Mandi Bateman

1.       You married a musician

2.       You married an artist

3.       You married a musician, and still date musicians

4.       You married an artist and still date artists

5.       You’re sleeping with your boss

6.       You think hippies in Range Rovers are hot

7.       You’re sleeping with a guy who isn’t sure if he is straight or gay

8.       You’re sleeping with someone over 37 who hasn’t been married

9.       You’re girls friends told you that you could do better the last time you broke up with him

10.   You get invitations to weddings without “plus guest”.

In the Flow – Route Deux Spirited Body

Monday – Day 5

Every day we were at Bonnaroo got better and better.  “This is the best day yet”, was said Friday, Saturday then Sunday.  2nd chakra blown.  I taught 9am Restorative yoga, then 10:15am Vinyasa on the Solar Stage.  Whoah…400 people showed up for the 10:15 class.  The bonnaroovians loved it.  It was powerful to be part of a group of so many smiling, happy people.

There’s an urban tale that Van Halen requests a bowl of M&Ms, with absolutely no brown M&Ms, for their back stage green room.  Later, after class, as we were walking backstage amongst the familiar VIP faces dressed in skinny jeans, in the 100 degree Tennessee heat, Sarah asked me if I knew the real reason why the Van Halen made this excessive M&M requested on their band-rider?  In the beginning of large pyrotechnic shows Van Halen, one of the first bands to have a massive pyrotechnics, knew if the M&M request was met the attention to detail would be top notch with the important details like pyrotechnics, sound, and other concert production.

You know when you are in the flow when you get your M&Ms, and Sarah and I got so many M&Ms in Manchester, Tennessee.  We were under cover when it rained, in the front row during the best musical acts, in the perfect place as a friend strolled by, and many more similar situations.

A blog about Mandi Bateman & Sarah Yukie’s travels to Bonnaroo, Spirited Body: A workshop by Tom Myers, then to Wanderlust

GET IT!!!! - Saturday: Day Two

Bonnaroo 2013

Sarah arrived Wednesday night after a 13 hour drive with 2 twenty-some stoner girls that she met at a small dinner gathering just a week before we left.  On the drive down she ate fast food, and one of the girls smoked cigarettes during the drive…grateful for the ride, she took this much better than I would have.  I arrived on Thursday evening, and missed one of my favorite bands Alt J, but we had a lovely dinner with our Nashville Baptiste contingency and Sarah and I slept in a bed at Liz’s house. 

It was a great night sleep for a few reasons, firstly I have been sleeping on a futon since I moved to California, also it would be the last bed we would sleep in for a number of nights, and most particularly I woke up in the middle of the night holding Sarah’s handJ 

Before I arrived I left Sarah a message asking her to go grocery shopping.  It was a rambling message. “Sarah, could you go to the grocery store before I arrive and get some food for us?  I pretty much eat anything (which is a total lie because I am a very picky eater) except wheat – and which I spelled out to make sure she understood that I was saying wheat and not meat: W.H.E.A.T.  Maybe get some carrots, cucumbers, cans of tuna and sardines, hummus, tortillas, chips and salsa, and kombuchu”.  So sweet and nurturing, Sarah took my message verbatim and bought everything I requested.  We had a few laughs and I told her how healthy, sustainably caught, and how sardines are a nostalgic food of my childhood.  Last night for dinner Sarah, who has taken over the cooking roll at our Bonnaroo campsite, made us tortilla, hummus, sardine, and corn/black bean salsa tortilla wraps…which will be on my menu if I ever open a restaurant…delicious!!! 

I teach yoga at POD 2 in the campground Friday, Saturday, and Sunday at 7:30pm and on Sunday I teach at 9am & 10:15am on the Solar Stage.  Friday evening before class Sarah and I were walking, on our way to meet our golf cart chauffer, in the backstage area of the festival.  We heard sirens ahead of us, all foot/ car/and golf cart traffic was stopped.  The road was barricaded, so Sir Paul McCartney could be police escorted into the festival.  I negotiated our way around the barricade through a chain link fence gate to get to our meeting place on time.  We arrived at our meeting place in front of the porta-potties. As we waited for our driver, Jess to get our golf cart, the universe blessed us with a little treat: about 10 feet away Sir Paul walked by us smiled and waved.  After we regained our composure each of us shared that it felt as if he was looking ‘directly at me’.  He saw each one of us, and we saw him.  Putting the words on paper doesn’t do the experience justice – No. 1 chakra blown!!!

Things we forgot: utensils, baby wipes, umbrellas, tea tree oil

Thing we brought: Flow, ease, healing energy, sleepy bodies (which made for good night’s rest)