expansion

this morning in yoga our instructor, jen, spoke about one of our tasks, that of expansion. some of our poses require contraction, and as yoga is ever about the flow of yin and yang and the universal desire for equilibrium, when one contracts, one must compensate by expanding.
she asked us to keep expansion in mind throughout our practice today, and I thought it was an excellent idea to keep in mind throughout my life.
like taking the bushel basket off of our little lights to let them shine, like mandela told us to not settle for less than the life we're capable of living, like daring to be who we are meant to be, we must all have the courage to take deep breaths and expand ourselves.
throw our shoulders back, take deep breaths, puff out our chests and dare to be everything we are.
ah.

circumstances this week caused me to tweak my riding schedule a bit: I had a choice of either riding this evening, or getting up at 4:45 to squish a ride in tomorrow morning. you know how I love my morning rides, but I must admit I wasn't eager to get up that early. and if I rode this evening, well, then I could sleep in a bit tomorrow, something I rarely get to do . . .
late this morning a storm whipped through the city, tearing branches from my ancient trees, sending sheets of rain horizontally into my west-facing windows, shoving wind into my house that slammed doors and rattled papers and magazines. it rained until rivers gushed down gutters and my flower beds turned a rich black with the moisture. by early afternoon the storm moved on, the clouds pulled back, and the temperature began to climb back from the under-sixty-degree-hole it had fallen into.
it started to look like it would be a great evening to ride.
I climbed on my bike at seven, knowing that the light of day began to quickly creep away by about eight-thirty, and I headed up my favorite canyon. seventy-something degrees, blue skies with the waxing half moon bright in the east, dry pavement, and the smell of wet earth everywhere: this was glorious.
up the canyon, down to the reservoir, back up and down the canyon . . . with a tailwind to push me out. by the time I reached the bottom the sun had set beyond the lake, sending hot pink low in the western sky, the moon glowed even more brightly, and the far mountains hung their silhouettes around the rim of the city.
it was an absolutely perfect ride, glorious, wonderful, exquisite.
you know I love my morning rides . . . but gee, this was a pretty amazing evening ride . . .
perhaps I'm expanding.