Freaks and Geeks
“They” say that everyone has a special gift, and I have several: the ability to sleep Indian-style; a Rain Man-like memory; an uncanny awareness of strange genetic diseases; and a freak radar that empowers me to hone in on the most upsetting and disturbing individuals within my five-mile radius. On an alarming number of occasions, those individuals have been my friends and boyfriends. Most of the time, they merely leave me temporarily unable to eat or sleep. Other people seem able to block out or quickly forget about these unfortunates, but I remain haunted by lost, lonely-looking elderly people; spinsters; handicapped, retarded and cancer-stricken children; people eating by themselves in public; people riding the bus by themselves at night; mentally ill people; the homeless; and anyone I deem to be oppressed (Muslim women in burkas, Hassidic women toting eight kids and wearing itchy wigs, women who are 9 months pregnant in the middle of a heatwave).
This “gift” has plagued me as far back as I can remember. The earliest and most definitive example I can give you is the man from the Friendly’s on South Avenue, whose image is causing me to tear up even decades after the last time I saw him. Every single time I dined there – whether it was after school with Jan and Jamie, for dinner (the Early Bird Special) with my grandma on Saturdays, or late at night after a high school cruise through the Watchung Reservation – he was there too, alone. He was roughly middle-aged at the time, with dyed black hair, a dark complexion and a severe limp for which he used a cane.
It was bad enough that Friendly’s seemed to be the mainstay of his diet. It was bad enough he was crippled and bad enough he was always eating his sad little sandwich or hamburger by himself. But the clincher came at dessert time. Without fail, the smallest of the Friendly’s sundaes – the Happy Ending Sundae – would arrive at his table a few minutes after he finished his entrée. For reasons that I still don’t fully understand, this memory of the sundae’s arrival is among my most poignant.
Since then, anytime I’ve witnessed something of this nature – something sad to me but not tragic – I’ve referred to it as a “Happy Ending Sundae Story.” This categorization is often misunderstood, because its inclusion of the word “happy” does in fact imply an element of “happiness.” But make no mistake: there is NO mirth in a Happy Ending Sundae Story.
Jan claimed that she saw the man from Friendly’s driving around town with a wife and children, but I think she just told me that to make me feel better. I do wonder though, from time to time, if he ever went home to this theoretical family and said, “Every time I go to Friendly’s there’s this creepy little girl there, staring at me with a look of pity on her face …”
Another tale from the ice cream freezer … in the next, slightly more upscale town over from where I grew up, there was a brand- spankin’ new ice cream purveyor called Haagen-Dasz. And Haagen-Dasz, being all foreign and shit (or so we thought in 1982), was faaaancy. I mean people, they sold BOYSENBERRY ice cream. This town also had its own resident schizophrenic. I didn’t know he was schizophrenic – I just thought he was odd – but that’s what Lew told me when I’d sadly watch him lumber around the town center. The man was bearded with pocked skin, had a very clumsy gait and always wore too-tight, too-short khakis, black orthopedic shoes, a short-sleeved plaid shirt, and Coke bottle glasses.
One day, my friend Bethany and I were partaking of a frozen afternoon treat when the man got on line behind us. At the time, the custom-ordered ice cream bars, dipped in warm milk or dark chocolate and then coated with your choice of crumbled candy toppings, were all the rage among the tween set. But for an adult?! Unheard of. Yet that’s what he ordered. This in itself wouldn’t have been the worst thing in the world – it was the way he ordered it. I can still hear him to this day saying, “Uh … uh … a vanilla bar please.” Needless to say Bethany enjoyed both hers and mine that day.
At the Bagel Chateau in the same town, a soft-spoken college girl with a severe under-bite and noticeably skinny wrists worked at the cash register. Snotty customers were always snapping at her, and she would get flustered, which made me feel sorry for her. Her cash register post also called upon her beverage preparation skills. Every day that summer, Jan requested a fresh-brewed ice tea, so finally, the kindly girl poured said beverage ahead of time and had it waiting for Jan when it was her turn to pay. That, of course, was the day Jan wanted a Diet Coke.
