In Between

What’s Winnie the Pooh’s middle name?

The.

What’s The’s middle part?

H.

That stands for Half-Way.

Pooh’s creator, A.A. Milne, wrote a poem about that potent half-way place.

Half way down the stairs is a stair where I sit.

There isn’t any other stair quite like it.

I’m not at the bottom, I’m not at the top.

So this is the stair where I always stop

Half way up the stairs isn’t up and isn’t down.

It isn’t in the nursery, it isn’t in the town,

And all sorts of funny thoughts run round my head.

It isn’t really anywhere! It’s somewhere else instead.

My beloved and I are presently in an in-between place. Not completely moved out of L.A. and not all the way moved in to the new place in Oakland. Up to our keesters in cartons, evaluating each item we withdraw from box after box, room after room. Stuff tells its own story... and there’s way too much of it in our lives at the moment.

This is a story about the potency of that in-between space, and how taking time to inhabit it adds value, depth and appreciation to my life.

In yoga there’s a word for it: dvaadashanta, which translates to “that peaceful (shanti=peace) place in-between.” When a swing has reached the zenith of its arc, it pauses just before it begins to swing the other way.

In between our in breath and out breath, there is a little pause. There’s another when we reach the end of our exhale - just before the breath turns around to come back in. Yogi’s say, that it’s in those little pauses where we’ll find our true nature; what I call our “Big S Self.” The Self that’s beyond gender, job description, status, race, beliefs, or age. Those are all part of us… but those descriptions are the ‘little s self,’ or personality, and just the tip of the iceberg. The Big S part is so vast and incomprehensible that we cannot grasp it except for the wee glimpses which the half-way down the stairs contemplations afford us.

Saturday and Sunday evening, I got to watch the sunset over San Francisco Bay. That ‘not fully day / not yet night’ is another in between place. The beauty of it lent extra enjoyment to the extended in-between-ness. Mark and I just hunkered down on the beautiful green hill all mud-luscious and puddle wonderful after the rain, and just WERE in the moment. It was found time, set apart, and all sorts of funny thoughts seem to leave my head, allowing a sense of peace to permeate all my cells from the inside out.

This move from one city to another offers various transitions which I’m relishing: from seeing a lot of clients, to anticipating seeing way fewer; from being an off-handed gra’ma to being a very hands-on sort of gra-ma.

Change allows me to re-evaluate what’s essential - just as the activity of boxing and unboxing possessions affords me an opportunity to question do I need/want this item? And further, who or what is possessing me? Do I really possess anything?

It feels as if I am possessed by my possessions. Finding the juicer seems all consuming… yet patience yields more benefit than does frantic searching through all the as yet unopened boxes.

In Between allows me to question every action, every choice, every thought. It seems I have a lot of weeding to do, in order for my internal garden to flourish.

With gratitude, I embrace this transition, even while struggling with some of the loss of familiar friends, family, and neighborhoods. I foresee a time when the now home will be bustling with new friends, colleagues, and neighbors, and the familiars will come to camp out here too. Then, we can all be in-between together!