Under an overcast sky, a pool of water is hollowed out in the middle of the grassland. The water is a cloudy milky white, and the soil at its edge is wet and black. Steam rises low, crosses the meadow, and scatters in the distance before a birch forest. It is a time when dry silver grass and wet moss are mixed in the same field, and the sun is behind the clouds.
Looking at a scene like this, the body leans forward a little. Just imagining the steam touching your face makes your eyelids heavy and your breath longer as you draw it in. While you picture in advance the feel of your soles stepping on the wet ground, the stiffness in the back of your neck loosens once on its own.
Through the hours of getting through the day, the shoulders stay raised. They have been raised so long that you do not even know they are raised.
Tonight you might fill the tub or the sink with water and lay a hot towel on the back of your neck. Three minutes is enough. Rather than forcing the shoulders down, what if you left them to the temperature of the water.
You can try something similar in the hallway on the way back to the office after lunch. If it is overcast outside the window, cast your gaze somewhere in the hazy sky, like steam scattered far off, and leave it there for the length of a few steps. Meanwhile, look at where your eyes are focused. Whether they are still tied to the distance of the screen you were looking at, or whether they are loosening bit by bit and moving farther away. Noticing it is all there is.
The steam rises without a sound, and the field takes all of it in.
