My Illegal Yoga Class

One Memorial Day weekend, like every weekend, I stepped into the exercise room at the gym, for my yoga class. Seated on my light turquoise mat, shiny on the top, cracked on its back, I chatted with my neighbor, while waiting for the instructor. Minutes passed as mats rolled out, straps and blocks appeared from tube-shaped bags, and yogis’ eyes searched questioningly for the door. Our instructor was always five minutes early. Now, five minutes after the hour, no instructor. Phones made their way out to check the schedule. Had we missed something? The front desk attendant walked in—the class had been canceled due to the holiday.

“It’s Saturday, not Memorial Day, yet!” protested someone. We were yoga addicts. People who showed up on weekend mornings and, often, evenings. “This is not fair!” added the protester, “all other classes are on!” My friend Lena would roll her eyes, “first world problems…”

Some gathered their belongings. One yogi looked at me pushing her chin forward and motioning with her head towards the front of the room:

“You should go up and lead the class. You are good.”

I shook my head “Oh, no, no… I’m not qualified…” I loved yoga, but I didn’t think I could teach. What if someone got hurt? I had gotten hurt before in yoga and needed time off. And more yoga to fix the damage.

“Yes, you are good. You go up there and lead the class, we’ll follow you!”

“No, no, no…” My no was getting weaker. Part of me was tickled, though and a rush of excitement flooded my thoughts. Who cares if I screw up? They can’t fire me—I don’t work here!

These were experienced yogis. I looked up to them. Why did they pick me to teach? Of course! They wanted their practice. Anyone would do…But…they trusted…me?

“Ok, people, let’s play!”

With my mat at the front of the room now, I heard my voice:

“Whatever you do, please don’t tell the front desk, and please, do not get hurt on me!”

Our incognito journey began, and so did my learning process.

How can instructors speak when in ‘down dog’? Or when they are twisted up like a pretzel? Can they hear me? Moreover, regardless how familiar I was with the names of the poses in English, at the front of the room my mind was blank. After over ten years of pretzeling up on a gym membership. What do you call this one? I asked several times. I could describe how to get into the pose, but the name would elude my tongue. And I wasn’t even around menopause yet.

My fellow yogis jumped to the rescue and would name the poses, suggest and ask for specific ones. Someone tried their luck Can we just not do half pigeon? I hate that one. I listened, obliged, and answered as yoga-like as one can get Take what serves you, leave what doesn’t...Our yoga practice became a democratic exercise of brainstorming. A workshop rather than a workout session. No one ever protested when the real teacher was at the front. Why do kids always negotiate with the parents, but never with the teacher?

My Toastmasters fellows would be hitting that bell with every sentence I utter if I keep starting with let’s. “Let’s go into down-dog,” “let’s go into warrior two,” “let’s this,” “let’s that.” My Toastmaster brain kicked in and from there on I launched into each command directly. “Lift your leg into…”, “inhale your arms up to the sky…” When our eyes would meet, they smiled with trust and a slight nod that I read as “keep going, we’re following.” At least I prayed that was their thought.

Oh, my God, I am teaching a yoga class! The next second, I forgot what I was going to say and scrambled for the rest of my time at the front, although applause rose from their mats at the end of the class.

A smile itched at the corner of my mouth—I just taught a yoga class! Never mind the hiccups. I did it. At the same time—relief—I’ll never do it again! I appreciated every second my instructors gave to be there. Their dedication to strangers willing to contort their bodies on pastel mats often displaying inspirational words. They must have possessed some superpowers gained in the many hours of training that allowed them to execute correctly while verbalizing cues their head hanging between their legs. Because I couldn’t. In addition, cueing without executing was impossible. I had to mirror my words with gestures. A predicament I could not escape: if I did not demonstrate, I couldn’t explain, if I did demonstrate and spoke, I couldn’t perform properly.

I had finally grasped what the instructor had meant by missing her own practice while teaching.

***

Days later, the experience got me thinking of my mother’s sacrifice to teach. An elementary school teacher, she taught first through fourth grade in the countryside for the entire 35 years of her career. Two thirds of that time, she commuted from Cluj, one of the largest cities in Romania, in the heart of Transylvania, to the village of Feleacu. This was between 1972 and 1993, meaning that most of the years she taught under the communist regime of Nicolae Ceausescu.

Today, her commute would be unconceivable. At the time, it was part of the job.

We did not own a car. Not every household had one. It implied waitlisting for an uncertain number of years. Buying fuel meant queuing for nights and days in mile-long lines. On Sundays, odd and even license plate numbers alternated on the roads. The only brand available was Dacia, made in Romania. Rarely, Skoda from then Czechoslovakia could be seen on the roads, or the Eastern German Trabant. The Romanian roads—unpaved in the countryside, and potholed in the cities. Unpaved roads turned into sticky muddy traps on rainy days, or when snow melted. Potholes sent hurried drivers into tire-patching service shops. Neighbors of highly ranked members of the communist party were lucky; those streets were paved, electricity or gas heating was never a problem, and grocery stores that catered to them were always fully stocked.

Mother would be the first to rise and leave the house. Most times, it was still dark outside. She would walk about 20 minutes down the hill, from Axente Sever Street in Gheorgheni quarter to the bus stop in Cipariu Plaza. The bus would drive up another hill to Feleacu. Centuries before, the hills surrounding Cluj earned its name of “city between the hills.” City residents commuted to the villages or towns neighboring Feleacu. Often, by the time the bus reached mom’s stop, it would be full. It was not unusual for her to end up hitchhiking, along with other commuters, splitting the cost of the ride.

A 30 minutes’ drive on a windy and abrupt road, dangerous in the winter for descending vehicles, pedestrians on the sidewalks or houses that dotted the side. Another 20 minutes’ walk from downtown Feleacu uphill, to the school on a dirt alley, awaited her and other teachers.

After rainy days, cleaning the mud off her boots she would tell us how she had grabbed on to plants or fences on the side of the alley, to get to school.

She would arrive home around six o’clock at night and never complained.

Although offered to teach in a school in the city, mom loved the villagers, loved teaching their children and they loved her back. She sacrificed time – hers, and time with family. She rarely made it to our school functions. We knew and accepted things as such.

Mom never gave up those children until she retired.

***

“You should teach,” someone told me after the yoga class. “Your voice is so calming.”

I did not become a yoga teacher, although I still practice. But I did take to heart the appreciations and the words of encouragement from my impromptu students.

My mother modeled the early ages of her students. Taught them to read and write and solve math problems. Her students would recognize her on the street many years after she had retired and thank her for what they had become. She never questioned the purpose of her physical efforts to shape the minds, personalities, and learning experience of those young humans into the best adult versions of themselves.

While my yoga “teaching” experience did not convey novelty to my “students,” I was the one who learned during that hour. I learned about the challenges that a teacher faces when in front of students. Not only physical ones, in this case movement and speech combined, but as an authority communicating a message regardless of its nature. I learned that the audience could become your greatest supporter when you reveal your vulnerability. That they trust your role in front of them, especially when you, once a student yourself, have grown along with them.

I had answered a challenge, shown my vulnerability, and worked together with my students to get us through a hurdle, even when that meant a routine yoga class. And the greatest reward—no one got hurt.