When Pretty People Get Shut Down…It’s So Rewarding

Are you a believer in mantras? I can’t decide if I am or not. Sometimes, I really really really need and use them. Auditions, convincing myself that I need to study instead of zoning out into ADHD land, maintaining patience with two very, very active, and precocious kids. Those are good times for mantras. I try out different sayings in my head, rolling them around on my tongue, and in my brain, testing them for usefulness and comfort. I admit that I discard a multitude more than I use.

The one time this is different, is when I am recovering from a certain level of malaise. When I am emerging from a depressed few days, I need them. I crave them. I use power speech and exercise like most people use paxil. A great many people have questioned my depression, because I can self-treat with relative efficacy. This is A: ignorant, B: really disheartening, because everyone’s journey with depression is singular and unique, and C: ludicrous. I have been hospitalized for my depression, and have had serious fugues, if you want to email me about your depression, just to talk and cope, I welcome it. However, please don’t email me about my depression, just because you don’t think I am depressed enough.

I guess I need to wear more black. 

I knew that this knee thing would throw me into a tailspin. I’ve been waiting for it. I’ve been constantly monitoring my inner demons, seeing if they have sharpened their claws, grew longer horns; put on a “Toddlers and Tiaras” sash and full-glitz wear.

The funny thing is that yesterday, while I was dressing the Peanut and the Captain, getting them ready for childcare at the gym, knowing I wasn’t going to hit the treadmill, I started to feel a bit down. I decided to look in my bag of mantra tricks to look for something apropos.

“You can’t run away from not being able to run”-nope, that one sucked. Try again.

“If you keep running, you’ll be running on empty”-maybe for an 80s pop hit, but not a mantra

Then I figured it out.

“Not all finish lines are at the end of a race”

This is true; for me at least.

I need to be finished relying only on one type of exercise to spur my endorphins. I love running, being a runner, but it’s not the only thing I love. I LOVE taking classes with friends. Yesterday, I took a class with three of my very good friends. We’ll call them Will (because we’ve used his name before), “The Navajo”, (self-explanatory, and a running joke with him, since he calls me “white intruder”) and “Grave Robber”…(her ex-husband is as old as my dad, and she’s my age. This is also her nickname in real life.)

Did I mention actors don’t really know how to be appropriate? Yeah, we don’t. At least not with each other.

Anyway, we took a HIIT class together, and it was more fun than I’ve had while running in EONS. We were all piles of sweat, and one of us might have taken someone home, only to be summarily rejected later; but damn, was it fun. How would I have known it would be fun, had I not given over to my mantra? I’d have stayed home and sulked. I’d have missed “The Navajo” reciting lines from “Last of the Mohicans” to classmates, pretending it was “his” story. That’ve been a crying damn shame. I’d have missed the Grave Robber, toppling head over heels onto a gym mat, after missing several steps. I’d have missed my endorphins. I’d have missed my friends. I’d have let the pity party take me away from my NY family.

I’d have missed the story about arguably one of the most attractive men I know being shut down by a wisp of a woman in grand fashion.

No sport is worth missing out on that; because, sometimes, pretty people need to be reminded they aren’t infallible. Hell, I’d have probably missed out on a late night vodka double face time with WIAW’s Jenn, which we tried to start in Google Gchat “hangout”, and moved to more reliable “face time”, but not before she took this super flattering picture…

that’s me. eating a cucumber on Jenn’s computer AND ipad. We’re classy. It’s also Jenn in the tiny pics with her face obscured. She’s smarter than I am.

Do you have a favorite mantra? I know Jenn’s is “shut your face, hooker” or at least that’s the one most frequently recited to me…it’s an odd one, I know.

But it must work, because she is the mistress of WIAW, (which it happens to be…) and i am not.

so here’s what I had.

waffles, kale and egg with whites and hot sauce, grapes, salad with tofu and a pile of cucumber, lychee nuts, and QUICK SCONES!!!!

The quick scones were the healthy star. I used a……mix. I wanted a scone, had no buttermilk, and less patience.

date, honey, and hazelnut scones

I used Trader Joe’s multigrain baking mix, made it according to biscuit prep, added 1/4 cup honey, 1 cup chopped dates, and 1 cup chopped, toasted hazelnuts.

They.Are.Amazing.

You should eat them. Now.

Here’s your new mantra.

“Go Scones or Go Home.”