Yoga teacher and energy session worker, Cat.

By JT Thompson

Cat: in her late 30s, travels all over the world teaching yoga and offering energetic work. For the last 11 years, she has been based in Bali. Cat occasionally comes to Bow Street Yoga in Union Square to teach, give dharma talks, and be available for craniosacral-shamanic sessions and teacher trainings.

Cat is now in the process of relocating her home base back to the States, and is excited to be part of what she sees as a rising cultural transformation in response to the Trump phenomenon.

When we meet at the café across from Bow Street Yoga, Cat is dressed all in white – white coat, white shirt, white pants. She has dark, full-bodied chestnut hair, which shows just a trace of silver. She has the healthy glow you see so often in yoga teachers. As she talks, her eyes dance with happiness; she has a warm smile and a deep, throaty laugh, which are frequently threaded into her animated storytelling. She is grounded and earthy, and brimming over with vibrant good humor.

Cat grew up immersed in the complications and joys of multiculturalism. Her family has numerous bloodlines – Irish, German, Moroccan, Spanish, Jewish, Native American, Austrian and maybe one or two others. “At airports,” she laughs, “people tend to speak Spanish to me.”

Until she was 9, she lived in Westfield, New Jersey, going to a school that was “a rainbow mix. I was one of the few white kids. We had kids from Taiwan, China, African Americans. When I was a little kid, I could distinguish Chinese and Taiwanese.” One of her closest friends was from an El Salvadoran family, and she “loved the food, the language, their neighborhood. They were growing rice in their front yard. It was so interesting.”

On family trips to Disneyland, Cat’s favorite ride was always It’s a Small World. “My mom told me that I once went on the ride 13 times in a row!”

In case you don’t know them, here are some of the lyrics from It’s a Small World: “It’s a world of laughter, a world of tears/It’s a world of hope and a world of fears/There’s so much that we share, that it’s time we’re aware/It’s a small world after all.”

When Cat was ten, the family moved to St. Louis.

“That was a shock. It was either so white, or so black. Not a mix. That bothered me. When I started dating a black guy, the guys at school had a hard time with that. It bothered me that the racism was there, but people weren’t honest about it.” After the easygoing multiculturalism she’d experienced in Westfield, “St. Louis broke my heart.”

Cat then went on a series of explorations on her own that are so far flung – and that she describes with such quick excitement – that I don’t get all the details of how she ended up in each place. Switzerland at 14. Peru at 19. Niger at 20. Arkansas at 21. Thailand at 23. Japan at 26. Then, finally, Bali.

Switzerland was a study abroad program.

“I was shy, and the experience helped me grow. And I loved the mountains, ice climbing, skiing – it was a whole new world. I always used to get sick at home, but I didn’t get sick there. I realized there were health implications of being at home.

“It was hard to come back to the States. But after Switzerland, and a visit to Italy, where everybody looked all the same, it was great to be back where you had all kinds of mixes.

“I wanted out of St. Louis, and went to college at Boston University. It was so multicultural in Boston. I could close my eyes on the streets and hear so many different languages. So many people from different countries.

“I realized I needed to expand. I didn’t care how.” She laughs her deep laugh.

When she was 20, Cat went to Niger.

“I knew I wanted to confront my privilege. I knew I was lucky, but I didn’t know how lucky.

“The experience really fucked me over. I didn’t know how to handle a town full of lepers, or true starvation.

“I also saw true generosity – people giving away half a day’s money to someone on the street. Six kids dividing up a piece of candy equally.

“I came back shell shocked.”

Cat’s next exploration was through AmeriCorps’ HEIFER project, whose mission, their site says, “is to end hunger and poverty while caring for the Earth.” She wound up in Arkansas, spending a summer working on a farm.

“People are down on Arkansas, but I loved it. It was hard work on the farm, but it was fun to be in Arkansas. Amazing nature, caves to explore. There were yoga classes, a great sense of community. We had our watering hole, a rope swing. We made our own musical instruments, drank homemade wine. But I couldn’t do it forever – HEIFER educates locals to be in charge.”

After she graduated from college, Cat and a friend took a road trip to Arizona and New Mexico.

