Day Four - Appreciative August

Renovations Wrapped

For anyone who has lived in a house whilst it is being renovated, the final act of completing the renovation is something to be forever grateful for. And to be proud of, for it is a brave act and one that tests the very core of any stable and loving relationship, including that of your bank account and ability to select tiles together in relative harmony.

We did all of that just last year. In the middle of writing my book at home, I had plumbers jack-hammering the cement floor out of our 84 year old bathroom (ironically during my section on finding time for yourself and learning how to meditate), a doorway being cut through a solid brick wall, internal glass and doors fitted, external french doors installed, wooden floorboards laid, underground rainwater tanks dug and buried, painters everywhere and the never-ending responsibility of making sugary and milky coffees for literally every tradie that stepped over the threshold.

We're happy with the results though:

In fact I almost feel as though I'm too daggy to live in my own home. My trakkie daks and ugg boots make the place look untidy, let alone my unravelling knitting bag, dog-eared novels, coffee cups, finger prints and pet hairs.

We no longer have dinner to the sounds of "KER-THUNK" as random chunks of ceiling plaster crash to the floor or trip over the cracked laundry tiles that used to fetchingly lead right up to the kitchen in a wet version of the Yellow brick road. Nor do we have the laundry loo door doing a great impersonation of a public toilet with a one foot gap at the top and the bottom to allow sound amplication and viewing to occur.

Our bathroom is tiny (being the original one from 1924) but is now modern and functional. No more 1980s pink-and-brass fittings with a bath that was wider the doorframe and included a shower so awkwardly fitted that you had to stand on the edge of the bath to get a decent soaking.

After a couple of months of streaking outside in the dead of winter to use the Bianco cubicle, we now have a seriously large-n-luxurious shower, a toilet (not there before, which meant my 3am twinkle used to involve a tediously long trek to the back of the house into the freezing cold laundry), a heated chrome towel rail (luxury!), massive vanity unit and mirrored cupboard and some towels that are so fluffy our floors still look as though a Yeti's chucked a tantrum in there.

Home, sweet renovated home. The memories of noise, expense, mistakes, cement dust, mud, plumber's bum cracks, missed appointments, swearing, SAFM at volume knob number eleven and warped boards are a thing of the past. Pretty much.

Hey hey hey heeey!

I've been going to meditation classes for about a year now and am now able to experience the odd - or very occasional - moment of 'being in the now.'

Relaxing my body to make it at least loose enough to stop sitting up as rigidly as a fighter pilot on a 'Maximum Collateral Damage' mission has been a huge challenge but I'm getting there. I can now at least focus on my breathing for about four seconds before racing back to thoughts such as "What will they put on TV during the 'off ratings' season when there was already such crap on during the 'ratings' season", and "Remember to let out the chooks, let in the floor sanding guy, take your CV to the interview tomorrow, don't inhale chocolate again and see if you can find out why Mark Holden is considered an expert in anything."

John, the teacher, is as calm and collected as you'd expect a meditator to be, but somehow he's managed to work in an IT Help Desk environment and manage to keep sane, smiling and out of any murder trials. "If thoughts arise in your mind, just notice them and let them go. Let go of these thoughts and shift from thinking to sensing: return back to your breathing and keep listening to your body."

I've since learned that by 'listening to your body' John does not mean fantasing about introducing a dark 'Kit Kat Chunky' chocolate to Australia's corner shops or a decent decaffeinated iced coffee but to remove all distractions and really check out how your body is reacting.

Despite having a nose I could rent out as a warehouse, thighs about as firm as cling-wrapped cottage cheese and an arse dwarves could seek shelter under, he urges us to see how hard our bodies work, 24/7. "You may rarely notice how your heart never stops beating, your food is digesting and replenishing all parts of your body (mostly the butt in my own particular case) and how it transports you to wherever you need to go."

