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Bend it like Bikram

March 1, 2012

One day I decided to spend 90 minutes in a room that was hotter than the desert. On purpose. And pay for it.

This activity was inspired by my co-worker at the newspaper, who wrote a series in which readers challenged him to try new experiences. His list of challenges included playing high school football, dressing up like a team mascot and driving a boat at a fancy resort. Also on that list? A Bikram yoga class.

I don’t remember my friend’s impressions of the class or the resulting article. All I know was that he didn’t die. And that was really important to someone like me, who wasn’t very athletic and thought Bikram was only for hardcore yogis.

After his experience, some of my other co-workers decided to go too — and when they asked me to join them, I immediately said yes. It’s like when your parents challenge you with, “Well if everybody else jumps off a bridge, would you?” Yes. The answer is yes. If everybody else does yoga for 90 minutes in a humid, 105-degree room, I will do it too. I like to be a part of things, even when that thing is sweaty, uncomfortable and certain to give me inner-thigh chub rub.

The studio was situated in a gritty strip mall. Inside it was dim and dank. The mirrors on every wall oozed with condensation.

It was surreal to walk inside a building that was hotter and more humid than the 100-degree desert day outside. The air was immediately suffocating. It tasted damp and hairy, like someone shoved a wool mitten down my throat.

The teacher enjoyed being nude, so she often shed her clothes outside class. Although I’m in the “every body is beautiful” camp, it made me a little uncomfortable to hand over my credit card to a naked woman. In that way, I am a prude.

Unlike many types of yoga, which can vary depending on the studio, teacher and students, Bikram classes are very strict and uniform. There are 26 postures and two breathing exercises. Each pose is done in a specific order, and teachers are never supposed to stray from that 90-minute routine.

This teacher’s instruction was the opposite of every yoga class I’ve ever taken: She said to push beyond our limits, be uncomfortable, make it painful.

Humiliation was another part of her repertoire. She mocked the co-worker who inspired the rest of us, saying, “Corpse pose is the only pose he can do. Get it? Because he is so lazy and out of shape!” She made fun of me and said my enormous body would get in the way of ever doing yoga properly. At one point, she swiftly kicked me in the legs when she said my knees weren’t locked enough.

A week later she called me on my cell phone to complain about my co-worker. I told her I didn’t appreciate the call and that it wasn’t professional to berate her students — especially to other students. In return, she told me I was fat.

And yes, I paid $20 for all that.

Now, many years later, I have a new job. And a new co-worker. And when she said, “Hey, do you want to go to this Bikram class with me?” I immediately said yes. Part of it was that I wanted to be That Girl — the girl who dashes off to yoga class after work with her fun, bouncy colleague. And then part of it was a mental hiccup. I kinda forgot what the class entailed. I only brought a teeny-weenie towel and a small bottle of water, completely forgetting that this scenario will make me sweat buckets and could potentially give me heat stroke.

But do you want to know the biggest reason I showed up on that mat that day? Because I couldn’t let one horrible teacher to define an entire type of yoga for me. This is my body, and this is my yoga practice. When I determine my feelings about Bikram, I want it to be because I gave it a fair shot.

So my co-worker and I went to a studio that was completely different than the place I went before. It was clean. The instructor wore clothes. I was only chastised once — when I left class to refill my small bottle of water.

And you know what? I STILL didn’t enjoy the Bikram class. I like asanas that are more flowy, like physical meditation. I like yoga that feels like an accomplishment, not a punishment. I turn to the mat to nurture my body, not torture it.

I know plenty of people who embrace Bikram, who feel rejuvenated by the classes, who are energized by the heat and the postures, but I am not one of them — and that’s OK. Not all styles of yoga are suitable for every body.

But I’m proud of myself for trying. For opening myself up again. And for deciding that if I can’t take the heat, stay out of the Bikram.

A life in three Valentine’s Days

February 18, 2012

First grade

On Feb. 14, every student was instructed to bring a cardboard box to class, which we would decorate and use for our valentine mailboxes. Mine originated as a Buster Brown shoebox. Then I covered it with aluminum foil and glitter, construction paper hearts and ribbon, paper doilies and candy Red Hots. In a word: Gorgeous.