On the train coming back from Washington just last week, my Spidey sense located TWO Happy Ending Sundae stories. One was the geriatric woman sitting next to me. She slept most of the way, but woke up every 20 minutes or so, pulled out a Tupperware container, took two bites of what smelled and looked like blondies and zucchini bread, sipped from a Tupperware/Rubbermaid water bottle, then went back to sleep. Someone had obviously put her on the train and made sure she had sustenance for the whole ride. The other was a man, also with a severe underbite, who couldn’t close his mouth all the way and chewed extra loudly as he ate a giant bag of generic Dorito-esque Party Mix, most of which ended up in his beard. He, obviously, couldn’t afford name-brand Doritos and had probably saved up his whole life for this one train ride.
There was the girl in my class who had no bladder control. I don’t mean she was a 1st-grader still having accidents. I mean she was 10 and had some sort of condition – involving a third kidney, it was rumored – that left her unable to know when she had to go to the bathroom. You can imagine how nice the other kids were about this. To make matters worse, she chose to go by a nickname that just about HAD to be paired with “Wetsy.” The kids truly tortured her, and one day, it got to me. I guess I couldn’t help but feel there was a little bit of her in all of us, and while I wasn’t strong enough to stand up for my picked-on self, I could do it for her. So I stepped out of line on the way to the playground and told one of the 4th-grade bad asses to shut up and leave her alone. It was the first and only time I ever had detention. The next day, the girl came up to my desk and asked, “Would you like a green apple jelly bean?” I remember being very touched by this gesture and accepting the bean, but then being afraid to eat it because I thought it might have had pee on it.
My sensitivity to the sad-sacked didn’t always result in kindness or appreciation. Around the same time that Peegate went down, a particular group of girls took to ganging up on me for no apparent reason. Let me tell ya – it’s real nice when girls gang up on one another. Real nice. I’m just thankful we didn’t have Facebook back then. They took turns being “the boss” and declaring who in the class should be ostracized. It was always me. (Remember, this was pre-braces, flat-iron and undereye concealer.) One time – ONE LONE TIME – they turned against a girl named Susan instead. Recognizing the pain and horror of Susan’s position, I disobeyed the “no talk” decree and made an extra effort to be nice to her. It was great for about two hours, at which point the gang reinstated Susan and returned to their hatred of me. I assumed that Susan would stick up for me, now that I’d stood up for her. But I remember her running away from me and saying, “I don’t know what to tell you Traci. No one likes you now.”
I’m quite sure that not one of the Happy Ending Sundae Story victims I’ve described here has any recollection of me. But I’ve never been able to forget them. And there are MANY more.
I saw these in person yesterday.
But every now and then, almost always in New York, it goes without saying, I’ll witness someone so odd that the rest of the world notices too, and for whom I just can’t conjure any feelings of empathy. I don’t like when this happens, because it makes me feel like a terrible person, but it’s beyond my control at times. Yesterday on the subway, I sat across from the creepiest man I’ve ever seen in my life. He was in his late 60s or early 70s, thin, muscular, and bald on top. The hair that he did have, on the side of his head and in back, was silver and very long. He had secured it in a ponytail with a leopard-print scrunchie, and his fingernails were freakishly long. The set of his lips made him look like he’d just tasted a really sour lemon. He was sporting the following: a skin-tight, polyester tank top with images of Marilyn Monroe silkscreened all over it. A polyester, skin-tight Speedo-shaped bathing suit or undergarment, black, with a neon polka dot motif. Knee-high running socks with stripes at the top and vintage sneakers. A dozen colored, plastic bracelets and rings. And ginormous Dame Edna glasses like the ones pictured here. He really wasn’t bothering anyone – in fact he was intently reading the New York Times – but the two women on either side of him got up, preferring to stand than be contaminated by his creepiness. I could see that everyone in the car was looking at him. I wished that I could feel bad for him. I certainly wouldn’t want people to run away from me like that. But I just couldn’t.
NBC Order
First of all, I promised I’d dedicate this post to Keith, who goes to sleep much earlier than I do and is quite cute.
I also must admit that I am double-fisting between WordPress and the last NBC episode of Medium (which will reappear on CBS this fall). It’s not right, I know. But I desperately need to find out the fate of the du Bois family and Allison’s brain tumor. I also desperately need to share this brief tale, as there will never be a more appropriate occasion.
