It is only appropriate that the name of today's blog be as Irish as I can make it, being St. Patty's Day and all.
But really, I do want to take a Mulligan on the yoga class I attended on Tuesday night. Since I go every Tuesday and Thursday, I am really hoping I can redeem myself tonight. Tuesday night was not one of my most shining moments for a variety of reasons, a couple of which I will outline here...
I'm habitually late. Nate often teases me that there is "reality" and then there is "Lindsey" time. And it is so true. I don't know if I was born after my due date or what, but I have been late my entire life (that I can remember...) So, why my tolerance for other people being late is so insanely low, I have no idea. It's not fair, but, hey, I can't change me.
My class starts promptly at 7:45. Or, so I thought! I arrived early on Tuesday night to this little gym for women where my class is taught. We have the only exercise room in the back of the joint and the walls are so thin, you can almost see through them, I believe. No matter, that is not important to this part of the story...but, it will be later. :) Anyway, I arrived at 7:30. There was a little girl (mid-late teens) that works at the gym in the big room cleaning the mirrors. I was the first one there for the class, so she felt it was important to beg me to not touch the mirrors in the room and to pass the sentiment on to my classmates and teacher. Duly noted. After all, it had to be a pain to clean the fingerprints off, but, then the thought crossed my mind that we were not the only class that took place there. In fact, they used that room for a daycare a majority of the time. But, whatever; it was obviously important to this chick and who was I to say different?
I get myself situated in the room and had to pick my "spot". That's always a tough one since I'm still fairly new to the class. I need to be able to follow along and yet, I need to be out of the way so that others could see themselves in the mirror. Decisions! And, as I closed the door to the room, I noticed how much louder the gym music seemed to be that night, but, I figured it was just me for the moment. Blood pressure "up" a little more than normal. Just breathe, I tell myself.
Begin watching the clock and 7:45 comes and then goes. NOBODY has arrived. I can hear the door chime and it had been silent for 10 minutes! Did they cancel class and forget to tell me? I don't *think* I was added to the phone tree! Panic. Keep breathing. Give them a few more minutes and if they don't show, just pack your things and leave. And send a scathing email later. Blood pressure increases again.
At almost 7:55, the teacher and another student walk in. Whew! She looks at the clock (which I made sure was correct per my phone) and goes "Hmmm. Looks like we're late. Oh well." No apologies, which I thought was weird, but, who cares, right? Trying to calm down.
Well, my lack of sleep didn't help. (I'll have to blog about the show "Hogs Gone Wild" another time...but, yeah...) I could not get into one single pose correctly, it seemed! I don't know if I was just unable to be calm or what, but I found that I was holding my breath, I was insanely hot, and my hands and feet would slide or just wouldn't "get right." I then remembered that a friend told me not to worry if I couldn't do one thing or another that I could do in the class before. Sometimes its like that. So, I kept going.
Then, the last 15 minutes of class is the meditation portion. I was advised to bring a blanket for that part as we lie in corpse pose and try to focus on one single thing and truly meditate. I call it "blankie time." :) And that night, I was ready for it!
As the instructor turned off the lights and I started to try to focus and clear my mind, I realize that the music in the next room is drowning out the yoga music. And it was just so loud, it was all I could think about. First, it was the Black Eyed Peas, followed by Pink, then by Eminem. I felt like I needed to be on the elliptical instead of trying to lie in the dark and focus!
So, the class gets wrapped up and Audrey goes to turn on the lights. Everyone is still sitting there trying to come back to reality (and, um, I was already WAITING for them in reality since I never LEFT...) and my mouth opens and I hear myself blurt out, "Wow, what was up with the music tonight, eh?" All heads turn and stare at me like I was the biggest jerk in history. Which, to their credit, I probably was at that time. So, to recover, I say, "No, not in HERE. But out THERE! It was so distracting and annoying!" Ugh. Audrey then says softly, "Well, I am just happy I have a place to practice my yoga with all of you. We used to be next door behind the tap dancing kids' classes, and that was tough sometimes. But, once you are really focusing on your practice as you should, you don't even hear it. You can tune out everything." Double Ugh. Way to be an arse, Linds. Good job!
Lesson learned here: Never miss that perfect opportunity to shut up. Why is that so hard for me sometimes??
Mulligan, please?
:) LAH
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