I had crushes on two boys. Andy Williams had red hair and freckles. He always introduced himself as “Andy Williams, like the singer.” I had no idea what that meant at the time, but I thought he was sweet anyway. We shared a love of swing sets, Slim Goodbody and the Smurfs.

Barry was the other one. I don’t remember much about him, except that he had a huge head. Massive. It was as round and full as a mylar balloon, crowned by soft, dark hair, parted in the middle and feathered over his ears. We didn’t have much in common. Even back then, I understood Barry was just a pretty face.

I loved both of them with innocence and fierceness, to a point where I found it impossible to choose between them. And when it came time to slip my Spiderman valentines into their cardboard boxes, I couldn’t possibly pick just one card. I had things I needed to say to these boys. Things that could only be communicated with “You’ve tangled me in your web, Valentine!” AND “Stick with me for Valentine’s Day!”

So I gave both of them valentines. And I gave them two valentines each, slipped into the same envelope, so it would look accidental.

Barry was the first to notice. “Hey, you gave me two valentines!”

“Oh, did I? That’s weird.”

“I got two valentines too!” said Andy. He beamed from ear to ear.

That afternoon, I had two dates for lunch in the cafeteria. And by the end of the day, both boys had made extra valentines for me. Construction paper hearts, crudely cut with rounded safety scissors, and pasted together like fat heart sandwiches.

I didn’t know what love was. But I was positive it had something to do with shiny, feathered hair and construction paper hearts and walking home with an overflowing shoebox.

***

College

I cannot stress how tiny my single dorm room was. It was thinner than the hallway of a Depression-era building and not much longer than a dining room table. In an effort to create more space, I hoisted my bed on stilts. That meant I spent drunk nights, most nights, on the floor, with the walls leaning over me in judgment. It was a particularly fragile year for me, and everything I had thought I knew about myself later turned out to be false.

I was sad and lonely. I didn’t have a broken heart, but I certainly had a weary one. I hadn’t yet had the breakup that would scar me forever. But I also didn’t have something good and true enough to give me hope.

What I’d had was a string of hookups and failed dates. Cigarette butts, ticket stubs and pitchers of beer. A night of chemicals and false intimacy with a guy from my sociology class. I could never remember if his name was Jack or Jake. Maybe John.

On top of it all, I was sick for months. It was the nasty crud that attaches like lichens to your bones during the grayest part of an Ohio winter.

I called for pizza. This was a big deal, because I don’t call for anything. I ordered a large pizza with two toppings — mushrooms and pepperoni.

“Um, is everything OK?” said the man at the greasy pizza place.

“Yeah,” I said, choking back a sob. “Why?”

“I dunno. You just sound kinda bummed,” he said.

So I spilled everything to this stranger. I blubbered until I could barely breathe. I told him how I wasn’t performing well in my classes. I was sick. I was lost. I was having trouble finding solid friendship, let alone love. I was tired. I was broken. And it all came together to make one very miserable Valentine’s Day.

“I’m really sorry,” he said. “Is there anything else you’d like to add to your order today?”

My dorm was at the farthest spot on campus while still being campus, so by the time the pizza arrived, the box was soggy with hardened orange grease. I flipped open the lid.

The toppings of the pizza were arranged in a smiley face. My pizza man had also scrawled in black marker on the inside of the box, “Cheer up Maggey.”

My heart swelled. I imagined my pie-in-the-sky future with this mysterious pizza man. He’d always listen to my concerns. Whenever I needed him, he’d come around in 30 minutes or less. And every time I got blue, he’d be there to turn my pepperoni frown upside down. I picked up the phone to call him back, to chat him up, to make a date.

After one ring, I hung the phone back on its cradle.

I didn’t know what love was. But I figured some things are better left to imagination and pizza boxes.

***

Grown-up

My friend Kye and I made elaborate plans for our first Valentine’s Day with our new skydiver boyfriends. I don’t remember exactly why we did what we did — only that it had something to do with giving us enough time to prepare dinner and slather ourselves in self-tanner.

We armed our guys with disposable cameras and sent them out on a crazy photo scavenger hunt. They had to solve puzzles to get the clues, then go to the destinations to take pictures, then wait for an hour at a drug store while the photos were developed. It was kind of like “The Amazing Race,” if “The Amazing Race” had no point, no finish line and no reward whatsoever.

