20 years after high school

Tomorrow is my 20 year high school reunion, which has me in a slight, but manageable tailspin. I got to thinking this morning of what I wanted to do prior to the reunion...

Things I wanted to do but didn't....
Get my hair cut
Get my teeth cleaned
Find a fabulous new dress
Go on 30 day cleansing diet to clear up acne
Figure out the best way to remove hair from my legs
Have some kind of book published

Things I did accomplish, that I wanted to have done...
Start my yoga business
Have a life that is reasonably balanced between work, family, and me
Have a wonderful three year old daughter
Have a fiance who my partner, my equal, and wouldn't have it any other way

Then I also got to thinking about 20 years ago, and what I never dreamed possible, that I have done....
Briefly be a dot com (almost) millionaire and then not
Have any clue what a dot com was
Help build half a dozen start up companies
Live in San Francisco (but I dreamed of it!)
Travel by myself to Europe for 3 weeks
Travel through Africa with my Dad for a month
Sleep in a tent in Botswana with lions and hippos wandering nearby
Travel to Hong Kong, Singapore
Be valued for being smart
Become a yoga instructor (wanting to teach anything fitness was beyond my imagination)
Create and publish (with lots of help) a world-wide read Internet magazine
Have friends that I love, adore, and treasure
Co-Developed and lead writing workshops with a great friend
Do lots of things with the help of others
Ask for help
Be willing to attend my 20 year reunion!

I'm sure there's more...but tell me as you glance back at your life 15 or 20 years ago, what have you done that you never imagined possible?

Quinoa, the other grain

Dear loyal readers,

Yes, there are many more things going on than I want to discuss, if you want a glimpse of them, read my other blog...but for now I want to write about quinoa.

When I first saw this grain in print, I thought it was pronounced kin-oh-ah. I was mistaken, it's pronounced keen-wah. And despite the initial pronunciation issues, the more I try it and and the better I get to know this little round nutritional marvel (it's the grain with the most protein!), the more I like it.

I found this recipe for Spinach Quinoa salad with cherries and almonds a couple weeks ago when I added myself to the Vegetarian Times mailing list. I made it while procrastinating one Friday afternoon and fell (almost) in culinary love.

Read the recipe first, as I'm not going to reprint it here just in case there are copyrights that will chop off all my hair as a penalty. But here are my mods:

Almonds: I used slivered, toasted, and found it's best if you add right before eating as soggy refrigerated almonds are not so fun.
Cherries: use dried ones, the texture works well
Chickpeas: if you like them, follow the recipe, if you don't (like me) leave them out - nothing is lost
Garlic: use one medium sized clove unless you want to kill your tastebuds softly with garlic
Quinoa: I used 1 cup quinoa and 1/2 cup millet because that's what I had - worked fine.

Other than that, I followed the recipe and would again. Yum! I ate this for days and never tired of it.

Then a week later I wanted to make it again, so I got around to cooking the quinoa and didn't make the salad. Now I've been having fun mixing the cooked quinoa with other ingredients, like for lunch today and I made what can only be called a Veggie Quinoa stir fry.

Here's what I did:
sauteed a bunch of sliced mushrooms in garlic and butter
added two handfuls of baby spinach and sauteed them
found some leftover sliced steamed red potatoes in the fridge and added them
then added about a cup of cooked quinoa and stirred up until everything was warm.

I've got to say...it's quite good! The bonus being that it's wheat free and dairy free! How did I manage that???

Overwhelmed by Possibility

For the last couple days I've felt overwhelmed. So much going on, so many things to do with the spare minutes of time I may have in a day.

Until today I was doing my irregular morning pages and realized I'm overwhelmed because there is so much GOOD going on in my life. So many incredible, unbelievable, happenings and coincidences and opportunities that I want to shut down, pull the blankets up over my head, and hide.

For example...
My little company, Yoga Delivery, has one client. I've been saying I want two more clients, two more, I said preschools but it really didn't matter what kind of clients. Just clients, from one to three. So then a couple weeks ago T and I invited an old friend of T's to our Sunday ritualistic breakfast and as it turns out he organized basketball camps for kids over the summer (he was a semi-pro BB player). Five camps, for a week each. I looked at him, incredulous, and said "do you know I teach yoga, and I have a company that I created to bring yoga to people?" or something like that. A great conversation ensued, including how I could help him with his business, and we just formalized this week that I'll be teaching yoga to the kids in his camp during the late pickup hours for the first camp the end of June. What does it feel like when I make a wish, and that wish seems so improbable that it could come true, and yet it does? It feels...overwhelming!!!!

I'm not complaining, much. I'm reminding myself to breathe, relax, practice yoga in this moment, not in five minutes, because there's nothing I need to do right now.

Then...THEN I sent out an email to the group of people in my yoga training last year asking for book recommendations and got a response from one of my favorite people and I arranged to meet him and borrow a couple books. THEN I meet him in person, and he's off for the summer (works for a high school) and YES! he would be interested in teaching at the basketball camp on days I can't make it. I mean, he's just awesome, and he's worked with high school wrestlers, and likes teaching yoga to kids.

And .... AND tomorrow I agreed last minute to teach a freebie toddler yoga class at the Children's Day Festival in Bernal Heights. I figured I could print a few flyers, give a brief intro to Yoga Delivery. And be a little more overwhelmed by dreams coming true.

I've heard before that it's not our weakness we fear, it's that we're powerful beyond our imaginings. Dude...I'm all over that.