Life sure is funny in how it progresses. I moved to Iceland seven years ago this December. I brought my dog to live with me almost two years later. It was an expensive endeavor (and month in quarantine for him). Since then we moved times, the last time was it as I bought myself and apartment (in the US called a condo). We moved here a little over two years ago and have already redone the bathroom and the kitchen. This coming spring the windows will be redone, as they are most likely over 50 years old. That is a lot in the first two years of owning a home.
Two years ago I became a tenured faculty member at the University here, some days I think yes this is great, then at other times, all I want to do is sleep. Last fall (2018) I was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis. At first I was on low grade steroids and an analgesic, but that wasn't enough to relieve all the pain, and then this summer I was told my D and B-12, so now I am on stronger medications and a bunch of vitamins, as well as off the steroids. I am not nearly as swollen as I was. As part of this new journey and learning how to live in this new body, I have been doing things differently.
I started taking a private yoga class where the teacher is designing a special routine for me as I can no longer do the practices I have had for the last 30 years. What I am doing is very simple, but it takes a lot of work to focus on all the movements, and the breathing, it is actually mostly the breathing that is hard. I am so competitive with myself, need to be better need to take longer inhales and exhales, but last week she told me to stop it and just breath for four in and six out and keep the focus on making in like waves and smooth and flowing with no space or pause between the inhale or exhale. So I made myself an agreement that I would do my very short routine everyday that I am off of work (which is two weeks). I only missed one day so far.
Since the routine is only about 10 minutes long it is hard to find a reason to skip it. What was hard for me about keeping to it as an everyday thing at the same time. I realized that I was thinking of it incorrectly not setting it at a specific time like 10 am, but rather as the first thing I do when I wake up, so no matter what time it is that I wake up, 6 am or 11 am. That has made it much easier to do it without feeling shitty about it. After the new year I plan to get back to swimming, as that seems to have made a huge difference for me.
Another thing that I have been doing has been trying to journal in the mornings after I do the yoga routine. It is a three page free write activity. I don´t try to write about anything specific, it is really an act of clearing my mind to work on other things. Mostly it is very boring, what I write, but I always feel better when I am done with it. I am hoping it will help me with both my poetry and with my academic writing. I feel like I need a change and moving into 2020 I see no reason why not to start now.
In general life is fairly easy, I can do pretty much what I want. I set my own schedule for work. Some days I work until late, some days I don't work much, especially when I have flair ups. I am working on my own projects, well kind of, I am telling people what to do on my own projects. I have gotten a huge (by Icelandic standards) grant for a three year project. I have a few smaller projects and have people working on them as well, so in reality I have a few employees. I rather miss doing fieldwork, but I will get back there.
In the past seven years I have done a bunch of travelling, mostly for work, Istanbul, London, Dublin, Oslo, Hamburg, Lund, Copenhagen, Toronto and Mexico City, oh and Porto, Ayr, Glasgow, Edinburgh and Rome. We took a two week vacation in Madeira at the beginning of 2019, so I have seen a few places. I would really like to go to SA and my aim is to go to Reunion in 2021 for my sabbatical, then I can travel to Africa, from there. But I have to be careful, with the illness I become very tired, so in the coming year I will only travel to Scotland and Calgary, (well I might stop in MN or CO).
I would love to promise to write more about myself, my work and my illness with more regularity, but I can make none such, my history with that kind of keeping up with myself is not good. If I had full command of my schedule, then maybe but that wont happen for another twenty years when I retire. Lol.
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