If I Can Do This I Can Do Anything...
Three and a half hours after we had climbed down the steps into the sea and headed off along the wall - because there was no beach to be seen until further along - the wanderers returned!
'Do you fancy a swim in the pool' Anadi said...
We showered off the sand from our feet and the sweat from our bodies and clambered into the gorgeous pool..
'We can practice our handstands again' I said....
We are much improved!
We concluded our practice session having completely disturbed a young woman's 'tranquil float and gaze out to sea' pool experience. She did at one point, when I apologised to her for our sploshing handstands and the laughter that accompanied them, say 'I might join in'!
'We just have to do it on dry land now' Anadi said...
I loved the feeling of stretching my legs up and balancing on my hands again, with the water supporting me... for now.
I did a handspring too!
I can remember my Dad, who was a very good athlete, doing a handspring in our garden when he was sixty years old; my sister Rosy and I were unfazed as he was a physical man. He did a routine of exercises each day, press ups, pull ups on the bit of wood along the stairwell, squats, sits ups...
It was quite usual for him to suddenly leap into a Russian side kick when we were out for a family walk... So a handspring was sort of normal to us...!
And I remain inspired, if my Dad could do it....
I also now have fresh inspiration from my nephew Jamie who is a extremely accomplished acrobatic gymnast, and his sister Jess who can beat me hands down at running, and has awesome leaping ability as an excellent netball player!
So after the hand stand practice I did a few underwater handsprings too, I could feel the stretch it asked of my back and I was glad of the sessions I am having with my massage lady... But it felt so good; it gave me the feeling of... 'If I can do this, I can do anything...'
Today Anadi and I had a plan to a 'Sunday long run' type of outing... The idea was that we would wake up and have an earlyish breakfast and head out...
At 9.30am Anadi was just waking up!
Our breakfast became very leisurely, and long. We sat about and talked and Anadi wrote another article for 'Running Conscious'... I answered some emails; we went way beyond breakfast into banana smoothie time...
At 2pm we finally headed out on our mission to journey the whole way round on the beach for as far as we could see to the jagged rocks at the end of the bay...
The tide was right in and the sand was very soft and difficult to move in, and at times we had to wade through the sea...!
We passed the harbour where we had come in on the boat from Koh Phangan four days ago... 'Wow... The harbour! We're back at the Harbour...' It felt somehow exciting, intrepid, voyagers on foot!
We reached the rocks and Anadi went on a reccy to see if we could carry on round to the other side.
I have to confess to an inner sigh of relief when he announced from his 'look-out post', high up, that there was no path beyond the rocks...!
I had clambered part way, but wherever I reach anything resembling height with 'perceived' danger by my primal self, a vertigo survival feeling in my base chakra kicks in...
Today it was interesting to explore it, go into a bit. In past experiences I have been terrified and all my energy has been used up in managing my fear and taking the next step...! For instance when in a mountain race finding the course took me onto on a narrow path, on the edge of a Glacier, 3000 metres up with a sheer drop to my right...
But I was perched perfectly safely up on a ledge. Even though I was safe, the feeling in the pit of my stomach - the feeling I recognise as the vertigo feeling - was still there...
This was exacerbated by a group of boys leaping across the rocks and then, like mountain goats, nimbly making their way up to where Anadi had been.
But because I absolutely knew I was safe on my ledge, there was no actual danger or possibility of falling to my demise...! I was able to really feel the feeling and clear the irrational fear from within my body...
I do not know from whence my vertigo has sprung... It has always been this way, I have no memory of anything 'happening' in this life; and so I imagine I brought it in with me from lives before...
We looked across from our jagged rocks at the curve of the bay, and could see all the way round to where we had set out from, way away in the distance...
And so we clambered back down the rocks and made our way home...
