Moon Child

Moon Child with Chicken

My husband left for a two week trip and on the night of his departure B, my teenage granddaughter, had a rare free night for a sleepover.  Perfect timing.  We ordered Mexican take out and watched Percy Jackson and the Lightening Thief before bed.  Next morning I was doing yoga upstairs when I heard B rustling around in the kitchen downstairs.  She was eating leftover corn chips.  "Wanna do some yoga?"  I yelled down from the upstairs to the kitchen.  "Sure."  And so this long legged girl climbed the stairs to my yoga space on the second floor.  She was wearing a roomy sweatshirt and shorts.  "Just a sec." I told her before I zipped down two flights of stairs to the basement and brought up her red Moon Child yoga mat that she'd painted while here last time.  She laughed.  I showed her some therapeutic yoga moves for her back because it was hurting.  "So bend over and touch your toes but don't look at me 'cause I'm stupid flexible." I bent over and laid my hands flat on the ground just in front of my barefeet.   When I  looked over at B her back was rounded and her shoulders up to her ears.  My heart broke just a little bit.  I wanted to yell, "Let's do yoga every day and your back won't hurt.  I can Zoom you.  We can do it first thing.  Remember Grammy is a internationally certified yoga therapist, for God's sake!"  But she is a busy teen and so I offer gentle and loving support when I see her.  "Straighten your back as much as you can."  I advised."  I moved a mirror so she could adjust herself.  "Go to the comfort point but it should be a little bit of work.  Not hurting but not just hanging out."  B straightened her back and bent over in a way that worked to stretch but not cause pain. "How's that feel?'  I asked her while also telling her to take a deep breath in and out and drop her shoulders while tightening her core.  "Good!"  She told me with surprise in her voice.  I was reminded once again that we don't move our bodies enough in our busy life hunkered over iPhones and computers.  Hold on while I sit up straight and adjust my shoulders up and down.  But, I am sad that somewhere in B's learning and teenage life, which is stressful with a single parent, a mother she no longer sees, a job, a new driver's license, navigating just being a teen in high school during a world-wide pandemic, there isn't more time for her to love, listen and honor her body.  I hope on her visits I gift her that.