Falling in Love

I am falling in love. We'll get back to that in a bit.

For most of my life, my body has been my frenemy. (Frenemy: modern slang for an enemy disguised as a friend.) It would lure me into comfortable complacency, serving me fairly well to live a "normal" life, and then BAM! Falling and bloodying my knees on a date with a hot guy and spending the evening dealing with the gory ruins of my white eyelet dress (borrowed from my fastidious roommate); trying with determination to earn the respect of my elementary school gym teacher only to be exceeded by his surpassing determination to tell me that I was beneath contempt as I failed to pass any standard of fitness on that damned "President's Physical Fitness Test" (which was surely designed by an evil dictator rather than a patriot);
always the last one chosen for teams ("groan! Not her again!"); the nightmare of shopping for chubby sizes as a child; the ridicule, the clumsiness, the rejection. My body, as much as I wanted to call it "friend", was so fickle and so prone to betraying me that I was compelled to exploit it, treat it badly, or beat it into a semblance of submission.

How does one exploit one's body? Easy. By using it as barter to obtain something desired, such as male attention. Enough said.

Treating it badly: Atrocious diet, sedentary lifestyle, mocking it, ignoring illnesses, hiding it, feeling shame about it.

Beating it into submission: Battling with it endlessly for supremacy over weakening muscles and expanding girth. Endless diets. Running to "beat CMT", not for the fun of it, but with the express goal of conquest.

To be sure, and to be fair, my body was, at times, my friend. It grew, fed, and cuddled my babies. It yielded exquisite pleasure in the experience of a lover's first kiss. It allowed me to feel the breathtaking delight of jumping into a swimming pool on blistering hot summer days. To hear the giggles of little girls at play. Thousands, if not millions, of acts of friendship.

I think I've made a pretty good argument for my body being my frenemy. What I could not have anticipated, and am only beginning to realize, is that I am falling in love with my body.

Believe me! I know how odd (narcissistic? self-obsessed? scandalous? perverse? crazy? or perhaps wonderful?) that sounds. I can't explain it (and don't even want to try), but I am finding my body to be exquisite, delightful, and truly fearfully and wonderfully made. I want to fill it with nutrient-rich delights, smooth it with aromatic lotions, and move it as though dancing with my lovely partner on the ballroom floor.

And as any lover will do, when they are cherished and pampered, my body is responding by wooing me with the flirtatious glimpse of a muscle flitting across my arm, and by pushing itself further to delight me with increased strength and stamina, and by willingly shedding the pounds that were appropriate for an enemy but not for a beloved. And I reciprocate in delight with proferred gifts of jewelry and perfume and words of appreciation. It is an intoxicating romance.

We are enjoying the dance... My body and me.