Pilates and Nineteen Resolutions

In the first week of January, a friend told me this idea of making 19 (for 2019) small resolutions/to-do's in lieu of a one big New Year's resolution.  (I'd already made my 2019 resolution, but I was up for this one, too.)

On my list of 19 things, I have things like take a bubble bath, play a game once a week with the kids, read a book in Italian, learn to make tiramisu, get a Viterbo library card, go to meditation with Daniel some, etc.  So they're doable items that make me excited or pleased or relaxed.

This week SYA students are doing sei giorni, six days in Italian school (Italians go to school Monday through Saturday 8-1pm).  We have faculty meetings for three half-days.  Complete sanity.  I've got a few things to catch up on, e.g. get new iphone battery, go to dentist, schedule hair cut, but mostly I'm taking it easy.  I've gotten each person in the family a bath bomb for Valentine's Day, in hopes that I will actually make the time to take a bath.  (Showers seem so much more efficient.  But that's the point of my real New Year's resolution: take more breaks.  I cannot remember the last time I took a bath.)

Monday: no meetings and no excuses.  I looked at the Larus (gym) schedule to find the yoga and pilates classes for the day.  These are on my 19 Things list: do a yoga class and a pilates class in Italy.  They don't have to be in Italian, but it's fine if they are.  I just need to get myself to a class: figure out the when and the where (there are many exercise rooms at Larus and on many floors -- scary), show up early to give wiggle room, stay and do it.

The schedule for Monday has three columns, with classes in the different columns.  I noticed that pilates was in all three columns at different days, and finally, for the first time -- I've had the schedule since December -- I noticed the headings above each column: strong, olistic, cardio.  Olistic was definitely the way to go: it sounded the most mellow and least difficult.  My twice a week pilates routine at the Waltham Y ended in July, and even with daily yoga and the occasional ten minute pilates video on youtube, I can't do a proper pushup.

Pilates has always intimidated me.  Until last year I'd never tried it, though I envied people who did, imagining that pilates would strengthen my core and cure all my back pains.  A little over a year ago a friend from the Y told me, "You should try the pilates class tomorrow."  She went every week, twice a week (at least) to Sandra's pilates class.  She told me, "It works the whole body."  I used to go to this friend's yoga classes (she teaches at the Y, too), so I trust her.

Scared to go and scared not to go -- I don't like wondering what if or having regrets: I went.

From last January until I left for Italy at the end of July, pilates Thursday mornings and Saturday mornings.  A gift.

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At the front desk at Larus, I asked, "Dove pilates?"
"La sala verde or rosa," one of the women said.
I pointed vaguely -- I'm not even sure where I was pointing.  It was my way of saying, And where are those? 
"Down two floors," she said.  "A sinistra."

I couldn't turn around now.

Julia was a tiny, curvy, forty-something Italian woman dressed in all black.  She handed me a black circle with cushions for my hands, asked me my name, and when I said that I spoke English and a little Italian, she said, "Guarda," telling me just to watch.  This was exactly my plan, to go in the back row (there was no back row, however) and copy whoever was in front of me.  Actually, this is my plan in Sandra's classes at the Waltham Y, too.  I don't want to draw the attention of Sandra to me and all my little cheating techniques to do full sit-ups and pseudo half push-ups.

The music blared from a speaker in the ceiling corner to my left.  Que sara que sara in some modern version.  While I was doing my breathing, I thought, Oh, that's the future tense!  "Giro cambio," Julia said, and after the third time, I knew to change the direction of my leg circles.  I thought of our kids at school, likely getting by a good bit by watching the other kids (though Hannah reports that her teacher shows some annoyance with the Italians when Hannah understands her questions better than they do...go, Hannah). 

Aside: Connor has a friend over this afternoon.  Sitting in the kitchen, I listened to them build a fort and have pillow fights.  I said to Sebastian, "They're like a cartoon -- not that many words."  "Yeah, and boof, bam, whap," he said. 

Julia's class was a balance of Jeannie's breathing and calming and stretching yoga and Sandra's pilates strengthening that felt good and, at some points, kicked my butt.  To my left was a woman who seemed about my age (though I have myself perpetually ten to fifteen years younger than I am), and to my right maybe four women and one man in their sixties or seventies.

At the end of class I was outrageously proud of myself: I came to a pilates class in Italy!  I stayed the whole hour and did the whole thing!

As I write, I'm reminded of a friend who visited this fall andwent to a yoga class in Rome her second day here.  She showed no pride, just pleasure that she had gone to the class.

So why are these little accomplishments so meaningful to me?  The truth is that the first time I went to Sandra's pilates class at the Y a year ago I was also totally excited and proud of myself.  I felt like I was overcoming a fear of pilates, getting myself into a new situation, meeting new people, trying something new.

To some people, such steps are not worthy of mention: you go or you don't.  I'm not sure why they are such big deals to me.  But I don't mind that they are.  My fear and excitement and ultimate patting self on back make so many small things, things likely often overlooked, a big deal to me.  Sometimes this means going to a new bar and ordering a cappuccino or caffe by myself.  Sometimes it means going to the community lunch at church.  Sometimes it means finding and staying for a pilates class.

I want to continue to revel in the ordinary.

No matter where I am.