Grandpa

This has nothing to do with yoga. Or maybe everything. I mean really, yoga is a microcosm for life isn't it? But I warned you all this might go this way. Maybe I'll try to work a cat in for good measure. 

As I am writing this, my grandad passed away just hours ago. I was fortunate enough to see him so recently my carry-on bag has yet to be unpacked. I wanted to share my favorite memory of him because it so perfectly sums up who he was to me. 

I was still in college when I got a 9pm call that my grandmother had just passed. My college was in Grand Rapids, the West side of Michigan, and my parents, in Detroit on the East side of Michigan, were in the process of booking an early flight to Florida for us. I had nine hours to drive the 3 hours to Detroit, sleep, make myself presentable and pack. While this may seem like an easy feat, let us consider two items on this list severely impacted by my college lifestyle:

1. Packing a funeral outfit.

Being an art student I did not own any funeral-appropriate attire. Heck, I didn't own a pair of jeans with even one knee intact. I had to dash from dorm-room to dorm-room asking girls roughly my size and shape for black dress clothes, which, of course, they did not have, being college students themselves. I managed to scrape together a skirt and blouse that fit...more or less. Nylons and shoes had to be arranged over the telephone. I called my sister for nylons but she couldn't help with shoes, her feet being a very normal size for an elf. My mother provided shoes, her feet were only one size too large (I brought a spare pair of socks to shove in the toes). 

2. Making myself presentable

College Kate was well known for her wide variety of hair-styles. Shaved head? Done. Purple leopard-print? Yup. Princeton? Uh-huh. Chelsea? You-betcha. Female pompadour? Briefly. The coiffure of choice this month (actually, I had been growing this out for almost a year) was a tall, fully shaved on the sides, green mohawk. My dad & step-mom are pretty conservative and, although they made their best effort not to show it, were horribly embarrassed by my hair and clothing even under regular circumstances. I was not sure they would let me on the plane, let alone look my poor grieving grandpa in the eye with a foot-tall green mohawk. 

As I explained, it took some time, but I did manage to get clothing together. The hair was another matter. I figured if I could just get my hair not-neon, I could comb it down and be okay. I sped to the nearest beauty supply store, which closed at 9. Of course the door was locked, but my pounding and yelling got the attention of the girls closing down in back. I knew I had to pound furiously because these girls were very talented at ignoring customers pounding on the door past closing. I know, I worked there. You would be surprised at the tenacity required to pretend the stylist screaming about her 8am perm appointment is not there. They let me in and I ran right to the dye aisle and picked out the top rated hair-color and developer (in darkest brown), some color remover and a crystal gel treatment. Does all that sound harsh to try on already bleached hair? It is. Very harsh. 

I grabbed my supplies and drove right to the other side of the state. Getting in at 1am, I had 4 hours to strip, cleanse, dye my hair and sleep. Hooray for adrenaline (I had yet to discover pranayama breathing)! I rushed through the treatments and ascertained that I had forgotten one major component — conditioner. My brittle hair felt worse than straw. I am sure half the hair attached to my head only remained because of the series of knots that tied it to other strands yet to break off. A little lotion was all I had to run through my hair, achieving the hard to acquire greasy-yet-dry look. To top it off, the brown dye and treatments only succeeded in turning my neon green to a moss-on-a-log camo pattern. Patches of neon butted up next to mossy brown. With two hours left, I heaved a heavy sigh and put on a baseball cap. Maybe it could be considered part of my funeral outfit, like a lady's bonnet? 

As this was pre-9/11, I made it through security and to my grandpa's house without taking off my hat, which had a Dropkick Murphy's patch safety pinned to the front. My parents had been warned of the horrors beneath my cap, but we choose not to speak of it. When we arrived at my grandpa's condo there were many relatives gathered around having the customary scotch and wine forced upon them by my grandfather.* None of my family lives in the same city so nobody knew what my hair was currently doing under my cap, but everyone knew me well enough to know to be afraid. And for g*d's sake, do not mention it. People avoided looking at my hat the way people would avert their eyes from satan. There was an elephant in the room and it was sitting on my head. Finally, my grandpa spoke up, "Kathryn. Come here. Take off your hat." 

For the first time all day (my family consists largely of stereo-typicaly thunderous Jews, of which I am no exception) the room went silent.

