she sniffs it through a cane on a supersonic train
I STILL HAVE A WEB PAGE
Life > internet, at least lately. Aaron is back at university for sophomore year. Another single room, this one with more of a view and a charming amount of space and storage. I think Aaron will probably get an apartment with friends for next year but he says there is something kind of calming about one-room living and I do understand that. I have already heard one minor complaint about the sheer number of first-years* clogging up the works and not knowing where they are going, which I told him is a very sophomore thing to say.
*Sounds like there indeed was a bit of overenrollment and some of these first-years are in triple rooms. NO THANK YOU. In college I personally cycled through three different roommates before realizing the common denominator in all the issues we had was probably…me. Applied for a single and never looked back!
SORRY BUT IT’S TRUE
Sometimes I forget that the other end of the leash has ears too. I was petting a stranger’s dog at a backyard party and I said (to the dog) “oh my gosh you’re so cute! You’re so nice! You have a big wide body but a little tiny head!” And then I froze a bit because some people get weird when you even lightly neg their pet. But luckily this owner said, “I tell her that all the time!”
WORK IT OUT
I am still going to the gym consistently, in a semi-organized way (running and weight training every other day). The outward change is not drastic, although it has crossed over into “some pants too big” territory. (Although, to be fair, I was severely damaged by ‘90s fashion and have only in the last decade or so stopped draping myself in oversized black rags.)
A few thoughts on embodiment and exercise, some shallow and observational and some not-so:
I have pretty good musical taste except when it comes to the treadmill and then it is the most ratchet rap about money and bitches and being the best. Some things I like about this genre:
- when it’s a remix and some guy just yells “REMIX!” at the beginning of the track
- references to cash, particularly to “standing on” stacks of it (to be taller?)
- a song where the main refrain is “PULL OVER, THAT ASS TOO FAT.” Like a traffic stop? Ma’am, do you have any idea how fat your ass is right now? Ass license and ass registration, please
- I know it’s hyperbole but when Cardi B. says “I gotta stay outta Gucci/I’m going to run outta hangers” I always think well you can BUY MORE HANGERS. You can send an assistant out for hangers. If you really spent that much money at Gucci they would probably give you hangers. Hangers aren’t really a limiting factor, but closet space could be. ET CETERA.
Sometimes I do Peloton-app strength workouts but the quality of the programming definitely varies. I thought I was going to scream during a “legs and glutes” video when we were instructed to pick up a weight for goblet squats but then the instructor constantly referred to “bodyweight squats” and I thought I was going to scream out loud right there in the gym. Stop saying that! We are using weights! Do you even understand words?
My gym puts out a fairly worthless member newsletter, which I rarely read, but a blah blah space-filler article about what counts as vigorous activity caught my eye. The activities listed included running, swimming, cycling, aerobics, and…”digging with a spade or a shovel.” Okay?
All this working out (combined with a particularly introspective edible or two) had me reflecting (AGAIN) on attitudes toward bodies. I think there is a widely accepted attitude to love your body for what it can do vs what it looks like, but…that is kind of a problem too? We will all get older and be able to do less. We will all get sick at some point and lose certain functions.
Add that to the fact that so many body-related things are now being framed as things people can do to FEEL “well,” and that this feeling well is somehow outside of beauty culture. It’s “wellness!” It’s not about bodies! This is a trick and a lie.
I unequivocally think you can do whatever you want to with your body. Maybe you get plastic surgery, get massages, always have perfect eye makeup, get Botox, or go on yoga retreats and “justify” it by deciding it will make you feel more positive about your body. Which is fine! But (and I’m really fumbling around in the dark here)…maybe you don’t have to feel positive about your body. Maybe that is a weird framing that we have all accepted, that you should constantly cheerlead your body and think it is so super great.
I am starting to think this insistence on having an attitude (positive or negative) about your body is just another measure of distance from it. Maybe yelling about “how every body is beautiful” is still being really attached to the idea of “beautiful.” Maybe the most important thing about your body is that it is yours.
Just so you don’t think I am a deeply spiritual being who is above all the beauty-culture stuff, I do go to a “skin care studio” for a facial (oh how porn has ruined that word) about four times a year and enjoy the experience very much. I like the steam and the attention and the weird specific way that facialists wipe stuff off of you (putting the towel around the edges of your face like an old-timey cartoon guy with a toothache and then smooshing from the top down). I did involuntarily snort on the table when the skin lady said she was about to use an “ultrasonic spatula” to apply something to my face. (She asked if I was okay and I just said yes. No need to mock the tools of the specialist, at least not directly in front of them.)
IT’S BEEN SO LONG I WILL NOT KNOW HOW TO BEHAVE
After many cancellations, LT and I actually (fingers crossed) have a trip scheduled. I will take your Amsterdam recommendations (I’d see them fastest via Twitter DM, probably). We are going to do that for five days or so and then flying to the south of France to visit some friends. I am anticipating LOTS OF CHEESE.
—mimi smartypants is your human ultrasonic spatula.