She wakes early on a Sunday, when she wants to sleep in, and mumbles that an hour and a half of Yoga is asking too much. Still, she moves downstairs in bare feet and loose clothing and quiet. She hopes, begs, prays that it will stay quiet.
Sliding in the DVD, she steps onto her mat and waits for Mr. Exercise Guru to appear. He is loud and moves too fast to be a real yoga instructor, but he promises strength and balance and “the ride of your life.” And, she wants all that, the good and the exciting, wants to clear her mind like he says she should. But, she fast-forwards through his pep talk, knowing time is of the essence; sooner rather than later, someone in her house will stir.
Three stretches and one Warrior pose into the routine, she is sweating and meditating and grateful for the solitude, when the door to the TV room creaks open. “You’re doing Yoga?” her son asks. She sighs and he sighs, and then he plops onto the couch. He knows his morning cartoons will be delayed now, but he stays anyway. Watching Yoga on TV is better than watching no TV at all, he says.
With this audience at her back, she stumbles through Crescent poses and painful Right Angle stances and too many Downward Dogs to count. He offers pointers and critiques. Fluffs a pillow, pulls at the lint in his sock. He asks for breakfast.
She relents and hits pause.
When she returns to Yoga, she settles into breathing and balancing and holding. Through the Tree stance and the Royal Dancer. She is good at the Royal Dancer. And, she wonders, in another life, could she have been a ballerina?
Having finished his breakfast, her son wanders back in and finds her gasping and grunting with her leg out in front in a toe lock. He laughs and dances the Limbo underneath her wobbly thigh. Twice.
She refuses to do the Half Moon.
“You should try, at least,” he says.
She skips past the Crane.
“Impossible,” she tells him.
They both do the Happy Baby and rock.
Well into the final stretching, her breathing rhythmic and her son quiet again, she falls into a calm. She is bent over, enjoying the feel of a hamstring well-worked, when the door creaks open a little wider this time.
Tiny feet travel the floor to her mat, and a small arm slips around hers. Bending over, too, like her mama, her daughter says there’s not enough room for them both, says she needs the mat.
“Yoga has become a group event,” she says out loud, more to herself than to her daughter, “Five more minutes.” That’s all she needs. “And, no talking,” she says. “Sit on the couch with your brother—and, no fighting! After, you can have the mat.”
She lies flat, then, and closes her eyes and breathes deep into the Corpse pose.
Five seconds.
Tens seconds.
Fifteen.
“Why are you so quiet, Mommy?” her daughter asks.
“I’m supposed to be quiet,” she says. “I’m not supposed to move.” She sighs. She opens one eye. “So, shhh.”
She breathes.
She concentrates.
She feels them both move in close.
Her son sits on one side and walks his fingers up her arm. Her daughter leans against her shoulder and feather’s her mama’s eyelashes with her tiny index finger.
They are quiet.
And, reverent.
And, meditative.
And, somewhere between the yin and the yang – between two, small bodies – she finds her center.
* Photo credit: Roxanneh on morguefile.com
Happy Mother’s Day.