All flippancies about fatness and flaccidity aside, I noticed that I was finally starting to get it. "Stay still. Stay in the now. Don't feel guilty about not doing anything, you are doing something, something incredibly worthwhile. You are deciding to listen to your body instead of overriding it or ignoring it to push through working longer at the computer, eat crap it doesn't want or stay up later than it requires. Be still, be silent and listen: this is just as important for your body as the most strenuous exercise."

My breathing was steady, strong and refreshing and I could easily watch those pesky and inane musings like "What would happen if I gave one of our chooks a chicken-flavoured rice cracker to eat?" or "Did Joe Dulce earn enough money from 'Shaddup You Face' for life or is he now eking out a living busking outside of Cunninghams' Warehouse" or even "How could I train my dog to weed the garden when I'm at work?" were easy to note, dismiss and ignore.

John continued the exercise. "Imagine a dark red rose bud at your heart, so dark it's nearly black at the edges, lightly covered in dew. It slowly opens and fills you with kindness, acceptance and warmth..." Oooooh yeah John I was feeling it, seeing it, smelling it.

"Picture someone you love right in front of you, someone you admire and treasure..." Easy - there was Love Chunks, looking as self-conscious in my imagination as he would have if he'd actually forced to stand in front of the group as a stripped-off study for life-drawing class. "Feel your light emerge from your chest and fill this person..." Yep, it's all happening, can do, rightyo, this is all good stuff so far....

Not an errant, "Don't forget to write up that article you promised Charlotte tomorrow and keep it serious, not stupid" or "I'll bet my month's wage that Bryce Courtenay has a novel out for Christmas" type of thoughts were entering my now rose-coloured brain and chest.

Then John said, "Now picture someone you dislike, standing in front of you. Fill them with your light of loving kindness......"

Oh. Bugger. "No," I told myself sternly. "You are making amazing progress tonight. Don't let your searing, boiling hatred that's stronger than the heat blasted from one thousand new suns distract you from the forgiving and letting-go nature of this exercise. Move on from this unproductive anger and distress - Share your rose light."

I bloody shared it all right. My rose light instantly changed from a misty, free-range cloud into a sharp column of red-hot rays, not unlike a light sabre. She got it full-on in the chest before toppling face-down in agony, body spasming like a horizontal Peter Garrett as she writhed and foamed her way to a painful death. My breathing sounded strangely "Mooorfth Moooorfth" like a certain bloke with a fondness for black and building Death Stars.

I was at peace with the world.

The stress of meditation

Those of you who have been regular readers may find it surprising to find out that I spent the weekend at a meditation retreat. In virtual silence. On my own. With no access to chocolate.

I have been going to meditation classes for a few months now and could see the benefits of learning how to relax instead of clenching my jaw and cracking my crowns as a way of getting to sleep each night. As such, I was interested in signing up for 'level 2' despite my disappointment at not receiving a certificate or award of some kind for completing the first level. Surely our teacher John had been watching us intently, and would hand out a chocolate frog or smiley face sticker for, oh I don't know, the 'Still-est Meditator' or the 'Person Who Looks Like They're Doing It The Best'?

There was a 'Finding Life Balance' retreat advertisement on the whiteboard and he assured me that my lack of experience, high-chatter-to-intelligent-thought ratio and non-mung-bean-munching persona would cope well enough on a 2 day meditation retreat.

Friday night found Love Chunks winding his way through the Adelaide Hills, with me, Sapphire and Dogadoo in tow. The retreat was sort-of on the way to Victor Harbor, where Sapph was going to spend the first week of her school holidays with my folks and LC and Dogadoo decided to stay with them for the weekend also.

As the station wagon roared off in a cloud of dust into the darkness, I was greeted by one of the teachers, Ann, who showed me into my room. Well, I *almost* stepped into the room until I saw the huge, man-eating huntsman spider leering at me from the top of the sliding door. "Erm, unless he can be err, removed somehow, I don't think I'll be able to sleep in here." Ann tried her best to persuade the Creepy Devil Beast to willingly enter a yoghurt container, but he gave her the big finger and scuttled away behind the curtains. "Oh, he'll be OK," Ann smiled at me encouragingly.
"Oh, I'm sure he will but I won't. I noticed that Room 3 looked empty?"