Side note/spoiler alert: the tumor is benign, but Allison is in a coma after suffering a stroke during surgery.
A little more than 15 years ago, in the frigid winter of 1994, I was a college senior in baggy, used Levi’s, dark brown lipstick and Doc Martens. I had spent the last four years surrounded by short, stocky, dark-haired, middle class Jewish boys in backwards baseball caps who wanted no part of me. (I’ve always suspected things would have gone a different way if my boobs had been more reminiscent of a Hungarian shtetl peasant’s, but what can ya do?) The unrequited loves of my college life had graduated the year before, and I lacked diversion. I couldn’t stand being there anymore but was terrified of the real world, I lived with the knowledge that Jan thought I was fat, I couldn’t sleep, I was depressed, and my friends had had it with me. Good times.
But there was one lone light in my life. We met during a bout of insomnia, when I turned on the little pink TV my grandma had scored when she opened a checking account. He made me laugh. He introduced me to people I’d never otherwise have met. He was an underdog, just like me. Physically, he couldn’t have looked more different from the people around me. He was nine years older than me, 6′4, with red hair, freckles and pasty skin. He was, as someone famous once said, the least Jewish-looking person you could imagine. But he’d gone to Harvard, he was the son of a doctor and a lawyer, and his little brother had gone to the prom with my friend Lauren.
The not-so-little talk show host who could
His name was Conan O’Brien, and I seemed to be the only person in the world who thought he was funny. Rumors of cancellation swirled around me, and I felt a certain kinship — he was the celebrity equivalent of me. Smart, lovable and misunderstood. He just needed more time! People mocked me when I told them I found his wit chuckle-worthy, much as they mocked me at the height of my Duran Duran obsession. On our spring break that year, Kiki, Wendy, Jen, Lisa and I were fortunate enough to attend a Late Night taping. I was very concerned beforehand that we wouldn’t be able to get tickets. The NBC page laughed when I expressed this concern and told me they’d been PAYING people to sit in the studio audience and clap on cue.
In June of that year I went again, and this time, actually got to shake hands with and talk to the giant comedic genius.
“I went to school in Boston too,” I said, sure that he’d find this FASCINATING and a sign of our soulmate-hood.
This prompted Conan to ask me if I was Irish, and I wondered briefly how someone who’d gone to Harvard could look at ME and pose such a silly question.
The first and only thing I could think to say was this: “No, but I use Irish Spring soap.”
Hey, it’s better than what I said to Pete Sampras.
Not surprisingly, this did not compel him to get down on one knee and propose.
“You’re my idol,” I blurted out.
And even Conan himself could only reply with, “Please. Let’s not get crazy here.”
No one thought he’d make it. But I believed in him. I knew he could do it. And tonight, Conan O’Brien has become the 5th host of the Tonight Show — the loftiest position in post-prime time television. This is one small step for a dork, and one giant step for dork-kind. I’m kvellin’ like Magellin’.
But you should know that in addition to feeling certain I’d one day be an O’Brien, I also fantasized about being discovered by Conan. So I decided to send him some of my brilliantly comedic writing samples. Except of course that I had none, so I had to be crafty.
Andy Richter, Sidekick Extraordinaire
There was no time to develop full-fledged sketches or sit-com scripts; I’d have to convey my unparalleled genius some other way. I remembered a brain game I’d once played at camp. It involved the penning of a poem or song containing 26 words, in alphabetical order. The fate of my comedy writing career lay with this gem of a plan, executed with a Macintosh SE and dot matrix printer, late one night in Waltham, MA. I think we all know what the fate of my comedy writing career turned out to be. But this, ladies and gentlemen, is my 1994 alphabetical Ode to Conan — mailed to Rockefeller Center, signed for by someone in the mailroom and never seen again until right this minute.
At Banter, Conan’s Deft. Educated Finely, Graduated Harvard. Imparts Jokes. Kismet! Letterman Moves, Now O’Brien Presides. Quipping Richter, Sidekick. Throw Us, Very Witty Xanthrocroid, Your Zeal.
