The Princess and the Locust

So I finally made it to yoga last night.

I love the slightly sensual smell of incense, the dimly lighted room, the warm, blonde wood floor....

I hate the fucking bendy people.

Me = Not Really Bendy At All.

We had a new instructor (hope the last regular lady's o.k., given the crisis last week!) and she kicked my ass. She made us hold poses a lot longer than the other (nicer, I might add, and I'll just throw a "prettier" on there, too, while I'm at it) instructor. It hurt.

Yoga is supposed to be about your personal growth, you focus on yourself, and every little bit you improve is your own personal success story for the day. It is not competitive.

My ass.

Every time I do something better than the person next to me (rarely) I feel quite smug. Every time the person next to me does something better (almost always) I secretly hope they'll fall while their leg is wrapped around their other leg 14 and a half times, knocking what I imagine are the very subtle traces of a smug look off their face.

Is that just me?

So anyway, about half way through, my left leg wussed out. I was in the zone, my arms and right leg were all game, all, "Ooh, sweat! Feels good! We can do this!" My left leg was like, "Oh hell no. I quit. And I will shake the rest of you until you join me on the couch." So I am sitting there, next to all these Zen-ed out balanced people, shaking like I'm experiencing my own, private, little earthquake.

At one point the instructor comes over to help push down on my feet, while I'm doing this pose that looks like a feeble attempt to play Superman. (If only there were a green screen and not a mirror behind me!) Her support on your feet is supposed to help you lift the rest of your body via your abs (abs? You really think I have those?) and get an extra stretch.

The instructor had been talking in this calm, half-asleep voice the whole evening, which, I think, is the only kind of voice ever heard in that room, when all of a sudden (as she's holding my feet down) she goes, "WHOA! Your left leg is going NUTS!" In a a voice more reserved for, "Look! Armed aliens just walked out of that spaceship!" The whole class turns to see me shake like I'm Superman on a Gallon Of Caffeine.

Beat that, suckas. I've taken Locust Pose to a whole new level.

Once class let out, I met The Funasaurus at the grocery store. Where my left leg continued to sulk, independent of the rest of my body, by occasionally giving out in the most inconvenient places, like the middle of aisle 13. Awesome. The Funasaurus just acted like he didn't know me. I feel like that's been happening to me a lot, recently.

Now my coworker thinks we're going for a run at lunchtime. I may have a hard time explaining to her why my left leg kicked her in the ass on the way out the door. I swear it's not me.