THE SLOUCH
Cindy Maddera
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Michael measured the Cabbage the other day and she is 4’9. She will be ten in September and she is just a little over a foot shorter than I am tall. Michael started talking about how the Cabbage is going to be a tall girl and I responded with “that means she’s going to slouch.” Michael gave me an inquisitive look, so I went on to explain how tall girls generally slouch in order to fit in with their peers. That’s where it starts. Then the slouching happens as a way to hide their bodies. Michael said something about knowing what it’s like to be a big tall guy so he gets it, but I’m not sure he really did get it. Sure he makes an impact when he enters a room but more often than not that impact is a resounding positive “wow! you’re so tall!”. The tone of that statement shifts when a big tall girl enters a room. I have rarely heard someone tell me that I look thin without using a tone of negativity and then adding an inquiry about my health. “You look thin! Are you okay?” is not a compliment. There must be something wrong with you at all times. You are either too thin or too fat. Too tall or too short. Really it doesn’t matter to you if you are either too this or too that. All you want is to be noticed for your abilities to think up cool things and do interesting stuff while having a healthy body.
Men are praised for being tall. Boys got Paul Bunyan and girls got Thumbelina.
We slouch because we learn at an early age that more value is placed on the shape of our bodies than the words we have to say. Slouching is way of saying “please don’t notice my height. please don’t notice that my boobs are big or not big enough. please just listen to the smart ideas I have running through my brain.” Sometimes the slouching never goes away because we have discovered that it hides so many insecurities. We’ve discovered a way to fold ourselves around those insecurities as a means of protection. We only discover years later that our spines were not designed for all of that protecting and that in order to relieve the stress on our spines, we must expose our insecurities. And it is hard. It is like having a cast taken off your arm and then having to straighten that arm after it has been fixed in position for months, but worse because the spine has been bent over for years.
I slouch when I’m tired and recently it seems that I am always tired. Michael asked the other day “don’t you just sit around and think about things some times?” I started to answer, but then he kept on talking, never giving me a chance to answer his question. I lacked the energy to straighten my spine and speak up. Instead , I just vaguely listened as he rattled on about his plans for changing the Supreme Court while thinking about my answer to his question. I spend my day thinking up solutions to problems. My job is a scientific puzzle. The spare thoughts I have are on things that I have control over, changes I can make, projects I can work on. I think about stories I can write. I think about how telling him all of this will make no difference. My words will fly in one of his ears and then immediately out the other. Answering his question will not change the things I think about. It dawns on me that it doesn’t really matter to me to have my voice heard. It is not a lack of confidence. It is just , I don’t know, a security in myself that doesn’t need that validation or at least I don’t need his validation. I stand up straighter as I realize this.
“Sing out, Louise!” Well… Louise did learn to sing out, while artfully taking off her clothes. To be fair, it was only a glove at first and if you notice, Louise is standing tall and proud, if not a little bit shaky while she peels that glove from her arm. I am not advocating that you become a burlesque act in order to straighten your spine and drop some insecurities, but if you think about it, it couldn’t hurt. Peeling that glove from her arm is a metaphor for peeling away insecurities. You do not have to literally remove your clothing. For years you listened to people tell you that you’d be so much prettier if you didn’t slouch. They never once said to you that your voice would be stronger, louder and heard if you didn’t slouch. But the song I sing out is meant to be read.
So I sit up straighter as I type.