"Um. No, grandpa. That's a bad idea." I responded. We bantered like that back and forth, him sounding like he was coaxing a ball out of a dog's mouth to play fetch and me sounding like he was asking me to slay my first born. I looked into my parent's eyes and saw horror, I looked around the room, further horror. No solace anywhere but my poor grandfather's playful eyes. If only he knew what he was asking, surely he would desist!

I didn't want to disappoint my grandad, not even being able to clean up for my grandmother's funeral, but there was no way around it. I just didn't have time to fix it. I bowed my head, apologized and took the cap off. A gasp came up from the crowd but above that could be heard laughing. Loud, joyous laughter. Grandpa thought the matted, greasy, mess on my head was hilarious, made even more so by my cowardice!

He grabbed my head put his lips to my shaved haffet giving me a big kiss. As he did, he whispered in my ear, a conspiratory whisper,  "Next time, shave these  better, the stubble hurts my lips!"

My grandad was always a regal man, a proper man. A classic WWII vet who loved his scotch, golfed and drank his tea very black. He was also above judgement and loved me unconditionally. Thank you for that last visit, grandpa. It was the greatest gift ever — even better than those plastic fisher-price roller skates you gave me for my 8th birthday. 

* The man was so insistent that every visitor to his home join him in a glass of scotch that not 7 days before he died, while The Boy and I were visiting, grandad had me run to the liquor cabinet and pour us each a glass.

Introduction to Princess Sidney, the Perpetually Annoyed

I am owned by an adorable, spoiled rotten princess who's only reason for having not taken over the planet is that she lacks the necessary opposable thumbs. Her name is Sidney. All 7 pounds of her little fuzzy existence is devoted to following me around, ensuring that I am not doing anything that messes up her living space.

Every morning my alarm goes off too early for my liking, although later than most of the rest of the world. I hit snooze. This is Sidney's cue to leave the closet of my home office and join me for the last 15 minutes of cuddle time. She lies down on my back or belly, depending on which is facing up, and purrs so contentedly as to drip a drool puddle onto my comforter. She is the reason I had to purchase a fancy duvet cover, so I could wash the darned thing of cat drool regularly. I know the drool doesn't magically stop at the cover and the down-alternative beneath must be getting soaked too. I try not to think of this. I suggest you do the same.

15 minutes later the alarm sounds again and I slap at it until it silences. Sidney happily jumps off the bed and rushes ahead of me to the bathroom. The Boy and I keep the bathroom door closed so Sidney can't spend all night drooling on the sink waiting for one of us to go to the bathroom and turn on the faucet. She loves drinking from the bathroom sink and will spend all day there patiently waiting if we let her. The Boy gets annoyed at the hair and I can't help but think that, although it makes her happy, sitting on the sink 24 hours a day can not be good for anyone's mental development. As such, this is the first opportunity of the day she gets to be truly happy with her beloved faucet.

Once I am done brushing my teeth, showering and banging my head against the wall (mornings are not my strong suit) I open the door, point and grunt. She gets the idea and hops off the sink and trots out ahead of me. She lingers at my feet as I make a green juice and tea if I am ambitious,  whatever seems easy and tea if I am not. Then, off to the office, a whole 30 feet away. Sidney sits in my lap, which is folded into lotus or criss-cross, ensuring the princess has adequate lap space to unfold herself.

I tell you all of this so you get the general idea that my cat and I are very used to each other. Like an old married couple, we have come to our compromises, roll our eyes at the other's perceived shortcomings and begrudgingly alter our routines to accommodate the other's needs. Everything goes very smoothly until a new interest or hobby is introduced, like yoga poses in the home.

Much to Sidney's displeasure, I have taken to trying headstands, with the eventual goal of Tiger Scorpion. Very eventual. I am pretty sure I've got a shot at the pose if I can just figure out how to lift my head up. While I am aware that lifting your head is not the most challenging part of the posture, I get the definite impression that this tiny movement will take me so long to grasp that by the time my head is lifted, I will have been practicing for 19 years and the rest of the pose will fall into place.* By then, I plan on having such a great backbend I look like one of those Chinese gymnasts cultivated from the womb or something.

At any rate, here I am, fairly regularly, placing my forearms on either side of my head, and slowly lifting my legs up into the air. Once vertical, I visualize my head lifting off the floor. Slowly, I move my eyes in the direction I want to go. Flop. Try again. Flop. Try again. Flop. No worries. Again. Flop.

