Happy Summer almost…I love this time of year and the way your body feels in the cool early mornings that are bordering on a scorching sun…you just feel like moving and being outside, being active, showing your skin and being joyful like a child. I think, like everyone, I attribute summer with playfulness. I think that is what we need to try to find this summer; our inner playfulness. As the season gets into full swing how can we all have a better time being ourselves? By connecting to what we eat, to how we move and how we find ritual in our lives. All of us need to remember to slow down a bit and set the stage for mischief and fun, like when we were kids. We used to fall into bed after we exhausted our bodies after a playful day, it feels like we need to find that part of ourselves again. Now I realize that most of us are working or parenting or doing something responsible and adult during the day and that the flighty ways of a kid on his or her bike is not what our lives are orchestrated for (even if it is summer time), but who says we can’t take a little time to have fun.
For me I know that I am going to get up extra early now that the sun is hot and hike with my dogs while it is still a bit cool and then after that I’ll spend a few hours working at my home office then ride my bike to the local farmers’ market or run an errand in my neighborhood by foot. I’ll work some more, then I am going to take time to set a place mat wherever I am, be it my home office or film set, and eat my lunch slowly. I am going to dine outside as much as possible this summer because there is nothing that says summer more than being out of doors. I have been recently taking a packed lunch in a reusable box with reusable containers to a park close to my house and I sit at a picnic table often by myself with my little lunch set out for me while I listen to birds or watch people pass by on their way to and from work, or dog walkers and consequent runners dodging poop on their noon day runs.
I smile as I watch them focused in their private worlds and I savor what I am eating… I have an avocado sandwich, so simple, made on a no-grain bread by a company called Julian’s and my handful of raw nuts and seeds that I sprinkle with cinnamon and a little stevia by Sweet Leaf…and a sliced up cucumber as it is so great for hot weather and dehydration. I drink a bottle of water out of a metal container, (I don’t drink out of plastic anymore or at least as little as possible) and the simplicity of it is just right. This sounds like it takes a lot of time but I assure you that it doesn’t. It takes 45 minutes max and I can do it in 30 minutes too. I recommend that you don’t eat lunch in less than 30 minutes because it’s simply not good for you. This kind of time is so simple and it’s for me. It gives me a sense of peace and harmony that my life is not really designed to have but I MAKE IT HAPPEN anyway. I go against the grain and make sure that I come first in my life just by doing something that makes me smile like a solo picnic or an evening stroll during these super long light filled days. I don’t need entertainment or music I just need me, a great little meal whether a sandwich or a plain avocado and an apple just something that says I care about what goes in and I care that it is ingested in a setting that is nurturing to me. That is what makes my summer fun, like when I was a kid…I don’t have all day to play, but it’s the moments I take for myself to jaunt around the block or to go outside and sit up against a tree trunk and look up at the blue sky, creating pictures in the cloud formations that makes me happy. I always make a point of smelling the flowers in my neighborhood or if no flowers I’ll take a leaf of a tree and roll it around in my hand till I can smell something spicy and unique about it. I love nature and although I can’t be in Idaho where I grew up and must bear the city, I find where the city serves my need for nature and I meet myself there. I know how to make the simplest things a joy for me to do and to see it through the light of when I was a kid and there is nothing more rewarding than that.
See what you can do this summer to take a moment to yourself and enjoy the world of nature around you.
July 12th, 2008 at 10:56 am
ihave two children