No Yogurt or Yoda jokes, please

Two weeks ago I decided to embark on a new adventure and start taking yoga classes. I know, weird. My whole life up to this point has been about making myself as inflexible as possible while keeping toxicity levels in my body as high as possible. Yoga negates all of that. What caused this shift? Getting older? My new hat? No, it was my friend Jacqueline. She came to visit three weeks ago and had arms like Linda Hamilton in Terminator. I was afraid she had started doing steroids, but no, it was just yoga. I decided I wanted to look like that.

My first yoga class was amazing. And not just because I sweat more than I ever thought possible. And not because I could touch my toes by the end without wincing. I felt absolutely amazing. Energized. Happy. Lighter. Stronger. I wanted to run right out and buy all the yoga clothes and mats and other accouterments immediately. I wanted to blog about it. But I stopped myself. You see, I have this habit of doing something once and declaring it my new life path. Then I drop it when it gets hard or get bored with it. Guitar lessons are the first thing to spring to mind. So, I decided to hold off. I purchased a ten class pass and vowed that if I finished it then I could go completely overboard and spend thousands of dollars on stuff.

I am now half way through the pass. I am still sweating like a pig and my core and arms are still as weak as an infant's, but I'm sticking with it. I like the fact that I am so busy thinking about my breathing and holding the pose that my mind almost stops running. I even stop thinking up snarky comments. And there is a lot to be snarky about, because Yoga attracts some weirdos.

There is the holier than thou "super breather." You can tell them because of the Sanskrit tattoos and the fact they start breathing with noise before the class even begins. It's like sitting next to a sucking chest wound. Then there are the "show offs." They twist themselves into pretzels, even if the position is just standing. They also never sweat, and never smile. And then there are the farters. I know yoga is all about relaxing and stretching the body, and that sometimes that can cause emissions no one means to release. But there is a group of yoga devotees who have the "everything the body does it wonderful" attitude and see flatulence as important to yoga as the downward dog. I had heard of these farters, but until tonight I had never experienced one first hand. The completion of each pose was punctuated with a loud fart. I think he even smiled as he did it. At first everyone tried to ignore it, but then it started to rattle people. It was hard to concentrate on breath when you didn't really want to breathe in. Finally the instructor turned on the swamp cooler to block out the sound and get air circulating in the room.

But even farters won't deter me from taking more yoga classes. Although I might start putting Vicks under my nose -- just in case.