After a few very discouraging attempts at moving my head I decide to just hold a headstand. Maybe all I need is a really strong headstand. I get up, hold it for less than a second and inevitably my little Lucy Ricardo trots over to see why I am not petting her. The balancing act that I am so carefully honing impresses my little one not at all. In fact, with my hands so close to her level, why in the world aren't they attending to their duties i.e. petting her? She, I kid you not, starts head-butting me. In the head. I have to squint because her fur and whiskers are poking me in the eyes.

Not only does it take extreme concentration to keep the pose up with a cat head-butting you, but she is also circling my arms and head, which is dangerously close to where my body would come down should I fall. I get a tickle in my nose. Probably from one of the stray cat-hairs she has just thrust up there. It is clear I am going down. In a desperate attempt to clear my precious from the crash zone, I blow as hard as I can on her face. She looks annoyed, but not so much as to run away. Well, crud. Here we go. Whump! Down I come, narrowly avoiding her tiny form as it dashes out of harm's way.

You would think this harrowing escape from death would be a learning experience. Not so with my wee idiot savant. The next day she is there again, head-butting me in the face. Bless her. She will make sure I get my balance one of these days.

Believe it or not, this is actually a step in the right direction. I, at one point, did backbends at home instead. She liked to hang out, to lay down in fact, between my feet and hands, making it impossible to come down. I have literally been in backbends staring upside-down at her screaming, "PLEASE move! I can't come out of this with you there! Sidney!... Damn it!...Jeff! Can you come in here and get the cat!?!"

Sidney strives to accurately convey her level of extreme apathy toward my discomfort.

Sigh. As I said, I am owned by one spoiled rotten princess.

*If you are about to tell me that this is not, in fact, how yoga works, I have just stuck my fingers in my ears and am loudly proclaiming, "LALALALA...I'm Not Listening!...LALALALA!"

P.S. If you read this far, I assume you are also a cat fan. So, I feel I can share this with you, compliments of the best cute-cultivator EVAR, Bleu Caldwell, YOGA KITTEH!!! http://happybiscuits.posterous.com/yoga-cat

Enjoy, yogis, enjoy.

Practical Yoga (A Continuing Segment)

Today, I would like to announce a new segment, "Practical Yoga." This handy guide is here to explain the benefits that yoga can provide to your everyday life. In an effort to appeal to the segment of our population preferring a logical approach, this no-nonsense guide will not be touching on the more 'foofy' aspects of yoga; instead focusing on hard, practical fact. We will not discuss calmness, increased energy or karma. We will eschew words like, "prana." Here, we will outline stale facts -- indisputable proof of yoga's daily benefits. Let's begin:

Practical Yoga #1:

Ladies, specifically, are familiar the burden of using public toilets. Public toilets are hazardous cubby-holes to be navigated with extreme caution. Techniques are taught at an early age to endure the hardships, but no amount of nest-building prowess has ever prepared you for the horrors of the late-night bar.

The scenario: 

You accompany three of your friends to an after-dinner drink. After an unusually classy evening, you are in heels(!!!), the comfortable atmosphere is perfect, low lighting, easy banter and the drinks are about as chill as you are feeling. After an hour you excuse yourself from your sedate surroundings. You push open an unassuming wooden door to find yourself within the ranks of hell. Wet toilet paper litters the floor and the toilet seat looks as if a blind person has been shooting it with a water pistol for months...and it must have been a Super-Soaker 100.* 

You build a nest 13 layers thick knowing that it is no match for the pestilence laying beneath it. Then, calm comes over you. You have got this. Thinking back to your yoga class, you strike a pose.

Fig #1: Awkward Pose

Fig #2: Awkward Pose for the Public Lavatory

The thigh strength and balance you have been building over the course of your practice have paid off. You wash your hands and exit the restroom (using a paper towel on the handle as you leave) with a buttocks as fresh as when you walked in. Congratulations. You have conquered plague with yoga.

(Seriously, I actually have had a way easier time using public restrooms since starting yoga. Even in heels, which I figure is just like second part of awkward, I can hold myself inches above the seat as long as I need. Thanks, Yoga!)

*www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYFma2IDwak

99% Perspiration

Like most of my generation, my siblings, parents and grandparents have chosen their places of residence based on family. Specifically, how far away can I move to ensure they will not pop in for surprise visits?

While eliminating the tedium of family dinners, we have now ensured exotic vacations are a thing of the past too. Self-centered destination retreats have given way to visits to the family bases. Specifically, my vacations have been replaced because I have been deemed the most mobile of my family. My refusal to have children, freelance career and major airport hub city have made me the prime candidate for a nomadic lifestyle. The rotation, kept as strict as tribes moving from planting ground to hunting ground, has me bouncing between Chicago, Washington D.C., Detroit, St. Louis and St. Petersburg.

