Twenty push-ups today.  Good ones, too.  A slight pause between the first ten and the second ten, but no breaking-out of form.  So far so good.  Had two really good sessions of qi gong, as well.  I was able to work the breathing part of the forms quite well, but I was surprisingly winded afterward.  I was able to slow down the tai chi form sufficiently, I felt, that the three forms together took 45 minutes.

As a side note, yesterday I worked on this Japanese album-style Moleskine notebook, which I’m gradually turning into a a geometry textbook.  I have seventeen pages left in the book, and currently I’m working on the section on establishing proportions. The proportions section of the textbook has enough space to do three problems per page, and I was able to lay out six of the remaining seventeen pages; eleven page-layouts to go, and 17 inkings to go.  I feel like, all other things being equal, that I can finish this project by the end of October.  Just in time — I was given a beautiful giant tome for illustration, poetry and suchlike yesterday by my friends D~ and G~…

Although, I have an art show in August 2015, and I should really think about slowing my production of beautifully illustrated books in favor of some canvases, prints, and suchlike.

ANyway, I’m drifting from the principal subject of today’s post, which is the fourth of the movements called Fair Lady Works the Shuttles.  In the first three of these movements explored over the last few days, I established that it’s really a sort of push performed in a round-about square: southeast corner, northeast corner, northwest corner, southwest corner in order.  What may not have been clear is that the back of the body is facing the outside of the square, and the front of the body is facing the inside. Anyway, here goes:

 Shift your weight back to the right toes and heel,
as hands shift to carry chi on the hip.
and swivel your left toes clockwise from heel.
Slide your weight once more, and then give the slip
to your right foot crossing the diagonal.
As this heel finds a spot two shoulder widths out
turn right toes out. By twist intentional,
push your weight left to right, and with your clout
move the whole upper body from the waist.
Hands push out, with a triangle of void
open between them. When correctly placed,
right hand is on top. With force thus deployed,
return mass to left side, and carry ball —
chi on left hip, knees bent, and standing tall.

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