Yoga Returns

It's been over a year now since Satan's Mistress, my yoga instructor Mary Ann, up and married and moved herself off to Birmingham, Alabama, thus ending my brief and colorful career as a perpetual yoga student.  For me, yoga turns out to be a lot like childbirth in that as time goes by, the memory of the pain fades.  This is how I rationalize my second foray into the twisted world of sun salutations and downward dogs.

It happened innocently enough.  I was cruising through a church rummage sale on Saturday when I spied and then bought a boxed set of VHS yoga tapes.  At the time it seemed like a  fabulous find -  two tapes for one dollar.  Sale items often cause a form of temporary amnesia in me and for a moment - just long enough to check out - I forgot how I feel about this particular form of exercise.
Instead,  I was swept up in the thrill of the trash-to-treasures moment, grateful that my VCR was still fully functioning.  (Otherwise what would I do if I ever wanted to watch all those Richard Simmons "Sweatin' to the Oldies" tapes?)

When the weekend was over and I was emotionally back on solid ground, I exercised the bad judgment of telling my walking partners about the tapes. Before I could squirm into a pair of leotards, I found myself in my basement with a friend, listening to all the warnings about visiting doctors before beginning new exercise programs.  Who are they trying to kid here?  If I did that, I'd need a standing appointment.

My new prince of evil is named Rodney and he has the finely chiseled muscles of a youth who spends way too much time lifting weights at the gym.  I'm not so sure I want to take exercise advice from someone who's that into himself.  

This tape was copyrighted in MCMXCVIII (don't ya just love Roman numerals?) No matter how much effort I put into fitness, I'm pretty sure that I'm never gonna look as good as I did in 1998.  I'm not gonna lie to you - that's just a bit irritating, especially when I consider that Rodney will remain forever young. No sagging glutes for him, no paunchy abs.  Not even a tinge of graying at the temples.  No, thirty-something Rodney will be my own Dorian Gray, watching me age while he, himself, serenely smiles.

There are several pluses to using this videotape program though.  Obviously if I'm in my basement, I won't be seen outside the house in my exercise outfit. That is a huge check mark on the positive side of the paper for both me and the community at large, trust me.  Also, if I look crazy attempting one pretzel pose or another, only one person will laugh out loud at me and I'm pretty sure that if I blow in her direction, I can make her fall over sideways.  The biggest benny by far though is that any time I want to - any time at all - I can turn off the television.

In an instant, Rodney will disappear and yoga class will be over.  Then there's always the potential that the tape will get eaten while it's rewinding…

I never thought I'd admit it but I miss you, Mary Ann Raughton Rickman.

My former yoga instructor is now a Roller Derby Queen!

www.StillSwimmingUpstream.com

The Wedding

Satan's Mistress (aka my yoga instructor Mary Ann) married Jason the Giant Friday and the wedding was fabulous! FABULOUS!!!!!!!!  

Why?  Because the bride and groom had the foresight to rent a photo booth to entertain the masses during lulls in the action.  Since I knew a total of three other guests, it was easy for me to corral them all into the booth before they really even realized what was happening.  Sadly, the pictures had kind of a "deer in the headlights" look to them and I just knew we could do better.

I'm an overachiever and that boring, normal, sub-par photo strip just didn't sit well with me.  How to spice things up?  Hmmm... Immediately after we received our photo strip, the woman who'd been behind us in line emerged from the photo booth with a little red feather on her shoulder.  Hey!  There were props in there that we hadn't noticed.  Jackpot!

I was only able to convince two of the original three ladies to get back in line with me for a "do over."  We piled back into the photo booth, this time grabbing boas, hats and a mask.  We were much happier with our photo strip results this time.  We were so happy, in fact, that we began arguing about who got to keep it.  Never the shy one, I asked the photo booth attendant (yes, that appears to be a legitimate job opportunity) if he could make us copies.  He said no, but we could go back in again.  Since he gave us official permission, it was a done deal.  

Luckily, there was now only a short line.  The other adults were off doing whatever ~ listening to toasts, watching the bride and groom cut the cake ~ something along those lines.  There were few kids in attendance so nobody was really competing with us for booth time.  

