Studio Life

This precious gem of an email, shown below in its entirety and of course with permission, was in my in-box as soon as I powered up my phone upon landing in Seattle on Wednesday afternoon after a month on the road.  This was pretty much the best possible welcome home sentiment I could ever hope to receive.  My comments about this appear at the very end of this post.

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Dear Rebecca,
 
This letter is SO overdue…..! 

I first met you when Merianne and I went to a Pilates Style Conference in NYC, I think it was in 2006.  We attended one of your lectures and loved it!  So the connection for you and Merianne began there.  Your enthusiasm and passion was instantaneously absorbed by both of us.

Merianne is a very close friend of mine who introduced me to Pilates about 41/2 years ago.  Since then my life has been changed forever, in so many ways, and those changes have been so much for the better and so very positive (and will forever continue....).  I could go into the details, but will save those for another time if and when you feel like talking (or should I say hearing) about it. 

Suffice it to say that Pilates helped me heal, brought me hope, focus, encouragement, patience, strength, and self-confidence, as well as physical health, strength and flexibility, and so much more, and is ever changing and growing and evolving; Pilates is a never-ending challenge for me, both mentally and physically, which I just LOVE!!!!!

Merianne has always been a wonderful teacher.  Her passion and enthusiasm (as well as her movement and gift for teaching!!) are amazing, as you know. 

Sooooo, I am writing to thank you so very much from the very depth of my soul for showing her the path(s) she can take in Pilates.  She searched for a very long time for the person she could train with that she could also connect with….and in you she found what she had long been looking for. 

Since she visited you in Seattle, she has grown so much, not just in her teaching but she has grown so much as a person.  You have given her brain and her body so many tools and so much inspiration and encouragement, and she, in turn, has given me so much of the same.  Pilates has really come alive!!! 

Since her visit to Seattle, I have grown so very much stronger.  I feel that all of my movement has changed so drastically - my scoop has unbelievably changed and become so much deeper - you gave her tools to make Pilates come alive each and every time one does it, the tools one needs to always work harder and deeper and truer….truly amazing stuff, Rebecca. 

For me, life has come alive.  Joseph Pilates’ work will never cease to amaze me, and for so many reasons.  Thank you so very much for your extreme dedication, determination, and hard work.  For people like me, it is absolutely life altering and joyous.  Not a day goes by that I am not thankful for people like you and Merianne.
 
With much caring and appreciation,

Paula

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Of course I want to know the rest of Paula's story so she is not only writing it up so I can share it with you but she and I will also talk by phone (I take and return all calls, you knew that, right?) so that we can personalize our relationship.

Has reading Paula's email helped you sense more clearly that what we do when we teach well is not only change the world as it exists around us in that moment but that we also have a part in the extension of that moment as it carries on in the world in all manner of ways, every one of which is well beyond our control.  My friends, that is a beautiful thing. 

One of the most amazing things about teaching and practicing Pilates is that it disappears the instant we create it - it slips right through our hands - so although residual strength and flexibility hopefully remain to be built upon, the magic we create, the feeling of it, the mental and physical synthesis of it, are over as soon as the moment of their creation passes. 

We have to keep doing it in order to make a difference and, here's the really pivotal part, we are only as good as our current session.  We can't say to clients "remember that fabulous session I taught you 3 months ago?  Let's just keep remembering that one and forget all the mediocre ones I've taught since then." 

Whether it is good or bad, the past becomes irrelevant and we can't rely on it because it no longer exists! 

Perhaps this concept is best summarized by Janet Jackson: "what have you done for me lately?"

So after reading Paula's email, I hope you are inspired to go teach or perform the session of your life.  Then keep doing it.  Over and over again. 

And if you're lost in the work and cannot create this type of result, it probably won't take much to get you so that you can, I can help with that so give a Nun a shout and let's get you finished up, settled out and headed straight for the achievement of your potential.  Can I get a witness!!! 

Lastly, and this is a common result of teachers who have studied with me, Merianne has blasted through some impressive levels of accomplishment, found new and exciting space for a brand new big studio of her very own.  Hopefully, sometime soon, I'll be teaching in it and at that point this story will come full circle; I will have the delightful pleasure and honor of working with both Merianne and Paula.

Can you see that we're part of a chain that began with Joe and links through us to the Meriannes to the Paulas and on through to who knows next . . . care about everything you do, pepare well, let your joy flow strong and true throughout all your days and become a part, whether you know it directly or not, of changing the world. 

How utterly fabulous is THAT?

Virtually every teacher I've met has a common problem when it comes to scheduling regular Pilates sessions.  This whole thing about Pilates being a helping profession puts many teachers in a bind, time-wise, with little if any time left over, after everyone else has been served, for us to take proper care of ourselves.

I cannot remember the last time I've had a session with Heidi where she put me through a vigorous Reformer routine but last Thursday, when one of our uber Powerhouse clients Jen, said she was taking Friday off and wanted to get in another session (her 4th of the week) I jumped at the chance to do a semi with her with Heidi as our teacher.

Jen is pretty rare in almost all respects but especially in her dedication to Pilates.  Other than protecting her wrists, she's perfected her form on all the usual Advanced exercises on Reformer, Cadillac, Barrels and Chairs.  And like most of our super strong clients, mat is her favorite and most weeks she's in mat class 2 or 3 times.  

We love Jen and I can't help but think that Joe & Clara would have loved her, too.

At 1:30 on Friday, I'd felt like I'd slipped into the Pilates jet stream and was being carried forward by Heidi's brilliant words, Jen's youthful energy and my deeply ingrained biomechanical patterning that I worked like a dog to establish when I was preparing for and in my primary training program.

What a delight in the body, what a dream-like state in the mind and what a lovely afterglow the Reformer has to offer those who mount with seriousness, strength and authority.  Plus, we laughed a ton and couldn't believe how the hour flew by.  It was a usual Pilates session, well taught, well performed.  

But so rare for me, who rarely chooses Reformer over computer, Cadillac over Gmail, Chair over creative.  

Realizing there is no point at which I'll be caught up on admin, accepting that and making the right choice in the moment - to move, to sweat, to work on my form and function with greater structure and seriousness - feels great, familiar and deeply satisfying.  

I'm on Heidi's book again today for a private where we'll go back and get for my selfish satisfaction the wrist-centric exercises we left out with Jen.  And I'm also on Heidi's book for a total of another 3 hours Thursday and Saturday.

I'm back and I'm bad (but in a good way)! 

Are you gone, are you tinkering, are you losing the battle, are you half-assed trying to get in sessions, are you driven from your own studio to someone else's to take session?  

Take matters into your own authoritative hands and make change happen.  

Your advanced Reformer is waiting. 

Admin is in my blood.