“Wow, the desert. The wild sage. I spent some time smoking pot with Navajos, asking them about reservation life, what it was like getting visited by tours. I felt like an outsider in Indian land. I felt confused and guilty about how we’ve treated our indigenous.

“But that feeling of going out West – that spirit is still there. It was my pilgrimage. I didn’t want an office job. I wanted to travel the world.

“We had $2000 in a suitcase, we’d just pull some out when we needed it. It was our own little vision quest.

“I was feeling so much wanderlust. Eventually, I scraped up the money and went to Spain, where I taught English for a couple years.

“At 23, I moved to Thailand, but quickly felt disenchanted, not at home. I felt like I’d failed.

“I went home to live with my parents.

“Then I called my old yoga teacher – she said, You’re going to take over the classes. So I stayed in St. Louis, and grounded for a year.”

After that year of settling into being a yoga teacher, Cat made several cross country road trips with her fiancé, looking for a place to live. The one place he didn’t want to go was Boston.

“But Boston was calling me. In the end, I decided, I have to do this on my own.

“It was a good choice.”

Cat started teaching yoga, “ignoring people who told me I couldn’t make it,” with the goal of traveling after two years.

“But I didn’t know how I was going to afford it.”

Then someone in Japan, who had heard about her as a teacher, flew her out for a job. She wasn’t there long – on a trip to Bali on vacation from Japan, she was offered and took a full time job teaching yoga.

Bali would be her home base for the next 11 years.

In 2012, her brother died suddenly, which woke up a desire to spend more time with her Dad, Mom and sister.

“I have created a strange life where I just show up around the world. I’ve started noticing how much I spend on accommodations,” she laughs. “In my 20s, I felt I needed to go to other countries to serve. Now – I want to serve the people around me.

“After Trump got elected, I started asking myself what it means that I’m an American. I started compiling a list of what I love about America.

“As I think about establishing a home base back here in America, I think it’s part of my dharma to teach kids. I love the energy and imagination they have.

“And I think America is so refreshing, because we have a little more of that childlike energy.

“We’re going through some growing pains right now. ‘Dad’ is not that fun right now.” Her deep, throaty laugh. “But we’re the rebels.

“In Switzerland, they’re rule followers.

“We were formed by rebels. I don’t know another place with that Wild West energy.

“My favorite thing is getting off a plane in the States. You can’t tell where you are from looking at the people. I think we’re getting *more* multicultural.

“You really see it in Boston. It’s such a beautiful mix.

“I was talking to my taxi driver from the airport. He was Lebanese, has been here since 1978. He said, ‘Of course I’m an American. I feel so accepted here. I’m Muslim, and it wasn’t hard to find other Muslims. Here it’s not about skin, or religion, or economics. It’s about spirit.’”

She pauses.

“Another thing I really love about America is our nature.

“We have 50 different countries. With different vibes, different smells, different people, different ecosystems.

“And Americans are really positive. When things fall apart, the feeling is, we’re going to make it.

“Americans are good at the funeral humor.

“When Trump came to power, it was the comedians who had the most insight. Americans communicate through humor – intelligent humor, minus the bitterness.

“In college, I was working on a world religions paper, and I was interviewing an anthropologist who said, snidely, America is such a smorgasbord.

“I love that,” she laughs.

“No other country has such a mix. So many ideas. Of course we’re innovators, creators.

“I’m proud of the country that created jazz.

“The Indians who wanted to spread yoga around the world brought it to America very deliberately. We’re the best marketers.” Another hearty laugh.

“That entrepreneurial spirit – that’s the core of America. As stable jobs are dissolving, people are functioning that way.

“We’re the teenagers of the world. The Europeans are proud of their long history. But that can be moldy. I love the idealistic energy we have.

“It’s been latent for a long time.

“That’s the beauty of Trump – the rise of kindness in response. People are now fighting to uphold American values, freedom, freedom of speech.

“People are rekindled, reawakened.

“The warriors, the pioneers, are rising again.”

Cat glows with happiness as she says this – a big smile, her eyes bright, leaning forward in excitement.

It’s hard not to get caught up in her enthusiasm.

I hope she’s right.