When White Girls Do Yoga

Wellness, whiteness, and wealth walk into a bar

Photo by Zen Bear Yoga on Unsplash

I’m twenty two and sweating my ass off at Jersey Shore Hot Yoga. It’s my first yoga class. Somehow, I’ve managed not to do yoga during my entire four years of art school in New York City.

Well, actually, I tried once.

I had finished a day of film studies and Bolex winding, ready to smoke weed and watch some trash TV, like Rock of Love or I Love New York. When I noticed an unfolded flyer loosely taped above the elevator buttons in my dorm building. Being on the 11th floor, I had a ways to go and nothing to look at but this flimsy paper inviting me to a yoga class in the East Village.

I had nothing else to do that night, so I went. I climbed up the five staircases in my flared sweatpants and oversized cotton t-shirt. It was 2009, and Lululemon hadn’t yet told the world what to wear to work out. I opened the creaky mid-century door to dozens of people crammed into a tiny room. The smell alone was enough for me to walk out, but since I didn’t know exactly what was needed for yoga, I left. I didn’t have a mat, and they weren’t providing one.

Anyway. Back to Jersey Shore Hot Yoga. The memory of why we went to yoga at that studio and took a hot yoga class escapes me. But it was probably because we found a Groupon, which was cool…