I've been a receptionist, copy room girl, secretary, legal assistant, trainer (as in training new employees to perform various tasks), executive assistant, bookkeeper, word processor, office manager, business manager and just about any other title that they slap on all manner of grind and grunt work you can imagine.

And I've loved it all right up until now. 

Now, 8 years into running my Seattle studio, if my admin load was sitting in my lap it would be so heavy that I'd fall through the floor, if my admin load was luggage I'd be paying $300 overweight fees and if my admin load was in pennies I'd be a millionaire.  

I'm being buried in admin, or at least it feels that way.

There have been months where I've finally caught up on accounting by balancing over 10 monthly bank statements in a single sitting.  I've been trying to take the PilatesNun.com site to video for almost a year and am no closer to reality on it than I was when I began.  I have video from my Mom's memorial service in December that I was supposed to send to my forever dear friend Neil who lives in LA (and is the director of Biggest Loser and a gifted writer and independent film maker) who not only shot the footage but is patiently waiting for me to send it to him so he can edit it into something brilliant.  I've lived in my current house since February and still haven't set up my paint table in my art studio which of course means I haven't painted anything since I've been here and although this doesn't qualify as an administrative task, it's admin's first cousin because I can't justify working on getting my paint table set up when I'm hopelessly behind in actual work, in administrative tasks that there's nobody else to do.  I have 2 especially dear projects waiting for me on my paint table, which as you know, is not set up but when it is I'll be behind by 2 espeiclly dear projects; wedding gifts for two adored friends - Sherri Betz and Molly Wizenberg.  I told Sherri last time we talked that perhaps I'd get it to she and her husband in time for the 10th anniversary.  

How lame is that?

When it comes to admin, I don't have a me to delegate to.  I only have a me to do everything, or almost everything.

Heidi, my right hand man, is learning more administrative tasks and is a huge help to me but she's at about her limit of being able to accomplish, time-wise, the things that she currently is trained to do.  She's going to massage school in the spring and she'll have even less time then to enter sales in Quickbooks, audit client accounts, manage the calendar and take care of me in every other way that she's so brilliant doing. 

When I think about where all this admin comes from, I think it's because my business is fueled by 3 revenue streams that all require their own bizarre and detailed accounting, I've tried getting by with only 1 lawyer but apparently I absolutely must have 2.  I have only 1 CPA and 1 commercial insurance agent but I have 2 tech consultants, one for video and in-studio systems and the other one is a graphics artist and my web developer.  

My systems, the processes I use to keep me organized, are pretty refined and have worked for me for years and I really don't think my ineffectiveness is due to me being out of control with organization, determination or endurance.  I think I just have too much to do and everything I do that keeps me away from teaching makes me feel farther from Joe & Clara.  That makes me sad because all I ever want to do is move closer to them so I can understand this method more clearly and grow stronger in my own teaching.   

If you're wondering why on Earth I don't just hire someone, it's because I absolutely cannot justify the expense of hiring an administrative person because I shudder at the thought of their salary (and I pay extremely well) coming 100% off my bottom line.  And I'm not alone; most small studios - and Heidi and I are a 2 teacher shop - can't afford administrative help.  Besides, I feel as if I should be able to keep up, I have the skills to do it and surely, I should be able to manage my time well enough to get it all done.  

Would a non-paid internship work?  I wonder.  I should call some local colleges and see if there's the possibility of a good match.  Surely, it would be a fascinating experience for a solid #2 mentality to learn to support my business and me, a solid #1 mentality.  Or at least I think it would be.  But then again, I'm me and looking at it from the inside of being me, I must say I think it looks interesting, challenging, super fun and exciting.  

I read an article a long time ago in Harper's about air cargo pilots and there was a quote from one of them that went something like this: our jobs entail many hours of mind-numbing boredom that are punctuated by seconds of complete terror.  In my life as an administrator, I can understand what that's like.   

So, I'm off to bed where I will update my day list for tomorrow, mark off in grand stylish strokes the many things on my today list that I nailed, and will sleep like I'm dead for 7 or 8 or 9 hours and then, I'll get up tomorrow and teach and laugh and eat and drink and do it all again.   

That's the way it's been for all these years and I guess that's the way it will be for a few more.

Want to move to Seattle and be my admin hero?  Well, do you? 

If you received me blast email sent out on Tuesday, May 19th, you hopefully read that I'd be putting up a PilatesNun.com piece with ideas about how you can raise money within your own studio to help you pay for registration at the PMA conference in 2010, or any other educational experience that you're interested in having.

 My finishing school, Pilates Excel, includes a bunch of ideas like these because most teachers, most studio owners, will never have as much money to spend on continuing education as they'd like.  Most teachers feel it's hard enough just to get through primary education and once they've cleared their basic program, they often wait years before they're able to afford to continue learning within a formal structure.  Of course, we learn every day that we teach but our teaching becomes stale when we don't immerse ourselves in educational experiences outside our own teaching environment.

And then there's the troubling issue of what to do, which of the gazillion options available should you say yes to?  I'm the type of person who likes to shop online at sites that have very few options within a particular category.  I am easily overwhelmed in the face of too many choices.  And there's a good reason for that.

I just finished reading a great book about that very sort of thing, it's called How We Decide and it's written by a sexy neuroscientist named Jonah Lehrer.  Among the tons of great stuff in the book I learned that many people have trouble with too many choices because we can only actually and really track on so many pieces of information at a time.  Know how many?  Are you ready?  Seven.  As in 5, 6, 7.  Makes you feel better about being so challenged by multi-tasking, doesn't it.   

It'll help you make a good decision if you have a process by which you decide what continuing education you'll pursue.  Start by researching teachers you connect well with, evaluate their offerings for the next 3 - 18 months (PMA certification requires 16 PMA credits every 2 years so you'll want to make your educational horizon consistent with your professional certification).  Determine your weaknesses in teaching and try to find educational options from that favored teacher that most directly and fully address your weaknesses.  One of the biggest mistakes teachers make is they keep taking more courses in things they're already good at.  You have to make the most out of the money you do have to spend on education, your clients, co-workers and studio owner will very much appreciate you filling in your gaps instead of moving further toward specialization.   

And now for formats.  

The big educational conferences give you a taste of educators, presenters, exhibitors and schools but the down side to the big conferences is that the vast majority of education happens in 90 - 120 minute slots.  Remember that PMA conferences have the highest standards for presenters and some conferences don't have any standards for presenters.  Buyer beware.  At the big conferences, there's not much meat but you will have exposure to a whole lot of educators.

The big schools offer all sorts of workshops from a half day to intensives that run for several days in a row.  My school, Pilates Excel, can be presented in anywhere from 32 - 75 hours with the difference being time to practice.   

