There I was, being entertained by one of my sweet elderly friend’s great-granddaughters, who felt that the wide open spaces of the fellowship hall made the perfect venue for a demonstration of her gymnastic flexibility. And I sighed.
Because my days of being Gumby are so far behind me, they feel like a dream. This “old and fat and vertiginous” thing has wreaked havoc on my flexibility. It’s true that my chiropractor reassures me that “tight” for me is “normal” for others… but it’s poor comfort, since we both know that’s not the point.
Instead, I feel the ghost of my little Finnish grandmother (the one who could not only touch her toes but actually flatten her palms onto the floor, right up until the day she died - at age 80) hovering beside me, demonstrating how it should be done…, while exuding {fond} disdain.
And really, there is no reason for it.
I know from Grandma’s example that age is no excuse, and I know that weight isn’t, either. I’ve been close to this weight before, with a flexibility of about six-fold.
Nor is it like you need a lot of equipment to just plunk down on the floor and stretch and yet, here my pudgy, un-flexible self sits, sighing - yet relishing an un-spinning world.
I console myself with the fact that there’s more than one way of being flexible.
(And that maybe, flexibility isn’t always the answer… ;-p)
