Lost & Found

A short list of personal sanctuaries throughout my lifetime:
Pacifier. Cuddly yellow blanket. Big Bird. Little yellow pillow. My mom’s arms. The Wizard of Oz. Cabbage Patch big wheel. The Beatles. The Bible. Purple. Darkness. Prayer. Karate. Yoga. Writing. Meditation.

I can’t say that I actually recall the comfort of my less-than-a-year-old self sucking on a pacifier or the comfort of being wrapped in the soft, yellow blanket my mother still has somewhere. However, I can look at photos: me happily cuddled up with blanket, Big Bird and pacifier, and somehow--through whatever brain power we possess that allows time travel--I can go back to that moment. I feel the safety and refuge of those sweet things even when I have no solid recollection.

Sanctuaries are powerful like that. They can rule us, they can tear us apart. They can disillusion us, trick us, deceive us, encourage us, unite us and we may never be aware of it. It can be something as simple as ice cream, as destructive as an abusive relationship or as miraculous as unwavering faith.

About two and a half years ago while crossing the street in Chicago, I was hit.

Sanctuaries can serve us, destroy us and at times, do both simultaneously.

During my four years in Chicago, I weathered all the seasons of nature and the various seasons of heartbreak and depression. Living the life of a single girl in a big, cold city forces you to seek refuge. The winters are violent and desolate. Nights can be lonely and infinite. I survived by relying on myself for everything, even comfort.

More than ever, yoga had become my favorite sanctuary. A mental oasis and a physical challenge. It helped me battle depression, kept my arms tight and my thoughts managed. For years, it was a solid structure in my life when things and people and places were ever-fluctuating.

I heard the Dali Lama say once that any adversity we experience in our lives is meant to somehow mold us into a better version of ourselves and that is precisely what yoga does. You go through the discomfort of a pose over and over only to one day arrive at a beautiful peace you never knew existed and never expected. That peace is where my refuge lived and yoga was the only way I knew to access it.

About two and a half years ago while crossing the street in Chicago, I was hit. The road was clear of cars and so I stepped out onto the street. I was immediately knocked to the pavement. I twisted hard to the right. My right elbow hit the ground first, then my head, and then came the rest of me, along with the weight of another girl, a bike and the velocity of twenty miles per hour. I was unconscious for a moment. The next thing I remember: the girl pulling me up off the ground, my head spinning, my right arm on fire with pain. My purse strap had wrapped around my neck three times, I felt suffocated. The wind was knocked out of me and I struggled to breathe. I had no idea where I was or what to do. I sat down on the curb to undizzy myself and catch my breath. The girl asked me if I was okay and upon hearing an “I think so” from me, took off on her bike as if nothing had happened.

I sat on the curbside stunned, confused and alone. People strolled by and drove by. One woman shouted out of her car an offer of help but I shook my head “no.” I willed myself to stand up and find my balance. I was only two blocks from my apartment. I took a deep breath and put one foot in front of the other until I arrived at my front door.

Once inside, I melted. I’d been too taken aback to cry or assess what happened, but standing in the quiet of my apartment I suddenly felt traumatized. I looked in the mirror and saw that I already had a black eye, a large bump on my head and my arm was bleeding and turning blue.

What do I do? I thought. I was alone in Chicago. Family in Alabama. My good friend and roommate wasn’t home. No car to drive to the hospital, in no shape to be jostled around on a bus or the El, not serious enough to call an ambulance and I couldn’t reach the one person I needed most; my mom. I needed her arms again. I needed her guidance. I needed that soft, yellow blanket.

By amazing coincidence, a friend of mine was in town from Louisville. When I called her and told her what happened, she and her husband dropped everything to pick me up and take me to the hospital.

When I got the news that my right elbow was fractured and that I was sling-bound and yoga-prohibited for eight to twelve weeks, my heart sank. Yoga had become part of my identity, I needed it to feel right. Going without for even a week, jolted me back into depression and sluggishness. How was I supposed to go four months without it? Especially at one of the most confusing eras of my life, when I needed comfort the most?

The answer was simple. I wouldn’t go without. I’d find a way to do it anyway.

I let out a sonorous roar and curled up into a ball on the floor... Addicted to my sanctuary, nothing could convince me that yoga was bad for me. So despite doctor’s warnings and even my own inner voice telling me it was a terrible idea, I attempted to keep up my yoga.    Part of it was cockiness, an overestimation of my strength. Part of it was anger at what had happened and part of it was a blind desire for much-needed comfort.

I decided to start a practice at home. One of the most basic sequences is called a Sun Salute. You start in a standing position, move into a forward bend, then a plank, then cobra, then downward dog, then back to forward bend and then standing. The sequence is repeated several times as a warm up or to move into other poses.

Eager, I took off my sling and go into it. One one-armed Sun Salute was a success. But on the second go around, my strength gave out and I lost my balance. I started to fall. My face was headed toward the cold, hard floor and so, instinctively, I caught myself on my right, broken arm. My arm stretched out in slow motion, my hand connected with the floor and half my body weight was forced into my fractured elbow.   My face hit the hardwood. I let out a sonorous roar and curled up into a ball on the floor, hurting not just from the pain in my arm but from the pain of being even further away from my sanctuary and realizing the truth of my predicament.

I’d love to say that I replaced the sanctuary of yoga with something just as physically and mentally healthy for me, but that would be a lie. I could have pursued the other wonderful challenges of yoga such as meditation and breathing. I could have taken that time to read all of the books I’d been meaning to read, or taken on several other productive, enlightening hobbies. I chose, instead, to watch five seasons of Lost (roughly 100 episodes) back to back.   I sat on the couch and watched episode after episode of an hour-long drama on DVD.

And I loved it!

Night after night, I cooked elaborate meals, drank red wine and stayed up sometimes until three in the morning, dying to find out what was in that hatch and who the “others” were.

I couldn’t fasten my own bra. I couldn’t tie my own shoes. I could barely type and I couldn’t write.

I do not regret it. What I needed in that time was to heal. More importantly, I needed to spend time with myself. My yoga obsession was a healthy one, but cooking with my roommate, relaxing in my home and enveloping myself in simple pleasures was something I needed to experience.

Also, I desperately needed to realize that I couldn’t always be self-reliant. My I-can-do-it-myself attitude could not thrive in the eight weeks with the use of only one arm. I couldn’t fasten my own bra. I couldn’t tie my own shoes. I could barely type and I couldn’t write. My roommate helped me make my bed, put my hair in a pony tail and carried my groceries. Perfect strangers opened heavy doors. Friends gave me rides to work. For one of the first times in my life, I allowed myself to ask for help and I was shocked and touched by how graciously willing people were to lend a hand.

If I think of it all in terms of what I quoted the Dali Lama saying before, that all adversity is somehow meant to mold us into a better version of ourselves, then I can’t look back on those events with anything other than gratitude.

When I think about all of the tiny details that had to happen in order for me to go through the loss of a sanctuary, the discovery of joy in the simple things and the humbling experience of relying on the kindness of others, I see that it was all supposed to happen as it did.

If I had stepped out onto the street two seconds later, the girl would have missed me completely. If I hadn’t made the split-second decision to cross the street in the first place, if I’d checked the bike lane for traffic, the girl would have whizzed by with no trouble.

But those ‘ifs’ are wasteful speculation.

A sanctuary is not always elaborate or romantic; it’s not always a grand, magnificent, life-defining thing. It’s something that helps you or abandons you when you need it the most; a destroyer and a savior.