How the Equinox actually turned out

One of the things that I love about keeping this blog is that it helps me think about how and what I want to observe in my spiritual practice. So I plan ahead and write posts for holidays that then go up right before or as they are beginning. Then the actual observance occurs – and sometimes things don’t go according to plan. This is what it’s like being a householder, trying to create my own ashram in the midst of being a stay at home parent and partner and possibly make a little money here and there, too.

On Friday I had planned to fast, stay off the internet, spend a goodly chunk of time in meditation and find Balance. The reality was the baby was recovering from a cold and nursed like a fiend from 4am on. I woke up tired and very hungry when the boy wandered in at 7am saying the power was out. So we went out to breakfast, unshowered, and the boy got to preschool an hour late, which meant my entire routine was thrown off. I have discovered the key to parenting small children is routine. I sometimes think I need it more than they do!

I spent the afternoon making rabbit stock (we’d eaten rabbit earlier in the week) and I made a huge batch of tomatillo salsa. I felt very domestic and engaged with the late summer harvest. I know that salsa will be like a burst of sunshine when I pull it out of the freezer in the deep of winter!

I thought, not the day I was planning, but a successful day nonetheless. We’ll start over on Saturday, the day of the real equinox.

That night a transformer on our street blew up at 2am, waking me out of a dead sleep. Then the beeping trucks came to fix it. I woke later that morning groggy, tired, cranky. My period started, the boy came down with the cold, and the baby basically yelled at me all morning long. Balance seemed not to be in the cards for me.

So I did for myself what I sometimes do with my kids: I started the day over, rebooted myself. I put myself down for a nap. After that, I ate some healthy food. I took myself outside and sat in the back yard reading a good book. And the day ended with a nice dinner to celebrate a friend’s birthday.

In the end it was not the equinox observance I’d wanted, but over all it was entirely appropriate!

Looking ahead to October, it’s a busy month for holidays! Navratri, a Hindu celebration of the Goddess, is mid-month, and the Samhain (Halloween) season ends the month, which in my house is a collection of 3-5 different nights. We’ll see how all of these observances turn out….