Relocation Chronicles: There's a Southern Accent Where I Come From

"I'm going to get the mail!" I chirped to my co-workers as I headed out of the office.

The words had barely escaped my lips when my hand, almost of its own volition, clamped over my mouth. I froze in horror.  It wasn't what I had said that caused the reaction. It was how I said it.

Mell. I'm going to get the mell.

After thirteen years in New York, and countless hours of acting classes, I thought I had squelched the last traces of Eastern Kentucky from my speech.  Sure, there was the occasional "y'all" now and then. But even that had evolved into the more Yankee-approved "you all" over time.

I'm not even sure how I ended up with the slight twang I brought to New York.  My parents, both Northern born-and-raised, speak with a neutral accent, even after living in the South for decades. It was just something I picked up, I suppose. I didn't even think I HAD an accent until my New York cousin, Marco, cringed upon hearing me pronounce "umbrella" (with the decidedly Southern emphasis on the "um").  "Honey," he chided, "you have GOT to get rid of that accent.  People are going think you're stupid."

I was hurt, of course, and indignant that Southerners could be so unfairly judged by these rude Yankees.  But his comment, I'm ashamed to admit, cut deeply. I became more aware of how I spoke.  Still in college at the time, I worked to adopt a Neutral American Accent in my scene study classes.  Before long, it became natural.

The Neutral American Accent wasn't to last, however. A dozen years later, with two years in the Bronx and a year and a half in Brooklyn under my belt, my "r's" were sometimes slipping. The word "quarter" somehow sounded more like "qua-dah".

When I moved back to Kentucky, I thought I was at a point in my life where I no longer gave a crap about what other people thought about my speech patterns. But the slip-up, the Eastern Kentucky mell-mail incident, gave me pause. I never imagined myself as one of those people with a Franken-accent. Like my great-uncle Alan, who spent the first half of his life in Brooklyn and the second half in South Carolina.  The words that rolled out of his mouth almost seemed to be fighting their own Civil War. Pure Brooklyn-ese was punctuated by a confusing Carolina drawl. I remember being more fascinated by the way he spoke than by what he was saying.

And yet, here I was, dropping r's like a Yank and twanging like a hillbilly. At the same time. I stood for a moment in the hallway, contemplating my new identity as a perpetual stranger in a strange land. Then, with a smile, I continued down the hawl-way to get mell.

The Relocation Chronicles: Driving

"Whyyyyyyyyyyy? Why would you do that??? Why? Why? Why??"

"Are you DRUNK?? You MUST be drunk - wait, it's 7:15 AM! Oh, maybe you're high on the bath salts!!"

"Don't do that, don't you do that, don't you think about - gahhh!! You @&;#$*!!! You dirty, slutty @&;#$*!"

No, these quotes aren't plucked from the police transcript of a domestic violence call. These are screeches that can be heard, several times a day, emanating from my car. More specifically, from me, inside my car.

Driving has been one of the biggest adjustments for me since my Big Move. Luckily for the motorists of the greater New York area, I happily relinquished my car when I moved to New York 13 years ago. I was never very good at driving.  It took me four tries to pass my driving test when I was sixteen.  Before the fourth attempt, Mr. Spicer, my examiner, glared at me from over the top of his glasses.  "We WILL pass this time, won't we, Miss Megan?"

We did. Barely. 

After victimizing several mailboxes, one parked Mac truck, and more or less leaving a path of destruction and terror in the wake of my 1990 Honda, I handed the keys to my brother when I moved to NYC and never looked back.  When people in New York complained about missing driving, I looked at them like they had a second head.  What is there to miss? The hassle of parking? The gas and insurance costs? The speeding tickets? (Okay, maybe that one is just me.)

Alas, moving back to Kentucky meant getting back behind the wheel, come what may. 

What has come, to my total lack of surprise, is frustration. Lots of frustration, coupled with utter bewilderment, and topped off with a new appreciation for my creative cursing skills.

There are a few idiosyncrasies I've noticed to Louisville driving that are especially infuriating.  There's what I call the "Louisville Drift", where motorists slip nonchalantly from lane to lane, turn signals be damned.  There's also the "Friendly Cut-Off", where someone will peel out in front of you, and apologize by way of a cheerful "sorry I almost murdered you!" wave. 

The thing that drives me the craziest, though, and leaves me sputtering out non-words, has no catchy name. The simplicity of it is maddening:  It's turning. People here come to a near dead stop every time they turn. Every. Single. Time. Cruising down the road at a comfortable 45 MPH? HAHA! Nope!! The idiot in front of you needs to turn off, and he must come to a COMPLETE FREAKING STOP before he can do so. 

I'm getting back into the swing of driving. I haven't taken out any mailboxes (yet). Every day I get into my car, I tell myself, "Today is the Zen day! No cursing today!"

