Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, 2013.
Today is the day Barack Obama was inaugurated for his second term. And mentioned equality for gay people in his speech. Which feels kind of incredible.
Today I woke up at 6:30am, caught a ride to Beaverton at 7:30am, helped sew five out of 158 blankets for kiddos as part of the bi-annual Bink-a-thon I've helped put on now for the past four years, stood on a chair in front of a room of 100 and welcomed everyone while the camera rolled, returned home by 3:30 thoroughly spent, collapsed into bed after a bowl of yogurt, and made the mistake of reading emails before trying to take a nap.
Five emails about my mom's memorial. Logistics, planning, questions, ideas, asking permission. I am holding the reigns.
I fell asleep with a fluttery mind and dreamt of my mother in moments. And for a moment, dreamt her alive. Waking up felt familiar. And then the feeling was gone.
---
Awake. Out of bed. Chit-chat with Cristina, have a cup of tea, pedal to the grocery store, pick up vegetables and Umcka, pedal home, chop, chop, chop while listening to Radiolab on Bliss and Heredity and drinking red wine (bought for the recipe, so why not pour a glass?). And the clock ticks and the pot bubbles and I pull out yoga pants and a mason jar to fill with stew for a sick Jordan and write a quick note and put my matt in the bag and I'm off.
Pedal, pedal, pedal.
I feel the wine. Crap.
Drop the bag with a housemate, lock up my bike, send a text, change into my pants, go to the bathroom, enter the studio, adjust to the dim lights, feel the warmth of the place, unroll my matt.
I am tipsy. Crikey.
---
The first half hour is me trying to find my edges. My head is fuzzy. The wine is pulsing. I am not fully present. I sink into child's pose and feel the pressure on my forehead.
Breathe.
His voice encourages me into a forward bend, into downward dog, into cat, into cow, into a deep lizard pose that hurts my pelvic muscles until I give up and release. I keep my eyes open to remind me where I am.
---
An hour in, we practice breathing with one nostril and then the other. Inhale with the right, close both nostrils, hold, relax, exhale with the left. Inhale with the left, close both nostrils, hold, relax, exhale with the right.
"It's like the moon. Let it fill you, gently. And when you're ready, let it leave."
I try and imagine my breath and the moon as one. I'm not sure what he means, but it works. I soften. I finally find my rhythm. I am here.
And I remember the story of my mother and father, and their first yoga teacher. "Breathe through both noses," in a faux Indian accent, my father's impression.
---
We sink into a hip-opener -- we can choose regular pigeon or reclined pigeon. I choose to lie on my back, my poor pelvis still sore from lizard pose. I find the pose. I find my breath.
And I remember again -- "Breathe through both noses."
My parent's yoga class.
Doing yoga with my mom.
My mom.
Restorative yoga with my mom on fourth street. Barbara is up at the front of the class. My mother is there on the mat next to me, lying on her back, one leg crossed over her body, wearing teal leggings and a bright t-shirt. I can see her warped spine, the permanent hunch, slowly stretching, lengthening.
I hear her breath.
I am there, in the wrinkles in her forehead, the slight downturn of her lips as she focuses, concentrates on the pose. Concentrates on the pain. Breathes through it.
I am there as we leave the studio and walk to the 4th street market nearby to grab some wholesome 4th-street-priced deli food. My dad is there too. The three of us. We eat.
I am there as my mother unwraps her sandwich and eats. I can see her chewing. Her square jaw, crumbs at the edges of her mouth. Large detached earlobes moving slightly with each bite.
I smell her purse as it opens, as she reaches for a balled-up kleenex to dap at the crumbs.
I am the lipstick as she reapplies it to her lips, one coat, then another, pieces of it balling up at the edges where her lips are chapped. A muted tone. A glossy reminder of the color they once held.
I am in the middle of a hug. I feel my dad on one side. My mother on the other. Small. But there. Holding us. Her family. Her two favorite sweeties.
My mother.
My mother.
My mother.
I miss my mother.
---
I feel the heat rise in my cheeks, my eyes beginning to pool.
My mother.
Tears begin to roll silently down the sides of my face as I am reminded to deepen into the pose. "Take it deeper. Go deeper if you can."
I remember. My mother.
I watch her cooking in the kitchen. Smell the pots of "working mom's dinner" bubbling as she flits from stovetop to counter in her jewel-toned outfit.
I hear her voice, slightly strained, calling me up in my room... "Melia... Melia... dinner's ready."
I can see her left hand, holding the fork, small and skinny, but the first joints of each finger slightly swollen and bent with the beginnings of arthritis.
My mother.
I want to hear her laugh.
My mother.
The tears begin to roll faster, pooling in my hair as I try to keep my breathing steady, deep, unobtrusive.
"Go deeper if you can..."
I watch her, hunched over her wheelchair at the dining room table as I pass her the memory book. I am there when her eyes light up. When her eyes twinkle and her smile is so large, larger than I've seen it since the moment I walked in the door and she saw me. Her daughter.
I watch her as her eyes twinkle and glow and her breath gasps as she looks through the pages and she comes alive and I can feel the emotion rising in her throat and I look down because I know the book was the right thing, I know I feel proud, I know I feel happy to see her happy... and a part of me feels shy. I am her daughter. I am her only child.
My mother.
Her eyes twinkle and mine leak. I feel my chest swelling, my breathing loosing its cool, the hot tears rolling fat and free over my temples, into my ears.
And I wimper.
I didn't expect it. It just escapes. A small, high-pitched inhale as I try to catch my breath before it hiccups. A tiny, distant, audible moment of sadness.
I have no idea how loud it was. Or what it sounded like to those sinking deeper into their poses around me. I just know that these tears feel necessary. This sadness feels real. My body finally softens.
---
This was the first time since the day after she died that I allowed myself to be there with my mother in the memories. The first time that I was truly there. Feeling alongside her. Feeling her. Feeling her details, feeling her presence, feeling my mother next to me, very much next to me.
Not watching from a far and distant place, from the safety of a third-party observer. From the vantage point of those who knew her as a musician, as a friend, as a mentor. From the vantage point of an event planner. From the vantage point of some one else. From the vantage point of not-her-daughter.
But I am her daughter. And she is my mother.
She is my mother.
And I need to allow her to be here, with me. And for me to be there, with her. Present in those memories.
Alive.
