By Sue Eisenfeld

Pooja is the warm, smiling, excited, and athletic summer camp counselor you remember from youth, the one whose enthusiasm is infectious, with an arm out to take your hand, drawing you into the game, into the group, and out of yourself. In her Zoom vinyasa class, she summons the seasons to guide the class through movements. You begin in winter, which is hard – literally, using balls or other firm props to stoically endure uncomfortable knee-opening and hamstring and calf-stretching – myofascial release. But it eases into the gentle stretching and calisthenics of spring, a gym class of fun and challenge. Summer comes eventually, too – the heat of vinyasa, the creative acrobatics of forms and movements that draw a sweat, while the world outside your window is cool and breezy. And then comes autumn, the cool-down, the soaking-in of the work, the reward; the getting ready for facing whatever’s next in the world. Who can say, exactly, what that will look like.

The whole routine is an analogy, she says. Like seasons, this isolation/pandemic period, too, will come to an end. We will come out the other side, the same way a season inevitably comes to a close, she reminds you. And what will we find then, you might wonder? Change, no doubt, but also: possibility, reassurance, and routine.