Can we ride the sun?

It's fitting that the first blog is today. Today's the Day of the Sun. The summer Solstice. My daugther's birthday and the day I became a mother. Today this project is born out of the sun and my personal suns.
Eventhough today is E's birthday, it is my son, M, who is attached to the sun.

 It was a conversation with him which gave me the image for this blog. It went like this:

-Mommy, can we ride the sun all the way until tomorrow?

I paused. I was in yoga teacher training. We had been paying our respects to the sun every day and some mornings he would join me, chanting "Shanti Shanti Shanti Om" before giving water to the sun.

I didn't want to say no, because the sun is a powerful force in how we go from one day to the next.

So I answered:
 --I suppose we do, every day we wake up with the sun and we follow it until nightfall and then we wake up to follow it again.

He didn't bite.
-No! I don't mean that. I mean can we travel to the sun and ride for a whole day!

-I don't think anyone has invented a way to do that yet.
-Well, I will work on it when I grow up.

That is how dreams begin. He wants to be a ninja, or a scientist. I keep telling him he can do both. No need to let go of any one thing you want to do. He goes on to bring up The Hulk and Ironman of course. Then he momentarily debates if maybe he wants to just be Batman when he grows up.

In any case, be it Batman or ninja scientist, he also wants to build a car that loves back.  He figured this when he heard the Bluetooth in the car and I explained the car talks but doesn't feel. So he will build a car that can have feelings and love mommy like he does.

In the middle of superhero scientist discussion and cars that love back, I nurture his dreams. I want him to reach and leap forward. I imagine that if at one point a NASA engineer to be had a conversation with his mother about traveling to the moon. I would want to think she encouraged his spirit, instead of domesticating it with what's real or what is practical.

Thus, we have a ninja practice station:

A.K.A. the couch.

Every day without prompt he is tumbling, leaping over pillows and showing me his latest ninja combination. Then we spell and he builds Legos; for science's sake.

I can go look around for wisdom all over, in books and on the mat. The most raw and bright, I find when I look through the eyes of my children, or in the miracle of a sunrise and a flower.

I hope this blog to be a place to share those moments, along with yoga adventures and wisdom on the sages depending on what comes my way. I hope this is a place that serves my teachers, big and small and brings something to your life as well.

Happy Solstice!!