Open ID 911
Can someone offer a tip or two about Open ID? I can’t figure out how to get one, or what mine is if in fact I already have one. I thought it was just the Letter T’s URL plus my WordPress password, but that doesn’t seem to be working. Please advise!
Nuts and Dirt
Please excuse the rather banal nature of these last few “demi-posts.” It’s just that I haven’t had time to craft an official post but don’t want to suffer a relapse of ablogorrhea. I am currently waiting out the painfully slow process of uploading email lists to our e-marketing program. I really can’t do much until the process is complete, so I thought I’d share two concerns that are now plaguing me.
At approximately 10:28 a.m. yesterday, I was enjoying a Greek yogurt/honey/granola parfait from Starbucks. Just as I finished the last bite, I espied the Google News headlines about the pistachio-related salmonella outbreak.
Phew! I am so glad I never eat pistachios! Salmonella totally sucks!
As I trashed the empty plastic cup that had previously contained my breakfast, I noticed something terrifying.
Frick on a nut-dipped stick! What is that small, green, sunflower seed-shaped item clinging to the side of the cup?!
I began to hear the faint strains of the slow, foreboding music that always preceded trouble on the “Brady Bunch.” The music grew more ominous as the reality hit me: I had, in fact, just consumed at least a handful’s worth of the very nut that was caught in the maelstrom of public discourse. I might even be Patient Zero. OMFG.
But wait. There’s more. Before boarding the subway this morning, I noticed with shock that, while there were no seats, of course, there was a reasonably comfortable amount of standing space. I secured a spot and was delighted that no one was exhaling garlic-breath directly in my face.
I thought too soon. A foul-smelling homeless man came stumbling down the aisle, holding a half-eaten Boston Kreme donut in one hand and a filthy-looking tissue in the other. (In case you’re wondering, I did NOT try to bite into his donut, but I did think about it.) You can guess which spot he chose for his commute downtown. That’s right — the same spot I was occupying. I tried to gently and subtly relocate, but was not able to do so on account of the the train’s rapid, bumpy motion.
Fine, I thought. I’ll just move at the next stop.
Unfortunately, there was enough time between 86th and 77th Streets for contamination to occur. The homeless man, about to lose his balance after a particularly violent lurch, went to grab the pole with his tissue-holding hand but instead grabbed MY NAKED HAND.
Ew! A thousand times, ew! Blech! Yuck!
I had intended to wash my hands — under boiling water — immediately upon arriving at work. But then I got sucked into the vortex of professional Twitter use and absentmindedly began to eat my yogurt-blueberry muffin. It was a good few bites before I realized which germy, disgusting, filthy, amputation-worthy hand I was using to serve myself.
So I ask you, my loyal readers, this: what are the odds that my death (and/or Ebola, and/or severe illness) is not imminent?
DNA Analysis
Random question of the day: are Shmoo (of Flintstones fame), the Pillsbury Dough Boy (of flaky crescent roll fame) and the Michelin Man (of tire fame) all made of the same material? What kind of freak genetic similarities would scientists find if all three provided samples from the insides of their puffy white cheeks? Are they relatives? Inbred? Why is one a “man,” one a “boy” and one a “shmoo?” Why is the Michelin Man the only one with fully developed limbs (the PDB has no defined feet, FYI)? Do they know Grimace? Do they eat marshmallows or would they consider that cannibalistic? What are they?! Just curious.
The Wheels on the Bus
In an effort to fuel my blogging momentum, I shall now share a brief New York tale for the “What is WRONG With People?!” files. This morning, in a rare moment of mass transportation luck, I was able to get a solo seat on the 86th Street crosstown bus. This is highly unusual, as the bus is often jam-packed during rush hour. Furthermore, it was a particular blessing today, because I was feeling a bit self-loathing and it meant that the unfairly gorgeous Israeli girl I see every time I ride that bus – the one with the unfairly perfect body and unfairly ginormous Tiffany engagement ring – would be out of my line of vision. I could pretend that my jeans were not ridiculously tight and that my under-eye circles did not really make me look like I had recently used a Sharpie to craft decorative half-moons on my face.
