Kate Milberry

I was preparing my kids’ lunches today when I had a profound realization: what happens to us in childhood stays with us. Elementary, my dear Kate, you might utter with justified condescension. Of course. But I’m not talking about big things – like absentee parents, divorce battles or finding a dead body (like in Stand By Me. Man, I miss River Phoenix). I’m talking about the little things that are seared – if not into your conscious memory – into your sensory memory – that collection of experiences that is stored in your body, only realized in physical release.

Let me clarify. So I was making lunches for my kids – you know, turkey on brown (oh the indulgence, the irony of using deli turkey as a carcus of the same bird sits in my fridge reminding me of yesterday’s gluttony). It was as I was cutting the sandwiches (diagonally) that it came to me: I do it this way (triangles NOT squares) very purposelfully, and only because this is how I wanted MY sandwiches cut as a youngster. It was a minor tragedy to endure squared sandwich pieces. I felt resentment toward my dad – for his practicality, his lack of creativity, and what I was certain at the time was his mean spiritedness. Now, my dad’s a decent guy – an author, mentor to some, and overall good citizen (shovels his walk on snowy days, tips the Canpar guy at Christmas, and says things like “howdy” and “good man”). But to my young mind, he approached Scrooge on this matter.

Well. I reflected on this as I finished preparing the lunches; there are other things – tiny little things – that I do as a definite reaction to my childhood, and it’s perceived shortcomings. Mostly this has been brought into relief as I raise my own children. It’s a bit like reliving my childhood and, in a way, it’s like a second chance. I get to broaden and deepen my experience of childhood, after the fact, from the perspective of an adult. It’s fun. But in other ways, it’s a conscious response to aspects of my childhood that I wouldn’t want to recreate for my own kids. Trivial? Yes, on some level – and it’s prudent to be mindful of context. But some of the silliest things (to adults) carry the most weighty significance to children. In righting the injustices of my childhood, I hope I can also stay attuned to my kids, and respect their harmless (yet potentially profound) little likes and dislikes.

On another note, I’m finally making some progress on my comps. I dumped one committee member, and signed up another. Rick Gruneau is an old Marxist, but erudite and pretty fucking savvy. He knows what’s the what and doesn’t mind telling you. He swears a lot, which of course I like, and has more than a healthy disrespect for authority. He comes from an interesting place, which includes, but is not limited, to being his daughters’ soccer coach. I like that. I gave up a long time ago on the dream of having a woman on my committee. In some ways it was tokenistic, but in other ways, still important. But I’ll settle for three out of three being parents, and two of those with kids young enough that they’re still involved.

Rick and I talked for over an hour in our first meeting, and his endless stream of information (about socialism, modernity, enlightenment, social change. But wait, there’s more!) was literally music to my ears. By the end of our meeting, we had my list sorted out; by the end of the day, I emailed him my revised version. I feel like I can finally begin this process in earnest.

I went to yoga the other night, for the first time in almost three years. Back then, I was a recent Ontario transplant (I’d been living in Kits, my “starter” hood, for a few months) and yoga was as foreign to me as moonwalking. I remember my mum doing yoga in the 70s when I was a kid, and my dad not liking it, thinking it was some sort of cult. Now my mother wasn’t by any means a hippie, or part of the countercultural revolution, but she did wear a poncho, and took up yoga for a bit there.

Aside from Kerry Anne, before she did a Yoga for Geeks class, I was probably the only woman on the west coast who hadn’t at least tried yoga. But I was pregnant and unemployed, and thought prenatal yoga would be a good thing. And it was, but I never went back. Who has the time, what with an infant and a two-year-old, and then later full time grad studies plus part time teaching assistant job?

Now, I’m more in the west coast groove – I drink fair trade organic coffee (but not Starbucks), and I sometimes visit nature. (I still don’t own a raincoat and I refuse to succomb to the seemingly dominant MEC fashion trend – I consider these to be endearing quirks. You know what they say – you can take the girl out of Southwestern Ontario…) And, more importantly, I have the time! My kids go to sleep fairly easily, and stay asleep. Combine this with a yoga studio, Unity Yoga Tea House, opening up at the top of my street, and I can nip out for an 8pm class without much fuss.

OK, so, the logistics of possibility aside, why yoga, why now, you might ask? It’s that balance thing I’ve been carping about. I work out on a regular basis and am fairly fit. This keeps my body healthy, and able to fight the illnesses that typically come with stress. I rarely get sick. But it’s a fast paced, high energy, unreflexive process; the physical stress dissipates but the mental/emotional stress remains. Sometimes I feel like it’s too much, that something has to give. But I’m stubborn, and will get this damn PhD if it kills me.

That said, I don’t want to be an absent (or crazy) mother, be a crappy teacher, or produce sub par work. It’s been obvious for a while I need some (more) tools to deal. I’ve been thinking one yoga class a week will allow me a peaceful, quiet time to focus, to contemplate my physical self. I think practicing yoga will help me achieve emotional and mental balance through close attention to my body, identifying where I’m holding tension and releasing it through stretching and strength training.

Unity Yoga is lovely – warm, calm and welcoming. I sat on one of the mats, which were arranged in a star shape, painfully aware of my lack of Lululemon attire. One of the women already seated chatted me up as we waited for the instructor. She asked me where I “practiced”. I had to laugh; if you knew me, you’d understand. I admitted I didn’t practice at all, that I was just here to try it out. The class was led by Sue, one of the owners. It was Vinyasa yoga, which meant nothing to me at the time. All I knew was that it was hard – lots of deep stretches and balancing and legs in the air. But it was great; afterward, I felt uplifted, calm, at peace with my body. I think this will be a good thing. I’m going to buy a membership.