You Haven't Done Child's Pose Until

As I was driving away from the rock climbing gym, I second-guessed my decision to head to yoga. It was dark, raining, yaddayaddayadda.

I have two visits left on a group coupon and since Yoga Wall is on hiatus, I decided to try Candlelight Restorative Yoga.

I walk in and about seven women were already on the floor. Some of them looked as if they were about to give birth.

I rolled out my mat and it looked completely jadan. The teacher, Madonna, quickly came over since I have a tendency to stick out. She gathered props for me: a strap, eggs, blocks, a blanket, a bolster and eye bag.

Madonna assembled some props and asked me to put my back to the bolster. I put the soles of my feet together and put the strap at my back then over my head and, finally, around my feet. The eggs supported my knees and I reclined with an eye bag. It was like reverse Savasana and Madonna did ring a bell to bring us out of each pose. She told me ahead of time that they usually hold one pose for about 10 minutes.

Next, we did Crocodile. Most of the props were moved to the side except for the bolster which we placed our ribs on while placing our foreheads on an egg.

After Crocodile, we put our legs up on the wall and put our eye bags back in place. The bags, by the way, smelled divine.

At some point, we did Child's Pose by placing the bolster at our knees then laying on it. Amazing. I felt like it was the first time that I've gotten the full benefit of the pose. As I was in Child's Pose, I thought Yoga, where have you been for most of life?

During class, Madonna came around to massage feet, legs and shoulders -- the shoulders with some mentholy situation. I know that the massage and yoga communities are intertwined but I'm not sure where the whole massage during yoga comes from. Never mind. Why look a gift horse in the mouth?

We did Savasana and Madonna preambled by saying that it was the most important pose. After we came out of Savasana, we ended the class with three "Om's." Madonna's got some pipes on her. After "Om," you know what came next:

Namaste