Body Time, by Nancy Osborn

If I had to focus on one part of my body as the representative part, the epitome of who I am, it would be my legs, along with their feet, knees and hips.

Legs: strong, sturdy, ready to walk anywhere, up to the challenge of hills, loving the splash of rain water puddles, but not too happy about ice.

And willing to carry more than just myself. They've carried a sister riding piggy-back, a baby (first inside me then on my back), knapsacks of school books, library books, groceries, laundry, a yoga mat and meditation bench, backpacks of clothes for travel in Greece and Italy.

Feet: overlooked at times but having the uncanny ability to draw my attention when they are hot, when they are cold, when my socks have rumpled themselves down under my soles, when my toes cramp during meditation, when my shoes are too tight.

Legs and feet can create the most elegant and beautiful movements in dance. And I love my legs and feet for having been willing to school themselves in these motions. Now more often I school my legs and feet to fold and relax into meditative silence, allowing the rest of my body to slow and quiet itself.

Knees: I could just consider them a part of my legs, but as I age these joints have begun to demand more attention and care. Now I can no longer expect my knees to gracefully lower me to a squat. Now I must sometimes pamper these joints and use a helping hand when rising from meditation or sitting.

Hips: another often unappreciated part of my leg, just there, helping me walk or fold into a forward bend, swing my legs or land a jump gracefully, until they don't help. I knew long ago that I should never take my hip joints for granted, learning this lesson the hard way during a dance concert. Another woman and I were expected to gracefully extend first our left leg into a slow développé and back, and then when that movement was completed, to do the same with the right leg. But I could never do it quite so smoothly on the right, despite hours of practice. There was some sort of quirk in my right hip joint that made the movement less than smooth. I always hoped all eyes were on my partner at this point. The same quirk shows itself in yoga poses these days, reminding me that we aren't just mechanical creatures, though some anatomy illustrations might give that impression in their diagrams of bones and muscles. We are creatures with living parts, less than perfect parts, parts that age and change.

When I was younger I'm sure I took my body and all its parts for granted. At the slightest impulse it would do what I wished: stand up, sit down, bend, turn, twist, jump, glide. There was no need to think about how the parts of my body accomplished these movements, they just did. And maybe that's the way of life: when young you just get on with things, make your way in the world, using your body almost unconsciously to move forward, both literally and figuratively.

But as I move into the last phase of my life I find that I can no longer remain so unaware of my body. I've come to realize that if an accident or fatal disease doesn't bring my life to an end, that my body itself will find a way to remind me that a life doesn't hurtle forward non-stop forever. And that it has, in fact, been reminding me of this for awhile.

My body calls out to me to notice it, to care for it more attentively, to coddle it even. It makes it quite clear that it is slowing down and with that slowing, that my life is also moving toward the stillness of death.

There comes a time when it is important to take account of the slowness of age, to reflect on all that the body has experienced and known, to honor the way it has supported my being through all my years. That is the body time I am in now.