And no matter what you choose to attend, I cannot tell you how valuable it is just to have a change of studio scenery and to hear wise voices, other than your own, talking their way through common Pilates issues and challenges.  Even if your choice of course wasn't the best, you will still get a lot out of just showing up, presenting yourself in a state of openness, willingness, eagerness and caring.  Sometimes, I've come away from educational experiences that were so awful - poorly planned, lack of content, speakers so deficient in presentation skills that you no longer even care what they're saying, you just want it to end - with a crystal clear idea of what not to do and a negative experience is almost always more powerful than a positive one.  My point is, any educational experience has value, even a less than fabulous one.

Continuing Education bottom line:  It matters less what you do.  It matters most that you do.  Quoting Nike: Just do it.  

Now, how to pay for it.

Here's the concept.  

The key to success in structuring an in-studio fundraising campaign is to have no-cost services provided in exchange for clients paying to experience the events.  

The simplest version of this is to add classes to the schedule, and the operative word there is "add," that are billed as Educational Fundraising Classes that are in addition to your clients' usual class schedule so there is a saturating clarity, purpose and expectation with every mention of the event.  Clients must be your ally in this regard, you have to let them know without exception that you're doing this in order to raise more money, additional money, money you wouldn't otherwise have in order to pay for you to suffer the inconvenience of traveling, abandoning your family and responsibilities and trying to learn things that you'll bring right home to them, to help them, to make them stronger, to better be able to serve them.  It's all about them and they must know that from the start if this is going to work.  

Your plan will fail if you don't make it clear to your clients that this is extra, in addition to their usual sessions, classes, visits to the studio.  That's key. 

Here are some specifics.

Other class-series ideas include: stretch, perfecting a 10-minute a day at-home mat or stability ball or magic circle program, finally getting those upper back muscles to come off their "locked long" setting, relaxation, breathing, partner classes of any sort, foam roller routines, advanced, 

Like most things, you're critical juncture for success is in the set up. 

Now, as you read the list below, please don't think to yourself "oh, that's ridiculous, that would never work in my studio."  You'll be defeated before you even have a chance to begin.  Even if NONE of these ideas is relevant to your unique situation, just reading the list will get your brain a bubblin' (not really, but you know what I mean) and you'll be energized and before you know it, you'll have come up with the perfect thing for you, all by yourself.

Open your mind.  

Here's some examples of how to go about this - these should at least get you thinking.

Add a technique-based "it's time to clean up our form" series of mat classes, 2 - 4 a month for 1 - 3 months and reserved the proceeds from them to bankroll your continuing education.    

Trade a couple of privates or simply offer to exposure the provider to a bunch of people who stand a good chance of doing business with the provider and get a massage therapist to trade out an evening of her time for her to do "bench work" at your reception.  What reception?  Your Educational Fundraising Reception, where in exchange for $15 (or whatever your market will bear) a head you'll welcome clients and their friends and families to share an evening of all things Pilates.  Do demonstrations - they love to watch you perform your beautiful Pilates routines - share historical information about the Method, Joe  Clara, our first generation teachers, the overall industry.  While all that's going on, have the massage therapist giving 10 minute massages to your guests.  

You can do the same thing with mani/pedi, tarot readers, caricature artists, astrologers, doctors of any sort (podiatrists are especially fun, not as people - good Lord, definitely not as people - but to do eval-recommend-refer type services in this format), belly dancers, dance lessons of any sort, and the whole time you can be working the crowd, pressing the flesh, filling the glasses and booking sessions, signing up new clients, and generally being the center of everyone's Pilates life.  That's what you do best.  That's what will put money into your educational slush fund.

Let's do the math.

Let's say you're wanting to go to the PMA conference in 2010 and you live on the east coast.  Your airfare, registration and hotel are going to total about $1200 and you have 18 months to raise it.  

At a single reception/event, you can expect conservatively to have 10 attendees, each paying $15 to attend.  With a single event netting you $150, you'd need to have 8 events in order to generate $1200.  If, at a single event, you get 20 people to attend at $15 each, you'd net $300 per event and only need to do 4 of them in order to generate enough revenue to pay your way to the PMA conference. 

if you run a mat series, you'll get there much faster than by doing a single event and repeating it over time. 

Are you already coming up with your own ideas of what to do?  If not, you better call during cocktail hour, we'll both do a heavy pour and together, will come up with the perfect thing.  

+1 (206) 525-7769.  

 

My Dad had a ton of sayings like the title of this piece, you can't see for looking.  He'd say "now you're cooking with gas" which meant that you were finally getting somewhere.  He'd also let loose with a 40 second string of unrepeatable cuss words, alternating between English and Italian and I can remember the very day that I realized he said it the same way every time and how delighted I was that he had his own rage song, if you will.  I've tried to develop the very same thing for myself; that's how impressed I was by it. 

So back to Daddy's saying, "you can't see for looking."

Apparently, I actually can't.

How can a file, a regular sized manilla folder with tons of papers pronged down to the inside of each half, sit on my desk in plain sight and yet be invisible to me.  An upcoming need becomes a present one, and before you know it you've got a hard target search on your hands.  People are waiting for information, the origins of which are in that file, yet I can't find it. 

It was just there.  Right there.  But it's not there now.

As my schedule unfolds, there are times when I have to set aside progress on pretty much everything in order to travel to teach or to host workshops in my Seattle studio.  When that happens, I am usually able to sufficiently clear the decks prior to the event so that nothing major needs my attention while I'm in workshop.  If I do a good job of that, I can go a week or two without having to handle any financial or any day-to-day operational matters. 

Sometimes, right before going into an extended event when I won't be available to keep pulling the studio cart, I leave all manner of important tasks in various states of completion.  Sometimes, and especially lately, I've been unable to find files - files I've looked for in a serious, methodical way - that I just had but now, can't find.  And here's the thing. 

Probably the past 3 workshops I've done, I've been looking for something, couldn't find it and had to leave the search effort to teach and immediately upon my return to my office post-workshop/trip, there it is.  And I mean, there it is like right on top of my desk by the printer.  Right there.  How, HOW, could I have missed it?

Because I can't see for looking.  That's how.

Here's another way I occasionally live in this particular "can't see for looking" hell.

I have flawlessly uploaded video from my fancy video camera on each and every one of my 5 computers before.  All of them.  Although I'm not sure which wire I've used, there are only 2 wires possible that perform the task and I have them both.  Right here. 

Can I do it now?  No, I can't. 

Why can't I?  Because I can't see for looking. 

I can't figure out which hole accepts which part of which cord. 

I'm serious.  I'm frustrated.  And here's what I'm going to do about it.

I'm going to to the store to buy a case of Corona, then to the studio to watch Game 4 between the Blazers & the Rockets and if that doesn't do the trick, I'm not sure anything will.

I have 5 Gratz Reformers and whenever we have 5 or fewer clients in a mat class, we work on Reformers instead of floorwork.  I'm a big Gratz fan because I'm interested in duplicating as closely as possible the feel of Joe's teaching and the results that Joe delivered.  I think the equipment we use has a lot to do with that so I've always bought Gratz because they were hired by Joe to manufacture his equipment.