Somewhere after Second Avenue, a woman began invading my personal space as she stood in the aisle, freakishly close to my seat. There was no real reason she needed to do that, but people are odd, so I didn’t think that much of it. She wasn’t old – I’m guessing mid-50s – and had no obvious physical handicaps, and I didn’t think to offer her my seat. I fully admit that this might have been rude, but it was not deliberate – I truly just didn’t think to do it, for whatever reason.
About a nanosecond after I realized she was giving me the evil eye and that I probably should have offered her my seat, I heard a very cute little boy – approximately three and toting a sandwich bag full of toy trucks – tell his nanny that he was quite tired and wished he could sit down. Again, I’m not sure why, but I did tell the little boy he could have my seat since I was getting off at the next stop. He thanked me in the kind of voice I’d give one of my stuffed animals and I knew it was the right thing to do.
But before I could even stand fully upright, the space invader dove into the seat with incredible speed, knocking me off balance and mortifying everyone who saw what happened. She’d heard me tell the little boy he could have the seat. She could SEE that he was just a little boy! She literally stole the seat from him. The surrounding bus riders all called her names and conveyed their disdain for her action. I couldn’t bring myself to look at her face, because I feared she’d say something really mean and my whole day would be ruined. Mostly, I just felt bad for the little boy, who probably didn’t understand why I’d told him he could sit down when in fact, he could not.
“Don’t worry. You’ll get an even better seat in a minute,” I said, and then was very happy when a man much older than the space invader stood up and instructed the little boy to take his newly vacated spot. I continued to feel appalled for the duration of my subway ride downtown to 23rd Street. I snapped out of it only when my boss called to tell me he was picking up Krispy Kremes for our impending trade show meeting.
Unreal. What is WRONG with people?
Meltdown on 84th Street
Each year, for her annual “well-woman” visit, Jan still sees the very same doctor who delivered me. I am always surprised to learn that Doc Baker, of “Little House” fame, is not part of his practice. I’m also always alarmed when I realize that it’s obviously legal to practice medicine well into your 100s. But anyway, much like Jan, I am loyal to my long-time gynecologist, Dr. A. Because I generally see Dr. A roughly once a year, and because these visits inevitably conjure thoughts of child-bearing, I often find myself taking stock of my life while there.
I first met Dr. A in 1996, when I was young, innocent and still hopeful that I’d get married and become a mother before the chances of having a kid with Down’s Syndrome octupled. In the early years of my relationship with Dr. A, I didn’t really pay much attention to pregnant women surrounding me in his waiting room. Their lives were about to suck, as far as I was concerned, and I was just glad I wasn’t them.
I remember once Dr. A walked into the exam room and apologized for being late.
“I had to tell a patient she wasn’t pregnant,” he said.
“Wow. PHEW! Right? Dodged a bullet with that one!” I replied, feeling incredibly relieved on behalf of the unknown patient in question.
“You know,” he informed me, “Some people actually WANT to get pregnant.”
A few second passed as I attempted to process this news.
COME ON! You expect me to believe that?! Sheesh.
Actively wanting to be pregnant was such a foreign concept to me at the time that I literally could not fathom such a possibility.
It’s not that I didn’t or don’t like kids. I happen to be quite fond of them and some are even fond of me as well. It’s just that the whole thing scared the bejesus out of me. Pregnancy and childbirth and breastfeeding filled me with an almost unbearable sense of anxiety. I certainly did not see anything beautiful about pregnancy, between the weight gain and the excessive gas and the puking and the “cankles” and the pooping on the delivery room table. I knew about post-partum depression and the toll kids could take on a marriage. I envisioned my theoretical husband losing all interest in me and my 400-pound body, turning instead to his nubile, boob-implanted secretary whose name was always Tiffany or Heather. I knew there were no fewer than 10 bazillion things that could go wrong. And I really, really, really questioned my own parenting ability. What if my child turned out like me?! I shuddered to think. How could I risk doing that to someone?
People told me that I was going to be a great mother one day, and that my lack of enthusiasm was just the fear talking. I hoped this was true, because what kind of horrible, selfish, sociopathic person didn’t want kids? Jan told me repeatedly that if it was such a horrible ordeal, no one would do it. I wasn’t convinced that she herself would have done it if she’d known what a disappointment I’d turn out to be, so this was not particularly comforting.
