Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Maha booty

Yoga pants cost an obscene amount of money, generally speaking.  My skill at rationalizing purchases of said-obscenely priced items can be extraordinary, but lately I've been unwilling to come up with my usual story about how essential it is to trade hard-earned cash for close-fitting exercise togs.  

And yet, last week, there came a point, 6 minutes before class started one evening, when my own physical discomfort drove me to grab a new pair from the shelf in the studio and lay down $73 for what are, essentially, pyjamas.  I was so much more at ease as a result, sad but at ease.

I have, shall we say, outgrown most of my current yoga pants, the pants that fill an entire drawer in my room, essential when one practices 5 times a week in public classes (ideal) and at home (ok, only rarely).  [In case you missed it, that was an example of rationalization.]

Yes, outgrown.  For whatever reason -- I still don't know exactly why, but place responsibility on my low-functioning thyroid, recently-uncovered Vitamin D deficiency, and on my advancing age, and also, if I'm being honest, on the fact that since Jasper died (hate that word), I am not hiking or walking consistently -- I have gained weight in pants-places.  Most of the time I am just uncomfortable, constantly aware of it. Sometimes the awfulness of it for me wakes me from my sleep.  I am just that fucked-up in the head, I suppose.

So there I was, at 6:09pm, throwing on pants for 6:15 class.  Because I was moving quickly, the color choice was nothing special, a dark blue.  Dark colors are slimming, right?

But there I was, going up a size.

That's what I've been foolishly avoiding, avoiding confronting what is, in favor of holding onto what is clearly not happening any more.

As recompense for squaring myself to what is [thanks, Abby, that's your voice inside my head], can I just say that I was so much more comfortable throughout class?  No fiddling with the waistband of the pants, no constant yarding-down of the top, no anxiety about exposure in inverted poses.  I was more at ease, less guarded and buzzing with a low-level of unhappiness, less constricted.

But a size bigger and $73 poorer.

If there's a time for new pants, I'm afraid this is really it. [More rationalization.]

I tell myself, though, that I could save money and just lose the weight.  But let's be honest: I'm not losing the weight.  I am still too paralyzed to hike alone in our hills.  I can't walk around the neighborhood like I did for years, except in the company of Jassie's ghost, and it's still too painful.  I can't eat less, since I just can't muster the give-a-shit to put myself through that.  So it's down to acceptance, to squaring myself to what is, to accepting myself.

To being a size larger.

This is an excellent opportunity to put everything into practice, everything that I've been studying for years.  If I'm perfect just as I am, then I'm perfect with a fatter ass.  The fatter ass is perfect.  [OK, that's a hard one for me, ok, just sayin'.]  Things change, people change, asses change.  It's all good.  That's life, etc., etc., etc.  But now, using myself as the material, I have to mean it.  And that, my friends, ain't easy.

Lo and behold, three days after my big purchase (oh ha ha ha, in more ways than one), imagine my own delight/irritation that there was suddenly 75% off items on the sale rack at the very same studio.  [Rationalization: now I had no excuse not to step up and accomodate reality.]  For less than I spent on the first pair of fat-pants (and I mean that lovingly), I bought two more pairs, including a bright pink pair (sale rack, after all)  + a cute t-shirt.  How's that for squaring to what is?

So I throw down the gauntlet to myself.  Yeah, I'm rocking bigger pants (for now), but I'm not going down quietly.  I'm going to be comfortable, and hot-pink, if that's what it takes, taking my place in the front row with as much acceptance as I can muster, busting bigger poses with my bigger butt.

XX

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