Monday nights are busy. I have several long-standing commitments that absorb the evening. Nevertheless, yesterday I made time to drive to a small park in Burbank and bid farewell to my T'ai Chi teacher.
I've known Marjorie for almost ten years. First intermittently, then steadily I attended her classes in T'ai Chi and yoga. Marjorie taught in parks from the San Gabriel Valley to Northridge. She flew from one gig to another. The rear compartment of her little blue Toyota SUV was crammed with registers and sign-up sheets, flyers for martial arts events, T'ai Chi swords and knives plus a CD player that gave every class a New Age underscore: Inca flutes, harps or Tibetean bowls with a crashing surf background.
For awhile, I was underemployed and immersed myself in T'ai Chi and yoga. On Thursdays in 2001 and 2002, I took Marjorie's morning yoga class at Victory Park in Pasadena. Afterwards, I'd student teach her T'ai Chi beginners, then attend the advanced class that followed. As a reward for helping out, Marjorie would show me next-level moves and correct my form. By the time I left around noon, I was floating on endorphins. Calm. Almost too calm. I never got much of anything done on Thursdays.
Chakras, auras, and past lives were a part of Marjorie's beliefs. She would laugh and call it "wo-wo" stuff. And if you were so inclinded, Majorie would teach "wo-wo" (as well as yoga) out of her rented home. Four years ago Marjorie and her beau bought a small house in Pasadena. Wind chimes and Buddhist prayer flags decorated the front porch while incense flotated through the house like spirits. A student painted a cloudy, blue sky on her ceiling so that while doing yoga, you could look up and see something other than ceiling. That house is in escrow, the cloudy ceiling painted over. And by the end of the month, Marjorie and her beau will be in Texas. After 31 years in Southern California, Marjorie will teach T'ai Chi and yoga as well as quality "wo-wo" to the residents of Austin.
I didn't ask why she was leaving. I guess that's because I always sensed she would. Marjorie says we each have our destinies. Mine now lies in marathons and hers in Austin. But for a time, we walked the same path.
A teacher is someone who shows you a door that only you can open. And for showing me the T'ai Chi door, I want to thank Marjorie and wish her a safe journey, a rewarding life, and, in time, a destiny fulfilled.
3 comments:
lovely post, john.
BTW, I've been eating a brand of oatmeal from Trader Joe's that's branded with your name. Are you in the oatmeal business, too? =)
Thank you, Raul.
I indeed wish that my family had gone into the lucrative oatmeal trade instead of civil service.
I see you remodeled recently. Very nice.
That was beautiful.
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