July was a wild month. It started off with me returning from Europe at the end of June. I spent a week in Northern Sweden by a lake leading an awesome Yoga of Trust Swedish Midsummer Retreat. In addition to lots of AcroYoga, enjoying lakeside tadpole pedicures, and long forest trail runs, we had partook in ancient traditional Swedish Midsummer celebrations. This happened:

On the way back, I experience some of the craziest layover / delayed flight shenanigans ever. My flight from Stockholm to Frankfurt was delayed 1 hour and 50 minutes. I originally had a 2 hour layover. Upon landing at gate A3, I quickly exited the plane to find my connecting flight. The gate of departure? Z25. At a full-bore sprint, I raced across one of the largest airports in Europe, literally jumping through customs, and made that goddamn plane. My checked luggage? Third bag off the carousel back at SFO.

Three days later, I met up with my good friend and acrobat extraordinaire, Lux Sternstein, to head down to co-facilitae a two week program through California State University at Monterey on Dynamic Partnering. We were part of an all-star cast of amazing movers and shakers, including Molly Gawler and Mark Fucik of Pilobolus fame, plus Darren and Heather Stevenson of PUSH Physical Theater.

The students were amazing. The co-teachers were amazing.

It was a profound experience, one that has shaped my style of teaching and understanding of movement. Plus, I got to lift people above my head on stage.

The night before I came home, I received a phone call from my roomate informing me that our home was broken into and a lot of stuff was stolen, including the new computer I had been working on all throughout my European tour. The one that I had taught myself photoshop on. With all of that awesome, unbacked up, unique content. Yup.

Only when you lose something so you realize you never really owned it in the first place. Two things became very apparent: 1) All of this yoga has definitely helped to prepare me to experience and process loss in a healthy and level-headed manner and 2) Renter’s Insurance also helps.

The over/under is that I essentially had a very large-scale yard sale of very expensive things at the height of their importance and relevance, and managed to get top-dollar for every item. The data is gone. The opportunity to recreate them is strong. My intention is get phoenix on this situation, burn away fear, and let life take flight. I have since bought a new computer. It’s pretty great.

I got to celebrate this at the Wanderlust Festival at Squaw Valley in Tahoe. Many pictures have been posted. Many exciting things happened, including an opportunity to see one of my favorite bands– Caravan Palace. In addition to seeing an amazing live show, I got to know them personally. They’re awesome people who love their job. This also happened, and I’m still not quite sure how:

I spent the next weekend in Houston, TX working with some amazing AcroYogis. In addition to eating succulent BBQ and eating delectable breakfast tacos, I got to connect with some truly welcoming and friendly people. I’m not trying to point any fingers, but let’s just say everyone I met was really nice…

Let’s stop here. All of this smiling has us caught up for July. August is just getting into full swing, and believe you me, it’s already been one for the record books.

Live Forever or Die Trying. You know the drill 😉