Greetings From Across The Pond

I wrote my son this early morning to see if he minds mom posting his letters on my journal? I find his letter's interesting and informative - but remember - I am his mom.

All that I share from genealogy, past, present, aging, family, images, thoughts of future, and my interests - might someday be interesting to someone. May not - but this One Woman is enjoying herself and feels led to document.

A new book he recommended for me - Tao Te Ching (Skylight Illuminations) by Derek Lin

The email was sent to his sisters and passed on to mom.


hello sisters !
Greetings from across the pond girls ! And yes - it's time for my occasional semi-boring email updating you on what I am up to these days - shall try and not wax too poetic, but here is some haiku for you - quite nice and from a Japanese novel that I am currently reading entitled - "The Buddha Tree" by Fumio Niwa :

A calm sea
Over the bay
A gentle breeze
A single sail

Currently staying in Bangkok, Thailand - avoiding the winter back in Nashville - one quite new aspect to this foray is that I am teaching lots of yoga classes - so I am gaining much hands on experience teaching full time for a few weeks whilst my teacher/owner of the studio here visits his teachers in Pune, India - home of Iyengar Yoga - the type of yoga that I practice.....For about 3 years I have taught as a substitute in Nashville, but never on a daily, and now sometimes twice daily level - I am surprised at how exhausting this is - you are the focal point for 90 minutes while talking and demo-ing......

A few days after arriving I attended a 3 day silent meditation retreat at a very modern international retreat center - we did what is called Vipassana style meditating which is the kind I study and practice on my own. The first day was very difficult on body and mind, but then you really begin to settle in nicely to the routine - so I hope to do some longer retreats each year - some are 7, 10, and even 28 days long. There are retreat centers all over the country - in the hills, on the islands, and in the city like the one I just did.

Quite a bit of reading on my part as per usual - so far this year have read:

"Cuba and the Night" by Pico Iyer
"Nostromo" by Joseph Conrad
"An Artist in the Floating World" by Kazuo Ishiguro
and "Istanbul" by Orphan Pamuk also many meditating and yoga books that I read over and over........

......next I will attempt the 800 plus page "The Brothers Karamazov"

As I write I am listening to classical music - a fairly new interest of mine - very relaxing like some "yoga" music - but a bit more cultural
and lasting I do believe - I found a 6 CD set of classical piano songs here for like $10.00 - tis quite good.....

No major side trips planned, but will go see Tim in Saigon, Vietnam later this month - have not been there in 18 months and its only a one hour flight so shall pop on over for 3 days.

I did have one nice half day excursion recently and shall have to make it a monthly event when here - I went with some friends and had an outdoor breakfast at the Shang ri La - an incredible hotel on the river downtown - a few steps from the mono rail - I had not realized how easy it was to get to - anyways you sit in the breezy shade and watch all the boats go by and just chill out for several hours as the surrounding gardens and swimming pools are so beautiful.

OK - not much else for now.

Be well, Love, Jimmy