Almost Anonymous

In this, my 70th blog post, I'd like to report on a sad state of affairs: I'm having a media meltdown of sorts.

Television has never been my babysitter. I have always been one to prefer a good book over the idiot box or its cooler younger sister, the internet. Oftentimes I'd rather stare at the ceiling listening to music and watching the pictures in my imagination.

Things changed when I moved to Istanbul. I got cable and I generally eat dinner in front of CNN international or E! I can hardly walk away from my laptop and into the next room without rushing to check my email upon my return. I wake up wondering if anyone has emailed me, and I often feel deflated when all my inbox contains is the NYT book update and a reminder to pay my student loans. I've even cried tears of anger over the lack of contact. And yes, on occasion I will even watch The Hills. It’s become a reflex, a need for perpetual contact. I justified my excessive (for me) internet and television usage as a necessary means of keeping up with global news while living abroad; a coping mechanism in a foreign country. However, I must come clean. It seems that I am no better than the other Twitterati whose ever existence is predicated on the fact that they say things, and others are forced to listen. Let's face it. I'd be the same anywhere in the world.

I have a blog and a website; I'm on Facebook and Twitter. I am no longer elusive and mysterious (if I ever was).Unfortunately, I find myself wanting to write numerous versions of a status that involves sitting in front of the computer searching for something of substance, realizing its becoming harder and harder to find.
I know, it’s not like I'm shooting up heroin, but there are side effects: I write less in my journal. I read fewer actual books. I question the very existence of journalism. I wonder if English Lit will be obsolete in a few years. And the information I so prolifically produce? It all just goes into the endless vaacuum of cyberspace, where one cannot see it in its entirety. I never know if it gets noticed, much less read. I never know if I achieve my purpose: to connect.

I've often felt I'm just not cut to be the media savvy type: I write and think slowly so that by the time I finish a post the moment has grown stale. My thoughts go sour before they go public. Nor am I okay with putting anything - a chirp, a status update, a banal blog entry - out in the universe without a bit of polish. I know spelling errors or inane comments followed by "oops, I take it back, that was my subconscious talking" have become socially acceptable, but they seem like attention seeking cop-outs. I like to pretend I'm at an old-fashioned typewriter; no mistakes or I have to start over. No cut and pastes. I don't like to be pseudo-raw on paper. I believe rawness comes not from just putting it all out there for others to sort through, but whittling it all away to the bare bones so readers have nothing left to pick at - just the truth. The latter takes more work. The formal is the literary equivalent of cringe worthy reality television. Call me a literary snob, but I refuse to prostitute language or stop striving for eloquent prose.

And yet, as a writer, unless I want to go the way of the dinosaur, I must evolve along with the rest of the world.
There are pros: there is a certain intimacy in self-publishing; there is no filter, no guarantee that anyone will ever read it. Freedom comes with anonymity. I don't think I will ever want to share everything; I don't care to tell you that I'm really worried the crown on my back molar is going to fall off and I will have to go to a dentist. I don't want to create a cutesy persona where I talk only about the perils of dating or every item I've consumed today and my caloric intake; and yet, it is these details, these images that attract and keep an audience, and I recognize that the internet is a sort of invisible stage. This begs the question: am I just another narcissistic wannabe using the internet as my personal sounding board? I guess I will let you (if you exist) decide for yourself.

Down Kopek

I find it hard to believe that revisiting yoga has taken me so long. Perhaps halting a practice that I love for over a year has to do with the fact that I still maintan a certain allegiance to Bikram's and Brian Kest's power yoga in Chicago and Los Angeles, respetively. I associate the intensity of Sunday morning power yoga with a particular LA lifestyle that seems incomplete without organic brunch, acting classes or a day at the beach; the sweltering sauna of Bikram's will forever be bound to a particularly frigid Chicago February. Although I had a yoga resurgance over the summer and I resolved to find a good studio upon returning to Istanbul, it still took me six more months to kick myself into gear. Yoga - or for that matter, any semblance of a spiritual life - seems to have no place here. It is part of a past world I no longer inhabit. Or perhaps I was hesitant to pursue yoga for the same reasons I flinch at the prospect of doing anything new in Istanbul: fear of getting lost, a long commute, being unable to communicate my needs or just merely not wanting to go at it alone.

My inculcation into the world of yoga was accidential. After college, I randomly ended up living mere blocks from one of the most renowed studios in LA. Despite its location in exclusive Santa Monica, the course was donation based. I usually submitted far below the suggested 10 dollars. The proximity and price is what allowed me to practice consistently, albeit briefly. Only after I began practicing did I discover that my yoga studio was was considered to be the epicenter of the American yoga movement, popular long before it became trendy throughout the United States.

From day one, the yoga aesthetic intrigued me: the streamlined poses, the sculpted bodies, the potent smell of jasmine or sage as you entered the studio, the fluid sanskrit jargon of the practice, the willowy frequent practioners who all took on that same elongated, gamine look regardless of ethnic origins. It all spoke of a higher consciousness, of potential transcendence of the pedestrian plane of existance I inhabited.

Early on, I recognized that yoga, like any other activity, came with its very own "scene" defined by a particular aesthetic and a set of subtle social codes. I also recognized that I sorely lacked the necessary accoutrements to fit in: nalgene water bottles, lower back tattoos, lululemon designer yoga attire, a certain air of self-satisfaction or contentment, and comradiere with everyone who entered the studio were beyond my grasp. I wondered what I often wondered while living in LA - if I was only projecting my inscurities, and perhaps it was everyone else felt like a phony and looked to me as an example of the real McCoy. I somewhat resented my fellow classmates, whom I figured had to do yoga and shop at Whole Foods for a living to get those bodies. They had the time and money to invest in the legnthy process of self-actualization, the common folk who have to work for a living simply can't afford to sacrifice their livlihood for pruning and shaping their spirits. Why didn't I float through the air like my fellow yogis? I guess I was just too stressed out. I came to love the practice but hate the scene.

I still maintain that yoga is one of the best things I've ever done for myself. Yoga - whether in Istanbul, Chicago or LA - still does it for me: it makes me feel strong, flexible and a more comfortable inhabitant in my own body. It was still yoga, but slightly different - my first time doing yoga led by a man speaking "Turklish" with an Irish brogue, my first time looking out over the Bosphorus while practicing, first time where a free sauna is available after my practice. My reintroduction to yoga has left me feeling slightly exhaused and sore, but perhaps one step closer to whatever it is I still seek from the practice.