During Mat class in late March, we had 5 of our Mat phenoms on Reformer and we were finishing a super intense "mat class" with some plyometric training on Jump Board. 

Before I teach Jump Board, no matter how many times the client has done it, I always show on myself, standing next to the Reformer, how quietly I want them to land.  I jump up, twitter my legs about and when all 155 pounds of me comes back to Earth, it's quiet and easy, even on our 100 year old Douglas Fir wood floors.  I stress how your energy isn't supposed to transfer into the Reformer and I warn that the first time a Reformer shimmies even a fraction of an inch upon landing, they're done.

Our dear client and friend Alix was delicately leaping and landing softly when the bracket that holds the Jump Board in place fell off.

The bracket fell off, the Jump Board crashed to the floor, it made a heck of a noise and Alix came crashing in. 

She instinctively drew her legs up under her for a crash landing with the springs slamming the carriage into the home position. 

I was on her in an instant, she said she was fine and I asked specifically about how her feet, ankles, knees and back felt and she assured me she was fine.  I was confident that she was but still texted her later that night, the next day and then again a day later.  She came in for her regular private the next day and assured Heidi she was fine. 

I actually saw her land, sans Jump Board, and because I caught a glimpse of it, I wasn't worried that she was hurt.  I am trained through teaching sports like diving, skating and swimming to have what's called snapshot vision.  When you're trying to teach someone something and that something, by its very nature, has to happen fast, you've got to be able to see what's actually happening when it's happening fast and, believe it or not, pretty much anybody who cares enough to try can develop the type vision that allows you to see all sorts of things even as they blur through your field of vision.  Things like when a skater is on an inside edge.  Things like a shoulder dropping too early on a Half Gainer.  Things like a pull through the water a bit too far from the body.  Things like what hits the floor first, then second, then third when a basketball player hits the court.  It's a bit morbid, but when I'm at NBA and WNBA games, I try to predict the injury from watching the mechanism of the fall or hit.  I sort of test myself and I'm pretty accurate, if I do say so myself.  Goodness me, who else is going to say it?

In Alix's case, I saw the exact position of her feet as they pulled away from the fallen Jump Board and the lowered footbar when the carriage came crashing home.  I knew she landed as cleanly as possible and that her feet didn't get caught up in the pieces of fallen Jump Board or go into the well to get torn up on the springs.

This was the third time a piece of Gratz equipment has failed in my studio.

The first time a piece of Gratz equipment broke, a pin sheared out of a stirrup handle not when it was in use but when I was snapping it in my hand to check it's security.  I have a habit of doing that, showing my client that I'm serious about safety and showing my client that I care about double and triple checking connections right up to the point I hand the thing over to them. 

The pin shearing caused a complete detachment of the stirrup to the leather it's connected to.  If my client, who was preparing for Swakate, had been using it, especially under load, it would have been very difficult for him to maintain control of himself and come away uninjured. 

Basil Blecher was the main man at Gratz when I first set up my studio in 2001 and it was Basil that worked with me through the first 2 equipment failures.

He not only sent me a new replacement handle, he sent me an extra stirrup so if another one broke, I would still have complete sets to work with while awaiting a replacement.  Basil told me that a pin shears at the rate of about 2 or 3 a year. 

This is 100% a stirrup manufacturing quality issue; Gratz buys the stirrups already assembled and incorporates them into their finished goods and they cannot be maintenanced, they can only be used and cleaned. 

The second time something broke it was a bit more serious.

The foot bar on my Electric Chair fell off while a teacher was doing Crossover.  She was fine, I didn't see it happen but heard the bang of it hitting the floor - that's always scary for everyone in the studio. 

Basil told me to remove the whole wooden flat plate that the foot bar connects to and send both back to him.  He said he'd put it back together so that it would never come apart again which begs the question, why didn't you put it together like that in the first place?  

Again, this cannot be maintenanced so there's nothing we as studio owners and shift teachers can do to maintain the safety and security of the Electric Chair foot bar. 

Basil said that particular failure is very rare (lucky me) and when he fixed it and sent it back, it's held beautifully and yes, I do check it with greater scrutiny as a result of it having been repaired.

The night of Alix's crash landing, I took a bunch of pictures of the failed bracket, the bare frame end and close ups of the rubber collars that had given way. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When I got home from the studio around 9, I called Gratz but it rang unanswered so I didn't have an opportunity to leave a message.  First thing the next morning - Friday - I called and spoke with Karen who, let me summarize here, didn't handle the matter well.  When I didn't hear back on Monday or Tuesday, I called on Wednesday and was furious but not rude, direct but not rude, clear but not rude. 

I finally got a call back from Michele Rosencrans, her husband Michael runs the Pilates division of Gratz now that Basil has left for greener pastures.  Michele was as upset as I was about the lapse in communication and she and I talked for over an hour, right up until she had to dash to her mat class.  It turns out that their front person dropped the ball and although everything was proceeding, behind the scenes, to fix the problem, I was left in the dark and had no way to know any of that was happening.

Not only did they send 5 retrofits for the Jump Board brackets but Michele assured me that there had been a design change that replaced the rubber collars with old fashioned screws. 

She and I also talked philosophically about the role Gratz plays in our industry and she agreed with me that they should take the word "Romana's" off of the Breathicizer.  I told her I would buy 20 from the first run without Romana's name on it.  When I talked to Michael at the PMA conference about that very thing, he looked scared and ducked the topic completely. 

I don't support what I call "credit shift" where one person takes credit for someone else's work.  Romana did not invent the Breathicizer, Joe did.  Romana's name shouldn't be on the Breathicizer, Joe's should.  When I ordered one and discovered the plagerism or whatever you call it, I told Basil I was sending it back and asked him how it came to be that Romana's name was engraved on it and he said she'd "gotten to Donald Gratz years ago" and had him do it. 

Romana is a rock star.  She's been an important player in our industry and nobody can ever say she hasn't been an important part of the explosion of Pilates, the world's most famous and beautiful performers of the work are her students and she has tons of brilliant work in her past.  There is absolutely no reason for her to lay claim to something like a Breathicizer.  I digress.

Michele said they were considering a recall of all Jump Board brackets, sending retrofit kits to everyone who has a Gratz Reformer with the old rubber collars.  I hope they decide to do that, and I hope they call it the Alix Palmer Recall.

I completed an equipment failure form and filed it with my insurance company and I also provided a copy of it to Gratz.  Whether anyone gets hurt or not, you've got to document every little thing like this and we sure did.

