I live in tennies, as we used to call canvas shoes. I own two pairs: one is a classic mid-20th-century women’s model, the other a unisex style – a twist on a basketball shoe. The classic model is prettier, but the other is roomier.
Why are they tennies? Perhaps people did play tennis in canvas shoes at one time. Nowadays, my beloved tennies are usually referred to as sneakers, and indeed, when I lived on on the east coast, I yielded to common usage (“sneakers”) rather than try to communicate with midwestern “dialect” (“tennies”).
Does the name matter? My mother loved Keds, the most popular brand, because they were inexpensive and could be washed in the washing machine. At the end of summer she threw ours out, but got several years of use out of hers.
And then there were the fall tennies. We were required to wear white canvas shoes in gym class. Mom fumed: “Why white? They’re hard to clean.” Yes, why make extra work for Mom? Typical of everything about gym class: make everyone hate it!
My return to tennies this August has been the hallmark of recovery from My Semi-Invalid Summer, as I refer to it dramatically. I have already mentioned my so-called sports injury in mid-June. The cause, ironically, was not a sport, but an intensive yoga class meant to keep one ultra-fit. Unfortunately, it did not work for me: by the end of the first session, I could barely bend my suddenly-swollen ankles, puffy knees, or weakened wrists. In order to sit on the floor to do gentle stretching exercises, I have had to kneel on two pillows, then lean on my forearms, then roll onto my back, and pull up my aching legs with my hands.
“This is how it feels to grow old,” I thought as I struggled to bend my knees enough to sit in the bathtub.
This yoga class with horrible consequences reminded me of gym classes of yore, when a baleful gym teacher with a whistle round her neck and wincing-white tennis shoes bellowed at us to run faster, to climb a rope, which I rebelliously declined to try, or to criticize my jumping jacks, which were “all wrong. You’re jumping too high.”
In general, yoga is a gentler sport. But in this fast-moving yoga class, everything is much accelerated. You rapidly shift your body from a sphinx pose, or perhaps a cobra, up to a plank, which is a stationary high push-up, and then up to a downward dog, and then again… and again… and again, faster and faster.
And so, after a month and a half of alternating rest with gentle exercise (my own personally-designed regimen), and constant popping of Advil (you don’t want to go the pain pill route – stick with Advil or Tylenol!), I am almost back to normal. That is, if I never miss a gentle exercise session again.
And now I can wear my tennies when I feel like it. I don’t have to wear super-sensible oversized super-supportive walking shoes every time I go out. The tennies are a symbol of youth. Who knew? You don’t wear them for long walks, but for joyous short rambles,bike rides, or when you’re out in the garden.
Keep on truckin’, but avoid excessively vigorous exercise.
Tag: yoga
Yoga Before Dawn & Other Delusions
This morning I had a dramatic thought when I opened my eyes at five o’clock. I will start a new exercise regimen. I will do yoga every day, I said to myself peppily. Doing yoga before dawn would be the equivalent of imbibing a mystical drug that reveals the meaning of life. And I loved the image of myself as a graceful aging woman who does Sun Salutations.
Alas, I am not delusional. I will never be that stretchy woman. I might lift an occasional hefty book over my head, but I have no time for yoga. As I drank coffee and read my book, I forgot about doing the Downward Dog.
Aging is a long wrangle with flexibility, strength, expensive facial creams, and cardiovascular exercise. And you learn that you grow older even if you stretch, lift weights, cut carbs, constantly moisturize, run, bicycle, and go to the gym.
Not surprisingly, my favorite exercise is going to the bookstore. I recently walked there, going the long way, climbing up and down hills. I wasn’t out of breath, but I was surprisingly tired. Once there, I sank into a chair exhausted. The real reason I read the first few chapters of the new novel by Elif Sharak was that I was too tired to go home.
The next day, my hamstrings were ridiculously tight.
This would have been unthinkable 10 years ago. Strange to say, I was a frenetic exerciser for years. My hamstrings were never tight, they were loose. Walking, Dancercise, exercise classes—I was so healthy that my resting pulse was 42. Once when I was sick, my husband had to explain to a doctor my low pulse was not from incipient heart failure, it was from cardiovascular exercise. I was so proud of that low pulse–and now I know it was mostly about being young.
And so I need to do yoga, I told myself. I have to be able to do hills.
Tomorrow, I start.
Tomorrow.