But the tide began to turn on October 23, 2004. That was the day Sloth dragged me to Bumblefuck, Michigan, where a litter of champion-sired Wheaten terrier puppies had been born six weeks earlier. I agreed to go ONLY because Sloth promised me we’d just be surveying the options. I can’t believe I fell for that bullshit. Once a Wheaten puppy licks your face, you’re doomed.
Happy bday, Ollie!
Ollie could not have been a bigger pain in the ass, and Sloth could not have been less helpful in the puppy-rearing process. For all intents and purpose I was a single doggie mother who easily qualified for Snausage stamps. There were many, many times (usually after the destruction of a pair of costly shoes and/or the eighth indoor pee incident of the day) I really wasn’t sure I could keep him. But at the same time, I felt a kind of love for Ollie I had never before experienced. No matter what he did, ate, tore up or peed on, I could not stay mad at him. When other dogs stole his toys or refused to play with him, I wanted to cry. When other dogs sniffed his nether regions, I was ecstatic that he’d made friends. When he was sick, I drove him by myself to the vet, through the ghettos of South Philly, without batting an eyelash. I went out of my way to patronize supermarkets that carried Frosty Paws. I told endless stories about the cute things he’d done. I truly believed he was the cutest dog in the history of dogs. I created an email address for him (snausagefan@yahoo.com); he corresponded with Jan, Dave, Howie and Jamie on a regular basis. I’m only a little embarrassed to admit that I threw him a first birthday party. He and his canine friends – Howie, LuLu and Dolly – all wore little hats. I’m in no way equating a dog to a human baby, but the point is, for the first time, I finally started to get it. There was a reason everyone did it. There was a flip-side.
A few months after we adopted Ollie, my friend DB called to tell me she was pregnant. I expected to feel the same way I had for many years when friends shared news like this: Oh well. Another one bites the dust. I was shocked to feel something completely unfamiliar to me instead: happiness for her, and a faint hint of jealousy.
Friday morning at Dr. A’s office, I saw an attractive couple come out of the exam room holding a sonogram print-out. They admired the image for a few minutes and then attempted to find a time slot during which they could both be available for some high-tech, supersonic follow-up test. They pulled out their Blackberries and took turns posing different dates, unable to agree on anything until long after the baby’s due date.
At first I found this mockable. Then I picked up some of the helpful pamphlets for expectant mothers and read about such fascinating things as chorionic villus sampling, second trimester terminations, the potentially lethal H.E.L.L.P Syndrome, cord blood, eclampsia, gestational diabetes, and a host of other issues not all that relevant to someone who was not weeks away from giving birth.
What a relief, I thought. I am SO glad I’m not dealing with all this stuff.
But suddenly I found myself getting teary.
What the hell? Eek. I guess the smell of my aging, rotting eggs is irritating my eyes.
Of course, that wasn’t exactly the allergen. It was this realization: I still worry a lot about all the scary things. But I worry more that I’ll never have a real reason to worry about them.
Two Shout-Outs
Congratulations to my very funny friend Lisa and her husband Jeff on the birth of Emmet Samuel, born yesterday!
And congratulations in advance to Melissa on the eve of her Boston nuptials — can’t wait to see the photos and hear highlights from Lauren’s speech!
My Soul-Mat, Part 2
A split-second recap of “My Soul-Mat, Part 1″: I suck at sports.
Sloth found it intolerable that I didn’t want to rollerblade, scuba dive or ski with him. He couldn’t relate at all to my phobia, and thanks to his harping, I came to think of my un-athletic nature as a serious manufacturer’s defect, and remain extremely sensitive about it.
Then I started spending time with the super-sweet K. He is a true and versatile athlete. He runs. He surfs. He does something called urban rebounding. In high school, he was on the football, wrestling and track and field teams. He is in amazing shape and I couldn’t imagine that he’d ever speak to me again if he knew the full extent of my un-coordination.
The other day, he asked me if I wanted to join him for an afternoon yoga class at his gym.
Oh well. This was nice while it lasted.