Here's what the report said:

 

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 Equipment Failure Report

 

Date of Failure:  Thursday, March 12, 2009, 6:45 pm

 Description of Failure:  The jump board bracket gave way, fell off of the frame of the Reformer and fell to the floor while in use.  The client was uninjured.  Here’s a link to the photos showing the failed bracket:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/31906189@N06/

 I attempted to report the equipment failure to Gratz the evening of Thursday, March 12, 2009 but their customer service number, the only one shown on their website, rang unanswered.  I spoke with their sales and customer service rep, Debbie Ingram, on Friday morning, March 13th, and she began the process of having the brackets replaced on all 5 of my Gratz reformers.  I have spoken at length with one of the owners of Gratz and I am quite satisfied that they are handling the matter in a professional, appropriate manner.  

 I followed up with Alix the evening of the incident and again the next day when she came into the studio for a private session.  She has been in a couple of times this week and continues to report no issues at all from the jump board failure.

 PILATES POWERHOUSE NW LLC

 By: Rebecca Leone

Single Member/Owner

 

 

The new brackets have arrived and will be installed this weekend and when they are, Heidi and I will test them for a good long while and next time we teach Jump Board, we'll do it the same way we always have, demonstrating a light landing only from now on, we'll say "and you guys, one night the bracket that holds the Jump Board in place fell off so be ready for anything!" 

Now jump!

UPDATE:  The replacement brackets didn't work.  They installed beautifully but installed as directed, were too tight to the frame to permit the sliding in of the Jump Boards.  My carpenter said it was clear that Gratz had not calculated the thickness on the lip of the old rubber gasket when designing the metal screw, bolt, washers and nuts fix.  He used some washers Gratz provided that were supposed to go outside the frame and moved them inside the frame to make sufficient room so that the Jump Boards could be squeezed into the opening but doing so removed the finish from the Jump Boards and caused divots into the flesh of the wood.  I called Debbie at Gratz and left her a voice mail explaining the problem and she got back to me the next day saying they would send 40 more washers and update their replacement instructions.  They should be here this week.  When they're installed and working beautifully, I'll make a final update.

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Continue reading "When Equipment Fails" »

We all get behind now and again.  Sometimes, we get really behind.  Sometimes, we need help in getting caught up.  And then sometimes, but just a few times, not many times at all, we get horrendously behind and it takes months and months to get caught up.

For those of us who own studios, we're relatively accustomed to the rise and fall of Rome, our Rome, but sometimes, extraordinary circumstances occur that put us into a tailspin of potentially fatal magnitude.  Dear readers, I've just pulled out of one such dive.  And only barely.

I've been horrendously behind and I have my Mother to blame for it all.

She's dead so there's little satisfaction in blaming her but still, it's clearly her fault.  And, smart as can be til the end, she suspected she was causing me trouble as she was dying; from August thru October of last year, I kept jetting off to North Carolina, leaving behind the studio, Heidi, clients, an untended pipeline of road work and everything else that goes into living a full and exciting life.

I assured Mom that there was absolutely no problem, no problem at all, in leaving my small business in order to be with her.

I assured her there was absolutely no problem, no problem at all, in focusing on the her needs and my own as they pertained to her.  We were both enjoying as best we could under such circumstances spending the rest of her life together and she, against all odds, squeezed in a few last lessons, schooling me on a life well-lived until her very last days.  She fought like a warrior, held firm like the Brit she (at least partially) was and cared more about me and my responsibilities than she did about her own condition, her increasing pain and the fact that she quite likely wouldn't live long enough to see her beloved Tampa Bay Rays make it all the way to the World Series.

My Mom was Baseball Betty, the Rays #1 fan and she died October 28th.  So close but not close enough.

Her big funeral, not to be confused by her two small funerals, was December 20th in my hometown of St. Petersburg and it was a great time, a really beautiful time.  It helped me feel like she was actually dead because, I must say, living on opposite coasts, it's a little too easy to think a loved one is still around when they're not.  But the funeral, the big one, helped move me a little closer to believing that she's gone.

I doubt the two little funerals,one this July and the other in August, will help with that finalization because I can report, with certainty and clarity, that I now realize my Mom is dead because I have finally, with certainty and clarity, finished slogging through the tons of work, the masses of work, the piles and piles - some ankle deep! - of work that accumulated from August until, well, about 3 weeks ago.

It was about 3 weeks ago when the dust settled from my February 1st move, when the dust settled from a February workshop in the Seattle studio, and when the dust settled on some longstanding computer issues in the studio that I began organizing, slating, prioritizing, strategizing, tranquilizing and philosophizing my way out of this mess.

I kept telling Heidi, "I just have to work smarter, I just have to be more effective, more efficient, I have to sleep less, I have to do more, I just have to." 

I'm embarrassed to say that things were so out of control that I welcomed visiting teachers in mid-February into my brand new home without having run the vacuum.

I'm embarrassed to say that my stress level was so out of control that I became less effective, less efficient, I slept more and I did less overall.

My mantra was "push on through, push on through, push on through."  And I did but man, the toll it took.

I've felt like I've been in a time warp.  How can it be late March?

Here's how:  In the past couple of weeks, I've balanced 20 checking account statements, I've finalized inventory reports for annual tax returns, I've ordered stock for the tons of balls, books and props we were completely out of, I've designed 2 more t-shirts (including the newest in our pelvic floor series - not to be missed!), registered a whole slew of folks for 3 different upcoming workshops, finalized the contract with the medical school for the cadaver anatomy class in April, met with my CPA, gotten my windshield replaced, gotten my door mirror replaced after I bashed it on the side wall backing into the garage (I blame Justin since I was bumping "Sexy Back" at the time of the incident - now I turn off the stereo when I pull into the alley - I do learn, but not easily), I've been to my eye doctor twice with another appointment tomorrow, I've had over 23 hours of PT done on my right hip which I've successfully returned to it's upright and locked position, and I've overeaten, had too much to drink, not exercised enough and my Roll Up sucks.

On Wednesday, I leave for York to teach for almost a week, 2 full days of workshops, some master classes and some guest teaching and I leave behind tended books, a full retail section, a happy and content Heidi, a studio full of wonderful clients who only vaguely remember who I am and a freshly vacuumed rug.

I don't recall ever being this excited about teaching.

Life is good.  Again.

But Mom's still dead.

I know what to do about everything else except that thing about Mom.

As I write, I’m bouncing along the tracks on the Coast Starlight to Portland, Jimmy (my gay husband is sitting silently beside me; shush, mommy’s working!) and I are going to the Blazers Spurs game tonight, we’re staying overnight at the Governor and returning to the Emerald City tomorrow on the Cascade Express. I love trains. I love Amtrak.

So, I just moved. Again.