I love my family, I really do, but most of them are far more sedentary than I am (heck, most gazelles are). By mid-day on day one, I begin a Mr. Bojangles routine that would make me a pretty penny on any street-corner in New York. In each of my temporary residences I have a yoga studio to stop the tweaking.*

In home base #3 (Detroit) I usually have a pretty rough class. I'm not sure why, but I always end up trying desperately not to loose control of my breath by the end. The places where my heart-rate are supposed to decrease come and go without respite. I stare intensely at the ceiling fan above my head willing it to spin faster (our gazes transfer energy, right?).

Upon my most recent visit to this studio, the person next to me announced herself as a first-time practitioner. I felt a little bad that she would have to experience her first class with me trying to cling to sanity through the mental madness that is this particular studio for me. I did everything I could to be strong that class. Still, I found myself panting like a dog by the end, as usual.

At the final savasana I was trying to get the gasping down to a minimum, counting my breaths: in... one... two... three... four... five... six... out... one... two.... when the persevering first-timer leaned over and whispered, "You're perspiring."

I thought this was a most lovely gesture. Here I was, about willing to die and the brave new yogi made a 'captain obvious' joke to ground me; reminding me that we are all just as comically sweaty and gross. I laughed and responded, "I know!" and laid back down, comforted by the laughter.

Two seconds later, I popped back up, my eyes widened in horror as I realized what was actually said.

The new girl did not say, "PERspiring." She had said, "INspiring." As in, "You are very inspiring," and my response, with a cocky little giggle, had been, "I KNOW." 

So, yeah, girl who took her first class at the Farmington Hills studio, I swear I misheard you through the blood pumping feverishly in my ears.

For every other yogi out there, if you ever hear a rumor that Bikram yogis are conceited, it's my fault. I'm sorry.

* With the exception of St. Petersburg. For mercy's sake, will someone please open a studio on the West side of Florida?!!

HOT Yoga

I love evening classes. Being a freelance designer I don't have a drive home to separate my work-life from my home-life. I read somewhere that a 20 minute commute is the ideal time to make that healthy mental separation. The closest I have gotten is leaving my office, going to the kitchen for tea and, upon returning to the office, announcing that I am done with work; thinking this would work the same way half-court basketball does. Much like half-court basketball, I can never remember which side I am on and end up shooting for the wrong team; work creeping into my free-time and Zombies vs. Plants sneaking into my work-day.

Evening yoga gives me that mental break. Before yoga, my office is an office. After yoga, it can be a painting studio, game room or den. Yoga has the added advantages, when compared to a commute, of invigorating me, giving mental clarity and not encouraging me to scream and hold my middle finger up at people, just under the dash-board where nobody can see.

Sometimes my work-day runs late and I end up eating a light dinner the prescribed 3 hours before 8:30 class. This was the case recently. I made a light dinner of curry. I make my own, using spices I grind at the time of cooking, organic spinach, mushrooms and hot peppers. I have to be very careful when handling the peppers because I have dry skin (Eczema actually. Before yoga it was not unusual for the dry cracks in my hands & feet to bleed). The pepper oils easily seep into the cracks and burn painfully for hours. This time, I was good. I used gloves when cutting the chilies and scraped them neatly from the cutting board into the skillet rather than transferring them by hand.

That was then. Three hours later, in half-moon, my hands were starting to tingle. By awkward pose the tingling became a fire. My hands, from finger-tips to just below my wrists might as well have been dipped in lava. Evidently, when removing the gloves, I had not been careful not to touch the gloves. For hours the oils had been sitting dormant on my skin's surface but  as my pores opened to release sweat, the mistake was obvious. The painful lumps on the end of my arms were getting worse, turning into white-hot pokers I wanted to fling from my body.

The march of time stops for no yogi. Next up, eagle. Hands over head. Swing your right under left, twisting at the elbow and again at the wrist. You know those crazy/talented people who swing fire around their bodies on the end of long chains?

Yeah. That was exactly how I felt. The problem is that fire-dancers keep the fire pretty much away from their body. I was about to twist my swinging chains up and hold the ball of flames to my face. My fear resembled a bad trip, where a seemingly innocuous item (my hands) inspires such fear as to be paralyzing. My hands were a rabid axe-weilding bunny and I had to hold still and watch them come at me.

