Kolkata Diary. The Journey Before The Journey

 

My Bailing Twine Chair today.

I sat in my studio, a pile of bailing twine on the floor next to me.  The broken old chair I started wrapping it around a few weeks ago  was in front of me.   I  loosely wove the bailing twine through the strands that were there from the last time I worked on the chair.  I braided the long ends that hung off of the seat.

It was all I could do.

The day before I had another opportunity to practice surrendering.  Now I was embodying it.

After all the confusion with flights, cancellations and rescheduling for my trip to India, I thought I had put my expectations aside.  Trusting it would all work out in ways I couldn’t imagine

But there were still some things I wanted to know.

I received our updated  itinerary which has trips to The Women’s Interlink Foundation, Puresa Humanitarian, Nijuoly House and markets where survivors from the sex trade sell their creations.  We’ll also visit the Red Light District.  This, Dahn told me was the most uncomfortable place for her to see because she could sense the desperation.

We’ll be meeting the girls and women who live and work in all these places and learning about their lives and what the foundations are doing for them.  The afternoons will be ours to spend any way we please.  The last day of the trip we fly to Udiapur, to relax and restore in the countryside and breathe the fresh air.

There are also yoga classes every morning and restorative poses at the end of each day.

I figured I’d be teaching the girls and women to make potholders on those afternoons I have free.  I asked Dahn if she had any sense of this.  I was still trying to have a bit of control, or at least knowing about this part of the trip.  But Dahn told me that she found when she travels to India and Africa, you can’t plan such things.  They happen when they do and when they’re supposed to.

Right, I thought again, let go…let go.

Then something else happened that I didn’t expect.  I’m going to have my own room.

When I first signed up for the trip I was planning on sharing a room  because it was less expensive even though  I would have preferred my own room.  I’m used to spending a lot of time alone.  It’s my alone time in my studio creating,  that helps keep me grounded and sane from day to day.  I’m thinking my writing and drawing (along with the daily yoga)  will help do the same during the trip.

Somehow, when the visit to the Taj Mahal was cancelled, and because  there was a reduction in the price of the overall trip after I paid for it, the group that made the plans, gave  me my own room.

It was so unexpected, yet somehow, after everything else that happened, not surprising.

As Dahn keeps telling me, everything works out as it supposed to.

So  two days ago, I sat in my studio, weaving and braiding bailing twine.  And with each strand I breathed in surrender and letting go.  Instead of worrying how and when I would teach, I imagined me working with  a bunch of girls and women, exchanging ideas, creating together.

In the quiet of my studio as the fibers from the bailing twine filtered through the space, my hands moved automatically, weaving and braiding.  And mind became still.   With each strand, no longer just ideas,  I let surrender, letting go and allowing settle into my body.

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