My pal + my wheels

Hasn't happened yet, but that doesn't mean there's no hope.

The Relocation Chronicles: Entry 1

I never thought I'd leave New York. Never ever, ever, in a million years.  And then a million years came, and I left.

It happened quickly, as things with me tend to do. Love, loss; it all happens very quickly. One day, I was talking with my boyfriend about moving in together.  The next day, he had broken up with me and I was sitting on my best friend's couch, staring into space. I didn't have a Plan B.  All I knew, all I wanted to know, was my life in New York with This Guy.  And he didn't want that.  He didn't want that at all.

Do you know that feeling that comes with a fresh breakup, that feeling of additional mourning because you now can't hang out with his best friend's girlfriend (who you really liked), or go to that coffee shop, or that bar, or that bookstore? Because you'll definitely run into him, and even if you don't, you'll be terribly reminded of him? That was how I felt about the entirety of New York City.  This breakup had taken something so deep from me that I didn't even have a word for it.  Everywhere I went, everyone I ran into, everything I saw, reminded me of him. And of my failing. And I had to get the hell out of there. As soon as humanly possible.

So I shook off this horrible feeling by buying a car and packing some stuff into it, and driving far, far away from there.  And then, about a week later, that horrible feeling, it tracked me down in Kentucky. That bastard.

And so I went about trying to make a life here.  I tried to make friends. I felt impossibly out of place. I think it was culture shock in a much more profound way than I felt when I moved to New York. But I tried. I am trying.  I am trying to make this work.

I'm dating.  I'm hanging out with my weird, crazy family. I've got some friends. I found a job. I'm doing this thing.

Dammit, I'm doing this thing.

Put your safety belts on, kids. Gonna be a bumpy ride.

Reflections on a journey: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

When you spend two months in India, people expect you to come back with something. Not like a scarf or a tan,  but something equally tangible. So, what am I bringing back? Besides several scarves, some sparkly bangles, and a new found appreciation for probiotics and Imodium? Lots of things. Most of them I'll keep to myself, but I have been composing a list in my head for the past few days. Actually, it's two lists - Things I Will Not Miss About India and Things I Will Miss About India- but like most things having to do with India, the opposites intersect and edges blur and intertwine in such a way that they are sometimes indistinguishable. 


Appropriately, a mashup ensued - please see below. In the coming days, I'll be going back and adding photos to the blogs I previously posted (sorry, the Internet situation in India goes snugly in the "WON'T MISS" category; posting photos while there was a three-step process that was usually hampered by slow or non-existent WiFi connections). Also, one of the immediately tangible items from my trip is my shiny new blog, The Skeptical Yogi. It can be found here: http://theskepticalyogi.wordpress.com/. It will be primarily focused on healthy living topics and yoga. I'll keep this site for personal use, but I'll be updating regularly over there.


Now, back to our regularly scheduled programming.



1) I will not/will miss the driving. My driver, BK, told on the first day of my Rajasthan road trip that Indian drivers require only three things: Good brakes, good horn, and good luck. I've been to some countries where traffic "laws" have been treated more as "suggestions", but never anywhere like India. In India, there aren't even any discernible suggestions. It's total mayhem all the time. It's great and it's terrible. It's loud and noisy and stinky, but teeming with life and more representative of real life in India than any museum diorama could ever hope to be.


2) I will not/will miss the cows. In India, cows are everywhere. It's not unusual to see traffic stopped because some cows decided to take a midday snooze in the middle of the road. They have free reign of the place (meaning, the whole country), and as such, walking anywhere should never be a mindless activity. The smell of cow dung permeates the air, sometimes bringing a whiff of freshness and life, other times a malodorous tiding of a ruined shoe, moments too late.


3) I will not/will miss the complete lack of privacy in India. I will miss it because it really made me appreciate American culture, a lot, on a daily basis. We may be considered prudes in the eyes of more liberal countries, but in the U.S., we take our personal space and privacy seriously. I didn't realize how much I valued that until it vanished. In India, there are very few boundaries. Few questions are off limits, and "personal space" isn't part of the national vocabulary. In a country where it's not uncommon to see a dog and a person sharing the same strip of grass to do their morning business, such notions are laughable. 


4) I will not/will miss the food. Lots of my fellow students complained about the food we had during our month of training. I thought it was great. I happily ate (most) everything we were served, and occasionally paid for it. I will miss the wonderful flavors and aromas of the food. I am looking forward, however, to some variety! It won't be long before I try my hand at cooking some of the meals we were served regularly.


