Over the past 24 hours, I did some healthy things: I showered. I ate healthy foods. I took my master's degree info off of my resume, and I've started to use my actual physical master's degree as scratch paper.
Oh, and I did Bikram today.
My mood has been in the toilet as of late due to my lack of employment and dismal financial state, and I'm constantly amazed at how going to Bikram really brings those emotions to the surface. There must be something about all of that organ compression, bending, stretching and sweating that forces you to deeply feel all of the emotional shit you're going through. Bikram doesn't allow you to ignore anything that's going on with both your physical and mental self--it's cheap therapy. By the time you're done with class, you're too blissed out to give shit about your troubles for a few hours. Or you're too exhausted to care. With me, it's a combo platter of the two.
I held it together during the opening breathing exercise, but during this pose, the desire to scream my fool head off was overpowering. I tried to concentrate on falling back, go back, way back, but it was tough to do when all I could see was me in the stockade for defaulting on my student loans. The other images sloshing around in my noggin were of me, living in a VW van in a trailer park just outside of Mattoon, Illinois, making & selling sweaters made of out my cats' fur. As I wrapped my forearms around my calves in this part of the pose, I saw myself sleeping in the van in an old army-issue sleeping bag & a large bag of rice as a pillow. I had one cat snuggled up in one armpit and the other was on top of my head, you know, for warmth. The windows of the van were blacked out by numerous rejection emails I printed out for added entertainment and a constant reminder of my failings as a journalist. Seriously, what was I thinking when I considered this career? What a mah-roon! What a nin-cow-poop.
After this pose was finished and as I focused my gaze on one spot in the mirror, I gave myself the finger. Ahh ... self-loathing. There's a certain dignity to it.
The rest of the standing series was just super peachy keen and I'm constantly surprised how physically powerful I am--even with my sizable ass and advancing age. Huge strength. Amazing. At one point, I allowed myself to notice the other students and realized that my ass wasn't the largest in class. Seriously, it's the little victories like this which keep me from taking a dip in the Chicago River in a lead bathing suit.
Tears mixed with sweat in the eyes really bite. Hard. I felt like someone had lobbed some pepper into my hazels for shits and giggles. Pretty damn painful, folks. However, my face was planted into my mat so no one was the wiser. I just plowed through and tried like hell to get the images of me selling my collection of F. Murray Abraham thumbnail portraits out of my mind. I can't bring myself to do it--I just can't.
What am I gonna do now? Don't know. I really don't. The fact that I wasted all that time & money on a useless degree really sucks and I'm angry I did it. The bile in my throat is started to burn more because I don't see things getting better for me. I do know one thing though--I'm gonna keep going back to Bikram every day because it's the only thing that truly makes sense at the moment.
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