I’ve moved 4 times in 4 years. If you believe in the law of averages, I’m making up for long stints of stability, having lived in the same house in Florida for over 16 years, I lived in two different houses in Bend, Oregon over 10 years, and when John (my “straight husband”) and I moved to Seattle almost 20 years ago, we briefly lived in a gorgeous house in Kirkland, hated the suburbs and promptly moved to the city where we lived together in a swank penthouse for about 13 years. During that time but only for about 4 years we also owned a second home, it was a mountain home over in Roslyn but we only used it for skiing and hiking and get-a-ways. It was nice to be able to head over Interstate 90 and know that in a short hour’s drive, we’d leave the urban light/blight behind and be surrounded by nature and at night be able to lay on the slope of the backyard and stare at the Milky Way. I moved out from living with John 4 years ago and began the life of a gypsy. A Queen Anne gypsy.

Continue reading "A Moving Experience | Smart Women, Wise Words" »

I spent the weekend in Palm Springs working with a couple of my favorite clients and the host studio where I have graciously been extended teaching privileges, Pilates of Palm Springs, has some new competition just a few blocks down the street.

The new studio, Pilates Plus of Palm Springs, is running a television ad campaign that shows a person doing Side Splits on Reformer with a bar bell across her shoulders.

As I write I’m flying back to Seattle from Palm Springs and just typing that, even though I knew it was coming, has resulted in me pressing the call button for an out-of-sequence Bloody Mary. I can barely get through this, Pilates People. Yet, with you as my inspiration, I shall try. I shall sincerely try.

Pilates Plus of Palm Springs is a new studio in a dingy shopping strip, neighboring businesses include a Dollar Store and a bar. There’s a vegan restaurant several doors down where we ate for lunch so after we finished eating and visiting, we went into the brand new studio and had ourselves a look see.

The space is perfect for a studio, a big deep rectangle with high ceilings and big windows along the sidewalk. They’ve decorated beautifully, too. There’s a stylish divider hanging from the ceiling to set off the waiting area in the very front of the space and the waiting area furniture is sleek, modern, crisp. So pretty.

There were about a dozen bastardized reformers staggered along a mirrored wall.

There were about a dozen pictures of naked people along the wall opposite the bastardized reformers. Let me be clear. If you’re on one of the bastardized reformers and you open your eyes, you’ll see pictures of naked people. And when I say naked, I mean naked.

Continue reading "Stop The World, I Want to Get Off | Side Splits..." »

In the process of moving from an apartment to a rented house, I'm going through all the things that I keep in my home office and one of the things I ran across is the subject of this article.

A few years ago I taught warm ups at a breast cancer fundraiser run.  When I include that as an example, along with tons of other outreach I've done, in my Service Beyond the Session segment of Pilates Excel, my finishing school, many people ask "what did you teach? how did you learn warm ups?  what should we teach as warm ups?"

Answer:  Everything you'll ever need to prepare the body for action is in Pilates.  Instead of thinking about formal exercises, discreet and complete, think segments, think fragments, think pieces of Pilates.

Today I ran across the file I set up for that event, and on the inside cover of the folder I'd written - like the good administrator I am - a list of the exercises I taught.  Not only did I list the exercises, but after each exercise name I wrote the muscle group the exercise would warm.  That way, I was sure I wasn't leaving anything big out of the picture.  For purposes of this article, I've added to the list a reference to the relevant Pilates exercises that correlate to the warm up just so you'll know there's precedent for every bit of it except those elbow braids which have Yoga written all over them but they're a great upper back stretch so I threw them in.  Did I digress?

It's important to keep complete records for many reason not the least of which you'll eventually forget almost everything and if you don't have a record of it, it's as good as lost to you.  You may have a pleasant memory but you'll lose the details.  I hate losing details.  That's where the devil lives!

Here's my list of exercises that form a brief but thorough full body standing warm up. 
Continue reading "Service Beyond the Session | Get Out!" »

When I travel to teach workshops on the road, I often go a day early and stay a day or two afterward to do what’s called Guest Teaching. A traveling teacher is a bit of an oddity in most Pilates communities and there’s great curiosity about what she’s like and how she teaches and most folks are interested in at least watching her teach if not actually booking a session and being taught by her.

A traveling teacher who makes herself available for Guest Teaching works with clients of the host studio, clients from local studios and teachers from the local community. My current rate for Guest Teaching is $150 for a private and $95 per person for a semi and during the session, I encourage whomever I’m working with to use the time to problem solve any Pilates issues either in their own work or problems they have with their clients. Sometimes, people ask me to do things like teach them every which way I know how to teach Stomach Massage or we work on progressing through flexion all the way to a Roll Up or Teaser. I always ask them to come with 5 or 6 issues because we almost always fix their first 1 or 2 in about 10 minutes. It’s like a mini-workshop all their own.

Guest Teaching is fun.

Guest Teaching is different.

Unlike my work in my own Seattle studio where I haven’t taken new clients in a couple of years and everything with my standing book of business has become very predictable within a predictable unpredictability, on the road I get everything thrown at me but the kitchen sink.

I’m on Delta, Seat 5A. I have traveled on Delta so often in the past couple of months they spiffed me a free upgrade so I’m up front and loving it, I’m 2 Bloody Marys and 1 Vodka rocks into the flight and I have a new best friend, he’s my seatmate and he’s wearing a T-shirt that says “I’d rather be complaining” and when he took his seat, I said “tell me now if that’s true, I’ll find out soon enough,” his name is Martin Dean but I persist in calling him Dean Martin and we’re going to have dinner together on his next trip to Seattle in 2 weeks – talk to strangers! It’s fun! I married a man I met on a plane and we were married for 10 years. I digress!

We’re at 37,000 feet under a crescent moon and clear skies and I’m winging my way between Atlanta and Seattle on my way home from an absolutely fabulous workshop at Signal Mountain Pilates, that’s on Signal Mountain (duh) about 10 minutes up slope from Chattanooga. My first full day in town, I taught two Master Classes and right after the second one ended, I hosted an Open House at Signal Mountain Pilates. We drew about 30 folks and we had a great time.

At the Open House, we had show and tell.

I always travel with Chuck Rapoport’s beautiful photography book containing the pictures he took at Joe’s studio the day he shot the Sports Illustrated piece in 1961 and, most importantly, my treasured first edition Return to Life and the marketing materials and Christmas Cards from Joe & Clara that were inside the book that they’d given to their receptionist, Phyllis.

Day 2, I taught 6 Guest Teaching sessions and the highlights of them included getting a client’s back that hadn’t moved in a while to move, helping a teacher come to Jesus over her tucked pelvis and helping a professor/runner find her primary hip flexors and strengthen her ankles.

Day 3 – 8, a full, luxuriously long 40-hour Pilates Excel, which is my finishing school where I teach what the fabulous, sexy and uber brilliant Vanessa Pinkam termed Stable Datums. Stable Datums are the rules of the road in Pilates, the processes by which you can accurately assess and properly solve virtually any problem that arises in the bodies of your clients.

