Missy | August 30, 2005
Missy | August 29, 2005
Yesterday I had a deep tissue massage to reward myself for taking Ezra’s 2-hour class at Dance Space two days in a row after nearly a month off from dancing. Heck, I’m taking the day off this coming Friday; in theory I could go for a three-days-in-a-row personal best. To my surprise, I didn’t collapse from exhaustion. The first time I took his class–which features a brutal warm-up that includes 20 uninterrupted minutes of variations on the theme of the yoga plank pose–he killed me and I died. And yet, I was thrilled to find a teacher whose style I loved and whose difficulty was at the level I desired. For all its difficulty, his movement necessitates efficiency of movement and, well, strength. I came back the next week and, as much as I still dread that warm-up, it’s become less of a desire for death in place of any more weight having to be supported by these arms and more of a stamina and sanity check. Since he’s been away for the past month, I had to make do with yoga in the meantime. Lots & lots of yoga, if I wanted to maintain any upper body strength. And I did! So much that he made a comment about it. Even better, when I was wiping my sweaty face with the bottom of my shirt midway through yesterday’s class, I caught my ab muscles staring back at me in the mirror. And I nailed the combination, including one of his signature moves that involves hurling oneself 180 degrees parallel to the floor and landing in the bottom of a push up but with only one foot on the floor. Right on. One of these days that one’s going to result in dislocation..wrist, elbow, shoulder, or all of the above with a split chin to boot. It’s a young man’s game and I do what I can just to keep up.
So, the massage. I’m a big fan of them, but I’m not paying that kind of money for what essentially amounts to a backrub. This particular massage therapist won me over, notably with, “Is that too much pressure on your back? Because I’m goin’ to town.” It was perfect. I walked out of there feeling like I had smoked some opium or something, like I no longer even had a back, as if she had carved out my shoulder and back muscles and ran off with them, like I weighed nothing. Had I ponied up the money for a full 90-minute massage, I’m not sure I would have had the ability to walk myself home.
In the event that my writing about all of this makes me sound like some kind of masochist, rest assured I am not one. I’ll be honest: today I feel a little bit bruised. Maybe a lot bruised. And it’s not an entirely happy place, where my body is today. I need a hot bath and a stiff drink.
Unrelated to this post but related to the one below: I finally watched Million Dollar Baby and was bored to tears. Except that I didn’t cry.
Tonight I think I’ll try some television-watching (it’s been awhile) to see what Prison Break is all about.
Missy | August 16, 2005
One day I will understand that “I love you” doesn’t necessarily mean “I love YOU”.
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
Missy | August 15, 2005
Little by little, I read each night. For awhile there, I was thinking that maybe I need to go down into a well and do some more thinking. And then I read this:
“I don’t want to stick my nose where I’m not wanted, but just let me say this: you really ought to sit down and think hard about what it is that’s most important to you.”
I nodded. “I have been thinking about that,” I said. “But things are so complicated and tangled together. I can’t seem to separate them out and do one thing at a time. I don’t know how to untangle things.”
My uncle smiled. “You know what I think? I think what you ought to do is start thinking about the simplest things and go from there. For example, you could stand on a street corner somewhere day after day and look at the people who come by there. You’re not in any hurry to decide anything. It may be tough, but sometimes you’ve got to just stop and take time. You ought to train yourself to look at things with your own eyes until something comes clear. And don’t be afraid of putting some time into it. Spending plenty of time on something can be the most sophisticated form of revenge.”
Missy | August 3, 2005
It’s August, which means that it’s vacation month. I’m not going anywhere, but it seems like a good time to take a few weeks off from blogging. I hope to continue updating my Flickr page, which has been sadly lacking of late. My dance teacher is away for most of the month, too, which will completely free up my weekends to do other stuff and take pictures of said stuff (unless I find myself just going to the movies). That is, as long as the right subway lines are running on the weekends when and where I need them.
See ya soon.
Warning: Nerd (or, loser)-ish post. You don’t have to read this…..unless you want to contribute! Comments are open.
Missy | August 1, 2005
[I'd like to give a shout-out to my new ('new' as in newly useful) favorite functionality: the CONCATENATE function in Excel. It has improved my efficiency by helping me generate copious amounts of SAS code that a do loop cannot handle. I *could* write a macro, but that'd probably take me longer to figure out and debug, even if it is more elegant. Yay CONCATENATE!]
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Listening
Unmap
Volcano Choir
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Reading
A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again
David Foster Wallace