By now, we were feeling like silver fox models. This time as we were squeezing in, Mary grabbed an adorable flamingo hat and plopped it on her head, Diane donned sunglasses and I grabbed the best prop of all: a tall, attractive man that none of us knew.  I threw a purple boa on him just as the flashing commenced.  At first he was stunned and looked bit confused but soon we were all laughing so hard that the first set of pictures we took were pretty goofy.  We just stayed in the booth, laughing even harder.  We took a second, then a third set of pictures.

And that's how we met Srini, Mary Ann's boot camp buddy and a genuine good sport.  I'm pretty sure that during the ensuing conversation I invited myself to visit his parents in India and I'm certain he volunteered to teach me (and a few of my closest friends) how to cook authentic Indian food.  If that doesn't have potential for a future post, what does?  

Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Rickman!!

PS  Your cake was delicious.  I ate two-and-a-half pieces of it while no one was looking.  Was that wrong?    

Getting Dressed

You know how sometimes you get up super early and it's really dark out and you don't want to wake your husband up, so you just get dressed in the dark and sneak out of the bedroom?

Well, that didn't happen to me today.  I got up well after dawn - my husband was long gone - so I dressed leisurely in a room that was full of light.  

I was half way through yoga class when my instructor mentioned to me that my yoga pants were on inside out. 

I have no explanation for this.

Twisted Sisters

I met this gal at a ladies' party and I hit it off with her right away.  She's young, about the same age as one of my kids, vivacious and delightful...and she's a yoga instructor.  Before she left, she gave me a card for a free lesson.  That was so sweet, but no way was I going to go to her class.  Thank God it was far away so I had an excuse!  I realize that every other woman in America loves yoga but not me.  I took a class once and I was still sore from it three months later.  No siree Bob, not doin' it.

Then came the emails.  Finally, the kicker -- she's starting a class in T.C. and that's where I live.  She officially invited me to her premier class.  What can I do?  I have been trapped!  I am horrified at the thought of yoga.  I know that I haven't been flexible enough to touch my own toes since I achieved double digits, yet I feel it would be rude not to attend and be supportive of her new venture. 

I argued with myself a lot about attending this class but somehow this morning I find myself wearing a pair of Lycra leggings and a shirt that's far too tight to be comfortable.  (I'm still not sure it will stay put if I do anything more exotic than sit down.)  There are whole industries that are devoted to yoga garb but I don't feel inclined to purchase an actual "yoga outfit" for something I'm sure will be a one-time-shot.  At best I'll be comic relief for the other students.  At worst... well, let's just not focus on that.

See ya on the other side.

                                 *   *   *          *   *   *        *   *   *

When I arrived at class, it looked like it might be a private lesson.  Oh, no!  That would not be good.  Not. Good.  At the eleventh hour though, another woman arrived - thank you GOD - and even better than that, it was my friend Mary.  Now Mary is one of the nicest women on the planet (I'm sure she doesn't even kill mosquitoes) and I was relieved because I knew she'd see the best in everything which would rein me in a little if I started whining and complaining.  If?

A graceful and smiling lady

The instructor is just too cute!  She looks like a young Deborah Messing and has all the energy and high spirits of youth.  Unfortunately for me, my youth has long since vanished and has left me with a little less to work with.  We posed.  We did the downward dragging dog, the sphinx, pigeon, half moon, dancer, little cobra and quite a few other pretzel moves.  Whenever we'd settle into a new pose our leader would ask us, "Where do you feel that?"  For me an easier question would have been "Where don't you feel that?"  I felt it everywhere and not in the happy way that she seemed to be feeling her stretches, either.

 

And it was then that we had a differing of opinions.  She thought my body was telling me that it would like to stretch more and I was hearing, "Stop this immediately or you'll be sorry!"  

About the time my elbows started to sweat, we changed gears and did some balancing exercises.  Then came my favorite of all yoga poses known to mankind called, "The Corpse."  You just lie on your back and pretend you're a possum trying to fool predators.  I was pretty good at that one, I must say.  That the ended of one of the longest hours of my life.  We were finally done.

That's when I found out the class wasn't an hour, it was an hour and a half  -- and -- it meets twice a week.