What We Choose to Follow

For the sake of wonder, frustration and HOLY COW!, years ago I began snapping phone photos of surprising things we by happenstance travel behind on the highway. Well, “travel behind” at least for a split second until we careen past them, or for several minutes as we poke along blind to everything but that which was in front of us due to its enormity. (Curses. Reaches for phone to snap a photo…)

Sure, we follow road signs and GPS instructions. Let's not forget lead cars through construction. And globs of scrambling people to another changed gate. 

But what we choose to follow throughout life is a bigger topic. For instance:

• Tweeple on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram 
•  The recommended food pyramid and the “new” upside down version of same 
•  The person in front of us in the restroom line  
•   Fashions. (I wear Crocs almost every day, so file that where you will) 
•  Trending diets 
•  Pill bottle instructions 
•   Our spouses and significant others across the country 
•   Musicians 
•   News channels 
•   Bad advice 
•  Hollywood types and the movies …

Case in point. In an attempt to slowly crank my slothy rigid body back to life again, I began following a gentle online yoga instructor. In a further attempt to bribe myself into actual participation, I paid for the series. FOR PETE’S SAKE YOU PAID FOR IT SO DO IT! It’s only ten minutes a day and the instructor’s mother sits next to her in a chair. (Chair yoga. It’s a thing. They offer it at senior centers and it is also in the title of this particular course.) Mom engages in the same poses but in a modified version due to lack of agility/mobility/youth.

For instance there is the Warrior Pose. Young Instructor (that’s not “my” course or instructor in previous hyperlink but a good illustration--and also I assure you I look NOTHING like that slim young poised woman) stands with one bent leg forward, the other leg outstretched behind. Mom carefully perches (careful Mom!) on the front side edge (-ish) of a chair, one leg forward, the other stretched back. There are arm and breath movements involved. Although I stand for this one, I sometimes LOL since I look anything but a warrior while weebly-wobbling in my ginormous sweat pants, sans warrior weapons, while occasionally grunting from the strain. 

Anyway, mom has a bum knee (one of mine replaced, the other sometimes moody) and she’s not very seasoned at yoga. **raises hand**  I waffle between following the mom or daughter based upon trust in my balance on any given day. 

Sometimes this decision intersects and changes directions depending on how long Younger Woman decides to blather on between poses after instructing us to Iiiinhale … Reeeach to the ceiling… then forgets to instruct us to exxxxxxxhale because she gets distracted by her own storytelling, at which point if standing, I crash into a nearby chair on my desperate near-death exhale after holding my breath too long.

This freaked us out until we realized it was being towed

But back to questionable following choices as they relate to travel. One incident in particular springs to mind: the day I road shotgun with a guy.

[TRUE CONFESSION INTERJECTION: Okay, there were dozens of those times and guys, but this One Particular Case In Point the guy I was riding with was lost and would not stop for directions. Okay, that one particular time and dozens of others. My marrying choice was partially based on a dude humble enough in spirit to not waste large portions of our lives lost. Thank you George Baumbich!]

We were in St. Louis MO in an unfamiliar area trying to return home to Illinois. He deduced that if we “followed that guy over there with the Illinois license plates” we’d find our way. And so we cut lanes and followed him.

We ended up at a zoo.

#truestory

DISCLAIMER: Following can be hazardous to your relationships.