Hi Adella!
I would say "I have a body" but it's a funny way of putting this strange interchange of constantly renewing cells swapping in and out of states and situations according to a combination of chemicals, genetic codes, and context. I'll revert to talking about the body like a tangible and enduring thing nonetheless.
I've been embodied for several years. Most of my recorded life - though perhaps not thoroughly so at times.I started as gametes and bodily material long before I had the consciousness that is, itself, centered in bodily function. Can't say if some essence of self predated the embodiment experience. If so, I doubt it spanned the abyss of time in any meaningful way that would allow for finite discussion. From my temporal experience, embodiment is where it's been at.
A body is a temporal thing. I've never thought much of my static body. It's in the movement - and always has been - where I feel truly settled.
It feels like the last year has been a series of stumbles through brambles, trying to find a way to get back into my body's aerobic sweet spot.With the busted foot, back and tendonitis travelling around my body, it's almost impossible to get my endorphins on without out-sized consequences. Swimming, alas, seems to froth up the reflux. And - my heart heaves its most doleful alas - partner dancing seems like a no go. I can groove out by myself, but let anyone lead me and I'm aggravating injuries left and right (learned the hard way more than once). PT and massage help. But every time I think I'm at a point to start pushing, something snaps a bit and we're back to ultrasound and icing. Love will find a way. Or I will simply get cortisol shots throughout my entire body until such time as my bionic body is ready. So the moving isn't as hot and sleek as it once was.
No really though.
Frustrated though I am, I do not feel estranged from my body right now.
And the more I think on this the more I understand how much I love/cherish/inhabit/revel-in this junky body. Not that it doesn't pain me with its limitations (and literally painful repertoire of strident sensations). This is decidedly not in a "I'm beautiful in every single Dove commercial body-positivity way" kind of thing. I find in those terms of beauty, I'm happy enough to embrace a neutrality of a shrug and "it's a body!" I'm aware of the unflattering angles, imperfections and mediocrities of my physique well enough to minimize them through various tricks of light and position when composing photos, whatever that says about me. I feel vaguely uncomfortable with the odd rolls of fat or cellulite and don't need to focus on the vagaries of my pebbled and irritable skin. This ain't earth mamma enlightenment and it ain't some hedonistic roll-in-the-hay between Narcissus and reflective surfaces.
It's just something about my body being deep and rich and infinitely intense in its sheer embodiment. Not just (nor even primarily) because it brought new life into this world, though I marvel at that as well. But most simply that *it is*. My highly enervated presence mediating between a psyche and the external world. Moving in it, sending ripples out through it as I pass. Gathering the sensations around me and blending until every conceivable hue of sensation scintillates my epidermis.
My hair, for instance, is truly a victory of sensuality over aesthetics. Wild, frizzy and untamable, it deigns only to attempt two modes when it's longer: tied back and threatening to escape, or else fully savage. Save a few emergency interventions by trained professionals, It is not actually flattering regardless of whether it be the coiling waves of yore or the post-child straighter version of frizz and sheer stubborness.
BUT the way it feels bobbing creamily against my neck, the sleek unfolding against my hair and lips, the coy way it crashes against my face likes waves in the occasional ocean of irresistible music... pure love.
It is my little secret delight even as I hiss at its reflection in the mirror most days. (less pleasant when used as an instrument of punishment by the beast, but trade-offs in all things)
I am not always comfortable in my skin and sinew, but I am infused in it, a personal flavor unfurling in the heat of blood and muscle. I'm flying through it. Flexing and twitching and responding into it with the rhythms of the universe encoded in every bodily process. The music. The soft. The sharp. The olfactory symphony of a simple hour. Ever more poignant in propinquity to another body in all its complex aromas that tug and pull at a million instinctive physical reactions in my own body). The throb and heat of blood. The brain-buzz of adrenaline, and the sweet soporific weight of tired limbs.
I hold the buzzing paradox of a physical-spiritual congress in every cell. It sparks and sparkles (and sometimes stings). It oozes like melted honey. It takes and provides pleasure, warmth, love, and awe. To say nothing of the tantric giddiness of temptation. It is *me*. It is the earth and stardust and primordial sludge. It is the universe.
Namaste to every profanely divine molecule that flits in and out of my corporal existence.
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