SPRING in Northwest Arkanasa!

It was a long winter......there were nights where the geo-thermal system needed help to keep up.    There were creaks and whines from the old trucks when they had to go to town, & there were gloomy days with no sunshine at all.   

There were also fires in the fireplace and a teapot.....wool socks and soups shared with neighbors.  Facebook kept us updated and entertained.

Spring comes again, and the change of seasons brings me joy.  I am amazed and grateful to witness the forest slowly waking up, and eagerly await the hummingbirds.   The fishing is all top water.   The angle of the sunrise once again lights my reading chair.

I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else.

Happy spring from NW Arkansas!

The Audition

The Audition/April 2018


Three hopeful yoga teachers showed up to audition for a spot teaching in a local studio.

I was one of them.    I first prepared an hour-long class, then learned three hours prior that each applicant had 15 minutes.  Okay:  slash!  cut!  skinny down!  Reduce that hour to a concise, fast-moving, and well constructed 15 minute class!  Practice it.....practice it again! 


First up were two women who specialize in teaching pranayama and meditation.  They presented an introduction to their program, and then left the studio.

The three prospective hatha/asana teachers set up, and a group of current teachers played the role of students.    We were selected to go first, second and third at random.

The first applicant was as shiny as a new-minted penny!  Although nervous, and laughing at her miscues, she did not let the pressure overwhelm her.  She was so fun and playful, very free-spirited. Once her music came on, she visibly relaxed and brightened.     She's going to be a good teacher once she has some experience.

The second applicant adheres to a strict and fairly rigid set of postures from a specific program most of us have heard of.   Quickly-paced, flowing power vinyasa, followed, and she went a bit over time allowed.   This teacher is obviously confident in her program of choice, and was firmly but knowledgeably hands-on.  Great speaking voice and sequencing.      Would have no trouble at all teaching power yoga.

My 15 minute segment was too similar to the second segment, so I elected to have the last 15 minutes be the deeper stretches and longer holds typical of the last part of an hour-long class.    I chose to abandon my "lesson plan" for what seemed to be an appropriate end to the session, which had both advantages and disadvantages --as I was winging the middle 5 minutes!

It continues to be my experience that the yoga teaching community is supportive and encouraging.  The beauty of the practice is the variety of sizes/shapes/types/personalities/backgrounds and approaches there really are.



Namaste!

A dog.

I was mowing below the deck with a push mower,  push up, pull back, forward and return, back and forth, roar of the motor, the smell of the grass bleeding, looked up.

"DOG"!    "DOG"! screamed my brain ....is it mean?  Is it lost?

I said "go home!" loudly.

Nope.

Dog.  Black, stocky with those light brown eyebrows and that soulful expression of a friendly animal, it turned out to be a "she".  No collar. Well fed.   Follows me...even as I continued to mow, shows no fear of the gasoline powered beast.

Grabs a flimsy stick....and NUDGES me!   Smile.

So I grab a BETTER and STURDIER stick, and throw it.   She fetches.

Then I remember I have a tennis ball handy!  I throw IT...we have a winner!  We play, I throw a dozen times or more, she retrieves the ball every time.  She's fast, accurate and seemingly tireless.

I don't even like dogs, but I'm enjoying this.  She has bad breath.  She slimes the ball, yuck.  I walk to the fountain,  "water"?  I ask?   "You sure are playing hard"!  

Nope.

We play.

Finally I am done with the throwing and return the push mower to the garage
and hop on the riding mower.   She follows.  Looks at me.   I drive up the driveway to mow there before it gets dark.

The tennis ball lays by the garage door.

She's gone.

Dog.

She Lives Above a Chinese Laundry

A story by Cindy Ascanio,  NW Arkansas, August 2017

Her name is Sanya and she is 26 years old.  She lives above a Chinese laundry in a small studio with any one window facing the red brick wall of the building next door.  Very little light comes through. The buildings are so close together and so very tall, it is often hard even to tell day from night.  At night the glow from city lights gives the room a perpetual gloomy look.

The laundry owner is normally at work by 6 a.m. so Sanya never needs an alarm clock (she doesn’t have one anyway).  The washing machines and clothing conveyor rattle are the first sounds that greet her each day.

