Chalk and Cheese Chronicles

Crying in Savasana

For 90 minutes, I said nothing.

For 90 minutes, I stared at my third eye.

For 90 minutes, I wobbled through 26 poses.

For 90 minutes, I was aware of my every breath.

For 90 minutes, I detoxed in a heated room.

Then the room faded away and there, while lying in final savasana, I wept.

The emotion stemmed from nothing specific. Gratitude? Loss? Exhaustion? But there it was, making me weepy.

I blamed John Denver, whose acoustic delivery of Sunshine on My Shoulders sparkled around me like fairy dust during final savasana, awakening my emotions.

I sat up, suddenly self conscious, then gathered up my belongings and quickly left the room. I soon rejoined the routine of my day, but that moment stayed with me. I couldn't shake it.

A Dazed Mind and Happy Feet

We're at Saravana Bhavan, nourishing a friendship back to health over a dinner of dosas and steamy cups of Indian chai. But our words fall flat, unable to remain aloft. To our left, the kitchen sizzles with the sounds of frying; to our right, a flat screen television blasts a Bollywood beat and above us, the piped in sounds of traditional Indian music together compete quite effectively, drowning out our conversation. We give up, our voices strained.

My friend suggests we do something relaxing and borrows my phone. She calls ahead. They are open late, she is sure. "Ok, ok, " I hear her say, "we'll be there at 10."

"What time do they close?" I ask. "Eleven p.m., " she says. "Let's give it a try," I reply.

We jump in the car and drive, passing by older style motels with neon signs. This is the seedier stretch of El Camino in Palo Alto. Then we see it - we think. There are two signs for very different businesses, but with similar names. It's confusing. Shadows move from behind the curtains - it's that one. We are not alone at this late hour. We duck into the non-descript, darkened building, chased by the night air.

Three people greet us. "We were at the apartment, " they say, "but we came back."

Sorry, says my friend, but I'm cringing of embarrassment. I'm not keen on being the last ones in. We're inconveniencing them. What time did they really close?

The dimly lit room seems enormous, with spaces for 15 people. We lie down on side by side oversized loungers. I feel nervous. Nobody talks. (Clothes are on, only my head band was removed.)

Slosh, slosh.

Water, hotter than I'm used to arrives in a plastic tub. I slip my feet into it, trying to relax but my mind is at odds with my feet. My mind says relax, stay. My feet say run away quickly. Too hot!

I bristle but my germ free feet stay put.

Get Off My Dot!

Over the past week, I've been working out at my backup gym. It's not my favorite gym, but I occasionally go there when I can't get to my usual gym. (Yes, I have two silicon valley gym memberships, down from three!) Last week, after dropping off my kids at preschool, I zoomed on over to my backup gym in hopes of getting in a little much needed T.A.G. (thighs, abs, gluts) workout. (A gym membership means nothing - alas, I am still flabby.)

After signing in for the class at the front desk, I'm good to go. After all, signing in means that there's a spot for me somewhere in the class. So, with twenty minutes to spare, I decide to head for the locker room and then, perhaps over to a corner to do some stretching. As I make my way to the locker room, I stumble on something. I look down and see that I have kicked over someone's water bottle. Then I notice all sorts of debris strewn about the floor. The water bottle, a crumpled white towel, People magazine (gimme that!), three more water bottles, a gym bag, keys and so on, like a battlefield of gym accessories. Oh my God - this is the line to the T.A.G. class!? These people have signed in early, thrown something down to "hold" their place, and then run off to burn calories on the stairmaster or something. Crazy! I abort my trip to the locker room and decide I'd better try and find the end of the line.

Is there a midnight boot camp for newbies?

I've mentioned before that the only thing I ever won was at a Gemini Crickets auction fundraiser. I guess my luck is holding because this year, I won again! Ok, everybody seems to win something there, but I like to celebrate my winnings, however small. Usually, that is.

"And the winner of the San Jose Adventure Boot Camp is...Akemi!"

I clapped my hands greefully. Me? Me? A winner?