My Eagle Pose

The good news is, I made it through eagle; holding my hands as far from my face as my twisted arms would allow. In fact, I made it through the whole class. The fire started to subside around rabbit pose. I can't say I did a good job focusing on my breath, unless you count snorting heavily to force a breeze onto my hands, but hey, any class you stay in the room is a good class, right?

I still enjoy my evening classes, but am now very careful to plan my meals accordingly should I have to eat dinner beforehand. 

The Decline

My mood swings are monumental in a way that makes Liza Minnelli look stable. Yoga has helped me even them out a bit and come to terms with the ones I can't manage gracefully. Still, during slumps, I whine about going to yoga the way a 6 year old whines about going to Sunday school -- complete with shoe throwing. Or, if you were a creative kid like me, hiding in the closet and refusing to get out of your pajamas by anything other than force. At any rate, this sort of behavior is REALLY unbecoming of a 30-something.

I had decided that the only way to get myself to stop making excuses was to include practice into my daily routine. If I was to go everyday, martini lunch be damned, I would, in theory, stop whining and just do it. Actually, this worked pretty well. The result has been far fewer hours spent wandering around the house, shoulders slumped, jaw slack, kicking things in my path, complaining about the impending yoga. The irony here is that I complain like this knowing that I will emerge from class the bright, pert woman I wish I was all the time. It is the only sure-fire cure for slumps that I have ever found. Does this knowledge make me skip into class merrily waving my rolled up yoga mat like a baton? Never.

What happens now, the shortened fit I have come to accept as my daily routine, is so predictable as to be obnoxious. Both my cat and my boyfriend have memorized their lines perfectly to get me the f*ck out of the door and on my way. I wish that meant I could dispose of the theatrics, but they seem interwoven into my person.

The daily script:
The deadline approaches. I wander into my boyfriend's home office and pull him (quite literally, his chair, conveniently, has wheels) away from his work, I curl up in his lap, as close to the fetal position as a full-grown adult can manage. I throw my head back and proclaim, "It's THAT time." This is said with the same inflection that one would inform their child that the asteroid will, in fact, be colliding with the planet, snuffing out the sun, at any moment.

He informs me what I already know, "You will feel so much better when you get done."

I inform him that, although what he said is common knowledge and I accept that, it makes my march into Mordor no easier a burden.

Several large sighs escape me before I begrudgingly let The Boy get back to his computer. I grab my things and go to yoga, telling myself the whole time that if I feel like sleeping through the entire floor series today, it is okay.

*Class* (cue fairy music)

After class I am energized. I am glad I rode my bike. I contemplate on the way home how freeing bicycling is. I decide dinner should be juice today. I am turning over a new leaf. Nothing but salads for a week. I could do a double (two yoga classes) tomorrow!

I realize I do this every time. Better to think realistically. Maybe dinner tonight just won't include a starch.

Halfway home my tummy grumbles and I think of ice cream. It's okay though, there are good alternatives. I could have some Italian ice before my salad. Five minutes later, it's sorbet. Five more minutes, it's gellato. Two minutes more and it's a scoop of rocky road, a scoop of chocolate chip cookie dough and a scoop of strawberry cheesecake ice cream, all topped with fudge. Whipped cream is a must, but we can balance it out with a banana...I should have some potassium for all the work I did.

I arrive at home happy, with plans to make a seven course meal. Now that I think of it, no wonder The Boy is so encouraging of my yoga habit.

Brace Yourself, This is a Long One.

I whipped my cock out on stage yesterday. That is correct, as I am writing this, yesterday was the Illinois Asana Championships. There is so much to say about the day; the competitors were ecstatic, love was gushing out the floorboards and inspiration was everywhere.

The day started at 5:08am when I peeled open my eyes, a good seven minutes before I was being picked up by the clown-car of yogis carpooling from Chicago to Naperville. Four bleary-eyed competitors and all our yoga gear piled into the car and drove the hour+ to the studio hosting the pre-show class. The studio was one of the prettiest I have seen (well-done, Mama Tam!) with a beautiful faux wood floor. It was flocked, making it carpet-like, but the pattern was so real my pre-noon senses were thrown for a loop.