The truth is, I’d always wanted to try yoga. Multiple gym-going friends told me they thought I’d like it, on account of its ability to reduce tension and the fact that I am somewhat flexible. Then, when I read “Eat, Pray, Love” last fall, I became curious about the balance and clarity it’s supposed to cultivate. Yoga sounded like the perfect thinking woman’s sport. But, being somewhat sloth-like myself, I never motivated.
So this would be my virgin experience. There was a 200 percent chance that I would look like a complete jackass in front of K. Was it worth the risk? WHY, for the love of God, had I not gone with Dave when he’d asked me a bazillion times in Philly? I’d have been a high-ranking yogi with my own ashram by now.
I knew I had to do this. And I wanted to. I was just a smidge anxious.
The first challenge was finding something to wear. I hesitated to even open the drawer in which I keep my limited stash of workout clothes, for fear that doing so would unleash a cartoon dust cloud. I did find a pair of faded black yoga pants that would have been perfectly reasonable had their left thigh not been adorned with some kind of oil stain, most likely from pizza. Ew. But what choice did I have? There was no time to shop for stylin’ yoga gear and skinny jeans were bound to hinder my bending ability.
So, in my flawed Old Navy pantalones and tank top, I headed east. The class started at 5:45. At about 5:30, K told me very matter-of-factly that this particular type of yoga – EarthRise yoga – involved elements of martial arts. A feeling much like the one I get before dentist appointments came over me.
“You mean like, ‘Wax-on-wax-off’ martial arts?” I asked nervously.
“Don’t worry. It’s unlikely you’ll have to smash your head into a block of wood,” he told me reassuringly.
I imagined that at some point in the next hour, smashing my head into a block of wood might seem merciful. But first I had to figure out which side of the yoga mat was supposed to face up. I prayed I would guess correctly, and called upon my intimate knowledge of Dr. Scholl’s shoe inserts, whose material sort of reminded me of the mat’s. Luck was on my side.
Then we sat (in the back, which I felt was safer), as one after another toned, Lululemon-clad girls piled into the room and began to stretch. It seemed unwise for me to expend any energy before the class even started, lest I use it all up. Furthermore, I didn’t know any official stretches, beyond the type that accompanies a yawn. But staring into space made me look creepy, so I compromised by sitting Indian-style on the mat and then bending my head down to my knees.
As I was wondering about the impact of that position on my intracranial pressure and the germ population on the borrowed yoga mat, K commented that most of the other attendees had brought personal water bottles with them. I looked up and saw that the nearest water fountain was about three miles away in the corner of the studio. Getting to it would require me to walk across several rows of experienced yoga-doers, all of whom would then know that I was too thirsty and too clumsy to hold the Crane pose.
Just then I heard the ceiling fans shut off. Crappy McCrapperstein: was this one of those “hot” Bikram yoga classes I’d heard about?! Fabulous. They were going to twist my torso into a pretzel, smash my head into a piece of mahogany and then smoke me out.
Enter the instructor, who is actually the creator of EarthRise yoga. He was covered in tattoos and, on first glance, rather menacing-looking. I watched as he showed off some of the newly inked masterpieces he’d just acquired on his wrists. And I couldn’t tell for sure, but from where I sat, it looked like one of them said, “R.I.P. Traci.”
A very heavy woman came and put her mat down next to mine. I’m really not saying that to be cruel – she was, empirically, “in charge,” as K said later. But she was also an inspiration – I figured that if she could do it, I could too.
And I have to say that it felt great once we got started. The instructor was not at all scary and in fact, very helpful. It was challenging, but do-able, and my muscles were thrilled to be in use. This wasn’t a beginner’s class, so most people knew the poses already. I was at a slight disadvantage because I had to survey the crowd and then try to copy whatever they were doing, which meant that by the time I got into one position, I was supposed to be on the next already. But some of the poses – or asanas, as I learned they were called in the yoga realm – were easy for me (as I assume they would be for anyone). I was quite proud of my performance on Upward-Facing Dog, Downward-Facing Dog, Pigeon and Chair. Others made my legs shake and underscored the sad reality that I’m not nearly as flexible as I thought I was, and not even remotely balanced. I almost toppled over onto K a few times.
