Twist like there’s no one watching.

As I walk our Long Beach shore I sometimes see symmetry in the life before me, on the ground and floating above…a reciprocal poetry. Life expressing itself. Life doing life.

Recently I saw such a poem.

I was chatting with Bruce and Jackie who visit our shores often. But as we spoke I kept an eye open for the unusual, on the beach or in the sky. I have to admit to this fine couple that rarely does anyone have my undivided attention when I’m at the water’s edge. I watch for ospreys, whales, or anything that might be fun for me to photo or write about. It’s just what I do and…

…that’s when I saw Eilis.

She was halfway down the next beach, a whirl of bursting enthusiasm twisting in the July morning. So I abruptly interrupted our conversation and I approached Eilis O’Connell.

I asked Eilis if I could take some photos, she agreed. She told me she’s new at hula hooping. She didn’t look new at it.  Spirit is essential to a poem and she obviously had that.

Eilis teaches Special Ed at Mineola Middle school.  She has been meditating and practicing yoga for the last four years and she says, “When I moved to Long Beach I really found my love for the outdoors.”

Eilis said she began surfing and hula hooping because it was an outlet for her creativity. She said, “Anything I’m able to be fully present and mindful in is an act of meditation.”

She said she loves hula hooping because there’s a joy she feels when dancing that she wants to spread to others. I could see that joy, I could feel it.

That’s Eilis: meditation, presence, creativity, dancing under the sun and the terns at the ocean’s edge, wanting to express herself, wanting to spread her joy to others.

Well, she spread it to me.

And I’m spreading it to you.

Here’s a music video of the twists and terns I found at Long Beach NY. Feel her joy, spread the poem of Eilis O’Connell and her twists and terns:

Be well,

Leebythesea