Velcro Part One: So Much Chewing

Velcro Part One: So Much Chewing

"Wait. What’s her last name?" I texted.

It was creeping into late evening and I was preparing a salad, which should be easy because it doesn't involve defrosting, preheating, measuring, or the killjoy setting a timer brings. But an intuition alarm is going off in my nervous system and unlike alarms that tell you to go-go-go, this one's like a strong cease and desist notification, demanding me to stop. I stand upright, step back from the counter, and look off into the ether, playing back in my head a text I'd just read. I look down at my progress. I was in the part of salad making where it felt like years had gone by since I'd first started and hunger kept interrupting the flow asking: "Are we still making the salad?" "Yes, yes unfortunately, we are still making the salad." It's a lot of prep followed by a lot of chewing, so much chewing, as time-consuming in the making as in the consuming. Strewn about a small counter were a bounty of healthy ingredients. The kind of foods an annoying yoga teacher would preach to eat to help with twists. I know this because I am that annoying yoga teacher.

The salad was being prepared via an over-engineered and time-tested sequence, not solely for the light-headed hungry lady trying to finish off her day with a healthy win, but also for the impatient and tired woman she'll turn into afterwards. That version is not going to appreciate a big clean-up. Short of eating everything separately, where my stomach is the bowl and plays the part of tosser, I also strategize food preparation for less handwashing, less opening the same cabinet doors over and over again, or the fridge door, or putting the cutting knife down, picking it up, moving the cutting board closer, further away, closer again, along with having the least amount of sticky mess after. If there is a joy of cooking, we maybe ran into one another at a dinner party years ago, but were never friends. It was during this one-person rush in my kitchen that I received a text from the owner of the yoga studio I teach at. We'll call her Sean. The phone's locked screen is set to only show the names of people contacting me and not what they want to contact me about. This is a privacy measure, for a person who spends most of their time at home alone where no one else can see my phone's screen. Mostly, it feels like I'm just trying to annoy myself rather than protect anyone’s privacy.

When Sean's message came I stopped the interminable salad preparation, washed my hands, and carefully dried them on a my fancy hemp apron. Whenever I use my fancy hemp apron as it's intended, instead of wall decoration, I feel like a real chef. I maneuver around the kitchen as though I were engaging an eager audience through a nonchalant five-minute roasted duck with walnut gnocchi side, when I'm really making the same salad I did the day before and the day before that. Drying my hands is an outwardly casual gesture working against my own best interests; I'm too fussy-hungry, and reading a text message is not the kind of consuming my body needs. It's also might not help the text exchange because if you shouldn't drive angry, you should definitely never text hangry. Choosing between hangry and work, I picked up the phone and responded, since the ladder directly correlates to my ability to consistently resolve the prior. Sean's message was longish because she's a fan of "voice-to-text obfuscation" as she likes to call it. Details about the possibility of a private yoga client, a woman named, lets say Streegya something, near Penn Station in Midtown Manhattan, who has a lot of health issues and is kind of a handful. Fungry I typed back a quick, "Hi, Yes." Sean's just looking for a yes or no answer and we can figure out the rest later.

After texting I'd gotten back to slicing, dicing, and chopping, when my nervous system sent a flare and I stood up, knife in hand, frozen like a video that's been paused. There are a couple of details in the text and the activity of holding a knife that bring about a negative feeling unrelated to the moment. My body is goosebump trembling and not because it wants to eat. This is my body attuned, its warning system communicating from subconscious to nervous system, suggesting I process a feeling I might've brushed off otherwise. Of the many benefits of yoga, the connection between intuition and circumstance comes in handy, so long as I listen. I honor this unwelcome vibe by putting down what I'm doing — holding a knife like a low-budget horror movie victim — and text Sean again with an unexplained urgency. I'm leading with my secondary gut, the feelings-focused one and not the food-focused one. I quickly wipe a pointer finger across my fancy hemp apron, across my abdomen, and tap-text Sean as fast as possible, trying to catch her before she responds back to the potential client, asking for the woman's last name.

I have an Aunt Strigga who lives near the Madison Square Garden, Penn Station, area Sean's voicemail mentioned. The voice-to-text Streegya sounding name is very close to my Aunt’s. Could there be two women who are a handful, who have an uncommon name, and live in the same neighborhood? It was possible, just like it was possible for there to be a left-handed short stop, and just as unlikely. I return to dicing vegetables, then stop again quickly, rinse my hands and try to find a dry spot on my increasingly moist apron. My message to Sean isn't conveying what's in my head. I want to be clear about something and add, "I have an Aunt Strigga near mad garden. Different last name" along with the important part, "And she’s a nut." Aunt Strigga, or Aunty Striggy as we never fondly called her, because I'm making up the name, is my dad’s sister and we don't share a last name. This is not a person I want to be blindsided into contact with.

After replying to Sean, I reread her first message again. For a communication tool that is fast and easy, reading a text often requires multiple go-overs, or an audience of friends to decipher intent. Salad prep is not quite finished, my body has moved beyond being frustrated-with-me hungry to a hungry high: wobbly, more fun, and a place mentally where I often keep going in the wrong direction decision-wise because my brain needs food, but the wrong way has a foggy, beguiling mystery to it. Sure, why not read in this moment, when my comprehension is, well, whatever the opposite of peak would be. The woman who contacted Sean is maybe in her mid-sixties, has a myriad of health issues, but is eager to work privately with a yoga teacher, starting with one session and then buying a package. Chef's kiss; the woman wanted a restorative yoga teacher, which is my niche. This could be anyone. I shake off the idea it's my dad’s sister, put down the phone, again, and add the last salad ingredients. After listening to my intuition, I have a probabilities doubt; maybe I'm overreacting, but really, who is the woman contacting my boss? The negative feeling is still there; the alarm's still going off.

(To Be Continued... Velcro Part Two!)