But it was a fascinating experience, and I was in awe of what some of the people in the class were able to do with their bodies. I loved the soft, soothing music in the background, the breathing and the fact that I didn’t have to worry about accidentally scoring for the opposing team or missing a ball that was thrown directly at me. If I screwed up, it was just my own spine that would pay the price. It was the first time I had ever engaged in anything physical and not felt like a complete moron. I could actually do this again!
Wow. Yoga could change my life! This could be the start of a new, healthier me! After 36.5 years of trying, I might actually find inner peace. As I rolled from an “Up Dog” to a “Down Dog,” I marveled at how well I’d held up. Sure, I was out of breath and sweating in parts of my body I didn’t know I had, but the class was almost over, I was still conscious and I had overcome my phobia.
“OKAY!,” the instructor said. “Great warm-up!”
My Soul-Mat, Part 1
Note: This is a long post, so I’ve broken it into two riveting parts for your reading convenience. I’d also like to give a special shout-out to my homie R in Rockville. Carry on.
It is surprising to me that this blog has not yet touched on my athletic prowess. Then again, that’s probably because I have none. My past attempts at physical fitness have been marked by humiliation, injury and unintended comedic relief.
I probably don’t need to tell you the point at which I was picked for any “team” in third grade, but I will: never. I am not above admitting that on more than one occasion, I had to be the teacher’s partner, and on those occasions, even the teacher wasn’t too happy about it. But every buck-toothed eight-year-old has her breaking point (literally), and one day, I vowed that things were going to change: I would lead my kickball team to victory. And I would do it in a skirt and Buster Brown shoes that had a habit of coming untied mid-step.
I geared up for my moment of glory all morning, and finally, the time came. A boy named Whitney kicked the ball with the force of a nuclear bomb. Normally, I would have run for my life in the opposite direction, but this time, I ran TOWARD it as fast as I could. I would be the hero! I would be popular! I would … trip on the blacktop, fall flat on my face and land on my front teeth, which in turn, would promptly snap in half. Ick – I still remember the horrible moment of impact. But the good news is that my upper central incisors still bear their original 1981 bonding. I’m a dental relic.
Cut to a gym class Frisbee game in high school. I thought I was making a valiant effort until the he-she teacher pulled me aside.
“Listen – I want you to cut out these shenanigans IMMEDIATELY or I’m giving you detention. You’re being completely disrespectful to me, and to the game of Frisbee.”
Whoa. Shenanigans?! That was a LOW blow. A girl of my ilk and GPA did not engage in “shenanigans.” And far be it from me to dis Frisbee. WTF?
It took me a minute to realize that I looked so palsied trying to throw and catch the Frisbee that she assumed I was being obnoxious. She simply couldn’t comprehend that anyone could be so uncoordinated.
Next up: the infamous Near-Drowning Incident of 1994. To graduate from my college, everyone had to pass a swim test. Don’t ask me why. I really do know how to swim, but have no stamina whatsoever. It never occurred to me that stamina would really come in handy in an Olympic-sized pool.
A week or two before graduation, I finally headed down to gym, envisioning a backyard-sized pool.
Hmm, I thought when I saw it. This pool looks freakishly long. Perhaps it’s an optical illusion of some sort?
It wasn’t. And about three-quarters into the first lap, I realized I was going to die.
Frick on a chlorine-treated stick.
I started to panic, and when I panic, I can’t breathe. Gasping, I gave up on my graceless breast stroke and tried to doggie paddle. The swim coach thought I was drowning and dove in to rescue me. This was not at all mortifying. Nor was the fact that at the same time, all of Zeta Beta Tau was in the pool taking a lifesaving class. I’ll spare you the details of what happened next, but suffice it to say that I do have a bachelor’s degree.
So you can sort of understand why sports have never been among my favorite pastimes. It’s not that I don’t WANT to buy expensive work-out clothes at Lululemon or sport the rock-hard ass of a gym junkie. And I do walk as much as I can. It’s just that I have a bad track record (no pun intended) in this realm and as a result am a fitness-phobe. I have always viewed this phobia as one of my greatest shortcomings and a huge hindrance to my social life. My friends play tennis, ski and go on bike rides together, but I can’t keep up. My boyfriends were cursed with an abnormally clumsy, sedentary companion. Not everyone is willing to take that on – it can be a real problem.
To be continued …
