A Return to Yoga

Namaste.

"It's been a long time, old friend," I thought, as I looked down at the floor to my yoga mat.  Almost a year...or was it just over a year?  Either way, it had been too long.  But all that was changing.  As I sat down on my mat, I could feel that familiar peacefulness of a yoga studio washing over me: the dark, low-lit lights that softly flood the room in a deep, shadowy glow; the inviting warmth of the bamboo floors; that peculiar, serene stillness in the air.

As I began my warm-up stretching, I could feel the beads of sweat making their way through my pores and coming to a rest on my face.  My date--oh yes, I should mention that my return to yoga came in the form of a date suggestion by a girl I had just started seeing--sat to my right, eagerly awaiting (I'm sure) what was about to come.  This wasn't your typical beginner yoga class.  Not to sound wimpy and melodramatic, but this was an intermediate level class in a 95-98 degree room (okay, I'll just shut up).

"Don't be afraid to go into child's pose," she'd kept reminding me.  

"Please," I thought as I rolled my eyes, "if anyone's going into child's pose it's not going to be me."  As I'd later learn, I was right in a sense, but we'll get to that.  

By the time the instructor came in, a sufficient pool of sweat had already begun forming on my mat.  As we went into seated position, it recurred to me how inflexible I was--comparable to a slate of granite or a rigid tree--not that my date hadn't informed me of that several times already (that is not a sexual innuendo.  She literally told me how poor my flexibility was).

As we went into our first downward facing dog, the first waterfall of sweat came pouring off my face.  I started worrying about whether I had put enough deodorant on and, arguably more importantly, whether I had drank enough water to avoid going into heatstroke.  Not that passing out in yoga isn't sexy, but I thought I'd save that for a more appropriate time like date six or seven. 

I should mention that there was a mirror in the front of the room, and her and I were right in front of that mirror.  This is important not only because it gave me a chance to check her out while we were doing yoga (let's be honest) and see her smirking at me while she watched me struggle, but also because it enabled me to see what I was supposed to be doing.  Since it was an intermediate class, the instructor walked around the room and gave verbal instructions; and since I'm clearly a beginner in yoga, most verbal instructions required me to look around at other people and see what they were doing.

As the class went on, it became increasingly apparent to myself that I wasn't going to finish without going into child's pose.  My legs were starting to cramp from dehydration, I was becoming light-headed and my yoga mat was beginning to resemble a bog.  

After a brief break in child's pose, I decided to stand start back up, only to find that I hadn't magically regained any of the water that I had lost.  I took a drink from my water bottle, which now felt like a drink from a warm pool, and decided to start back up.  After one more...vinyasa?...I realized I was faced with a major decision:  spend the remainder of class in child's pose, or walk out of the room.    
   
On the one hand, it wouldn't be the worst thing to lie gracefully and admit defeat.  On the other hand, I didn't want to spend 20 minutes lying on the ground in front of my date...at least not in that context.  Using the mirror, I found an opportune moment to slip out of the class while everyone was facing down.  I realize they probably wouldn't have noticed me leaving anyway, but it made me feel better.  

I spent the remaining twenty minutes in the lobby, reading a flyer on classes and times (yes, it only took about 45 seconds to read the whole thing, but I had nothing else in front of me).  When my date come out of the room she was glowing.  Whether it was because she was holding back from laughing at me or just satisfied from her yoga class, who knows?

As I drove home I had to ask myself a few questions: 
Had I failed?  
Sure.  
But did I have fun doing it? 
... I'll refrain from answering that.  
And will I be back?  
Absolutely.  Get ready, yoga; here I come!