Charlotte Latvala: Two out of five on a dumb flexibility test ain’t bad
“Can You Pass the Flexibility Test?“
This recent healthy living headline seemed more like a dare.
Flexibility? Are you kidding? You got this, I confidently told myself.
Why?
1. I do yoga. (Well, sort of. It may be slightly more accurate to say I’ve “done” yoga, or that I occasionally dabble in yoga, or that I often think about doing yoga but change my mind and take a nap instead. But still.)
2. I walk. I know, as challenging sporty activities go, walking is right up there with chewing and breathing, but nevertheless, I walk. (Doesn’t moving one foot in front of another require some flexibility?)
3. My daughter is a dancer. Where did she get that flexibility, if not from me? (Never mind those countless hours of training. I provided the genetic material.)
4. Finally, I’m not that old! I’m spry, I’m vital, I’m a human rubber band. (And not one that’s been sitting in the junk drawer for 10 years getting crusty.)
So, I took the flexibility test.
It consisted of five simple movements to determine my “range of motion” or possibly “date of early demise.” They were:
1. Touch your toes. Easy peasy. Nothing to it. My lower back, hips, and hamstrings are the stuff of legend, according to this move. (The fact that I have longish arms may be in my favor, but who’s keeping score?)
2. Move your head from side to side while sitting. Rotate it to a 90-degree angle. What? Ninety degrees? This is obviously some sort of typo, because no one who’s not an owl named Hedwig can swivel their head past 30 degrees, tops. Next, please.
3. The “open book.” Lie on your side with your legs bent, then swivel your torso so your back touches the floor. Fling your arms out to either side, Titanic-style. If both arms touch the floor without throwing your back out, you have “adequate” flexibility in your upper vertebrae. Adequate? I’m ready to join Cirque de Soleil, I performed this move so well.
4. Touch your toes to the wall. Take one leg back into a kneeling position. STOP RIGHT THERE, MISTER. I cannot kneel on bare wood. I need a soft pillow for my crunchy knee.
So I could not finish this test and I have no idea if I have any flexibility whatsoever in my calves or ankles. But I do have granola in my knee.
5. Lie on your back and bend your legs into the shape of a ballpark pretzel. Then proceed to do “The Worm” but upside down, across a tile or preferably a concrete surface. While inching along the floor and wheezing painfully, clap your hands behind your back to the tempo of “In the Navy” by the Village People. Or something like that. I sort of glazed over this one.
I guess I’m not as flexible as I thought. But as Meat Loaf once said, two out of five on a dumb flexibility test ain’t bad.
Charlotte is a columnist for The Times. You can reach her at charlottelatvala@gmail.com.
This article originally appeared on Beaver County Times: Latvala: Two out of five on a dumb flexibility test ain’t bad
