Jumping while lying down

I tried a new (to me) kind of Pilates class yesterday. It's called Cardio Jump Board, and it involves continuous jumping, with the feet and legs in various positions. But all while lying on the Reformer.

This is exactly the equipment I used.

Here's a taste of it. But I promise you we did it for 40 minutes of the 50 minute class.

You'd think it wouldn't really be that tiring, 'cause, after all, you're lying down the whole time. How bad could it be?

I'm here to testify: It was rough going.

Now, I want to glide into a nice bloggerific analogy based on this experience.  A Carrie Bradshaw-esque segue into a broader and more profound issue that I can then elaborate on for the rest of this episode. Er, column. Whatever.

"I couldn't help but wonder: Was my jumping getting me anywhere if I was doing it lying down?"

Unfortunately, I can't think of a pun to take us from "jump board" to the the topic I'm interested in right now. So inhale, scoop your abs, and now exhale as we jump to another topic altogether.

Two days ago, I went to a memorial tribute for someone I knew not at all. She was an artist––an animator, primarily––who was married to someone who went to my high school, who himself is really no more than an acquaintance to me. So for all practical purposes, I went to a memorial tribute for a stranger.

I found it to be a meaningful and moving experience. She was, by all accounts, and as made evident by the presence of more than 300 people at the event, a vibrant and well-loved woman. And what does one expect to hear in eulogies, if not that the deceased was wonderful, kind, smart, loving, full of life, talented, brave, funny?  But because I had no personal attachment to the woman who died, I was free to hear all that was said in more general terms.

I was going to tell the whole long story of how she and her husband met and how touching it was to hear about. But you can just imagine a touching story of how two people met as college students, and then were together for 36 years, and then the woman died at 56.

The point I thought I wanted to make was something about the life of an artist and something about life in general, and also about death. But now, two days later, it seems less urgent that I let you in on my little nugget of insight. You can go ahead and imagine that for yourself, too––can't you?––without me having to tell you. Something along these lines: Life is sweet, made sweeter by the fact that it ends.

I had some other thoughts, but they've turned spongy and slippery under my fingertips as I type, and I can't get a hold of them.  No big loss, I'm sure. If they were worth anything, they'll probably bob back up to the surface again, and I'll try to let them bake in the sun a bit next time, so that they can be held and turned over and examined.

So all in all, this was a particularly half-baked episode, but I'm not going to scrap it altogether, because look: I made a kind of a hat . . . sort of . . . where there never was a . . . you know . . . hat.*

*I was specifically asked by one very nice reader to explain things that might be obscure to people who aren't necessarily familiar with every single peculiar thing I might ever make reference to. So, to the others of you, those who don't like explanations, look away. And for anyone who would like an explanation, this is it: This is a paraphrase of a song lyric, from the Stephen Sondheim musical "Sunday in the Park with George," which describes the creative process.