One of the positive things middle-age has brought me, is a keen desire to stay healthy and to consciously go about expediting that goal. And so I do stuff that I never did when I was in my twenties—like going to the dentist and subjecting myself to regular teeth cleanings, which to me, will always feel like someone’s trying to gouge out my heart through my gum line. I won’t even discuss the mammograms and the ‘gyno’ visits, except to say that as bad as they are, they’re still not as bad as the teeth cleaning, because they don’t need to be scheduled every three months. And then, there’s the gym. I go to the gym five-six days per week. Like every other normal person, I hated this at first. But when the back pains I’ve had for the last twenty years disappeared, my clothing size dropped four sizes and I could run up the stairs without feeling, by the time I reached the top, like a “Dementor” had sucked out all the oxygen in my lungs, as well as my soul, I started to actually look forward to going to the gym.
I owe this transformation in large part, to whom I consider “The Greatest Personal Trainer in the World,” Justin Oliver. (Is a personal trainer expensive? Perhaps, but not nearly as expensive as back surgery, heart bypass and prescriptions for Lipitor, Coumadin and Fosamax.) Justin Oliver is half my age and literally twice as tall; a black belt, studying to be a chiropractor. For some reason, he took me seriously when I said, “I want you to train me, but I don’t want you to treat me like an old lady.”
So now, when I’m whinging to him during one of our training sessions, that I can’t lift one more thing, he feels free to sass me, like this, “Boo hoo hoo. Cry me a river, build me a bridge and get over it.” That ticks me off. So much so, that, much to my shock, I can lift one more thing…or two. Which is really kind of cool and which is why I think he’s terrific. Thanks to Justin, I have an impressive set of abs, biceps and triceps. (Impressive for a 51-year-old, that is) In addition, I’ve also earned the respect of the other body builders in the gym, whom, you might be surprised to learn, are not, for the most part, 51-year old females. They range in age anywhere from 16-85, are mostly male, mostly smart, mostly pretty darn sensitive, helpful and mostly tattooed. They love tattoos. Personally, I’m not fond of tattoos for myself, but there is one tattoo that has me intrigued lately and this brings me to Rick Reilly and Mia Farrow.
I remember Mia Farrow from the days when she was dating Frank Sinatra, then cut all her hair off, then got involved with Woody Allen and other such silliness of choice. (That remark doesn’t include her movie roles, which were, in my opinion, excellent.) Her personal selections, as she’d probably be the first to point out, are really none of my business, but I do happen to notice that like many women, (including me, I hope, I hope) she smartened up a lot the older she got. Her choices are now stellar, such as being the UNICEF goodwill ambassador and making the genocide in Darfur her personal crusade. Mia Farrow has taken on the Beijing Olympics, because China buys about two thirds of the Sudanese oil, the profits from which the Sudanese government uses to buy weapons and aircraft, which are mostly made in China. With these weapons, the Sudanese government has slaughtered an estimated 400,000 non-Arab Africans and made refugees of another two million. Mia says, “These are the Genocide Olympics. China is funding the first genocide of the third millennium.“ So now, she’s taking on the sponsors of the Beijing Olympics, one of whom happens to be Steven Spielberg. How’s that for irony? (Uh, Steve…honey—Holocaust? Shindler’s List?… Munich?? Have you thought this thing through?) If you want to find out more about this situation and what you can do to help, log on to http://miafarrow.org.
In the meantime, here’s what I learned from reading Rick Reilly’s column. For those who don’t know, Rick Reilly writes for Sports Illustrated and I look at that magazine each week, just so I can read what he has to say. Like Justin, Rick is great at what he does—”The Greatest Sports Columnist in the World.” Rick Reilly wrote about Mia Farrow and the Beijing Olympics in a recent column and he pointed out something interesting. He said that if nothing changes by the time the Olympics roll around in 2008, many of the athletes who are competing there are considering doing so wearing the “Dream for Darfur” Chinese character tattoo, which translates as “China, please.” The athletes are wearing these on the insides of their wrists, as a reminder of the way Germany’s holocaust victims were tattooed.
Well, I tried to find a representation of this tattoo on Mia’s website and other places online and when I couldn’t be sure I had the right characters, I wrote to Rick Reilly and said, “Show us the tattoo and I guarantee you every sensitive, smart, helpful bodybuilder will be sporting one in no time. I promised that if Rick printed the tattoo in SI, I’d personally put it up in my gym. What do you know—Rick took me up on it, that darling man. SI featured my letter in the June 4, 2007 issue in the editorial section, along with the depiction of the tattoo. So, I’m keeping my promise and I’m posting it on the notice board at Fairfax Health Club for Justin and all my new ‘muscle-y’ friends to see. But, I’ll do one better. I’ve uploaded a depiction of the tattoo here. The first person who writes to me at my blog and sends me a photo of himself or herself wearing the tattoo, I will wear a henna version of it myself and I won’t take it off, until Spielberg and all the other sponsors, which include Coca-Cola, Panasonic, Samsung, Volkswagon, Adidas, Swatch, General Electric, Johnson & Johnson, The Eastman Kodak Company and more, get the message that it’s more than just the two middle-aged white, women in the country and Rick Reilly, the sports columnist, who don’t like what’s going on.
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