Day 5: A (yoga) pedicure’s life

Day 5 yoga toes

I made it through the first 5 days of my yoga challenge, and my pedicure still looks pretty good, huh?

Day 3 of my challenge, my sister joined me. She’s a few years older than me and had never done yoga before. Her “thing” was running. Unfortunately, she broke her ankle over Thanksgiving and has been desperate to do something to get active again. Over a text on Tuesday afternoon, I suggested she join me at Bikram Yoga Rockville. She said yes!

After she said yes, I wrote that if she liked the class, I would buy her a mat as an early birthday gift. (Her birthday isn’t until the end of June. Bribes help motivation, what can I say?) After Wednesday’s class,  she really liked it. She’s gone 3 times in the past 5 days and has a nicer yoga mat than I do!

Another highlight from the weekend: I did a double. I attended the 8 a.m. AND the 10 a.m. classes on Saturday morning. About 30 minutes into the first class, I was having doubts about attending a second class in the same day. My left thigh was sore, and the room seemed hotter than usual. (Yes, you CAN feel the difference between 100 degrees and 105 degrees.) Then my mind started wandering. I started thinking about the movie The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. What a tragic film! I could feel tears welling up inside of me as I remembered the scene when Benjamin and Daisy were both the same age (roughly 30) and they had their child and then Benjamin leaves.

“Jesus, Paula! Stop thinking about that movie. And please don’t think about the end of the movie, okay?”

And then Daisy at age 60 caring for toddler Benjamin… and then tiny infant Benjamin…and then his last breath. The tears were flowing but easily camouflaged by the sweat dripping down my face. It felt good, the crying. I refocused my breathing and realized a second class is just what my body and mind needed.

The second 90 minutes was better than the first, and luckily I didn’t drift into thinking about the Button movie or Pan’s Labyrinth (gotta write about THAT film soon). I finished on a high and drove home feeling like I had accomplished more than I imagined I could that day, and it wasn’t even past noon yet!

Tomorrow is my second date with the Art Erase laser. Hopefully, I’ll have a bitter-sweet image of my right forearm to share. To catch up on my tatoo removal journey, read the following posts and laugh at my expense. Namaste!

1. Tatoo, what tatoo?
2. Tatoo removal: The first steps