, the time commitment has lessened (and the hypomania has receded (dang!)).

I’ve discovered, in an unexpected and deep way, that I am part of a community of generous, caring people who understand mental illness because of ‘lived experience.’ Many people have stepped up and given time and effort to maintain our connections with each other during an uncertain time when many people are experiencing anxiety and isolation.

Khare, DBSA-Boston's technical guru, works every day to improve our online experience. For years he has been our meditation specialist, generously guiding a weekly Meditation Circle. Now he offers one every weekday.

How comforting it was to  see familiar friends this morning. Khare suggested an image I've been thinking about all day: a flagpole and flag. The flag is whipped by a strong wind, then ruffled gently, then hangs limp. The experience of life can be as disruptive as strong winds, but I can be the flagpole, not the flag.

I've never bonded with the standard meditation metaphor that my thoughts are clouds to be observed dispassionately, letting them drift by without trying to prevent them or hold them. But this has possibilities. My thoughts can be like wind: coming and going, unbidden and, unpredictable. They can be benign, helpful, practical, distracting, distorted, depressed, or hypomanic. My spine can be my flagpole. My backbone gives my body structure and strength. It supports me, whether I sit, or stand, or lie down. It isn't brittle and in danger of breaking, but strong and supple. With a healthy spine, I can be solidly grounded.

I’ve never stayed with meditation; I'd get restless and bored. But this practice is different. I awoke this morning feeling anxious, fully awake but unrested, and reluctant to get out of bed and face my life. After twenty minutes with my eyes closed, I was ready to start my day afresh. Not energized, exactly, but fortified.