The Signal Mountain Pilates Pilates Excel workshop was booked in early December, we had about 5 weeks to promote it and I was astounded by every one of the 8, count ‘em 8, fantastic teachers who changed all manner of big heavy plans, pulled money out of their hats and found a way to go to Signal Mountain for 5 long days of Stable Datum Pilates with me. God Bless them all and each!

There was an ageless gorgeous goddess of a woman who’s also a dentist who specializes in cranio mandibular release and I saw she and her husband at a restaurant near the studio after the open house and when I visited with them at their table, her husband adjusted my jaw and although my left jaw has cracked for years, it hasn’t cracked since. Isn’t it funny how Pilates teachers are always so eager to let people do things with their bodies? I am always so happy to give myself over to someone who is in charge and large in their industry, ready for new, ready for better, ready for change. Every day, I hope for change. Every day, I hope for new. Every day, I’m ready for it all. I digress.

I’m still on this goddess of a woman who works with her husband putting people right and together for over 25 years they’ve published a technical journal for their industry. If I have anything to do with it, they’ll be presenting at PMA in the future.

Back to the group.

We had a massage therapist who, strangely enough, went to the same primary training center Heidi and I did in Seattle and I must say, she was the most surprising, most unexpectedly wild and sexy and edgy part voyeur, part vixen. I did not see that coming yet what a sight it was!

There was a beautiful young marathon runner who is super well Pilates educated and works in a Virginia studio where I’ll be teaching workshops in July. She had a turned Ilium, just like me, and through an elegant and deep engagement (no touch, just talking her through it) we turned it back so now it’s where it’s supposed to be.

There was the smart, fast talking and funny new mom who’s danced all her life and teaches dance to little kids.

We had another dancer, with impeccable technique, a loving spirit and heightened energetic sensitivity – a gift through and through.

The studio owner and my gracious host, Sydney, was a lovely, perfectly perfect picture of perfection from start to end. It was an honor to teach side by side with her on my two Guest Teaching days and I hope I can always call Sydney’s studio my east coast home. Good Lord, she’s precious.

I could write a book about the firecracker of a gal from Kentucky who is nothing less than an ass-shaking, ball-breaking fun fest of a party disguised as a Pilates teacher and, it seems scary now looking back on it, she was also my roommate for 5 nights and I do believe I shall never rid my psyche of the image of her pole dancing without the pole to Beyonce’s All the Single Ladies at home late one night when I was helplessly held in the vice-like grip of the deep and thorough exhaustion that comes after several days of non-stop teaching compounded by the brain death of 3 strong Margueritas at Taco Mamacita’s where I mercilessly hit on a 28 year old waiter named Billy and somehow came away with not one but two serving trays stuffed into my bag as souvenirs, 1 of which was personally presented by the manager who seemed to be facilitating my blatant exploitation of Billy. I’m going to up my life insurance policy limit before I visit this def-con-5 of a friend in July after I finish up in Virginia. She promises Kentucky Bourbon, pedicures and a manual physical therapy session with her husband. I digress.

Another student is perhaps the most gorgeous being on the planet, she embodies the very essence of grace and kindness, she also had a turned hip from a childhood skating fall (just like me!) and we turned it back through a gentle but strong muscular engagement (no touch, just talking her through it) and solved virtually all the mysteries her body has held for lo these many years. She had to leave a couple days early to teach at a community Yoga event and to attend the Fur Ball, her local Humane Society fundraiser. Don’t you love the South? The Fur Ball. If I attended a Fur Ball, I’d wear my mink. Or my squirrel. I’m serious. I have a squirrel coat. I’m at the top of the food chain and I love the view. I digress.

All in all, it was another unbelievable group of talent, graced upon me undeservedly so, and they’ve all, one by one, reported that they’ve immediately begun sprinkling their Stable Datums into their teaching, to great success and one, the Fur Ball Queen, has since even given her very own Pilates 101 in a Walmart.

Pilates People, my work is done.

But I have a new rule. The Tennessee Rule.

Continue reading "The Tennessee Rule" »

It’s a glorious Sunday, January 17^th and I’m reporting in from 39,000 feet over the American west, I’m on Delta (again) heading to Chattanooga for a 5 day Pilates Excel workshop, plus 2 days of guest teaching, plus 1 day of open house hosting and Master Class teaching. The sun is bright, the Rockies are stunning, almost unbelievably gorgeous and everything from around 5,000 feet and lower is socked in with dense fog which looks like ultra white gauze. God is great and so are you! I digress.

About 2 years ago, I discontinued land line telephone service which I’d had with Qwest since opening the studio back in 2001. I was able to keep the same 2 phone numbers, one which had been published and was custom to include the acronym of the name of the studio (Pilates Powerhouse NW, 206-525-PPNW) and the other which was unpublished and was used as a dedicated fax line. Back in the day, faxes were quite common and it was unthinkable that a business wouldn’t have a dedicated line just for faxes.

Speaking of faxes, back in 2003 I began receiving legal notices in the mail that I was eligible to join a class action suit against a junk faxer who'd been caught and, loving the futility of it all and having wasted cases of paper to junk faxes over the years, I jumped right in.  Every 6 months or so, I'd get a request in the mail to reconfirm my business information - address, phone numbers, ownership, etc., and for all these years, I've just kept on filling out whatever they sent.  Right before Halloween last year, I received a five hundred dollar check in the mail representing my portion of the settlement against those evil spam faxers.  The court documents included with the check said that the spammers had sent faxes to my fax line twice, both in the summer of 2001.  I haven't taken the time to call the lawyer who tried the case to find out why my portion of the settlement was so high but the only thing I can figure is that so few people kept up with the infrequent but consistent requests for confirmation that by the time the thing was litigated, the survivors to the litigation were generously rewarded. 

Continue reading "IT Guys & Phone Lines | We're Out of the..." »

 

Do you know who Chuck Rapoport is?  Here's a link to his website and you could spend hours and hours just looking through Chuck's beautiful work, he's captured a good bit of what's great about our culture and it's there, for all to enjoy, on his website.  Here's the link:  http://www.rapo.com/icrgallery/gallery_frames.htm

Chuck is one of those lucky people who got to spend time with Joe Pilates.  We all know that Ron, Lolita, Mary, Kathy and Romana all spent time with Joe & Clara but there are so many others who also had the privilege.  In Chuck's case, spending time with Joe was even more special because Chuck got all of one day with Joe.  Just one day. But what a day it was.

Chuck is the famous photographer who was sent out by Sports Illustrated to shoot a story about Joe & Clara's studio and not only did his pictures of the studio run wth the 1961 article, Chuck has also put together a collector's item of a book featuring every single picture he took that day.  I bought one a few years ago and it is one of my prized possessions.  I treasure it just as much as the original marketing materials that I have from Joe & Clara's studio.   

