Zumba for Beginners

(Note:  I do enjoy the days where nothing else creative comes to mind but the simple, every-day weird stuff we do to occupy our time.  Humans are the only creatures who pay others to help them get in shape.  I do not think there are any animals who need to be coaxed into staying healthy enough to live.)

Zumba for Beginners
Combat class, I understood.
I can logically accept the burning of calories, the practicing of uppercuts.
Running makes sense.
Dancing as well and
the shaking of body fat is the only way to convince it to fall off.
Apparently
you have to move fat cells around, almost like grabbing them by the shoulders and shaking them
yelling at them
telling them they are no longer wanted, and humiliating them and then they dissolve in embarrassment the pain of being unwanted too much to bear.

I get the concept of aerobic exercise. 
Logic brain says yes, but this amazon-sized mama needs some convincing before she
buys a beaded skirt on amazon (ironic) and
shakes her plus sized body parts in the face of a total stranger on a Monday morning.

I apologized to the instructor for the confused looks and the times during class that I stopped in place and stared at the wall, laughing.  My body needs some convincing to partake in the salsa rumba
cha chas and the madness that was
walking into and advanced Zumba class late with a Scooters cup and
wearing the wrong clothes.
My brain needs some convincing that there is a time and place for that kind of loudness outside of a dance club.

A bit much for a Monday morning.

Dancing and laughing and loudness and madness, sweat and forty different women of forty different sizes, jumping around as kids walk past and stare into the windows of the studio, staring in amazement as these women of various ages go aerobic-mental in a dancing hyper mass.

Synopsis?  Sweat through three shirts, survived.  Still not buying a beaded skirt.  Yet.

SEA 4.29.2013

Ah, Ego. Thou art a giant stomping through a fairy tale world of beauty, trampling pretty stuff with your stupid huge feet.

Once upon a time there was a girl.
She was locked in a cell with cinder block walls and one door.
She stared at the walls.
Clawed at the walls, cried into the walls, laughed at them.
She counted the blocks and prayed for a sign.
She did sit-ups to work on her abs, as to distract herself.
Stories, art and music danced through her head, distract me... distract me from seeing these walls that contain me.
Oh Lord, why would you do this to me?  What have I done to deserve this?
I do deserve this.... oh, I do, I do, she chants and paces and cries out in horror,
her sins and sacrifices drag across her mind like a rake across a barren field.
I am horrid.
I am your princess.
I am a child of yours, a child of yours!
I am nothing, I deserve this cage.
I deserve to be free.
Please do not give me what I deserve....
She gently caresses the walls, traces the patterns, makes them a home.

         Um, hey.  stop for a minute and breathe.
she shakes her head no, shakes off the small voice, covers her ears, her eyes.
         Hey.

(pause, breathe.)

she utters a defeated "what?!?"

pause, silly, and turn around.  you remember V for Vendetta, right?  oh my honey, my darling, such a human... you never tried the door.

So the door was unlocked, always was, always would have been, but here's the tricky part.
I still can't get myself to walk out.
It's scary and wild out there, scary and wild if I am free, if I am not contained, where would I go?
And she (would) live happily ever after (if she could get her legs to move)... the end.

It's not a new story, not a new tale, but each creation, each creature, each character is stunned when
the door is unlocked and 
the walls are not real and
the captor is me and
you are not the problem.
So, as the illustrated persons prancing through Grimm's anthology, I stumble through my story blind, unaware of the next page turn but alas, unlike the Brothers' tales, I have the luxury of questioning the writer, yelling at the writer, being perplexed and wading around in my own self-delusions, as He allowed me free will to do as I please, but he will not let me write it myself.   So the pen and ink drawing of me throws her tantrum, sits down, and pouts in her porridge, not knowing that she will get up on the next page and start a new adventure.

Sara Ammon 4/24/2013

ten minute timer

Set a timer for ten minutes, set it down.
Listen to the inside of your head, write it down.
Calm your heart down, settle your ass down - sit on the ground.

Refusing to do what lights you from the inside becomes
more painful the longer you do it, the more you push it down,
the more it digs it claws in like a kitten climbing your pant leg -

the kitten
doesn't know it is a small cat, doesn't know it's a pet, just wants to get to you, wants to climb, wants to
see from where you are, is who he is right now, all ego and claws like tiny needles.

I would like to lie and say that I do not know the whys...
I would like to say that I can't write because I don't have time.  I would like to tell you I can't write because I can't focus my brain can't get things in line can't afford the time can't put pen to paper...
I can't because I am held in by words, wrapped up tightly like pa pier mache' laid down and glued down
word wrapper tight like a mummy, kept to myself

Keep it to yourself.  No one wants to know, no one wants to hear.
There is no money in writing.
There is no point - we all have a story, every story can't mean something...

She asks the God of the Universe what she should do for a living.  She asks
what side of herself she shall show her children, what example to set.  She asks, knowing the answer, and knowing that that there will be no time clock, no guaranteed pay, no time clock

nothing to hold her together but her own skin, words begin to peal off like old wallpaper and

I don't know if I should be telling you this, but for someone who talks a lot, talks so much it annoys people and they make fun of her for talking talking talking, for someone who never shuts her mouth...

enough talk.  talk makes liars, so I will keep writing until I can use my words, toddler language, I will
set a timer for ten minutes and sit on the ground.  (sea 4/5/2013)