Having achieved that crucial first victory, I was fully revved up for a weekend of serious meditation. About a dozen of us gathered in the hall, shyly smiling at each other, but not talking. Our rooms and the communal bathroom had signs tactfully advising us to "....respect each others' needs for a retreat by keeping conversation and noise to a minimum." Ann and Robyn also told us that we did not need to chat over our meals, but instead see them as a chance to concentrate on the food, take longer to eat it and enjoy the tastes, sights, sounds etc of the meal and of the bush surroundings. We were told too that most people attending their retreats did not wish to reveal why they were there, what job they did or anything else that you'd mostly ask someone in a social situation, so we were released from the wear and tear of empty social chit-chat.

We had a couple of meditation sessions and, by the wild-and-crazy Friday night time of 9pm, it was time for us all to head back to the retreat block to our beds. As per usual, I had a night of tossing and turning - too hot in my uber-arctic-condition sleeping bag and too cold with just the sheets. Elsewhere was complete silence as I tiptoed to the loo and back several times. My dorm mates must have thought a constipated elephant was patrolling the hall.

Despite this, I did get up at 6.45am to shower and get ready for the 7.30am stretch and meditation session on Saturday morning. The bathroom was a co-ed one - something I hadn't experienced since uni days. The sharing with blokes didn't worry me as much as having the toilets in the same room as the showers. How were we supposed to ~ ahem ~ "let it all out" when other people were trying to get clean? Also, it felt very strange to be cleaning my teeth with toothpaste and drool all over my face and smiling like a rabies-infested Al Jolson at a half-naked bloke getting into the shower to my left and hearing the drops-and-plops of a very genteel-looking lady in the 'engaged' cubicle on my right.

At 7:30 we were all at the hall, still shyly smiling at each other and only venturing as far as a whispered, 'excuse me' in the huddle to kick off our shoes at the shelves by the door. Afterwards, at breakfast we were all feeling supremely relaxed and were busy eating, drinking hot tea and trying to 'just be', when Nathan - not me, it's nice to write for once - got his bread stuck in the toaster too long and "REE REE REE REE REE REE REE REE REE REE REE REE!" went the fire alarm, jolting us all of our relaxed states. Hell, someone even said "Oh dearie me," out loud; most likely Nathan.

Eventually calm was restored and classes resumed. One of the practicals was to walk outside in a meditative state, which, for me, was to slow it r-i-iii-ght down to 1) lifting foot; 2) moving foot; 3) placing foot - said like a mantra. My eyes were supposed to be softly focused on the ground about 2m in front of me, but my failure to achieve this meant that I got to spot this gorgeous little blue wren and about six of his little brown girlfriends hopping about a bush. (why are the males and females of the bird world around the wrong way? Why is it that the blokes look all colourful and gorgeous and the poor little females are so drab - topic for a future blog maybe).

The food was fabulous. Mainly vegetarian which meant soups, lentil-based curries, rice, salads and fruit. By late afternoon, my digestive system was struggling to cope with the night before's dinner of lentil soup and that day's lunch of lentil dahl and I was seriously worried about how in the hell I'd be able to get through our 'deep relaxation visualisation' without letting rip a butt blast or two...... Bless Robyn's sweet heart - we were allowed to lie on the floor, put our legs up on chairs, cushions or blankets.... Let's just say that there's one poor grey polarfleece rug wedged underneath me like a doorjam that got the full force of my silent-but-deadly arse emanations. Hopefully it served to soak up the odours, but if not, at least the voluntary vow of silence taken by us all meant that no-one could voice any objections.