I mostly won't miss the hygiene situation in general. Both the bathrooms and the cultural hygiene mores I am happy to leave behind. The morning routine is one I especially won't miss. The first time I heard it, I had just settled down to a delicious-looking breakfast at my hotel in Jaisalmer - a fresh mango lassi, paradtha and pickles, and piping hot Marsala chai. I was starving and began to dig in, when I couldn't help but notice a ghastly sound coming from a nearby outdoor bathroom. It sounded like someone was getting horribly ill. Retching and hacking sounds emanated from the poor fellow inside. I felt bad for him, and the barf concerto in B flat put me off my breakfast completely. 


It wasn't until that guy skipped out of the bathroom looking fresh as a daisy, and the next guy stepped in and began a new series of horrible retching sounds, that I realized this was just part of the daily routine. It doesn't have a name that I know of, but it's a terrible-sounding sort of throat clearing process that most Indian men do every morning after brushing their teeth. I can happily live the rest of my days without hearing that sound again. 


The last thing that bears mentioning is treatment of women. Even though living it gave me a new appreciation the why, I still found myself chafing daily at the assumptions that were made about me again and again, just because of my gender.  I understand that women there are, for the most part, respected and revered. The part I couldn't wrap my head around was the "I'm such a delicate flower" part, where because I'm a woman, I can't walk around by myself, or drive, or wear a tank top because my lady powers might make the menfolk crazy and then who knows what could happen!! The part where I walked into a shop to buy some pencils and have to  run out because the proprietor of the shop  thinks it's okay to put his arm around me and try to kiss me because I'm a delicate flower (also, because I am a hoochie momma Westerner, thanks a lot, Hollywood) - that part?! That part I won't miss. 


As I was getting off the plane in Helsinki, I was flooded with relief that I was back in the "West". Not surprisingly, some Indian dude tried to elbow past me on the jet way, and at first I acquiesced. Then I remembered, I'm not in India anymore! "You're in my house now, bitch!" I thought, as I elbowed him back and strutted off without the slightest bit of remorse.

I Try Too Hard and Help Me Choose A New Vice

Last night, I left the mountains.  Light rain streaked the windows of the Volvo bus I was seated in as we careened our way around the terrifying, hairpin turns I had come to know and love. There was a Bollywood action/adventure/romance film playing on the TV overhead, but I paid it no mind. I was thinking about all that had happened over the course of the past month. I was contemplating the strange nature of change - how it never seems to happen when you're inside looking out. 


But change I have, there is no question. The trousers I wore to India, once snug, now sit loosely around my waist.  It's not just phsyical, though. There's something different about the way I feel. I feel balanced - centered. (Although shame on anyone who spends a month meditating in the Himalayas and doesn't walk away feeling at least a bit more centered.)  It's more than a mere feeling of balance, though. Over the course of the last two months, I've had to face a few personal demons. I felt like Atreyu from The Neverending Story, when he looks into the Mirror of Truth. It's scary, and it takes some guts, but in the end, it's worth it. And in my case at least, it wasn't so bad. 


Two items of note emerged over the course of the past two months. One is:


I sometimes try too hard.


I always have to be the first one in class finished. I always have to get the highest score on a test. There's photographic evidence of this from my childhood - a ballet recital where the rest of the class is doing a plie and I'm doing what appears to be a bodybuilder's squat, my butt hovering inches from the floor. They plied, I plied harder. 


The problem with this is, there's an error in the circuitry somewhere. In my bulldog-like refusal to accept anything less than absolute perfection, I have caused myself to miss out on a lot. Because somewhere along the line, a competitive streak got mixed in with the Quest for Ultimate Perfection in Everything. The logical conclusion to this was: Anything that I cannot be the absolute best in is not worth doing.  Naturally, the circle that included these things widened with age, and continued to grow until, before I realized it, I had stopped trying at just about everything. If I couldn't be the best of the best, what was the point?


I've decided to try to strike a sort of balance. The pathological perfectionism can't be helped. Nor can the competitiveness. However, I can use these to my benefit, as long as I am able to find balance. I will continue to seek perfectionism in yoga, even though I know it doesn't exist. I will also be the absolute best yoga teacher I know how to be. I will be constantly trying to improve (in order to beat myself, see?).  At the same time, I have to practice acceptance. I can't be the absolute best at everything all the time. 


Another small item (not nearly as heavy, I think):


I need a new vice. 


I enjoyed the crap out of my vices before I came to India. Particularly smoking. That expensive, life-shortening, stinky habit made me so happy. I loved smoking. I won't lie, if there was a way to reconcile a pack-a-day smoking habit with my aspirations to pursue a career in healthy living, I would have found it and would now be puffing cheerfully away at an Indian cigarette. But, alas, there isn't. Not even in a tongue-in-cheek sort of way. Booze doesn't really fit in, either, except for the ocassional glass of wine. Shopping? Being that I'm presently unemployed, this might not be the best choice. Eating? Please see "fits in with a healthy lifestyle" above.

