Tied to Be Fit
When geometry and gravity collide with inflexibility and confusion
The Missus and I have embarked on yet another joint adventure.1 We chose this one to complement — reinforce — what we seem to be relearning from our respective physical therapy regimens: a weekly class in Tai Chi, tailored to the lifestyles, ablities, and interests of aging participants.
You’ve no doubt seen videos of Tai Chi groups working out — maybe even witnessed such groups in person, in a public park or other pastoral setting, often at daybreak or sunset, perhaps on a riverbank: graceful, free-flowing human forms in workout clothes, bodies swaying almost balletically in harmony with one another, stretching, bending, arms slowly splayed or withdrawn. It’s quite hypnotizing to watch.
What you may not know about Tai Chi is that its practice makes use of multiple standard “movements,” often chained together in a sort of Taoist choreography. This sounds coldly mechanistic but in fact is not, because each of these 24 movements (in the most widely used form of Tai Chi) has a unique poetic name, derived from a brief sort of scene-setting — a tale, I guess you could say — which prepares you mentally, dare I say spiritually, to more or less flow from stasis into the appropriate motion(s) of hands, feet, arms, legs, and/or torso.
I thought I’d share here a few of the lesser-known such movements targeted specifically towards our age group.
Pushing Tea
The tale:
You’ve overnighted at the home of an officious younger person who has determined you shall live a healthier lifestyle. Your host brings to the table a delicate porcelain cup and saucer, with a pewter spoon apparently scavenged from an antique dollhouse. In the cup is a pale, nearly transparent liquid the color (says your host2) of a lotus blossom. Your host places the cup before you and says, “You have to try this.” They purse their lips, fold their arms, and radiate in your general direction a challenge: Well?
The movement:
Sit at a table. (If you’re already seated at a table, all to the good; just stay put.) Place your hands lightly on the table, body-width apart. Maintaining contact with the table, bring your hands together such that your palms are almost touching, and then rotate them, palms out, as you lean forward — arms extended — with your upper body, ideally reaching all the way to the far side of the table. Mentally recite: No. Coffee, please. A doughnut would be nice. Slowly resume erect seating posture; again push forward, a bit less politely, perhaps shaking your head. Repeat seven times.
Drown the Lotus
The tale:
You are naked, alone in the bathroom, and have not showered for four days.3 Before you is an elegant claw-footed bathtub. The rim is thigh-high — oh, say, about two feet off the floor. (If desirous of extra humiliation, make it just a few inches.) The water in the tub steams; it infuses your soul with the aromas (so said the label on the bath salts’ package) of sacred life.
The movement:
Step forward lightly with the left foot; follow with the right. STOP. Lean forward, keeping your torso straight. Move both hands forward, palms down, and a little to each side. Continue to lean forward… lean forward… leeeeeeeeean forward — and abruptly, but with cosmic grace, bring both hands down and closer together to prevent a headlong nosedive. (Remember: there’s not really a tub of water there. It’s probably just the hard floor, which has all the resilience of a frustrated, impatient heir.) Hold steady for a count of six. Now lift one foot — either one will do — and scissor it forwards while rotating your torso toward the opposite side. Stop when the foot is about six inches from the floor, as though the instep has caught on something. Wobble on the other foot; groan. Return the lifted one to the floor. Wait for one sun’s full passage across the heavens, and then repeat.
The Rattle of Bamboo
The tale:
In the forest is a stand of bamboo, within which is a clearing. You yourself are in the center of the clearing, almost certainly lost: no paths lead into or out of the clearing. Perhaps you have parachuted there. A gentle breeze stirs the air; the bamboo seems to respond, organically. The breeze picks up a bit, becomes a wind. Oh yes, you remember now: the area is under a typhoon warning. Hannibal, the Weather Channel meteorologist had called it while making a Silence of the Lambs joke: Typhoon Hannibal. Gnawing its way up the coast of the Straits of Taiwan and thence inland: aimed, like an arrow shot from a tautly strung bow, straight for your placid, pretty little bamboo patch.
The movement:
Stand, relaxed, feet together, hands at your sides. Stretch your hands out fully until they are extended, palms up, at shoulder height. Slowly, gracefully, raise your hands further, bringing the palms together overhead — so far overhead that you are tempted to stand on your toes. (Do not stand on your toes.) Keeping the palms together, arms extended, bend your torso left slightly; return to the vertical; now bend to the right. Always emulate the movements of the surrounding bamboo grove. Vertical; left; vertical; right; vertical… Repeat ten times, increasing the rate at which you bend with every movement, and oh heck, forget the vertical step altogether, just go left-right-left-right, until you are literally thrashing from side to side, arms always whipping about and extended overhead. With the tenth thrash, suddenly stagger forward, drop to a crouch, fall to the floor, adopt the fetal position, and whimper, gracefully.
Sparing the Beetle
The tale:
You have wandered out the back door on a vague mission to do something in the garden plot back there.4 It’s a mistake to think of it as a “garden,” per se5, because the summer temperature never dipped below 97 except on the days when the rain poured down by the bucketsful, smelling faintly of something floral. (Lotus blossoms, surely. Translucent ones.) You look down and glimpse something dark and shiny skitter around at the edge of your field of vision, and suddenly realize: you are barefoot.
The movement:
Begin with feet together, posture erect, centered over the (what-was-it — the point your trainer keeps talking about, two inches down from your navel and two inches in: your center of balance, she calls it, although you’re pretty sure your balance no longer has a center). Your hands hang loosely, gracefully, at your sides. Palms down, extend your arms forward and — gracefully, ever gracefully — touch each thumb to the corresponding index fingertip, in the manner of a robed monk plucking a lotus blossom from Gaia’s lips. Tilt your head as though to inhale the aroma of Nature’s blessing, then look straight down. Squeal delicately, like a rodent no more than four inches long (including tail). Leap gracefully into the air and backwards, at least three inches in both directions, and descend to the earth as though borne upon a cloud of ineffable Nothingness. Repeat three times, unless doing so aggravates the plantar fascitis which has been dogging you since late 2022.
Place your palms together before you and bow, lightly, saying under your breath: Namaste — which is to say, Chrissake. Is this still only Week 1?!?
Now that we’re in our mid-70s, of course, we’ve carefully recalibrated our Adventure Index — it’s currently set at around 3 on a 10-point dial.
…but you are not convinced.
There’s always something getting in the way: a trip to Walgreen’s, a dental emergency, a half-hour grocery expedition culminating in fifteen minutes’ confusion in the self-checkout line — the damned barcode on your customer loyalty card never seems to work as it should.
You think so, anyhow. It’s not important. All you know is that you were standing at the back door, looking out, and found your hand on the doorknob. You’re outside. That’s all you need to know.
Garden “plot” works, though, because since mid-July it has indeed conspired with the rest of the yard to revert to its pre-civilized form: brown brittle weed stalks poke up randomly through the hardened-clay dirt, taunting you with daily reminders of your retiree’s fecklessness…