Poise and Presence

Robertson Davies, in Curiosity Recaptured: Exploring Ways We Think and Move, makes this observation:

‘Commitment to the Alexander Technique is a lifelong sentence……  But it keeps the body alive, at ages when many people have resigned themselves to irreversible decline.  It keeps the mind alive, for it demands unceasing vigilance.’

It’s 1:58 p.m., and the eclipse apex here in Ohio will be at 86% and occur around 2:30 p.m.  The sunbeams on my office floor have disappeared, and the view out the window is one of the approaching darkness of storm.  But there is no storm! Alert to the light, I watch; keenly aware; vigilant.

Driving to a neighborhood park, I see hundreds of people congregated around the library, where viewing glasses are being distributed.  No one is hunched over their phone. Spines are long, bodies lengthened toward the skies, unceasingly vigilant to the wonder of the eclipse.

Alert aliveness is ours to claim, not only as we marvel at nature’s spectacular events, but  also in the mundane routines of our daily lives. Here’s to ‘unceasing vigiliance’—–

(Thanks to Ellen and Phyllis, who traveled to Kentucky for the total eclipse, and told me all about it today. Wonderful to be with you both.)