Taking class pre-competition is a beautiful thing. Looking around you there are yogis of all sizes, skill levels and age brackets (so, yeah, a little like regular class I guess). In front of me was, I would later discover, one of the judges. To my left and right were fellow Bikram Yoga Andersonville friends. Kitty-corner was a little girl of maybe 10 that may or may not have been doing a dance routine throughout class. I attribute my excellent focus that morning (and maybe the lack of sleep and food) to the fact that I missed (and therefore did not break out laughing at) the little girl turning around mid-standing series and facing Borislava, the yogi next to me. Good job, little girl! Testing Borislava's concentration was key to her performance later that day. Maybe if we all had had a little tap-dancing cutie to challenge our focus that morning none of us would have fallen out of standing bow later.

Borislava's Standing Head to Knee

After class, we piled back into the car, passing Starbucks, Chipotle, Five Guys Pizza and many other drool-inducing stores on our way to the Wentz Concert Hall. Thankfully, green juice was in ample supply. In the warm up room, which counter-intuitively was quite chilly, the mood shifted from casual to anxious and back again. Camaraderie ruled supreme as people did each other's hair, gave last minute tips for transitions and shared green juice in the grand fashion of breaking-bread.

After a long wait for the on-stage dance, music and bowl meditation acts, the children were taken. This was especially sad as it took away our 6 year old entertainer, Christian, who had been showing us how he could use his foot as a telephone by holding it to his ear. The pied piper came back for the men and eventually for the first 5 women.

The thing about an impending performance is that there is both nothing you can do to prepare and everything you can do to prepare. Do you do backbends to make your spine limber, or will this just make you fret? Do you do a few cock poses, or will that tire your arm muscles? Do you sit and talk with others to calm your nerves, or concentrate on a spot to gain focus? I, at the advice of a pro, settled on pranayama breathing. I also figured I would get one solid standing-head-to-knee before going on stage. 20 standing-head-to-knees later I stopped, having finally achieved this goal. Maybe that wasn't such a grand idea.

My turn was announced and I cued up to the stage, careful not to watch whomever was on stage just before me. Stripping down to my leotard was fun. First came the leg warmers, socks, pants, hoodie, tank top. I felt a little like a stripper who wasn't aware there was supposed to be grace to her job. The pile of clothes next to me kept growing until eventually, I was naked enough to walk into the public eye. In seconds I would attempt to convey everything I've learned in my year and a half of practice through an odd but very precise dance lasting only 3 minutes.

Before going on stage, standing in that chilly stage-doorway I got hugs and well-wishes the likes of which true competitors would never give. This is why I take issue with the word, "competition." I have yet to find a word that truly grasps what we are seeking to accomplish here, but competition certainly isn't it. Yes, there is a winner, but that winner represents all of us. The winners got there because of all of us, and they know and appreciate it. There is an understanding that each one of us has a part on stage, virtually naked, proud and humble, with every demonstration. A part of my standing bow is trembling under the spotlight from the time it hits the first child to when the last woman shuffles off the tiny yoga mat taped to the palatial wood stage. I literally tighten my knee when I see a competitor shifting in standing head-to-knee, I feel proud when Gianna completes a full standing splits in bow. One could argue my tightened knee-cap will not help and I have no right to feel pride in another's actions. I will argue, they need my strength and my love.

It is that sort of spirit I find, waiting in the airy side-door waiting for my name to be called, as yogis twice my age, twice my size, half my experience, three times my hardships, seven times my strength, hug, kiss, wish me well and love me with all their beings, with all their honesty. In their hearts, they are about to walk on stage with me.

After the last of us joined the audience, leaving the warm-up room empty, things got chaotic as they are apt to do when one person organizes an entire regional. As if in sympathy, my mental faculties began to digress from hunger; I had not eaten since the evening prior. My brain had long since abandoned its post inside my skull and the hole left in its place was calling for Chipotle. I had been eating raw for a week* so, with the promise of a burrito the size of my head looming over the horizon, it was taking all my strength not to take the microphone and unceremoniously announce winners according to who's leotard I thought was the prettiest.

After the ceremony, of which I did not ruin, possibly my greatest accomplishment that day, a few of us ate ravenously at Chipotle before heading home. Post competition libations were consumed in a beer garden (rain be damned) and I got to bed after 22 consecutive waking hours.

At the risk of turning this blog into a cheese-fest, I would like to formally say, "thank you" to my instructors, fellow yogis, friends, family and the boy, making special note to those yogis to whom I have met only in passing, yet still show amazing interest in me, as they must to everyone. It takes an open heart to put that much love into every person you meet and I am grateful.

*Full disclosure: there were two relapses 1. pizza 2. bread with peanut butter.