Chuck is an important legacy-holder in our industry, he saw Joe toward the end of Joe's life and as a non-Pilates person he had a fresh perspective on who Joe was and how Joe operated.  Chuck went through tremendous hell just to reclaim his rights to his own photographs of Joe and for that and for so many other wonderful reasons he's invaluable to our industry.  Bonus:  Chuck is a dear sweet soul!  

If you ever ever have a chance to meet Chuck, just shut up and wait patiently in what will undoubtedly be a very long line, get out your credit card and buy that book and whatever else Chuck is selling.  Chuck is great.  His book is great.  Joe is great.  Joe is in Chuck's book.  You're great! 

I first met Chuck at a Pilates Style conference in New York a few years ago.  He and his lovely wife were at a booth in the expo hall, signing posters and selling those beautiful photograph books.  He was at the PMA conference in November down in Phoenix and I was honored that he attended my workshop at PMA.  We had about 20 minutes at the end of my workshop where everyone could come up to the front of the room and take a look at my historical materials, visit, make connections and hug and kiss. 

During that "cocktail hour without the cocktails," Chuck told us this Joe story.

Continue reading "Wellness, Disease Prevention & Joe | 30..." »

As I write, I'm sitting at the bar at Pepin, my favorite Spanish restaurant in St. Petersburg, Floriday which is my hometown where I've been for the past 2 weeks.  It's been over 8 years since I've had what normal people would consider a vacation, the type of trip where you go someplace where you don't work and you spend days doing fun things you don't usually do and you disconnect from your every day life and you rest and you don't worry about anything and you get a tan.

That's pretty much what I've been doing since I arrived in St. Pete on the 17th of December, and even though the first few days of me being here were spent planning and fussing over my Mom's funeral which was on the 20th of December, that was still a lot of fun and it felt really different from the type of work I usually do in running the studio and in running my Pilates school, Pilates Excel.

Almost every day since I've been here, I've walked my favorite beach, the one I grew up playing and swimming and drinking and skiing on, it's called Pass-a-grille and it's at the very southern tip of St. Petersburg Beach.  Pass-a-grille is about a mile long and 2 blocks wide, the long sides are on the water with the west side on the Gulf and the east sde on the Intercoastal.  It's still relatively untouched by development, progress, bastardization.  The main resort, the Don Cesar, still anchors the approach to the beach fro the Bay Way, which is a series of bridges that connect south St. Petersburg to the Gulf of Mexico beaches. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When I haven't walked Pass-a-grille, I've walked the downtown waterfront which is so stunningly beautiful, it takes my breath away.

 

My family moved here from Ohio when I was 4 in 1961 and I left here almost 30 years ago but it still feels like home.

So much so that sitting at the Seahorse Restaurant one morning, the woman next to me at the bar said "don't you shop at Bamboozle?"  I do.

I eat at a table in Debby's section at the Seahorse almost every morning and here's what I have, every single time:  Cheesy grits with butter, 2 scrambled eggs with ham and cheese (that would be American cheese) and white toast with butter.  I also have about 5 glasses of iced tea, unsweetened.  I only sit in Debby's section at the Seahorse.  Debbie is a gum smacking, sass talking sweetheart of a woman who has waited tables for over 40 years.  I love Debby and at every meeting and at every parting we squeal at each other, both talking at the same time, saying things like "hi baby, how you are you precious, hi sugar, isnt' it a beautiful morning, you here with friends?, how's Corinn, is she coming?"  Debby kisses my face and my neck even though I'm slathered with a quarter inch of non-greasy greasy SPF 50 and I kiss her face and her neck even though she's sweaty wth the work of her shift.  I love Debby.

Shortly after arriving I couldn't help but notice that my pants began feelng tight.  I went to TJ Maxx and bought a size 10 Lucky low rise and they felt much better than the Ralph Lauren's I brought with me from Seattle.  I think my weight gain has something to do with the cheesy grits with butter almost every morning, but I don't care. 

As friends have joined me for breakfast, Debby's met them all and we've loved telling her how long we've all known each other.  We bring old pictures of us together for us to see and we show them to Debby and she always says how we haven't aged, that we still look 4 or 14 or 24 or 34 or 44.  I love Debby.

It's New Year's Eve and I'll have one more Seahorse breakfast before heading back to Seattle on Friday morning.  My oldest friend, Leslie and her husband Kevin are going with me to the Seahorse tomorrow morning.  I'm not sure I can get through it without making a scene; saying goodbye to Debbie is going to be heartbreaking.  I love Debby.

 

 

 

My evening meals have been at Pepin's where I always get the same thing: chicken with yellow rice.  My waiter at Pepin's is William, he's been taking care of me for years and he always, always makes me feel like I've never left.  One night William wasn't working and I had a lovely waiter named Joe who honeymooned in Seattle so we had some things to talk about.  The marriage didn't last but his fond memories of Seattle did.  Only 3 nights out of the more than 2 weeks I've been here have I not eaten at Pepin's.  When I wasn't at Pepin's, I ate at Gigi's, my favorite pizza place out on the beach.  One night at Gigi's I ate an entire medium pepperoni pizza by myself and my dinner mate, another of my oldest friends Carol Roberts (Dr. Carol Roberts who has a radio show on the local PBS station) only had soup.  Carol weighs 1/8 of an ounce less than she did when she was 14.  I think there may be a correlation between Carol's stable weight and her eating a cup of soup for dinner. 

The whole trip has been a food fantasy and my friends have been very supportive.  I've told them if they want to see me, they need to either come with me on my beach walks, to the Seahorse or to Pepin's.  When I'm not doing those things, I'm working.  They understand.

I've gained 10 pounds. 

I'm eating more food in one day here than I usually eat in 3 days in Seattle.  This does not concern me.

The blisters concern me.

Continue reading "Sister With a Blister" »

Do you decorate your studio for the December holidays?  We do.  We don't go overboard but we do have a bit of spirit about it.  For example, we decorate the skeleton, hanging huge Christmas balls inside the abdominal cavity and we also hang misteltoe and kiss kiss kiss our way through the season.

Last year, although I can't specifically recall the precise reason for it, we didn't send Christmas Cards even though I'd bought boxes of beautiful cards on sale, as I usually do every year right after the holiday, but we never got around to actually getting them signed and mailed.

This year, I committed to not only doing a better job on getting our own cards done and mailed but I also decided to try and help our clients get through their holiday crush a little more smoothly.

I figured none of us needs to crowd our busy December calendar with yet another party where we dress up in uncomfortable clothes and stand around all night eating and drinking too much.  I figured our clients would appreciate having time together at the holidays BUT not spending it in a strictly social fashion.  After all, this is Seattle and we're known for getting stuff done so I decided to have two holiday gatherings that would help our clients do just that.  Get stuff done.  And we did.

Continue reading "Holiday Cheer in the Studio" »