I finally believe it is spring because we have planted the
vegetables and put the down comforters away, replacing them with light summer
quilts. For my friends with teenagers,
though, spring has those meanings, but there is also something darker and more
troubling going on. And I’m not talking
about zombies. It was Tennyson who wrote
the famous line, “In the Spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of
love” and proms are now held at this time to honor this fancy. But it’s not just young men, but young women
who also turn to thoughts of love, or at least a cool dress.
As I watch a beautiful young neighbor bask in
the attention of her first boyfriend and hear her parents simultaneously fret
and enjoy her happiness, I think back to being 16 and my first love. It felt amazing to make out,
coming home with bruised lips and the occasional hickey, and the longing to
touch and be touched, definitely over the clothes because things were just too
messy and unknown underneath. There was
the knowledge that you liked someone, and there was physical evidence that he
liked you back. It felt powerful that
first time, not in a bad way, but in a wow, I had no idea my body could feel so
alive and sensitive.
There was also the emotional part, where every waking
moment was spent thinking about the other person with sheer happiness and
lightness of being.
Except.
While the story of my first love did not have a happy
ending (he was a good kisser but a thief and liar), it does not have to be that
way for my neighbor. I would simply
suggest that she ignore yogis and runners, who often advise a person to listen
to the body over the mind.
Runners and yogis carefully inventory their bodies for
twinges and shadows of previous injuries.
This is where they try to circumvent the pesky ego who often rules the
mind and seems to divide messages between “That soreness you feel is
imaginary. Don’t be a fool. Run fast/do 40 sun salutations and ignore it”
and “You’re a fool. Everybody in this
race/class is faster/stronger/more fit/smarter than you. You’ll probably come in last/be the only one
who can’t get into handstand.”
So, messages from the mind are questioned through the lens
of the body. Research shows that
runners’ minds tell them to slow down before they physically need to in a tough
race. And yogic research indicates that
if practitioners are patient and soft with their hamstrings, for example, they
may actually loosen over the course of a class.
It’s almost like the body needs to trick the mind, but we have been
trained to ignore the body’s messages since the ego behaves like that obnoxious
bare-chested guy in the stands with a huge sign who is yelling “Look at
me! Look at me!” In contrast, the body is the woman in the
hoodie reading a book in the corner, not hiding exactly, but not asking for
attention.
Unless of course the body is attached to a teenager, in
which case, I would suggest listening to the mind instead. The body is saying
things in a Yoda-like way, such as “Take off your bra let him” while the mind
is still behaving in a logical order, such as “Mom is going to freakin’ kill me
and Dad is going to kill him. And I LOVE
him.”
Those heady feelings and physical sensations are something,
all right. I feel like a little of that
magic has spread across the grass from my neighbor and is lighting up the trees
and flowers. We can be as cynical as we want about young love, but I say, let
them enjoy it. Let them bask in it, and
let’s bask in it as well. It can be this
fun, innocent time, and maybe just for once I don’t have to be critical and
think about gender, race, and class and can just enjoy the experience through a
picket fence viewfinder.
