Body

Dear Ira Glass,

When my brother, sisters and I were growing up our mother was really into parenting by lecture. She would announce “Children, gather round! I’m about to give a lecture! Gather!” and we’d all groan and try to scatter. Not fast enough. Somehow a few minutes later we’d find ourselves in a mini-audience, all different ages but roughly half her height, the backs of our heads signifying raptness like the Apostles in the paintings watching Jesus. Our mother didn’t exactly look like Jesus, but she commanded our attention like some kind of blunt, 1980′s female deity with a crimped bouffant and a four-inch roll of bangs. Larger than life. Looking back I realize she was in her late twenties and early thirties, only five or ten years older than I am now, but her wisdom was for the ages. Everything from safety awareness to sibling kindness was covered as part of her lecture series. Every subject made us squirm. It was so personal. What right had she to analyze the deepest components of our emotional and relational imbalances, our mother?

Sometimes the lectures came with corresponding materials, like a set of required reading. Our mother would seize any opportunity to really hit the point home- but always it was because the point had been genuinely hit home for her. She wanted to share her little epiphanies with us. Lucky us. A lecture on complaining about my body at around ten years old came with this poem:

The World is Mine

Today upon a bus I saw a girl with golden hair;
She seemed so gay, I envied her, and wished that I were half so fair;
I watched her as she rose to leave, and saw her hobble down the aisle.
She had one leg and wore a crutch, but as she passed–a smile.
Oh, God, forgive me when I whine;
I have two legs—the world is mine.

Later on I bought some sweets. The boy who sold them had such charm,
I thought I’d stop and talk awhile. If I were late, t’would do no harm.
And as we talked he said, “Thank you, sir, you’ve really been so kind.
It’s nice to talk to folks like you because, you see, I’m blind”.
Oh, God, forgive me when I whine;
I have two eyes—the world is mine.

Later, walking down the street, I met a boy with eyes so blue.
But he stood and watched the others play; it seemed he knew not what to do.
I paused, and then I said, “Why don’t you join the others, dear?”
But he looked straight ahead without a word, and then I knew, he couldn’t hear.
Oh, God, forgive me when I whine;
I have two ears—the world is mine.

Two legs to take me where I go,
Two eyes to see the sunset’s glow,
Two ears to hear all I should know,
Oh, God, forgive me when I whine;
I’m blest, indeed, the world is mine.*

As I read the poem now, some fifteen years later, I find it excruciatingly saccharin & overt. Many things about it make me uncomfortable, including the reference to a Deaf person as a victim (I studied Deaf culture and language for two years, the first lesson of which is “Deaf people can do anything hearing people can do except hear”), the patronizing attitude of the author who deigns to buy sweets in the midst of his busy schedule, and the antiquated rhyme scheme that can only be described as lilting. Lilting? With such subject matter? Not a great fit.

But I remembered it. Long after losing the scrap of paper someone on the street had dutifully passed to my mother which she had then dutifully passed to me (with a lecture), I remembered enough to find this poem on Google. I remember so clearly the moment she said to me, “I can’t do anything for you if you’re going to insist on being like this. Here, just read this poem. Read this poem and change your attitude.” I remember why she was so frustrated. Why the lecture and the poem-flyer were so ill-received. I hated my body. Completely uncomfortable in my own skin, I couldn’t stop itching to be out of it. I wished for anything else than what I had inherited, what I saw in the mirror every day, what I schlepped around at school like the red-haired, brown-eyed, glasses-clad & freckled burden I thought it was. I wished for some kind of magical solution, that my hair would start growing in thick and blonde, I would wake up one day with 20/20 vision (it’s a miracle!), and my limbs would organize themselves cutely and finely instead of awkwardly flailing and poking people at random. I stayed like that for years, well into my late teens. I couldn’t let go of the deprecating addiction.

Over the years my mother mellowed her style of imparting wisdom, but the messages remained clear and acute. She started doing confidence-building activities with me like shopping, running, and going to yoga class at the gym where we shared a membership. She was already an elite yoga instructor by this time, and didn’t need to bother with unstandardized, low-energy, poorly-heated classes taught by soccer moms in their spare time. She chose to practice weekly with me as a meditation, in a cramped, dark blue room on borrowed mats separated by one thin wall from a step aerobics class that blasted dance mixes we couldn’t help but bop to during final relaxation. Afterwards we would get three-day old packaged sushi from Top Foods, the rice almost crispy and the avocados questionably edible. We’d discuss everything from the family dog to skinny jeans (a then just-emerging trend) to boys to eating vegan. Confidence-building.

One day in class as I was struggling to stretch my head upside-down toward my knees in downward facing dog (this is a resting pose?!? WTF?) and my mom was floating effortlessly into a tripod headstand, her legs swirling around in the air like the stems of an uncurling fern, I caught sight of a disconcerting image at the back of the room. About three rows behind me an older woman with short white-blonde hair and a red face was shaking uncontrollably as she labored to hold her arms up in the air and balance on her feet in a basic standing lunge pose. Her hands fluttered like unprinted flags raised high, white sails in the wavy sea without tether. As though without tendon. As the class moved fluidly through series of poses she ground every effort to stay in the flow, just enough to keep up every moment while others could rest in the current. Whatever medical condition she had prevented her from being still in any volitional movement. It was the bravest thing I’ve ever seen.

Again, years later, long after I’ve stopped attending that gym, started attending yoga classes at an actual studio, and begun eating sushi that doesn’t come in a plastic box, I remember this woman. I think of her often and wonder if she still practices yoga. I wonder if she brings that same quiet, verdant bravery to other tasks in her life. I wonder how she feels about her body. Because for some years now I’ve been broken out of that addiction to distortion, to body-hatred. My mother’s lectures and educational materials and confidence-building activities finally worked. This is why I now view vanity as a rare gift, why looking in the mirror is one of my favorite activities, why I find endless fulfillment and energy and soul-growth in doing things with and for my body. And it isn’t trite. The world absolutely is mine. Is ours. And in this gloriously body-centered, body-powered life I’ve found, when I think of that woman, I can shake a little and still be strong. I can waver and still be a bright light, in the back of the room, in the current. Letting go of the tether to reach for the work ahead.

Sincerely,

Courtney

*Credited to Dr. Tennyson Guyer/ Anonymous

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