Sometime in the early Eighties I had a pair of jeans that I really loved. I wore them all the time and since I was still a little kid I even wore holes in the knees the old fashioned way - by doing kid stuff on the floor, ground, in the garden, crashing bikes and roller skates and all that... There was a narrow metal copper-colored label riveted to one of the back pockets. I think it just read: Sassoon. Were they hand-me-downs from my sister? Or was I really so chic?
Sometime toward the end of their useful life - my mom was not a holey jean fan - something shifted in me. Maybe it was the early stages of becoming a man, of noticing that girls walked differently from boys. And maybe it was something about those sexy slim-fitting jeans that prompted me to notice that I was still walking with a pronounced swing in my hips. Like a girl. Well I had to put a stop to that immediately. I remember consciously focusing on not moving my hips while I walked. Social pressures ensured that I kept up my diligent training and before long I was walking straight ahead at all times. No more swing.
But that's not a very natural way to walk. Even for a man. It forces all kinds of straight-legging that shuts free flow down and stiffens up almost every join from head to toe. It turns one into a board. After years and decades that board-body is no longer going to be able to do much of anything but peg-leg up to the bar like a cowboy - something my childhood self would have been delighted to attain.
I wasn't ever a ballerina or anything so it all worked out okay... for a while. But then I started running. And running and running and running and over the years started focusing on form and how to improve stride and pace and efficiency and speed. Across the decades I've come to believe that none of that focus on form was going anywhere until I got to the root of the problem. Cowboys don't run.
I can't and don't blame Vidal for this. If anything, he showed me the way all those years ago and I just chose to ignore him. Actually, now, if anything, I should thank him and those jeans because now I have a point of memory that I can go back to. If I can just imagine myself wearing those jeans again and walking like I used to when I was a kid and being willing to roll around and move freely like a real human animal then maybe I can bring some of that swing and twist and freedom back into my gait - to my hamstrings and glutes and hips and back and neck and mind! Freedom at last to run freely through the world as goddess intended!
2 comments:
In my soccer coaching days a big part of the training was hip and knee flexibility. There were lots of swinging techniques to accomplish this. Now they call it yoga or Pilates.
Thanks, Midnight. And so many of these movements are so easy to do. Even a few minutes could make a big difference.
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