Reflections on the First Week of Summer – Hoodie Yoga 

    Since I retired, I’ve practiced daily, before-breakfast yoga in our loft following Rodney Yee’s DVDs. In front of the wind and water carved rock formations of Arizona’s Glen Canyon on one DVD, Rodney stretches in shorts, a t-shirt, and copious sunshine. On another, Colleen Saidman wears pedal pushers and a tank top on a Hawaiian cliff above the Pacific Ocean. Breezes curled strands of her hair. That’s the real way to practice yoga, I told myself arching for a standing backbend and staring at the massive six by eight inch wood beams overhead.

    On my last visit to see Mom in Florida, I practiced yoga on her screened-in porch. Geckos crawled up the screens, Gulf of Mexico breezes cooled my arms, and a full grown black lab sat beside me. I stretched for downward-facing dog, the pose my husband Spence affectionately calls “butt in the air,” and mentally wrote “outdoor yoga” on my bucket list.

    So when I woke two Sundays ago and my son Charlie sat on the porch listening to the bird chorus and breathing dewy air, I figured it was time for outdoor yoga. But, Charlie, a fresh-air-window-open-year-round kind of guy, wore in his hoodie.

    Probably too cold for me. I climbed to the loft for indoor yoga yet again.

    Afterwards, at breakfast, I told Spence and Charlie, “I’d like to practice yoga outside, but it might be too cold.”

    “Wear a hoodie. You’ll be fine,” they said in unison.

    What could go wrong?

    The next morning, I pulled on my green velor hoodie, unrolled the yoga mat on the deck, and inserted Rodney’s DVD into the laptop. Laying on my back, I stretched my arms wide, pulled my knees into my chest, and lowered them to the right for a belly twist.

    Rodney said, “Inhale.”

    I inhaled the light, sweet, earthy fragrance of the petunias beside me. Overhead clouds opened revealing a quarter moon. Songs of phoebes, robins, mourning doves, chickadees, and song sparrows blended for a robust morning chorus. Tension drained from my muscles.

    Rodney said, “In downward-facing dog, raise your right leg.”

    Yikes, distracted by nature. I hadn’t heard him tell me to belly twist to the left let alone roll over and come into downward-facing dog.

    I switched poses but didn’t chide myself. Being in the moment is a yoga goal.

    As the week progressed, I heeded Rodney’s directions while enjoying ash leaves shimmer, a hummingbird buzz, and a black millipede crawl across my mat. Yoga in nature captivated me.

    Then last Sunday night, a week after I started outdoor yoga, rain fell.

    Damp wouldn’t hurt the yoga mat, made from plastic and rubber. I unrolled the mat on the wet deck and placed a hand towel within reach. Colleen guided me into wide-legged forward bend and said, “Walk your hands out in front of you.”

    I walked my hands forward between two pansy pots, walked them back, then dried them on the towel. No slipping.

    Colleen guided me from plank pose into a side plank variation in which I reached my left foot behind me. It landed in a soothing, cool puddle.

    “Breathe in. Breathe out,” Colleen said with her feet on a dry platform. “Come back to plank position.”

    Balancing on my right hand and right foot, I couldn’t dry my left foot. I swung it to the mat, slipped, and fell like an old-lady. Oops. I wiped the mat and my foot while Colleen continued without me.

    The rest of the week, when water puddled the deck, I practiced yoga under the porch roof. That worked until this Saturday when a two by six foot piece of plywood resting on yellow sawhorses and holding a stack of maple flooring boards (which Spence will use to build Charlie a desktop for his new apartment) occupied my yoga space. I called Spence. He moved the love seat, end table, and folding chair. I swept the cement floor then unrolled my mat. Great. Yoga in a junk room with the view of a wood ceiling.

    But a catbird sang from the tip of the leader on the tallest Fraser fir, and Deer Creek rushed in the valley. Arching my back for camel pose, I followed Rodney’s calming voice. “Let your head release backward. Breathe.”

    I inhaled rain-washed air and gazed beyond the stacked furniture to puffs of clouds drifting across the powder blue sky–still yoga in nature.

    With puddles and nature distractions under control, I only had to manage varying temperatures. Days got sweaty hot this time of year, but mornings in our rural valley could be chilly.

    On that first Monday two weeks ago, the air was 62º F (17º C). Following Spence and Charlie’s advice, I wore a green velor hoodie with matching sweat pants but kept hands and feet bare for solid pose foundations. Mist nestled in trees at the end of the field. Cool air rejuvenated my lungs. Stretching one arm to the floor and the other in the air for triangle pose energized me until my hands cramped–undermining a goal of practicing yoga to minimize arthritis pain.

    When the temperature rose to 66º F (19º C) the next morning, that outfit sufficed. But the temperature dipped back to 63º F (17º C) Wednesday. After pulling on yoga gloves, I placed my right heel by my left hip, put my right leg over my left knee, and held a gloved hand in a finger spread salute for half fish pose. No cramps. No aches. Tweaking the hoodie advice, like wearing a T-shirt and loose linen pants for 72º F (22º C) mornings, managed temperatures.

    No problems . . . until the temperature dipped to 58º F (14º C) this past Tuesday, a deck-puddle day. I moved to the cement porch floor, put a blanket under the yoga mat, pulled on yoga gloves, and hoped for the best. When I lay on my back for constructive rest, cold seeped through the blanket and mat. My back chilled to iceberg temperature, and my bare feet felt as if they’d been packed in snow. Resisting the urge to run into the house to get my fuzzy red slippers, I forced my stiff neck, stiff back, and stiff knees to finish the practice. Calm, but shivering, I gritted my teeth and hobbled inside.

    Spence said, “You looked cute in the yoga poses.”

    “Don’t you mean cold?” I slipped my feet in the fuzzy slippers then twisted an infinity scarf around my neck, turned the heating pad to high for my lower back, and wrapped my legs in a green afghan.

    So when the temperatures dropped to 53º F (12º C), this past Thursday, I bundled–an old pair of non-slip Bair Paws  hospital socks, long underwear, a warm turtleneck, velor sweats and hoodie, and yoga gloves. I also layered two afghans and a yoga blanket under the yoga mat. To a subdued bird chorus and two cats watching through the sliding glass door, I stretched for Warrior II. Hands, neck, back, knees, and toes stayed toasty warm.

    Now I’m hooked. I may never dress like Rodney in shorts or Colleen in a tank top, but yoga in nature entices me out the door every morning. The only question is will I brave yoga in snow.