My Heart Took a Picture

In 1988 a movie came out with Linda Hamilton called 'Go Toward the Light.'  It was based on a true story of a boy who gets HIV from a blood transfusion.  I was addicted to it beyond measure because, in the late 80s, I was in love with both Linda Hamilton and things that made me cry my eyes out. One of the parts of the movie that continues to stay with me is the scene in which the dying boy is holding his baby brother and their mom says "My heart took a picture."  Maybe it resonated with me because my dad was a photographer, or because I thought it was such a beautiful freedom to be able to take a picture with your heart and carry it with you always.

This morning I taught my last two yoga classes here in MN until I return in August. For the last year, best friend Amy and her husband have come to my early class and then we all head over to Starbucks for breakfast and conversation in which we try to solve all the world's problems--or at least our own.  Amy and I have both changed jobs over our Sunday coffee.  We've planned retirement, trips to Vancouver, and tattoos.  We've vented, cursed, moaned and whined.  We've celebrated, laughed, plotted and schemed. Today we did this one last time for the foreseeable future, since I will have a different teaching schedule when I return.  I managed to not cry in my coffee....even when Amy bought us all cake pops and we sat there like three teenagers trying to guess the flavor of the cake before we ate them and making jokes.  Our Sunday breakfast is something I'd dreamed about my whole life without ever really realizing I was doing it: having a coffee klatch. Who knew?

I taught my second class, then met Amy and John for a "goodbye lunch" that isn't really a goodbye quite yet (it's really goodbye #2 with at least one more to go).  We went to the Golden Nugget for burgers and beer.  John drinks beer all the time. Amy and I never do, but today we were both craving it. We laughed about that.  And we chatted about work, California, yoga, people who don't wash their hands after using the bathroom, whether beer or cocktails are better, and other Very Important Things.

And it was there, while we were sitting down to our second meal of the day, with a beer in my hand and Matt Hires' 'Restless Heart' in the background, that my heart took a picture of my beautiful friends.  Their importance in my life is immeasurable.  My gratitude for moments where all of my senses engage in a way that creates a picture only I can see and that I can take out to look at whenever I want defies description.  It will make me cry for awhile, to think of today, and to hear Restless Heart (yeah, I know---I have no idea what my thing is with that song...for real) and know that today closed out a lovely chapter I've been fond of for such a long time.  Each day that goes by I'm getting more and more excited for my time in California and for the inevitable transformation it will bring...but my Sunday coffee just won't be the same.