Trying on new vices! Not as fun as smoking but more delicious.

Hm. I'm currently flummoxed. Cussing is at the top of the short list at the moment, but that's all I've come up with. Since I'm in "vacation" mode this week, I have induldged a bit in some shopping and eating (how have I never experienced Red Mango frozen yogurt before today?!). When both of my feet are again firmly planted in reality, I will need to find a vice or two that is sustainable. 


Suggestions are highly #*!@ing appreciated.

Buggin' Out

The monsoon rains have arrived at the ashram, and with them came bugs. Lots of bugs.  The rains have been a welcome respite from the heat and humidity, but I would happily bear the heat over the insect invasion any day. 


In the beginning of the course, there were flies and some mosquitoes. Mostly they were just an annoyance during yoga class - Shavasana Pete, as I call him, is the fly who lands on your nose during relaxation (he has a brother - Meditation Maury). The peaceful quiet of morning yoga class is always punctuated by the sound of people slapping away mosquitoes. 


Since the rains, though, the mosquito population has mushroomed. There are a lot of them, and they are ravenous. Today during afternoon yoga class, I got three bites. During dinner, two. By now, I am the Bruce Lee of mosquito swatting, so those are the lucky ones who managed to get a bite in. I have given up any reservations about chemicals and cover myself in DEET whenever I leave my room, and still, I am covered in bites.


In addition to the mosquito plague, the monsoon has brought cockroaches. I live in New York, so I have seen my share of cockroaches. These aren't your garden variety NYC cockroach. These are small-bird-sized monsters who descended from the Himalayas on WINGS. Yes! Enormous, winged cockroaches! My roommate and I had the ill fortune of having one visit our room the other night. After our subsequent freak-out, our teacher, Krish, assured us there was nothing to worry about because they don't bite. WHO CARES IF THEY BITE! Just the look of them is the stuff of nightmares.


I had been very proud of myself because I hadn't had any major freak-outs over the spiders. The spiders here aren't very big, but they jump. *Shudder* I have mentioned on here before that I am not fond of spiders. This is a vast understatement. My Australian classmates think it's hilarious when I scoot myself across the floor during class to avoid the path of a nickel-sized spider. What they don't realize is, that scoot is an exercise in restraint for me. Usually a spider sighting means a full-on spaz attack from yours truly. The Australians can roll their eyes all they want - the huntsman spider is the sole reason I may never visit that continent.


It's not all bugs and rain, though. It's mostly pretty fun. Our days are jam packed, and there's always something new going on. In the evenings, we sometimes gather around for bijans, which are songs in Sanskrit. It's usually during those times that I take a moment to look around and appreciate how lucky I am to be right here, right now.

Consciousness + 4: An Education in Yoga

I'm well into the third week of Yoga Teacher Training, and it's been quite a ride so far. Much like India itself, it's completely different from what I expected, in a mostly good way.

We begin each day with 40 minutes of meditation. This doesn't sound like much, but for me, it's a lot. My instructor, Krish, likens the mind (when you're trying to meditate) to a monkey that's eaten a chili and then been stung by a scorpion. This is very accurate. I do like the practice, though, and plan to continue the daily battle to pacify my mind when I go home. At least 10 minutes a day seems reasonable.

After meditation, I find myself staring out at the adjacent farm's verdant pastures. The Himalayas rise up behind it, and the sun is usually just starting to crest over the distant peaks. In this bucolic setting, we perform our daily kriyas, or cleansing rituals. This is a decidedly un-beautiful, un-glamorous process that involves neti pots and lots of nose blowing.

I wasn't expecting our education to be so heavy on the philosophy. I am enjoying it very much, and that is mostly thanks to the excellent instruction of Swami. Swami has been studying philosophy (and the Yoga Sutras in particular) for 15 years and usually doesn't teach beginners. He is a disciple of logic and dismissed Descartes with a wave of his hand. In between cracking us (and himself) up with jokes, he has opened my mind wide open about what yoga is, exactly. 

Life here is very busy, and always full of surprises. There's a surly monkey named Randall that lurks around whenever we have our afternoon snack (usually someone tosses him a banana). The other night we did an evening dancing meditation, which is something I never thought I'd ever do.  On our last day off, they offered a class in Reiki healing, so I took it and now have my certification. 

I'm off to class in a minute, but I'll close with a Swami joke: An old woman looked in the mirror one morning and saw she had only 3 hairs left on her head. She thought for a moment, and then pleated the hairs into a braid.

The next morning, she looked in the mirror and saw she had only 2 hairs left. "I guess today it's a center part!" she said.

The next morning, she only had 1 hair left. "Ponytail today!" she thought.

The fourth morning, she looked in the mirror and saw she had no hair left on her head. "Thank goodness," she exclaimed, "I don't have to fix my hair today!"

:)