***Yawn***

Ouch, hard to get up this morning. I spent the day yesterday pruning fruit trees, something I've never done before. Poor trees. Actually, they look really happy this morning, released from the weight of all the heavy branches they were carrying.

As I was sawing through boughs over my head, I realized that I was assessing the situation rather like a climbing situation: I had made my commitment, so I had to see it through, and I had to assess how gravity was going to make something fall, gauge its trajectory, and try to keep from getting hurt. Nice to have the falling thing be a bough, instead of my body. Lower stakes. But an interesting brain teaser regarding gravity and the forces generated by falling objects.

Anyhow, I think my day out in nature (i.e., the backyard) may have made me kind of allergic. I was groggy this morning and sniffly. Went over to meet Sanskrit Scholar and The British Director at the fitness center. And yes, I brought the heater.

Nice practice--not as light as yesterday, but oh well. Sanskrit Scholar adjusted me in down dog and did this thing to get me to release my shoulders--um, not that they ever release--but to get me to imagine such a possibility. I have to move my idea of where my strength comes from away from my shoulders and into my legs. Not sure how to accomplish that, but it's a goal.

Skipped handstands and went with lolasana. Maybe less handstand practice will help the backbends? Someone on ezboard made that suggestion a while back.

Sanskrit Scholar then asked me to stand on her thighs during baddha konasana. Alrighty, then. It was kind of scary, needless to say--seemed like the sort of thing that could result in injury with one false move, but it worked out fine. I think it'll be a long time before I ask someone to stand on my thighs in that pose, though.

My lower back seems to be going through some...well, I don't really know what it is. I've been through the sacrum opening stuff, which was scary at first--but this is different--higher up on my back--right around the back of my waist and a little lower. I know I have to extend more through my back, particularly on twists, and I think there is some fear attached to this sort of movement for me. All those years of squats makes me comfortable keeping my back compressed and straight and then there's the valsalva maneuver, which really was (and is) second nature to me, and which my brain accepted as the way to keep my body healthy when lifting a lot. It makes kind of exactly the opposite effect of uddiyana bandha, I think... So letting go of that pressure, that method of stabilizing myself, is rather frightening. But exciting, too. Like all physical pursuits.

Oops, the pool guy is here to teach me and The Cop how to maintain the pool...