We were given time for a walk, or sleep or do what we liked (bar making any noise) before dinner. I stumbled along in my bright aqua crocs along a cornflake-crunchy, parched brown paddock of roo poos and gum tree bark to find a shady little spot away from everyone in order to try my best at 'being in the moment.' All was well for a while - I heard sheep baaaing, horses whinnying and many different bird calls. The air was warm, the sun bright and I was slowly sinking into a dreamy state. But then it happened - the distant tweets turned into raucous squawking as an enormous flock of cockatoos decided to choose my gum tree to land in. The ominous 'Pfft pfft pfft pfft' sounds of bird turds dropping all around me. Holding a particularly large chunk of bark over my head, I ran for cover - not an easy feet in crocs, believe me. If it had been rain instead of poo, I'd have had two handy little dinghys to sit in and paddle to safety.

Dinner that night featured more adventurous salads and lentil-based deliciousness and the festive noises being made by my lower intestines hinted at the interesting challenges that lay ahead.

On Sunday, I again made it to the early morning session and was immediately in a panic - yoga! Not even the Queen could do a yoga session of downward dog, warrior pose etc and not let a few 'parps' or two slip out! As I'd discovered overnight in my tiny room the night before, mine weren't likely to be quiet or discreet, let alone acceptable to folk who'd been standing outside breathing in lungfuls of country air with contented expressionns on their well-rested faces.

Luck was on my side again. The yoga session was a mostly lying down and relaxed and Meredith near me was soon promptly asleep, her snoring not unlike a slow burp. It was my opportunity to let a few pearlers go and hope that they'd be silent so as not to identify me as their creator, but instead be blamed on her supine state instead. It was indeed a blessing that Meredith's dreams were my dutch ovens and my gut was now only half the size of a basketball and slightly less dangerous to touch.

Ann was taking us through a meditation in which we were to find a warm, safe place to feel the sun on our skin, soaking into us and moving through out our bodies. That part was working, right up until she said, 'Now imagine a soft, light rain, washing down from your head, face, torso, arms and legs, washing, washing, dripping, soft and continous...."
"Hey hey heeeeeey!" My thinking mind shoved my sensing mind out of the way and accusingly blurted out, "We're suffering a severe drought here right now - we should be saving our rainwater, not wasting it." The internal scene worked better when my brain shifted the scenario to a dark room and a warm bed with no alarm clock, no migraine and no work to do.

Just before our farewell lunch on Sunday, I again stumbled down to the gum tree to visit my now-favourite mellowing out spot. Instantly, a herd of neighbouring sheep came trotting towards me, the barbed wire fence the only thing separating us. "Hello Human Thingy - we're here for our hay", they seemed to say, their long faces looking at me with expectation.
"Sorry sweeties, I don't have anything for you." They still waited, very still, which gave me a chance to count them - 43 in all, and all with their beady, sheepy little eyeballs on me. It made me simultaneously feel very awkward and also a bit sorry for them (especially seeing as there was no grass to be had on their dried out paddock and we'd been lavishly washing ourselves in rainwater during our last session), so I waved good bye to them (I know, it's stupid - who on earth waves to sheep?) and bumbled and stumbled my way up the poo-strewn hill to the dorm, farting like a volvo all the way (you take your chances when you get them, trust me).

"Now that your formal retreat with us has ended, you are now allowed to talk freely over lunch." Instead of the verbal diarrhoea I'd been expecting, I instead stayed fairly quiet, preferring to sit and listen to the others and answer their questions if they were directed at me. Little did I know that I'd spent the weekend alongside a doctor, a palliative nurse, a psychologist, three IT experts, an artist, a naturopath, a builder, a surveyor, a teacher and a school principal. It showed me how hard it was to label people when they're barefoot, wordless and all wearing trakky daks.

Love Chunks picked me up and found me serene, refreshed and so very glad to see him. Whilst it was good to go into retreat and meditation mode, it was his face and Sapphire's face that rose up in my mind every time I closed my eyes in every session. Unfortunatley for him, my chatterbox had finally woken up, and he was verbally assaulted for every second of the hour long drive home. I loved him even more when he shared his dark chocolate Lindt balls with me when we settled down onto the sofa...