New year, new (old) me

This year will be different!

I signed up for a restorative yoga class a few days after New Year’s Day. It had been probably six years since my last class, but I decided 2025 me should re-embrace stretching in public.

“A lot of new faces in here today,” said the instructor, whose floral sleeve tattoos peeked out from beneath her tunic sweatshirt. We’d gently contort ourselves into a series of easy poses and hold them for several minutes each, she said, so we should space ourselves out enough to stretch our arms wide on either side. We should also grab several blankets and props, because today we’d be supported. (Nice, isn’t it?)

I built a little fort around the edge of my mat using two foam blocks, a huge bolster pillow and a few rolled-up Southwestern blankets. I tried to empty my mind of thoughts like, “How often do they wash these blankets?” and “How long does bacteria live on microfiber?”

Moments before class began and just when I’d started feeling secure in my little rectangular sanctuary, a man with chin-length hair and culottes arrived, shrugging a little apology toward the instructor.

“Good to see you!” she replied. “Sit anywhere.” He unfurled his extra-thin mat maybe two feet to the right of mine—much shorter than his arms! I scooched myself a few inches to the left, but he didn’t seem to notice. In fact, the instructor had barely started her welcome spiel, granting us the empowerment to take our own shapes and move at our own pace, when he flopped onto his back, arms wide—fingers grazing my mat—with a weighted mask over his eyes.

I spent the next hour pretending to focus on my breath while playing limb Tetris with a man who couldn’t have cared less what was happening. If spatial awareness ever existed to him, he let it go when he emptied his mind of all thoughts, knees splayed directly in the path of my overhead stretch. At one point, I think he might’ve fallen asleep. Well, somebody did; I heard gentle snoring during assisted child’s pose, while my nose was smushed deep into the bacteria-ridden bolster.

A few hours after class while folding socks, a charley horse grabbed hold of a muscle in my upper-middle back. The spasms hobbled me for the next day or two, then lessened into a knot. Maybe this means my back got more flexible, like a sunburn turning into a tan. In any case, I haven’t been back to yoga.

2025 me also adopted a pescatarian diet for the time being—well, except for the occasional meaty sins I commit in the name of my silly job. So far, I have already housed a couple of duck carnitas tacos to honor Chicago’s dearly departed Taqueria Chingón (which I’m told is probably resurrecting some time soonish anyway) and a bacon-flecked onion tart (for research purposes!). There was a plump, illicit roast chicken in delicious cold sauce made from crème fraîche, rinsed shallots and dill, and something heavenly called toast royale, which is essentially sourdough French toast griddled in beef fat so it tastes like a truffle burger without the beef.

Good! And boring.

For the most part though, Sean and I are cooking a lot more, which is great. So far this included pancetta-less carbonara with caramelized brussels sprouts, pecorino and lots of lemon; oil-packed tuna and grain salad with pistachios and mint; black bean and hominy stew with dried New Mexico chilies; broiled salmon encrusted with miso, honey and grapefruit; deconstructed pesto and white bea—

…God, cooking is fucking monotonous isn’t it? Everyday I wake up shackled anew to this burden of feeding myself and my loved one. We burn through fresh produce like rabbits, and my hands are so dry from washing that they resemble bird talons. Plus, by the time evening rolls around, we feel like a couple of walking farts from all the extra fiber. The other night, Sean denounced the diet for giving him “digestive issues,” as if to say, “The beans know what they did.” (Um, help keep us regular?)

And in case you’re wondering, no. I’m not doing Dry January. I’m not sure my poor body can take much more betterment.

Sending love to all creatures affected by the devastation in L.A. ♡