Together our boyfriends found roses at the market, sought out candy makers and bakers, went up to the observation deck of Carew Tower, the tallest building in Cincinnati. All very romantic things to do sans girlfriends.

In retrospect, some of the places we sent them were a little unfair — for instance, a lingerie shop at the mall. We did not ask the guys to actually buy us any lingerie. Just take pictures. It’s a good thing it’s NOT CREEPY AT ALL for two grown men to take photos of underwear inside Victoria’s Secret on Valentine’s Day.

At the end, the guys arrived back at my apartment with a stack of freshly printed photos and some high expectations. And in return they received a dinner that absolutely did not justify the kind of time Kye and I spent making it. I think we made a green salad and rolled some Trader Joe’s pizza dough into a heart shape.

“OK, we did it!” my boyfriend said, exhausted but triumphant. “Now what are you going to do with the photos?”

“Oh. You expect me to do something with those?” I said.

Clearly, this plan could have used some work, but my boyfriend didn’t seem to care. He was happy to do something that made me happy, and he did it without question.

I didn’t know what love was, but I was pretty sure I’d just watched it come and go and run all over town and back again. And so I married that guy.

World’s best valentines (for people who don’t like Valentine’s Day)

February 4, 2012

You’d think that I’d love Valentine’s Day, what with all the candy and cards and heart-shaped pizza. But I don’t.

It’s just that I hate being told what to feel. How can you possibly be starry-eyed and romantic when everything is shoved down your throat? It’s like the Linda Lovelace of holidays.

This is the same way I feel about the forced fun of Las Vegas. Yeah, yeah. You’re supposed to be all, “Vegas is so crazy epic, man, and what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.” You know what happens in Vegas? You spend too much money, cry in front of a stripper and vomit on yourself in an elevator. That’s what happens in Vegas. You want a truly debaucherous weekend? Go to Fresno. Shit gets real in Fresno.

That said, Valentine’s Day is going to happen every year whether I want it to or not, like a pap smear. So I might as well make the best of it with really weird, unconventional valentines.

So here you go — some of my very favorite lovey-dovey, but not cloyingly so, images. Consider this a sickeningly sweet, candy conversation heart just for you.

For the one who plays hard to get:

For the boring-ass couples in your life:

“Walking Dead” fans:

For medical students:

When love hurts:

And when love is taboo:

When you’re crushing on a glassblower:

For those who enjoy stern, disappointed animals:

And for my very close friends:

Danger! Growing up in the ’80s

January 29, 2012

You know, I’m OK with bringing back the ’80s. I don’t mind skinny ties, synthesizers, porny mustaches. I won’t even laugh at the oversized nerdy glasses on hipsters who don’t actually need prescription eyewear. Fine. But as long as we’re embracing the decade, let’s show some love for a more unappreciated aspect of it.

The very best thing about the ’80s was that only three dangers existed in the world — quicksand, Satanic cults and abductions at the mall. Beyond that, we were untouchable. We were safe. We were happy.

1. Quicksand.

Yeah, yeah. The history books will say that the Cold War struck fear in the hearts of my generation. But I lived in Ohio. I had about as much chance of running into a Russian as I had of meeting a Muppet.

Quicksand, however, could be lurking ANYWHERE. And I knew it was true, because I saw it happen all the time.

It was impossible to be a film or TV star in the 80s without getting stuck in quicksand. In fact, the only reason actors survived the ’80s at all is that their huge shoulder pads kept them afloat in all that quicksand.

Here’s the typical scenario: You’re arguing with someone in the woods. You make a bold statement like, “I don’t need you” or “I’m going to find a way out of here or die trying.” As you walk away, you suddenly find yourself neck deep into a pit of shifting sand. As your friend/partner/relative tries to help, that person tumbles into the quagmire as well. Now both of you will drown in the dirt, suffering both slowly and quickly, because that’s the bitch of quicksand. And then … oh no! … commercial break.

Quicksand was such a prominent plot device in ’80s entertainment, I was convinced that I would plunge to my doom with just one misstep in the backyard. I carried around a walking stick until my teen years, simply because I wanted to make sure the ground in front of me was firm and secure.

