Favorite Christmas Memory 2009

Christmas is still a week away and I already have my favorite Christmas memory for 2009. It actually happened last Saturday, December 12th. My Mom was in the city to do some Christmas shopping and spend some time with me getting the house ready for Christmas, and of course she made sure that she was in the city on a weekend that I had William.

That day was started early for me, with less than five hours of sleep because of a Christmas party I attended that spilled over into a bar until sometime after 3am. I was a little dizzy and probably still over the legal limit for alcohol so I wasn’t driving. We packed up Mom’s car and headed out to do some shopping and around supper time stopped at a make-shift tree lot to pick out our Christmas tree. When it was delivered I propped it up in the stand and gave it a ton of water while we ate supper and dug out the decorations (of which a huge box is still missing).

That evening we decorated the tree and snacked while a Christmas cartoon played in the background. William claimed the left-most side of the tree as his and kindly reminded me that it was his side any time I tried to put an ornament on his side. We cleaned up and then sat down to watch Polar Express, as it came on tv. It was Mom’s first time seeing the movie but one of my favorites even though Tom Hanks does many of the character’s voices in it.

It was in the final half hour that William decided to climb up in my lap and watch the end of the movie. It was nearing 11pm and we were all quite tired. And as the last commercial break came on William laid his head on my shoulder and closed his eyes. When the movie came back on, they opened; he watched the final scene and then closed his eyes again. He was out for the night.

I find it hard to believe anything else could top my list in 2009.

My new addiction

So I have an addiction, which I have mentioned on here before, but I haven’t gone into any detail. I love hot yoga and would go every day if my schedule would allow it. LOVE IT! I feel like I need to be the spokesperson for Moksha Yoga.

I ended up trying yoga back in the spring shortly after becoming friends with a local filmmaker Jake. He had been going for some time and thought it might be something I would be interested in and since my life is very different than it was a couple of years ago and I have periods of time where I’m alone a lot, I decided that I was more than willing to try something new.

I had not tried yoga before, but had some idea of what to expect. The part I didn’t expect was that hot yoga was so hot. I believe I was told the room is held at 98 degrees, 50 percent humidity. So when you first walk into the darkened studio and lay down in savasana to calm your mind and wait for class to begin, you already can feel your heart rate quicken, as your body adjusts to the heat. And during the class you sweat unlike anything you can imagine. I’m talking drops of sweat dripping constantly off your body. More sweat than I thought was humanly possible.

The first class I went to was a 60 minute class and from the completion of the class I knew I was hooked. I loved that once you entered the room and went through the series of postures your mind has no time to wander to other topics that can distract you from the rest of your day. While in that studio you have escaped the reality of your life and are brought back to basics; listening to your body and focusing on breath and balance.

And here I am almost a year into practicing and I still cannot get over the improvement in my body. Now, I haven’t lost much if any weight, because that really hasn’t been my focus, but I have noticed toning in my arms, my hips are more loose and my posture overall has been improved, most dramatically while sitting at my desk at work. I also love that you only push yourself as much as you want. There are no expectations put on you, although if you’re like me you push yourself a little harder in some area every class. And another thing that keeps me going back is that I feel it in my muscles every time I leave the class.

So, I certainly endorse hot yoga. I have taken a number of friends to the class already and have at least four more who want to give it a try after the holidays. One of my closest friends was going thru a very emotional break up and couldn't keep from crying and I took her with me.  As I drove her home after the class she told me that it was exactly what she needed, An hour that she didn't think about her ex.  And if anyone reading this has a Moksha or similar hot yoga studio around you, I ask you to just try it once and see what you think (but drink a ton of water before you go).

Doesn't get more wrong than this...

So it's now 11pm and I just finished watching the season finale of The Biggest Loser.  It's not a show I watch but there was nothing else on tv to watch and I wanted something easy to watch as I ate pizza.  Isn't that terrible?  A McCain frozen, throw in the oven pizza.  Probably the same type of thing those contestants did for years, that got them to the 400 lbs and their spot on the show.

Now in my defense, the reason I'm eating so late is because I worked until 7pm, was home half an hour before heading to hot yoga for the 8:30 class.  I sweated my ass off and pushed myself hard enough that I already feel it in my arms and back.  So even though not ideal to eat this late, or to eat pizza versus a salad or soup, I kind of earned it and will not be on my way to the Biggest Loser.

My favorite picture right now

Refusing to agree continues

I was going to vent on here today, but I’m striving to be a good person, so I will take the pill I was just given and choke it down as best as I can . I just got word from my son’s mother that she had been in to see her lawyer today and signed some papers. She was trying to circumvent needless stress on my part, since I have a lot of studying to do for an exam tomorrow evening, by giving me a heads-up.

I think that she thought of this, because of an under-handed move she made early in our separation, and maybe was trying to avoid a repeat. Back last summer she had her lawyer contact me with some of the worst words I have heard throughout this whole process, in essentially diminishing my rights to my son to six days a month, the day after I had driven her and my son to the airport to fly away on vacation. The day after she had made me promise that we would go on family vacations together. That was the letter that forced me to take legal action to ensure my rights and my son’s were looked after in regards to access.

Anyway, back to today. I thanked her (we were using email during this conversation), and told her that if it was anything bad then let me know and I would avoid my lawyer’s calls or emails until the end of the week. Then my desk phone rings. My heart sinks; obviously I am not going to like the words I am about to hear.

She tells me that she had just signed off on some paperwork that my lawyer had been working on, and they sent back a revision. She then told me what the revision was. It is in regards to our son. It was a section I had added whereby she would agree that we would each have to ask the other to take our son, if we couldn’t be with him, before finding someone to babysit him. It’s essentially right of first refusal.

I am not going to go into my thought process right now or how it makes me feel. It’s probably fairly obvious how hurt I am from this topic appearing on my blog. All I am going to say is that I know I am a good father. I have learned lessons from those in my life and I strive every day to be a better Dad to my son. The circumstances are not ideal, but I do the best I can and first right of refusal should be default, not something written on a piece of paper witnessed by lawyers.