This year, Kate and I celebrated our anniversary together at a yoga healing retreat in Chelem, Mexico, along with my niece, Juliann. I wasn't sure what to expect when I set up the adventure with Carol, my fascia release therapist, who has a second home there, and that's probably a good thing. It was lovely to be able to let go and take each day as it came.
We started each morning at 7:30 with yoga on the terrace, followed by a leisurely breakfast, then a session of bodywork for each of us. The closest I can come to describing fascia release work is a targeted deep tissue massage. She finds the spots where I'm out of alignment or achy or stuck, and works on the connective tissue there to persuade it it's safe to let go and move again. Usually, when I see her, I just pop in to get my problem hip realigned. To have five treatments in a row, to be able to work on parts of body in sequence, was a treat. She couldn't fix all the things in a week, but she did manage to get my hip and shoulders speaking more kindly to each other and to me - no small gift.
That breakfast I just breezed past deserves a closer look. Carol had hired Connie, who runs a restaurant in Michigan during the summer, to provide our meals. I did expect we'd get good food, but hadn't dreamed of the curated, plated, delicious works of art placed before me three times a day, each day we were there. No having to decide what to eat. No cooking, no cleanup. I felt coddled in a way I haven't since my teens, when Mom got sick and I was designated the new family cook. Delightful.
We spent our afternoons leisurely; reading and catching up on each other's lives. It's been too long since we'd been in one place and I treasured the chance to have deep conversations.
Dinner was followed closely by bedtime. Turns out part of healing is a need to sleep; to give my body a chance to reknit its raveled core. I slept deeply, awakening each morning to the dawn bird chorus. "Wake up! Another day has come!"
We took a day in the middle of the week for a field trip to the Mayan ruins at Uxmal, with a stop at a cenote on the way home.
The ruins were awe-inspiring. I tried to catch a sense of the people who built the structures without benefit of modern heavy equipment, but there were a few too many tourists milling about, so I contented myself with walking about and marveling at the weight of history. Nothing in the US is so ancient.
I'd not heard of cenotes before this trip - they are natural groundwater-filled sinkholes in the limestone. The Mayans considered them to be holy places, and after getting to swim in one, I am in full agreement. We parked in the dusty heat, got out of the car, and walked over to an undistinguished hole in the ground; the only notable feature, a sturdy staircase heading down into the depths. The descent was a bit intimidating, but we didn't let that stop us from gingerly making our way down to the water.
It took me a bit to ease my way in (brrr!!!), but once I got there, it was magical. The sun streamed down through the hole in the roof of the cave, its light turning to a milky green as it penetrated to the bottom of the clear pool of water. Along two edges of the cave roof, nature had created wavy pleats in the rock, framing the picture. In the central portion of the cave, a number of long stalactites reached to touch the water. (I could have reached up to touch a couple of them, but it seemed wrong to disturb their growth.) Such beauty.
The trip was a time away from time, time away from my daily cares and worries. It was a chance to step back and look back along the difficult road I walked last year. A chance to pat myself on the back because I managed to keep taking one more step, and together, those steps have carried me through and beyond the worst parts of treatment (for now. no guarantees) and onto a road where I have begun to heal.
Stop. Breathe. Relax.
Yes.
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