But then it hit me. I hadn't won the trip to Disneyland, like my fellow twin mom, Linda. I hadn't won the VIP tickets to see a taping of the Dr. Phil show. Nope, I'd won the chance to wake up at 5am, five days a week, for a month of Boot Camp.

Stepping Down, Way Down

How do you give up an activity you love?

I fell in step class today. Fell in step class the previous week as well, tumbled onto my behind with a thud. We were doing these ridiculous, super advanced moves and I just couldn't handle it. "Are you okay, are you SURE you're okay?" the instructor asked, shining an invisible spotlight on this fallen stepper. "Yeah, " I assured him, getting back on my feet, "Go away. I'm fine." Actually, I was fine. Fine, fine, fine! But oh, the indignity!

I've been doing step aerobics for a long, long time. It kind of fell out of fashion for a while but it's been experiencing a sort of resurgence lately. Tapless step is all the rage. I'm addicted. Our much loved instructor Ralph guides us through an athletic routine that is challenging and fun with precise cueing. Some say that this sort of speed demon step is dangerous, but I crave the 150 bpm (beats per minute). Crank it up! I even drove 30 miles up the Peninsula to catch a class he was subbing. I can't imagine ever giving this up.

On some days, I’m just not that into swimming

I’m prone to misplacing things. Some objects land in predictable places and are easy to find. My lipstick, for example, often manages to roll out of my bag and get wedged in the floor space next to the driver’s seat of my car. My keys, like all keys, magically disappear and reappear from my purse to the kitchen counter to the pocket of my sweatshirt. I can’t find my medical insurance card anywhere. If a quick search around the house fails to turn up the missing item, I then turn my suspicions to my sticky fingered twin toddler boys who like to hoard items in secret places. I once suspected that maybe, just maybe, they’d managed to steal a paring knife from my kitchen counter, but then later I realized I’d probably left it in the container of the rotisserie chicken I’d been carving and then had tossed the whole thing into the trash.

My latest missing item fiasco concerned a certain feminine hygiene product. I usually don’t misplace things like that, I don’t! But it’s just that, well, I’m a pad person (explain in a moment). Call me old-fashioned, but I just prefer pads. The only time being a pad person presents a problem is when there’s water, i.e., swimming pools. When I was an adolescent, I once feigned sickness to avoid having to go swimming with a bunch of friends. I just couldn’t own up to the embarrassing truth (shudder, shudder). You just can’t go swimming when you’re a pad person. You just can’t. But fast forward to the present and it’s the morning of my kids’ much loved (parent-and-me) swim lesson. I get my period. Of course, it’s the worst possible timing for me, being a pad person, but this time, I am undeterred. My kids want to go swimming, and mommy is going to take them!

From Keds to Nikes: My Voyage Through Step Class

I wore Keds to my first step class. It was fashion suicide. It was stupid. In the cardio room, I paired my zero stability Keds with boxer shorts; elsewhere, I wore my Keds with cropped pants. Same shoe, two winning looks. Over the next decade, the Keds gradually faded into a distant, embarrassing memory, replaced by more suitable workout footwear. I became a cardio addict, following step instructors from gym to gym in search of that next endorphin high.

Two years ago, I traded in my cardio shoes for flip flops, the kind worn by third trimester pregnant women everywhere. My trips to the gym plummeted to zero as my body concentrated instead on the life – two lives – growing inside me. In the weeks before my twins arrived, beset by preeclampsia, I could barely heave my 70 plus pounds of baby belly out of bed. On rainy days, I sloshed through puddles in flip flops and a sundress cinched with a belly bra.

When my new, larger post-baby self finally returned to step class, I celebrated my new, larger foot size with the purchase of a new pair of Nikes. My gym attire, however, was now limited to that which would cover the stretch marks on my tummy. I’d been absent from step class before, but never for longer than 2 weeks, let alone two years! When the music started that first day back, I felt clumsy in my new body which was still heavy with baby weight. As the beat picked up speed, the class moved…no, flew, through each increasingly difficult move like Cirque du Soleil acrobats. I stuck to the basics, despite my snazzy new shoes.