Brief Encounters of the Exercise Kind Me & the Y & the Yogi…
MY SHORT-LIVED FORAY into the intimidating world of the gym was back in January 2005 when I signed up for the special $40 per month annual plan at the local YMCA on 33rd Street and Queen’s Boulevard.
It was done in a flourish – that flush of post-holiday, hungover, resolution-making madness. Plans to get up at 6.00 a.m. for a brisk pre-work walk on the treadmill were made, then immediately forgotten. And of course by the time the working day was done, the only exercise I cared to think about was filling the kettle and lifting it with one hand onto the stove. So although I gamely went along to the Y on three separate occasions, overall, the membership plan lasted about a month before it was cancelled, with great determination.
On my first visit, I had made the mistake of popping my head around the changing room door to be greeted by a sight somewhat reminiscent of the cover of a Led Zeppelin album circa 1973. Naked bodies. Everywhere. Call me shy, or perhaps just plain uptight, but for all my hippie Woodstock-wistful ways, I’m not the kind of girl can carry on an earnest conversation about the delays on the 7 train, or the unpredictable New York weather, while toweling myself down in public wearing nothing but a pair of rubber flip flops. So initial doubt set in about whether this gym business was really for me. Needless to say, no exercising was done that day apart from a swift trot along the snowy boulevard back to my apartment.
On my second attempt, I signed up for the complimentary training session on offer with one of the Y’s in-house personal trainers. The experience was educational but not encouraging. At one point, he had me standing against a big blue sphere like object, which I was supposed to move slowly to the floor using my back and the muscles in my knees. After three half-hearted attempts my bones cracked and I fell over sideways and asked not to be moved for at least half an hour so I could regain my shattered composure. No sooner had I struggled back to my feet, than it was time for pasta and a DVD, preceded by another speedy power walk towards the safety of my sofa at home.
Finally, a week or so later, I returned, determined to complete an hour experimenting with the muscle machines followed by fifteen minutes plowing up and down on the device that looked like a walking bicycle. I even had an unread copy of People Magazine with me to provide much needed moral support. The problem was, it was the busiest time of day at the Y, and the place was full of toned toasted creatures striding about and exuding complete confidence from every finely tuned pore of their fitness.
Egg-shaped, maybe, but I was certainly dressed for the part - black hipster style track suit bottoms, a cute black T and a gleamingly unused pair of Reeboks (picked up half price at Marshalls the previous weekend). So with a degree of misplaced aplomb, I marched up to one of the medieval style bicep building contraptions and took steely possession. As I was wondering where my arms went, and whether I was actually sitting on it the right way round, I noticed an impatient looking perma-tanned Adonis had appeared beside me. Bottle of water in hand, he rolled his eyes and looked at me. Then at his watch and then at me again with a pointed sigh. I exhaled deeply and stretched, to give the impression that I had just finished a strenuous work out. “That was a tough one. It’s all yours.” I said, hopping off. Pretending to be out of breath, I made a quick play of dusting it all down lightly with my towel, hoping that this evident knowledge of gym-room etiquette would disguise the lack of sweat anywhere close to the vicinity. And so I left again, this time with a detour via The Gaslight on my hasty route homewards.
That day, the decision was made to take a break from exercise for a while. The stress involved was far more damaging health wise than any benefit to be gained from all that physical torment. To offset my laziness, I undertook to consume a good healthy portion of spinach and pomegranate juice daily and to walk up the escalators to work rather than standing still to enjoy that last minute early morning doze.
Two years later, when my friend Elena, a highly skilled yoga instructor, offered to give me a private introductory yoga lesson in the gentle confines of her living room, I couldn’t have been more delighted. Yoga struck me as a perfect form of exercise, given that most of the time would be spent lying down, striving for the mental enlightenment that would manifest itself in dramatic weight loss and an all over sense of zen-like wellbeing. Full of enthusiasm I went straight to Whole Foods and invested in a black yoga mat and matching shoulder carrier with silver circles that I guessed reflected the eternal spiral of life.
Having once chastised my drooping posture, Elena greeted me with an unnerving zeal when I arrived at her door on a sunny Sunday afternoon. I was full of readiness for an hour of what I assumed would involve standing like a star, turning to the side and pointing before reclining to my mat in the corpse like pose and staring at the ceiling thinking about clouds and how I would like to return to this world if I was reincarnated. Sadly, it was not to be.
Yoga is deceptively challenging, especially to the uninitiated. Elfin and sprite like, Elena demonstrated every pose with an easy grace and then stood back patiently and perhaps frowningly observing, as I clumsily attempted to do the same, while audibly struggling not to collapse into a sweaty, broken stupor on the floor. She had me do Warrior Poses, Triangle Poses, Sun Salutation Poses, using bricks for balance, straps for stretches... And that was all in the first five minutes. It was the longest, most demanding hour of my life. To finish, was a valiant effort to arrange myself into a shaky shoulder stand, which came precariously close to toppling a shelf full of books and knocking myself - and her - out in the process. Thankfully, we all survived, furniture included. That said, I spent the next two weeks nursing aching muscles and waddling around Sunnyside like I was in flippers.
Hopefully, though, in two more years, I’ll be ready to progress to a more senior level. Probably with a physiotherapist, so as not to endanger or cause undue distress to innocent yoga instructors - thus protecting myself from any potential liability for damage to person or property.
