I've been doing a lot of yoga lately: at-home, on-my-mat, Adriene-on-youTube-type yoga. I started because I missed going to yoga and after a few days I realized it really helped me handle some of the stress of this life a little better. Also, let me be honest and say I am 100% counting the 32 calories I burn while doing it as exercise. If you have done yoga, you know how much they make you breathe in and out and in and hold it and out. It is as important as Warrior II or mountain pose. Feel your breath do this, feel how it makes your body do that. Breathe in, breathe out.
Today, we have a snow/ice day from school and as I woke up and the realization that I did not, nor could not, be anywhere today hit me, I feel like I inhaled for the first time in a very long time. I inhaled and thought "No school!", I inhaled and thought "No soccer!", I inhaled and thought "Nowhere to be!" and I inhaled and thought about how very long it has been since I felt like I could breathe this deeply.
I do a lot of exhaling. Breath out in exhaustion. Breath out in resignation. Breath out in wondering what the hell I am doing. Breath out as I ask "Why has no one done this assignment even though we had two days to work on it in class?!?" Breaths out as I wonder if I am the only one who can smell the litter box? Warm, fetid breaths of tired, worried, stale air. (I am in that mask nine hours a day; this is an accurate description, believe me).
Some days, I have quick little gasps of inhalation. Gasp in "I forgot that was due!", gasp in "I need to cook fourteen meals for the week so I don't eat only boxed mac and cheese." Gasp in as my jeans are tight and I know it's because I have only burned 32 calories doing yoga and despite saying I want to go round and wear snap-up house dresses from HEB, I am still very vain and don't want to go round and winter is not the season for snap-up house dresses. Gasp in, long breath out, gasp in, long breath out.
Is everyone running like this? Social media tells me yes. We are running and we are out of breath and self-care is a phrase thrown about but no one believes in it anymore. Used to be a bubble bath, a face mask, and a glass of wine could hit reset, but they just don't anymore. If someone had said I needed a face mask night prior to this snow day my only thought would have been "Fuck you and your face mask" as I slowly exhaled and forgot to breathe back in. (for the record, I did do one last night. Nothing.)
Is my inability to inhale due to the worst teaching year in the history of teaching minus when Laura Ingalls Wilder had to teach in that tiny shack and the woman she was staying with wanted to kill her? But even then, Almanzo! Deep breath in! Is it the teaching/coaching combination? Yeah, it is a killer load, but there is joy to be found in watching young women do something they love to do and one that is not often found in my classroom. Also, I believe passionately about two things in my life: sports in high school are purposeful and powerful for young women and need to be supported and that the Bills will one day win a Superbowl. I can only help with one of those things though, so I do it. Um, and I need the money because teaching does not pay a livable wage.
We have been collectively holding our breath for so long waiting for our world to be normal, I guess it is normal that all we do is breathe out and out and out. Other teachers and I have commented that our students are just broken, but I am starting to recognize that the adults are broken too. Our world, our pre-COVID world, is gone. And we are weary of waiting for it to come back. And we are breathing out only as we realize it is not coming back. Not today, not this school year, maybe not ever. Long, slow exhale here.
So what do we do to bring back the inhalations? The joy? The rest? The equilibrium? I have no idea and you now know my thoughts about face masks. I would love to know what other people are doing or not doing but want to be doing.
Today, I am breathing in and in and in as I wear soft clothes and wool socks and drink hot things in a big mug. I am breathing in and in and in as I read a book in bed and unleash this torrent of words. I am breathing in and in and in as I step outside with my reluctant dog and feel my cheeks get cold and that sharp air hit my lungs. Today, I will just breathe.
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