Today though, there is only silence downstairs.

Sanya wakes from the same familiar, recurring dream and for a moment is disoriented in the silence.  She realizes as she turns to look at her watch on the nightstand, that it’s 9 a.m. and there are no sounds from the laundry.   No machines, no voices, no tinkle of the door chime, nothing.

The silence is a loud roar to Sanya, she imagines she can hear her blood whooshing through her heart and brain.  “What made me sleep so long?” she wonders.  Slowly, as if she has been under the influence of sleeping pills, she gets out of bed and goes to the bathroom, flipping the light switch as she enters, but nothing happens.   Flicking the switch up and down two more times (just to be sure!), Sanya smiles to herself at that, and sits down on the toilet.   “Just a power outage” she reassures herself, “there must have been a storm overnight, or maybe a car hit a pole.”

Those thoughts are followed immediately by the desire for food.  Sanya is not usually hungry upon waking but its three hours later than usual, and Sanya’s stomach growls at the mental image of a big breakfast.  “Dream on” she thinks to herself, remembering that she only has one small muffin left in the white paper sack she brought from the bodega a few days ago.She makes her way to the dim little kitchenette, removes the muffin, and chews slowly and with pleasure.

Later that morning, Sanya starts violently, waking up still sitting in her kitchen chair, muffin crumbs in front of her and in her lap.  “What on earth!” she thinks, “I can’t believe I slept again just sitting down to eat”!  She has no idea what time it is, her watch is in the bedroom area, so she goes to get it, blinking away sleep and a sense of being out of time, out of routine, out of sorts.

The dream she has over and over is not exactly scary, but rather disturbing and sometimes follows her for a few hours afterwards.  She wakes (in her dream), and she is the only human left alive, everyone else is gone.  Like that tribe or civilization that just disappeared she muses,  “what were they called?  the Anastazi?”  “Yes”, she thinks that’s right…..anyway, poof, just gone one day.

Her watch reads 7:00 and she quickly calculates that it must be 7 p.m.   “Wow”, she thinks, “9 a.m. to 7 p.m., what on earth could be wrong with me? Am I sick?”

By 8:00 (a.m.?  p.m?), Sanya decides to go downstairs, is pretty sure she can walk a little bit better now.   She has only been into the Chinese laundry twice, first when she rented her living space, and again about a month later when she had to ask the owner for repairs to her leaking sink.

Her door opens to a hallway, then to stairs that split at a turn, one way leads to street level, and the other to the laundry floor.

Both doors are locked (and sealed tight).  She tries again and again, but they are sturdy and won’t budge, her final, frustrated kick at the street door was weak and only made her foot hurt.  And she was so tired.

Sanya returns to her studio and goes to the window.  She has never opened it, and it will not open now.  She considers breaking it with a chair or end table, but dismisses these thoughts immediately.  The window is thick glass, with wire mesh inside, and has been painted many times. 

“Lock-picking” she thinks, “What do I remember about lock-picking?”  Well, there are tumblers, and if a thin wire or blade is manipulated just so, the lock should open.  “Who are you kidding?” she thinks, “YOU don’t know squat about locks.”

Sitting down, Sanya gets a whiff of herself and decides to take a shower and think things over.  Once undressed (which seemed to take a very long time), she lifts the shower handle, but nothing happens.

“Oh no”, she whispers….”the water is off too?”   That thought brings tears to her eyes, and in despair for the first time, she flops down on the bed to have a good cry over her (now) seemingly desperate circumstances.

Hours (days?) later, she awakens to murky light and a ravenous hunger.  She uses the toilet, it flushes but doesn’t refill, and searches her small space for food.  There are dried beans, some stale crackers, and – yes! peanut butter!

After the meager meal, Sanya sits down in her easy chair and tries to decide what to do next.  But it’s so hard, her brain doesn’t seem to work, she can’t concentrate, or even hold a thought for long…..and in a few minutes, Sanya goes back to sleep.

………………………………………..

