I have no core.
You know how some people are inexplicably missing a finger? Or have only one kidney? Or no cartilage in one ear*? Well, I was born with no core. It's true. I have tried to find it and it is not there. I am core-less. If I was an apple you'd be able to eat all of me with no wastage. If I was an argument I wouldn't be very effective. If I was the earth we'd all be floating into space. If I was a nuclear reactor then the engineers would be in considerable trouble, because I have no core.
I tried to find my core years ago when I was having serious back problems and my doctor referred me to Pilates. After a series of private lessons, in which the instructor and I got increasingly frustrated, I decided that I was devoid of a core. As I wrote at the time, being asked to move my core muscles was like being asked to move my sixth toe - bloody impossible, because I have no sixth toe.
 |
| I DON'T HAVE ONE OF THESE |
In despair, I gave up Pilates for
Well, Matt the Physio was very charming, but kept insisting on trying to find my core. He wouldn't listen when I told him I didn't have one, nor was he impressed by my clever apple metaphor. He stood there, hovering over me, as I lay on the floor with a hopeful expression, squeezing everything from my pelvic floor muscles to my tummy muscles to my thighs to my fists**, but unable to squeeze The One.
Matt gave me a series of exercises to help me find my core. I was crap at the first one, but gradually got better as the session went on. Except that I DIDN'T, at all. I got WORSE as the session went on. I thought I maybe glimpsed a shadow of my core.... and then it slipped away, never to be seen again. It was woeful. Poor Matt. And poor me.
And yet I plod on, lying on my back, bracing this and pulling that, in pursuit of the corporeal goal that hovers - for me to be whole, at one, to have my very own core.
Or, if that fails, perhaps I could borrow yours. Do YOU have a core? Do you know where I can find one?
*okay, that last one would be me
**in frustration
