yoga diaries

A day in the life of a non-union, non-work permitted, non-American actress hanging out in lalaland...When at all possible, my day starts out with a Yoga class in Runyon Canyon. These classes are offered 7 days a week, outdoors, at the foot of the canyon where everyone and anyone (celebs included) come to walk their dogs (and their bottoms) up the hillside and back down again. There are various trails of varying degrees of difficulty one can take and all are rewarded by a spectacular view of the city and surrounds.

I'm using 'spectacular' here in both a positive and negative sense (regardless of whether this is a grammatical possibility). After strong winds or rain, the view is spectacular as you take in the Hollywood sign, the sprawl from Los Feliz to Hollywood, Century City, Beverly Hills and even a glimpse of the ocean in the distance. The sunlight reflects off the buildings and the hum of sirens is like the faint buzzing of hyperactive mosquitoes.

On other dry, sunshine-filled days (like today) the prized view is spectacularly bad. Pollution and smog as far as the eye can see. In fact, the eye cannot see very far at all and those happily sun-reflecting buildings are all but invisible behind the dirt in the air! This is no exaggeration - you cannot see the Century City high-rises for the smog. It's SO depressing - especially when you're out on a hike and that is what you're looking at. In these conditions, terminating one's respiration would be an appropriate, albeit life-threatening, decision - either way you lose. It amazes me that Los Angelenos are so patently aware of how dirty their city is... yet NO-ONE wants to give up the SUV....