While it’s been quite a while since I’ve posted here – today’s
events made this seem like the perfect opportunity to do express myself once
again.
As some of you know, pretty solidly for the past 8-plus months, I’ve been editing and revising Instructing
Hatha Yoga for it’s second edition. (If
you didn’t know that, now you do.) Since my partner-in-crime and co-author for
the first edition passed from this realm, it’s been a pretty solitary endeavor.
Seriously, writing without KLee to converse with and to share ridiculous
amounts of chai has been a long, drawn out, under-caffeinated process!
Happily though, there’s a shiny upside to wrestling this
beast single-handedly. While I did kinda
miss my first text edit deadline (only by 3-months…), I calmly bulldozed my way
through storms of ennui and have met every deadline since. Shoot - I even
turned in a cycle of re-writes three
whole days ahead of schedule! Truly, this is a HUGE accomplishment for
“Last-minute Lola” here. And when my editor thanked me for submitting early, I
felt a cool bit of swagger! (Insert vision of Rosie the Riveter’s bodacious
biceps…)
That feeling was short-lived though, as I began
organizing the video and photo shoots. Luckily, picking dates to coincide with the
publisher’s videographer, photographer and the yoga studio was a slam dunk, and
April 10-12 was decided to be golden on all fronts. The tricky part here has
been the tedious business of scheduling student and teacher models. A sampling of scenarios: He can do this pose,
but not that one. She has tattoos. His work schedule is inconsistent. She can’t
make up her mind if she’s able to commit. She, she, she and she are all having
a baby any second now. (A while I think a live birth would be fascinating to film,
it has NOTHING to do with how to practice yoga asana!) OK – so just breathe, I
guess!
AahhhhhOohhhhhhOooooooMmmmmm! (Visualize angels parting the
clouds) And, quite literally overnight – it all clicked into place. Last
night, as a matter of fact! All of my yogi feelers and helpers drew in talent
for the shoots. Yay! As of this morning
there are only a couple of holes in the schedule and a few “orphan” poses to be
struck by some currently unknowing, yet willing yogi.
Woo Hoo! Super excited! Can’t wait for tomorrow! Eight
o’clock in the a.m. – our first video rolls. (I guess “records” is a more apt
description.)
But. Wait… Yup, here we go!
The jaw-dropping phone message I received at 11:00 this
morning required me to pass the phone to my co-worker so she could listen - and
subsequently drop her jaw. After we simultaneously mouthed some blatantly
“un-yoga” words, I understood that, no, I hadn’t just been swallowed up by a
mischievous, random wormhole…
What the what?!
Seems Chicago is having some decidedly nasty weather (again)
and my videographer is unable to fly out. He can (hopefully) get to the studio
by 2:00 tomorrow; which is a bit like the groom getting to the wedding 5-hours
late and then still having to get dressed!
While I continue to have a slightly twitchy eye at the
goofiness of the situation, (C'mon Universe - these were my plans!), I recognize that it’s not with dismay. Now, a few years ago I likely would have gone stark-raving ballistic and ranted for days and hours! (Perhaps it was the chai?) But today, because I had a class to teach after I got the news, I send my sweet students some extra love for unsuspectingly grounding me with their mere presence. Today, I smooth out that slightly edgy left-over energy here on this keyboard. And I feel my heart swelling with gratitude.
Sure, this shoot is crucial to the book and all, but the loss of the tomorrow that woulda, shoulda been is
not a catastrophe. Shoot, the first edition is still a best-seller and we had
absolutely NO clue what we were doing at the time! And honestly, needing to reschedule 5-hours of work is
nothing like having to be airlifted
out of Yemen. (My heart goes out to all of those affected!) This? This is an open invitation for me to
honestly live my yoga today, tomorrow and after that – which simply means to live in the sometimes muck-filled
mire of life! My eyes also are opened to the fact that this project is not a solo
project by any stretch of the imagination! There are SO many people who have my back, and me theirs, and together this will all come together. Yogis are flexible, and I'm profoundly thankful for that!
Safe travels to Gregg and Neil! (Sending some San Diego sunshine
to the mid-west!)
Keep you all posted on the finale! Peace!
Edition 1!