I went to yoga class this morning. Once again, I managed to do the crow pose. Only the once, and this is only the second time that I've managed it, but our instructor seems to think that I've got the hang of it now, and will be doing it effortlessly forevermore. I don't agree with him, but then again I know myself far better than he does. I must admit that I feel sort of put out on behalf of Yoga Buddy. He's been doing it perfectly for weeks now, and his accomplishment has been pretty much ignored. On the other hand, he's just been quietly getting on with it, and has never managed to lauch himself half way across the room, or end up sprawled face down on the floor, or give himself a black eye. or any of the other ways I spectacularly fail at that pose. He can't quite manage to do plough, either, which is one that's never given me a moment's trouble, which just goes to show that we all have our little weaknessess. Mine just happens to be balance.

I am starting to get into the rhythm and spirit of this class. My teacher in Italy taught us a vinyasa style of yoga, for the most part, which is a flowing sort of yoga, with lots of movement and strenous standing postures and the like. Not quite ashtanga, but very sweaty nonetheless. It's more or less the type of thing I do when I practice at home by myself.

The style of yoga we're studying now is kriya, which puts more emphasis on stretching and improving flexibility. The breathing is entirely different as well. Vinyasa does emphasize breathing, but it's synchronized with the movements. Generally, you tend to exhale as you move down and inhale as you move up. Kriya, on the other hand, has you taking a deep breath before, and holding it for as long as you hold the pose. Or you take a deep breath before and exhale it for a loooonnnnggg time as you do the pose. I have problems with the long exhalation bit, but I'm getting better. It's not hard to improve when you start out being terrible, I suppose.

Take a look at reclining hero's pose. Looks painful, doesn't it? Or maybe it doesn't to you, but it is painful, I promise you. I started out being able to lean back no farther than on my elbows-- only one elbow, actually-- although now I've gotten to the point where I can lay back, even though not all of my back is in contact with the floor and my knees gape open alarmingly. (The knees are supposed to be together, although you can't really see that in the picture.) I imagine it looks fairly pornographic, and I am eternally grateful that there are no mirrors and I am unable to see myself in all my glory. Not that I would think to sneak a peak: I'm far too preoccupied with trying to get into the damn position and, more importantly, how the hell I'm going to get myself out of it. Oh, and I forgot to mention that we're supposed to be holding our breath. The entire time. Struggling into position, staying there for a moment, and trying to extricate ourselves afterwards.

I haven't managed it yet. I have this feeling that I never will.

Another thing about kriya yoga is that it's very contemplative. We do lots of visualization and meditation exercises-- things like counting up to 100 and back down to one whilst visualizing each number as we do so, or travelling our awareness down the left side of the body and back up the right, focusing on our heartbeats, stuff like that.

A couple of weeks ago he told us to stand, facing each other, hands on our hearts, and gaze into each other's eyes. We weren't supposed to think of anything in particular, just "be receptive", whatever that may be. So we stood, hands on our hearts, feeling faintly ridiculous (at least on my part), and commenced to gaze. The first thing that came into my mind was "I pledge allegiance...", but that thought was mercifully cut short by the sound of our instructor's voice.

"No. Hands on each other's hearts."

Ah. Ha. Yoga Buddy tried to play it safe and put his hand on my upper chest. "No," says the instructor in his charming accent, "the 'eart is further down." So that there would be no doubt, he grabs Yoga Buddy by the wrist and plops his hand down in the proper position. "You don't know where the 'eart is?" YB flinches slightly. I'm pretty sure that he knows exactly where the heart is kept. At this point, I'm beginning to have my doubts about this whole kriya yoga thing. I'm also regretting having worn a tank top. Would it really have killed me to wear a crew neck t-shirt?

So we stood there, feeling even more ridiculous, gazing away.

I tried to keep my mind blank and "receptive", but I kept thinking about what YB's flatmate had told me about why she wasn't going to be joining us in our yoga adventure: "YB and I would probably catch each others' eyes at the wrong moment, and then we'd spend the rest of the class giggling."

I felt a desperate urge to giggle.

Do you remember how, back in grade school or even high school, everybody used to have staring contests? Stare-downs, we used to call them. I was never very good at stare downs.

I tried to keep my mind blank, and let my eyes go out of focus. Before I could do that, however, I noticed YB's cheek left twitching. Once I noticed that, I noticed that things were looking decidedly unstable in the mouth area as well. I brought my attention back to his eyes and I knew. He was going to laugh any moment now. All I had to do was wait him out, and I would win. Not that yoga is about winning, of course, but I sure as hell didn't want to be the one to crack first. I tried to clear my mind and wait him out.

I didn't make it.

I didn't just giggle. No, no, no. When I do something, I do it right, so I didn't just laugh, either. I EXPLODED with laughter. I guffawed. I ended up reeling around the room, drunk on laughter. My sides started to ache, and I tried to calm down. I looked at YB, who had started to laugh a second after I did. He was leaning up against the wall, doubled up, still laughing. I laughed some more. I looked at the instructor. He was laughing, too, but gently, tolerantly.

"Very good, Dilettane," he said. "I like your sense of humor."

I responded to that particular statement with another bout of laughter. I couldn't help myself. I swear, it was worse than being in church.

After that, we ended the class with the usual relaxation posture, or corpse pose. You're meant to concentrate on your breathing and your heartbeat, but all I could concentrate on was not giggling. I don't think I actually giggled out loud, but I'm sure I convulsed a few times. Hopefully, no one noticed.

So far, he hasn't had us repeat that exercise. I'm thinking that's a Good Thing.

Today, he had us sit in front of a wall-- different walls-- and pretend to be bamboo: straight but flexible, empty inside. So I sat up very straight and stared at the wall and tried my very best to be empty and I didn't giggle once. Thinking of nothing whilst staring at a blank wall is definitely something I can do.