yogaah!!

so yes... where was i about the fitness (or the lack of it?) and all? yeah well.... in the last few years, i have made numerous attempts to do some form of physical exercise. and no, banging on the keyboard wont count here i am told. i have a yoga dvd, of which i cant do most of what they're doing...i've tried dancing to filmi music... works but i am afraid neighbours will see me and wonder why i am acting crazy....walking in the morning... lasted a few days... walking in the evening... lasted a few more... aerobics... i found it too boring...joining a gym... the trainers were those romeo lecherous body builder types...salsa... lasted a month...and ah well... you get the drift...

for the last few weeks post the neck incident, i have been scouting around for a proper low intensity fitness option. every where i went, power yoga came screaming out at me because of its current popularity with the celebrities. tho it guarantees the fastest weight reduction, with my current state of shoulder and neck, i cant take this easy route out. it apparently makes you sweat like a very intense cardio session. so this power trip was off limits for me.

i now have found, not so close to home, a place where they will teach in small groups of 7-8, yoga to suit the individual need. after a phone call and a detailed personal meeting during which i told them half of my life history, i enrolled for a three times a week class. i told them i had issues with commitment... lets just hope this works!!

what lies beneath?

is a question i am asking myself today. A life interconnected because of a common set of relatives in between...someone a few years older, lets call her R....who was a woman when i was still a girl...who had a boyfriend and a seemingly exciting life when i was still awkward....someone who i kept away from with polite hellos even tho i knew we shared negative vibes... for reasons i dont want to share here and now....

thanks to social networking sites, i got back in touch with R... . we began to chat online quiet frequently over the last 4-5 months. With the stability and security my own life gives me today, i realised that she was as clueless as i was about why we circled each other with mistrust. i was in a safe place, safe enough to lower my guard and strike up a friendship with her. secure enough to know that she was just another person and would in no way make me feel inferior. because in the past, both she and i were very wary of each other and insecure in the other's presence.

the tables had turned. my life was more interesting this time around. and she asked, questions with wonder and appreciation .... told me how much she envied what i was doing....and generally made me feel, she was just another girl being friends with me...and that we do appear contrary to what we actually are as a defense to protect ourselves.

we'd talked over the phone when it got too frenetic to type. we spoke at length about how and why i made the choices i did. i realise now that she hardly said anything about her own. except that she wanted to do something of interest. i told her about starting a home business and all the possibilities it opened up for her. she was excited and we made plans for her to visit me at the end of this month, stay with me and learn all she could about chocolate making. at the end of that conversation, we did say to each other, how refreshing it was to exchange the mistrust for this new found friendship.... and we laughed at the silliness of yesterday....

R took her life yesterday. i still cant believe it. i got a very emotional message from her a few days ago. i asked her why she sent it and she said she was glad we got this second chance and that she found me and friendshop with me.....i wonder what made her do this. was she so alone and helpless? so desperate that she didnt care about living anymore? what was it that made her do this? except tell me her routine, she never spoke about her life....

a life so worthless, that you wanted to discard it? so unhappy with something that you couldnt share it with anyone? i dont know what else to write.... i still have her messages in my phone....

RIP

hiiiii!! how are you??

my market value has gone up since i joined the workforce again...people who once condescendingly asked me, either in person or through social networking sites "what do you do all day?" or "So, how do you spend your time?" (not that i did nothing? i ran a very successful class and worked as a consultant on project work...and wrote web content....and ...well did more than their sorry asses did in a "fulltime job") now want to know how i got back, what i do, which firm and who are our clients.

i now get resumes atleast twice a week delivered by email. and calls from people i wont even acknowledge in the street if i passed. All calls begin with a shrill voice "hiiiiiiiiiiiii! how are you? long time yaar!" yeah, like i didnt know.... these very same people who bitched about me getting better work, getting away with not doing much and other such "i dont know how she got there when we too deserve this" kind of sour grapes gossip..... now ask me completely amazed with jaw on the floor (this i am not so sure of because we talk on the phone) expressions of "how i managed to get a job in the recessive market when all support functions are facing layoffs?"

because i am bloody good at what i do is what i feel like telling them!! but then, restraint is something i am trying to get good at...and i realise that it wont score me a point to say this...the fact that they are calling me up itself is punishment enough. so i respond depending upon the time i can spare and my mood, as vaguely as i can, and then hang up. then wait for the resumes to come into my mail box....

i realise that i have been very lucky. to do the work i do and do it well. not many have that. Which means, despite not wanting to suck up to anyone, i still didn't have to call people i didnt like very much and ask them if there was anything available. i wont screw that up.... so i wont mess with my work. period. that should take care of everything else!

how many have you got?

a friend yesterday sent me a lovely poem meant for the sisterhood... you know...the i love you sister kind of forwards that i read and like and seldom forward to the 21 people and if you get it back then you are loved etc....

i dont really need forwards to tell me who loves me...the people in my life already do.......so yeah, while i dont need the replies to tell me how important i am to people, i wonder what makes the relationships i am in work? take my newly formed friendships for instance. in the past 2 years that i have been blogging, i have found some endearing people...they will stay on with me regardless of how much longer i continue to blog... and on the other hand, i look at the friends i have collected on social networking sites that confuse me. hell, at last count i had 293 on a popular site...surely at 2 a.m if i need someone, i wont be looking there! one of these days i need to run through that list and purge myself of all those who i actually dont know and recognise....i mean, yeah you add people for various reasons...and i've been able to get in touch with long lost classmates and cousins thrice removed....so its nice that way... but every once in a while i am reminded that i may be someone's "contact" just to add numbers and make the friends list more robust.... yeah...there i said it!!

i've had some of the most amazing people come into my life, and regardless of not being in touch with them to know what outfit they wore on monday morning to work, i dont think of those in the past tense. my best friend i havent spoken to for 3 yrs. when i do, i know the three years of incommunicado wont matter... when i need my 2a.m friend, that's who i am calling.

here's the line i loved from that forward of yesterday
....but it was a lovely poem all the same and it had this one line which i quote

Be the kind of woman that when your feet
Hit the floor each morning the devil says
"Oh Crap, She's up!"

things that made my world go round... literally

the thing with me is, i imagine the consequences of an action far too much, inflicting much more stress on myself than the real thing will....in the end...the actual consequences aren't as bad as the self inflicted torture!! ah well.... i am nothing if not a "self inflicter of pain"

work type of things have taken centre stage yet again, and i do agree with the quote i had on facebook by Rita Mae Brown " A deadline is negative inspiration. Still, its better than no inspiration at all"

so to make things worse, i couple this with procrastination and what i have is a stress adrenalin junkie's dream come true....but all's well that ends well. and while some important lessons have been learnt, has come to some kind of full circle too....

the neck and shoulder pain notwithstanding, i have given up wearing that damned collar. it is socially embarrassing and physically uncomfortable and that isnt the combination in which i like things. and so contrary to the advice of everyone around...i've chucked it for now and lets hope i will be ok. i am however sticking to the stipulated time limits for using the laptop etc. will have to start exercises soon....

that apart, the summer has been relentless...and it tires me to even talk more than i have to! (yeah it happens to me sometimes!) ... havent had good mangoes yet and summer's almost over... damn!! that's the one thing i really look forward to in the summer.... still hopeful tho....

i now have to go...with nothing in particular to say, i'd better sign off.