What I didn’t realize back then is that quicksand is also incredibly sexy. I’m not sure why this buxom blonde decided to put her arms down into the quicksand, but how fortunate for us that she’s so pretty and helpless!

Related ’80s horror: Amnesia, which struck movie and TV heroes almost as often as quicksand. Remember how amnesia was a big thing in the 80s? If you don’t, there’s a good chance you suffered from it.

2. Satanic cults.

Say you’re walking around in the ’80s and you see a group of grim teenagers, clad in rock and roll t-shirts, wearing ungodly amounts of eyeliner. Fans of the Cure? NO! That’s exactly what they want you to think. These grim kids are actually Satanic cult members — and they are actively recruiting.

When I was growing up, Satanic cults were more popular than Scientology, so that’s really saying something. My parents were worried, of course. They attended several informational meetings in musty church basements, studying pamphlets entitled, “Is Your Child a Gothic?” “What to Do When Your Child is a Devil Worshipper” and “Teenage Fun? Or Satanic Ritual?”

What my parents learned is this: Satanists are super tricky, so they lure kids in with seemingly innocent games and music. You might think you’re playing a round of Dungeons & Dragons, but you’re actually signing on to become BFFs with Charles Manson. Messing around with a Ouija board seems like fun, but you’re practically making a collect call to Satan himself. And listening to an Ozzy Osbourne album might be harmless — or you could wake up from a musically-induced trance, your bedroom walls redecorated with bloody pentagrams and puppy skins, holding a butter knife and wondering what the heck just happened. It’s up to you.

I am still unclear as to whether my parents thought I might be sacrificed by Devil worshippers, or if they worried I might become a cult leader myself. Since I’ve never been the virginal type, I’m guessing it was the latter.

Even big business wasn’t immune to the devilish hysteria of the ’80s. Procter & Gamble couldn’t seem to shake rumors that their logo was a secret Satanic symbol, that the owner of P&G made a pact with the devil and that company profits were turned over to the Church of Satan. After this rumor was printed in our church bulletin as fact, my mom tossed all of our Crest toothpaste, and BOOM — we became a Colgate family, just like that.

3. Mall abduction

While other kids grew up with “Stranger danger!” warnings, my family was living in the prequel to a “Dateline” episode.

In the World According to My Mother, dangerous people perpetually wandered the malls of America, hypodermic needles in hand. And you’d best believe those sinister folk were prepared to inject drugs directly into the circulatory system of little girls who wandered more than three feet from their mothers.

According to my mom, injecting me with drugs was only the beginning of this nightmare. The abductor would then drag me into the mall bathroom, where they would cut and dye my hair in a toilet. They would claim me as their own child and force me into indentured servitude, likely playing the accordion for tips on street corners.

These fears were not unfounded. Back in 1985, street urchins playing the accordion were reaching crisis levels in Dayton, Ohio.

Thankfully, someone invented a service called Ident-a-Kid. The program was sponsored by police departments and TV stations, and it involved fingerprinting your child, drawing pictures of your kid’s bizarre birthmarks and putting some of their hair into a plastic bag, all of which went into a very important file somewhere. My mom was so convinced of my impending abduction, I was identified — and then re-identified — on a weekly basis for almost a decade. You could create an entire Locks of Love wig with all the hair I gave up for this thing.

Unfortunately, in order to register for the Ident-a-Kid program, we had to go to the mall. Yes. The same mall where seedy strangers were balancing their shopping bags with handfuls of hypodermic needles.

But hey, that was the ’80s. That’s how we rolled.

One year gone

January 12, 2012

It’s been exactly one year since my mother passed away.

Mostly, I don’t want to talk about it. I don’t have anything new or profound to write on the topic. And I’m not willing to dive into the deep and murky places of this subject yet. Even after 365 days, it still feels as if I just pulled my skin off yesterday, so fresh and raw and bare.

But I feel forced to acknowledge in some way this momentous thing — this thing that stirred up so much grief, anger, anxiety and gratitude in me — this enormous thing that means I now live in a world without a mom.

So I’ll just say that I didn’t love her enough while she was here.