Glory Ho

“I always thought that as I got older, I would have more people around me,” said Brenda in an old Six Feet Under episode. “But it’s just the opposite. We’re just focused more inward, get more honed into ourselves.

She’s so right.

While I certainly know more people as my rings slide down the banisters of life, peeling away so much paint as I go, I’ve gotten much pickier about who I spend an evening with. I’m more accepting, but less interested. Less judgmental, but more discriminatory.

I’ve spent more time inside my own being and I like it better there all the time.

Perhaps we all get addicted to our own rhythms. Who we really are. What we value. What we don’t. We get to know ourselves best.

Instinctively, I am sad. Like Brenda, I, too, anticipated connecting with others as I aged. But lately, I’ve grown to like it.

In honor of a new initiative, Blog-To-Be-Fit, with my sassy new group,

. . .I am republishing my Yoga blog from January. This sums it up for me. . .

Yoga. Agoy. Ogay. Any way you move the letters around, I like the sound of it.

A few years ago, Michael and I gave his sister, Meagan, a present and spirited soul, a yoga studio gift certificate for her birthday. A few months ago, she lent Michael and I a yoga book from Baron Baptiste, life-long yoga master. Our gift had come full circle.

I’ve toyed with yoga before. Signed up for a class or two. Survived panic attacks during Bikram. But it’s always been more of a task than an experience. A line item in my planner. An event which required a careful clothing choice. An easier way to exercise than the run I am always avoiding.

Stressful, too. Where should I stand? Am I taking up too much space? I will never get my leg as straight as hers. That halter top is a-dor-a-ble. I wonder if it’s from Anthropologie. That girl with the eyebrow ring, don’t I know her? Yes, she was in my Master Program. And so on.

Do. Do. Do. Think. Think. Think It’s hard for me to stop.

This time has been different. I’m still Andrea, of course. Rereading chapters, giving self-tutorials and structuring my practice. I cannot go completely limp. I need something concrete to hold on to. And physically, it’s hard. Very. Hard.

But this time, I’m practicing alone with only my mat, my muscles and my mind.

This time, along with the instructions for Downward Dog, which inspires strength, sustainability and plenty of sweat, Baron slips in a little prose for the pose. Make a meditation in motion, he recites. Look high to the heavens, he insists. Open your shoulders to the sky and create space between your ears.

My gaze, unlike my expression during Taebo class, where I appear capable of scalping someone, should be soft and strong. The flow, from one move to the next, unlike my hurried, jolted life, should be slow and fluid. My breath is best, during both yoga and crisis, if complete and steady. I balance by bringing my hands together in prayer. I rest, when tired, by lowering into child’s pose. I lead, when ready, with an open hand.

As I learn yoga, I am learning life.

I listen to my body. I listen to my breath. I listen to this rare and inspiring sermon—one I could never find at church.

Just listen.

“Sometimes you just have to put on your Petzl, look deep inside your own cave, remove a few rocks and find a path. . .”

–Michael Boudreaux, July, 2007

The other day, Michael said to me:

“Who are you and what are you still doing here?” Like he remembered me from a party back in 1998 and just realized I’d never gone home.

He was kidding, of course. But metaphorically, he was catching a glimpse of me from another angle, almost as if he was looking at me for the first time.

When I was young, I used to redecorate my room, rearranging my figurines, carefully securing my latest Sassy magazine collage to a massive bulletin board. Then, I would leave my room and walk back in, attempting to view it through the eyes of a stranger. It’s not an easy perspective to achieve. A little like your dreams, just when you find the edge, the opening, whatever you’re looking for begins leaking, faster and faster from some invisible hole in your head.

But I found it from time to time. And the difference was dramatic. It felt powerful.

Have you ever looked at someone, something from a new perspective and felt like you were meeting it for the first time?

I’ve been trying to stop biting my fingernails for oh, I don’t know, about 27 years now. I suppose the habit began when I stopped sucking my thumb. At age five. Obviously an oral fixation of sorts . . It’s not a nerve thing. I don’t discriminate. I will bite at any time, in any room, in front of anyone. I search for the white and eliminate. Needless to say, my attempts at quitting have been unsuccessful. Nearly poisonous polish, beautiful acrylics, exhaustive moral support–nothing works.

When they (no idea who they are) said the definition of insanity is something like attempting the same action again and again and expecting different results, I think they were talking about me and my nails.

I thought I’d take a photo of my fingernails for this blog, but after about 12 shots, I decided they were just too ugly to post.

Enter FutureMe. You write an email to yourself and Jay and Matt deliver it to you at some designate time in the future. In ten days. Ten months. Perhaps you wait ten years, at which point, I suppose email will be some antiquated form of communication, or your email address may have changed. . .

They’ve published a book called FutureMe, which details the anonymous letters of participants talking to their future selves. Some are light. Some are. . .not so light. You can imagine the possibilites.

My first letter will be delivered to me exactly one year from today and it will say:

Dear Me,

Congratulations on those fingernails. You finally did it! And guess what, I’m so glad you decided to go on that backpacking trip through Africa. You knew it wasn’t the most practical or financially sound idea, but following your instincts was still the right decision. Now you will never wonder what if. You will rest easy as an old woman, knowing that as a youngster, you leapt with faith that the net would appear.

Love, Me