Shimmy on the Pole

After a week where some jackal decided to call me a five, without my asking, I give you this. 

Not long ago I set out to conquer the pole.  Okay, well not really conquer but to shimmy and shake my ass in the name of exercise and self-preservation.  I mean, as a child we had to put the dishes away and sweep the floor as chores but little did we know that somewhere over the proverbial bridge of adulthood chores would become more cumbersome than that.  Now . . . now we shimmy and shake our bodies on spin bikes, running routes, various forms of yoga, and for the really adventurous as moments of cardio while shopping.  Working out is the new chore of life, as it keeps the body in motion, joints working, and as I’m told by a MD I pay good money to see that it will lengthen my life.  I side eye him wondering how he really knows this. 

Yet, I drag myself to gyms, spin classes, on road courses, and other modes of physical hell more frequently than my mantra would like to admit.  I wish I was one of those people who could eat a supersized jar of peanut butter, down six Cokes, eat a couple of cheeseburgers, and then sit there and not see my vision start to blur, my skin become oily, and feel like my stomach is trying to come out of my body.  Instead, I don’t even have to smell a chocolate cake to put on pounds from it.  You can just mention it and like a magical joke it ends up on my hips.  Yet, the perceived size of my mid-sized rear end isn’t the detail here.  Instead, in the adult realization that we have to shake and shimmy to make our bodies continue to work there comes a point when abs and crunches become more of a bore than having mono for a year.  That’s where we enter the power of the shimmy shake shake . . . yeah, you guessed it.  The pole dance masqueraded as an exercise class. 

Here, I willing pay around fifty bucks to stand in a room, walk on my toes with a poised back and uplifted arms around a pole.  Why yes, pole dancing . . . the so-called lewd “art” of back alley, late night, shady clubs selling pussy and sexual exploits probably with a side helping of venereal fungi needing antibiotics to quell is really a refined art form of ballet, yoga, and gymnastics.  It takes core strength, mental mindset, and balance. It goes far beyond that crass popular culture image.  Instead, that damned pole stands as a marker of demarcation.  I mean, think about it . . . it turns that very adult chore of exercising into something near comical while allowing it also to say “hey, I own this body.  If I want to shake it for display I can.” Of course, there’s something deeper going on here than just obliging my doctor’s notes of good health and staying active.  

What’s that?

The power of the pole is more than just repackaging the left over pot roast with cheddar cheese and a pretzel roll at lunch.  It’s about ownership and cultural space.  In a world where presidential candidates boast about kissing a woman without her permission while grabbing her pussy and promising white athletes receive little to no jail time for defiling and raping young women, women and girls—young and old—acting out, embracing public displays of bodily affection for themselves, skin, art, and health counter a narrative that still quarantines us and keeps the proverbial “baby in a corner.”

And with that, I rub some menthol gel into my sore calves that held me up for an hour of shimmy shimmy shake shake today.  My belly may not be flat, my ass is certainly not firm like a bouncing ball of a twenty-year old’s, but in the end I came, I danced, and I saw the show.  As I pirouette to the stage left, the next generation of girls seeking models and modes of acceptance sees me and others combating a culture of shame and self-hate.  They are next up at this pole, the literal and figurative one.  In a world where activism abounds and social setbacks seemingly outnumber our daily breathes I choose to believe redefining acts of exercise and self-worth will pave the path one pointed footstep at a time. 

And . . . in the end my MD won’t lecture me and side eye me on my next visit to his exam table.  Okay, he probably will but at least it won’t be for being sedentary.