(I started this post before Christmas break, and now that it is warming up, I'll send it out - my fingers thawed out and all...)
Baby it's cold outside! Even in our dry and wind-shielded parking garage it's pretty chilly in the morning. Cold enough that after turning on the engine, and shifting into reverse, and taking my foot off of the brake, the car does not move. Even as the engine races. But slowly the wheels begin to turn, and the car backs as I turn out of our space. Then into drive I shift, and the car rolls slowly forward. At this point, it takes some pressure on the gas pedal to drive up the two stories to the exit.
Why, you may wonder, such a laborious description of starting the morning 'commute' (taking Miller to school)? Why indeed. I think I am learning to put this practice of the slow start into my daily life - sometimes anyway.
Sitting here at my desk - just back from taking Miller to the orthopedist for a wrestling related knee injury - I'm sealing envelopes for a (very) few holiday cards, working on a short story, checking email and facebook, scheduling an MRI, and doctor visit, paying bills. You know, just the stuff people do. And earlier I had been to the gym: feel relatively strong today, my 'numbers' will be good, though bedtime is a way's off. The snow is falling outside, 25 degrees. Spencer just called from New York, he'd caught an earlier bus, should arrive by eight tonight. Every so often I'll take a deep breath, and relax into the idle. Open the eyes, remember the next todo item, then press on the gas.
Finding the idle speed: it isn't always so easy. It's not a matter of just doing nothing, chilling, vegging. There is some energy to it, and some days it just doesn't seem to be as available. Or I forget to check into it. Just now, tensing up a slight bit, getting lost in these words. These words that seem to bubble up from some forgotten place. They can remind me to slow down, feel the breath, the idle, then go forward.
It's helpful in the gym too. After pulling ten minutes of rows on the erg machine, it helps if I remember to notice my breath - maybe three of them - unstrap my feet, feel the idle, and slowly stand up and move to a weight machine. I usually take the walker to the gym, as the exercise (idle or no) pretty much knocks me out: I ride down in the elevator, seated in it. But by the afternoon or evening, I can feel the benefits.
Feeling that idle speed - some energy, but also some calm - that is the stuff of yoga, meditation, tai chi, and other practices.
Can they lead to the homonymic title of this post?
P.S. Sometimes. While walking to a meditation group near Dupont circle this morning, it occurred to me that a wheel chair might be kind of nice. Which is a far different feeling than the technology has inspired in me in the past.