The discovery of the blue planet was a lucky one, they were nearly out of fuel and starting to worry when they found it.   Plans to settle on the little world came together quickly.  First was release of the base gas layer, extending around the planet from the surface to a height of about 20 feet.   A mixture of sofamide and marchuload, the gas was deadly to all living things.  It hovered, and settled around every structure, it permeated all matter (it fused locks and turned metal into rigid rock-like stuff that would be ground into raw material later).   Next was the ash (but that’s not what it was called).  It settled too, but down through the air, falling softly like a gentle snow.   This chemical worked more slowly, testing each layer of atmosphere from the surface up and adjusting composition and strength as needed to transform oceans, mountains, skyscrapers, dams, and bridges.

To the human race, and the living creatures on the planet,  it was an attack of devastating and total effectiveness, but to the settlers, it was no different than spraying a nice yard of carefully tended grass to eradicate every insect living in it, ants, chiggers, ticks, spiders, centipedes and the like.

Within two days………..the little blue planet was lifeless…and ready for occupancy.

END

A professional career....1987-2017

ERP Systems  (Enterprise Resource Planning)

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) is business process management software that allows an organization to use a system of integrated applications to manage the business and automate many back office functions related to technology, services and human resources.

In the early years of my banking career, an analyst or accountant would request a report generated on a mainframe computer and it would be delivered the next day.   (In my world, this was Sarah's job....and she ruled it like a queen).   You got what you got.....and were grateful for it.

Now, the power of report-writing is in the hands of the user, open-source databases and built-in functions for designing and delivering the information desired, and how it looks / how it's organized.

Cloud-based information systems, retention and access....data is hosted by third-parties, and is in their hands.

GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles)

Generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) are a common set of principles, standards and procedures that companies must follow for presenting financial statements. It is a combination of authoritative standards and commonly accepted ways of recording and reporting accounting information.

I remember researching GAAP in my step-dad's offices, a full library of printed books in burgandy covers.....hours in the library, and in his conference room.

GAAP was codified and has a revised topic numbering and reference system.  A good portion of it is online, by subscription, and research takes place like common search engines in use, text strings and phrases in the search area usually take you to the appropriate topic.

The Tools

Of course, the Microsoft Suite of products rules my work environment now, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Word, Access.....have all come about since I began using ledger books, small computer systems (Compaq 386!) and lots of pencil to paper.

While my office is certainly not paperless, data is more integrated, uploaded, downloaded, scanned and available on a screen instead of paper.

Physical Presence, Offices

Remote, online and tele-commuting are popular (but unheard of at the start of my professional career).  Working off-site, from home and available 24 hours a day.   The ability to work closely with others from anywhere in the world....use of digital signatures and documents.

another year in Wichita

My hometown of Wichita, Kansas is known as a "good place to raise children", and frequently makes it onto lists of reasonably priced cities to live in............

I've been here nearly 55 years.

One morning in early June, I received a call from my boss at work ...."Cindy, can you come in my office for a moment?"   When I sat down at her table, she was the one who broke the news of my friends murder:   Local paper coverage

Later in the summer, my Uncle Larry was admitted to the hospital, and less than a month later, he died there.       The staff was excellent at Harry Hynes Memorial Hospice

Beth ended 30 years of service "on the street" carrying mail....and transferred to the customer care center - where she plans to finish her career with the United States Postal Service in May 2017.

After more than 16 years working in a beautiful office building, the holding company staff is relocating so that one of the subsidiaries can occupy the entire building.    We are moving to a smaller suite across the parking lot.  

Goodbye to the view of the pond, the swans and the sunset........

..hello cubicle life....

2015 comes to an end........still living and working in Wichita, Kansas.

Giving it Away:


The object of my attention from the third class was a young teacher in training,  willowy, long ponytail, earnest and open.

The next week, I brought a tiny yoga book to give to her.....101 Poses...and I received a spontaneous hug.

In the weeks that followed, I gave away several more books, then moved on to videos.

The regular teacher noticed, and they both may have wondered if I might be dying, or nuts, or both......but then one night I just mentioned that I was moving and that my new house would not hold all of my books.  

I've been blessed.....and now have exactly what I needed:  someone to pass along my yoga books to.  To her, it may seem that I appeared as if by magic, but this was intended all along, just waiting for the right circumstances to present themselves.

so much fun.