Blog: Swim, Gym

Blog: Swim, Gym

Swim, Gym

by Dunya Dianne McPherson

Swim

Atlantic Ocean. I learned my first mysticism here. 

I lie back in the cloak of waves beneath the day’s thin white clouds. They tell me, straight into my heart. Salt on my tongue tastes almost like blood and I ponder my bones emptied of red, filling with sea water, softening and bending. Fins. Flippers. With a seal soul I dive down where bottom sand drops away to rocks and seaweed. The dim sea floor pushes and stirs. Slower motion presses me in. I hear very little, but not nothing, unlike being in the rattles and shrieks of air. Water is silk between my fingers, the ocean a perfect robe, unbound, cool, and full of green-gold quiet. 

Gym

Wow! I left the gym and walked buoyantly with ease across the ground, a sensation I used to feel frequently as a young professional modern dancer in NYC. I loved that feeling! Hadn’t had it in a long long long time.

SOOOOO…I was very surprised to feel it today at the age of 68 (almost 69) with bilateral hip replacements. Since surgery, my experience of locomotion has felt a little disappointing—compromised, a bit sluggish, not fully stable—good enough but not great. I could live and work, for which I am so grateful, but that joyful sensation wasn’t there and I had begun to think I’d never feel it again.

I write about it because we often think of physical aging as nothing but managing limits. This might not be true…

I am delighted that you are with me and appreciate your sharing these writings friends. Thank you!

My work and writing are sponsored by Dervish Society of America, a nonprofit organization helping people realize their human and spiritual potential by honoring their body and its movement ways using evolutionary Sufi Dancemeditation practices. Thank you for your gift. It’s tax-deductible! Contribute Now