paper sun salutation

Yoga is like English psychedelia. That's what I'm thinking about on this solemn Sunday night, the last day of a two-week vacation that has evaporated into the ether before I was ever able to fully settle into relaxation mode. Last night I assumed a few poses after overworking my body with three hours at the gym followed by two hours on the tennis court. I will have to figure out a way to dial down the physical stress I put on myself. I'm really starting to feel my body change as I advance into my 40s (where 'change' = slow deterioration). But that's not my point here. After a long day of running and lifting and quick starting and stopping, I needed to open my stiff right hip last night, so I assumed the pigeon pose, which I've talked about before. I was discussing my body issues recently with my shrink when she asked me to describe the way I feel when I get into pigeon pose. I thought about the question for a long time before answering. The sensation is not one I can easily describe. I told her that the pose makes me feel like I'm enveloped in a protective cocoon, like a child safe in the knowledge that its mother won't let anything bad or frightening happen. The cocoon was really working for me last night, but as I got more deeply into the stretch I reached a certain threshold or critical mass, a point at which pleasure/ecstasy intersects with pain/fear, where you don't know whether to laugh or cry, where you want to do both simultaneously. This is what made me think of Traffic, Pink Floyd, Pretty Things, The Beatles, The Move...

60s Psychedelic music, particularly that of the English variety, exists on the exact same fear/security, pleasure/pain threshold, creating a heady vibe by adopting childlike points of view from which all perception is larger than life, and the line separating darkness from light is fluid and amorphous. It's this vantage point that makes the music sound at once innocent and creepy. The clown at the circus might have an ice cream cone for you, or he could just as easily morph into a scary lizard that swallows you whole. Ice cream, pain...pain, ice cream. This will be my mantra from now on as I explore the possibilities of yoga. ...Yoga practitioners - I believe they're called 'yogis' - will tell you to listen to what your body is telling you. Don't aggravate discomfort, but don't ignore it, either. Try to understand it, where it comes from, and why you experience it. I have some vague notions as to where my pain comes from, but they're not really well formed ideas at this point. All I know is that right now my body is telling me to set the controls for the heart of the sun...