You may
think that I am going to take some kind of exception to the Olympic Games event
they call Greco-Roman Wrestling. But no,
I am going to write about feet. A chancy
subject to be sure.
In his
gorgeous film Out of Africa, Sidney
Pollack has Denys Fitch Hatton remark, "Did you know that in all of
literature, there is no poem celebrating the foot. There's lips, there's eyes, hands, face,
hair, breasts, legs, arms, even the knee, but not one verse for the poor old
foot."
Karen
Blixen responds with a couplet: "Along he came and he did put, upon my
farm his lovely foot." If the
subject is good enough for Meryl Streep and Robert Redford, it’s plenty good enough for me.
Neither
is this about a fetish. Celebrated as
the foot is the annals of abnormal psychology, I am not going there
either. This is about members of my
family ridiculing, not my whole foot, but my little toes. My pinkie toes are not straight, the way
perfect little toes are supposed to be. They twist a bit, as if they are trying
to kiss the next toe over. My husband
and daughter used to point and laugh at them.
Then one
day, in the Capitoline Museum in Rome, I discovered the truth about my little
toes. They are a badge of my Greco-Roman
heritage. The gallery of ancient sculpture
in that magnificent treasure trove features many statutes on high
pedestals. As I walked through the exhibition,
in awe of the beauty of the ancient works of art, perhaps because the feet
we're at my eye level, I suddenly noticed that the Greek feet before me looked
just like mine. I went up and down the
gallery. ALL the statues—Roman and Greek—had little toes exactly like
mine.
This is
sensible genetically, since my ancestors on my father’s side were from Siracusa in Sicily, formerly the Greek
city state of Syracuse. My mother came
out of the gene pool between Rome and Naples.
Strange how, though I knew about my heritage, finding this little piece
of physical evidence strengthened the bond I already had with my forebears, way
back into history. In a way, I was them.
The blood
of ancients from some part of this world flows in all our veins. We need to remember that. Maybe it will help us not to take the present
too seriously.
Annamaria Alfieri
Much can be said about feet, even before we begin to stray into the realms of kinky sex. During WWII, Japanese spies could be identified by the generous space between their first and second toes. Was this a racial characteristic, or the result of a lifetime of thong sandals? My dance teacher, Mrs. Morgan, discouraged me from pursuing a career in ballet, though I thought it intensely romantic, because my second toe was noticeably longer than my first, bad if you wanted to spend any time on pointe. (Or because I was a clumsy dancer, and she was too kind to say so.) The long second toe is said to be an American Indian thing. I'm as sure as I ever was of anything that I haven't got Indian blood, though I think it would be cool.
ReplyDeleteKate, You never know. Your ancestors were hanging around a lot of Indians three hundred or so years ago. Being Sicilian, I have to imagine all those barbarian hordes--Saracens, Normans, Spanish--have contributed their little bits to my genetic make-up. But wherever your genes come from, you are way-cool enough!!
DeleteA chancy subject as you say--though clearly one with history. Glad to find this new (I think?) blog--great collection of writers!
ReplyDeleteJenny, welcome. So happy to have you with us. We have been doing this for a couple of years. We write about all sorts of things, a lot having to do with a writer's life. Or musings on life in general. I hope you will stop by often. Please chime in when you do.
DeleteThis article prompted me to go to my dictionary and look up all the words that begin with foot. Fascinating read!!! tjs
ReplyDeleteThelma, Tell us the most interesting foot word.
DeleteThere were several and the wide range was so thought-provoking - a few --- footboy, footer, footle, foot pound, footslog, foot candle - and of course all the words we use often that mean such a variety of things -- set foot, under foot, footgear, foothill, footlight, footpath, footstep... you could take a few and create a whole eerie story around these little words. Hey, somebody -- whydonchadothis??? tjs
ReplyDelete