While most rational people have stowed their patio furniture until next summer, my hammock is still swaying. Some nights (the nighttime is mine) I have bundled up in my ugliest sweater and cocooned myself in a wool blanket and plunked myself right down in it. I close my eyes and focus in on each sense. When I close my eyes and just listen it is possible to pick out the thin metal clanking of the loose letters on the electrical pole, the traffic way out on the interstate, the leaves rustling, the crunch of gravel under a bicycle’s tire, and someone’s yippy dog several blocks over. I can sometimes smell a fire burning in someone’s chimney. I love smelling a grill working somewhere. I can smell my roses. Lately the air is growing cooler and I can feel my nose and fingertips rapidly cooling. The wool blanket is scratchy on my cheek. The rhythmic swing of the hammock lulls me. Some nights, I can see the moon. There are stars. I can see the outline of neighboring houses, my rosebushes, and now I can add purple twinkling lights to the mix. The lights were added to the patio when my folks visited. I’m making my patio my special place.
I am making the patio my special place because I need it. The hammock is the key element. I love my hammock. It is one of my favorite things in the world. It is one of the best gifts ever after a particularly shitty February. On my hammock I sit. I ponder. I meditate. My senses open and I tune into each one. When I am out there, turning into myself, it is the closest to prayer I have felt in years.
I set out for hammock time with purpose. It is good for me. As a result, it is good for everyone around me. Making time for myself is important. Taking the time to sit and tune into myself gives rise to a multitude of benefits. It seemed incredibly hokey in the beginning, but now I look forward to it and find myself protecting that time. I find myself doing many things differently lately. Focusing on my needs has helped immensely with everything. It has helped me reframe my world-- With my kids, my family, my friends, myself.
And every.single.time that I announce to myself that it is “hammock time” I can hear MC Hammer crooning in my head. Come on… can’t you just hear it? I might even dance a little jig on my way out. *can’t touch this*