SYNCHRONIZED ORDINARY CELEBRATIONS

Today, my ordinary celebration is to recognize that my life has taken on a new meaning and Marie has played a role in cresting the wave upon which I am now perched.  The main photo... You BET:

Adding Marie's blog image was an inspiration that came after I began reading all of the Ordinary Celebrations that are spreading around the blogosphere like absolute wildfire.  Let's start at the beginning and I will make the "intro" quick.... Here WAS today's ordinary celebration.  

   

My yoga mat which became a part of my life as 2010 began to wind to a close.  It was a shitty-ish year.  Or not.  I suppose it's all about perspective.  Practicing yoga was the only form of exercise allowed by my surgeon after a somewhat extensive surgery and it was with the caveat: "NO engaging the abdominal muscles."  As a result, I began one on one yoga instruction.  The stretches were tailored to my specific needs.  And it has evolved.  Yoga is now a part of me.  It's what keeps my life in balance.  It's what makes me stop before I launch myself from zero to raging.  It's what energizes me to keep doing what I know I WANT to do.  Yoga helped me eliminate the static from my life.  The background noise is gone and in that space of silence, I can truly listen to the messages my brain is trying to transmit to my heart and soul.  Too zen?

Ok... then, let's move on..... the laptop and the iPad (which is a very handy device when I'm on the run) have become the best tools I own to assist me in listening to those messages.  Something so public, like blogging, is the result of something so private, like yoga and meditation.  That is the essence of yoga.  Balancing the opposites.  I'm sticking with zen.  It's gotten me pretty far on my own Journey Beyond Breast Cancer.

The laptop is a lifeline to a global community.  Yes.  Global.  There are people I consider to be integral in my life.  They are as far away as South Africa and New Zealand and they are in my own backyard.  And, everywhere in between, too.  I am part of a community that is proving we are stronger together than the sum of our parts.  (And yes, I WILL have to think about that, analyze the words, figure out if they even make sense because that's got a number theme and numbers are my own personal chemobrain hell..... in a former life... I was The It Girl when it came to numbers.... )

Yesterday, for example, the laptop enabled me to monitor events in Montreal where the Cancer Congress is being held.  As I was putting this blog together, I got to be part of a "Storify" put together by the American Cancer Society News tweeps. Another unexpected "add on" in this blogpost. Look:  

Proof positive.  We are connected.  And, we are in sync.  And this is how we can begin to effect real, meaningful change.  

This is what prompted the rewriting of this post.  Synchronicity.  Yesterday, I was catching up on everyone's Ordinary Celebrations and I began to see something that made me smile.  We are in tune with one another.  Forgive me if I didn't leave a comment or if I fail to include a mention here but chemobrain absolutely has its own set of unique challenges.  Feel FREE to include any links in the comments.  I need all the help I can get and YES, that is was this blog is all about.  An interactive exchange of thoughts, feelings and support.  Link away....

Here's what began to make me smile.  We seemed to be doing things in pairs, sometimes rippling into groups.  UNplanned. It started when I read Lori's blog.  She was celebrating bees.  Lori and I were roomies at the NBCC summit.  Many of you already know that.  Lori and I were often referred to as "The Newlyweds."  For the record, Lori and I each have husbands..... but... yes, we connected instantly and deeply.  Yesterday as Lori wrote about bees, take note of the last picture in my ordinary celebration.  Renn had flowers with a little critter smiling back at her.  Read the comments and you will see that Renn's post for the next day... and she had not seen my comment.... Well.... you tell me this isn't everyone sync'ing up.

As I began poking around, this theme of synchronicity was buzzing (yes, pun).  Beth and Jamie were talking kittens.  Then, I see Nancy and Brenda talking about food and I'm getting ready to run to a specialty store to get all sorts of goodies. When Katie and Jan were sharing their experiences of leaving for new homes, I think I got all teary.  Even Yvonne talked about houses, albeit houses of a different kind!  There was a tree theme going on and I will send you directly to Marie's blog to see how Nancy, Phillipa and Martine  were all about those trees!

Mostly, today's celebration is about MARIE.  She has been such an instrumental part of bringing so many of us together and today, I welcome Lisa.....  who has decided to "march" along with all of us.  With the weekly round up and now, with this photographing of the ordinary, she continues to bring us together.

The yoga and web2.0 do fit into this paradigm.  Without either of those things, this entire blog would be little more than a figment of someone's imagination... likely not even mine......

To get back to the original photo, MY original photo, there are two items that require a closer inspection.  This is the Where's Waldo section of today's post.

This little citrine colored glass sculpture sitting in the midst of the mat was a gift.  A yoga pose.  Very introspective.

AND That little slip of paper taped to the cover of my laptop?  The fortune cookie tells the whole story......