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Pushmepullyou

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I have lumbar scoliosis, along with years of cruddy posture. I even slump when I drive. I had physical therapy several years ago, which really helped my lower back pain. Like many, I stopped doing my exercises after the pain went away.

A few months ago I started to have chronic sciatica in both legs, and got a referral for more physical therapy. My new therapist assessed the situation and told me that she was surprised I could even walk, since all the muscles in my lower back and hips that ought to hold me upright weren’t doing their job, and the hip flexor muscles in the front of my body were doing it instead. Sitting at a desk all day in a bad chair only made things worse. (The ergo guy at work ordered a really good office chair with great lumbar support for me last month, so that problem is solved.)

I am currently in a lot of pain all over my back and legs since, as my physical therapist told, all my muscles are mad at me as we are doing exercises to get the back muscles to do their job and the front muscles to do their job. I am also being very mindful of my posture, even when I drive, and that has also stirred up some muscle pushback. All of this has reminded me of the Pushmepullyou from Dr. Doolittle.

My mother constantly harrased me about my posture. Ok mom, you were right! I should have listened! I don’t remember ever liking the Dr. Doolittle books much. I found the writing kind of stuffy, but the plot was fun. I appreciate the tug of war concept with the Pushmepullyou. My hips can relate.

What animals would you like to talk to? Ever had physical therapy? What did you parents tell you that you should have listened to but didn’t.

52 thoughts on “Pushmepullyou”

  1. I’d love to talk with our puppy, since all I would hear from him is how much he adores me, how great I am, and how he never wants to be away from me.

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    2. And be careful what you wish for. I know a couple of dogs who, if they could speak would say “throw the ball. Throw the ball. Throw the ball. Throw the ball.”

      Liked by 2 people

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  2. Rise and Shine Baboons,

    I would love to talk to any animal, just to know what is on their minds. When birds fight in the backyard, I can just imagine it:

    A: That is MY stick.

    B: No. It is MYstick.

    A: But last week you grabbed my weeds. You OWE me. Jeremy, since we were in the nest together, you have taken EVERYTHING. GIMME.MY.STICK.

    Or a squirrel: I will dig here. Then I will dig there. HAWK. Hide!

    I have had a lot of PT in the last few years with my hip troubles and my knee. I think it helped me have such a quick recovery with my hip replacement. PTs know a lot about how our bodies operate structurally.

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  3. Our boycat Keanu talks–he makes what sound like sentences, with intonation and everything, but sadly our monkey minds are too limited to understand him (anyone read “Spacetime for Springers” by Fritz Leiber?). I would love to be able to understand his conversation. Actually I’d love to talk to any and all animals, and to trees as well, as long as the animals said something besides “I’m hungry,” and the trees said something other than “I want to get bigger”–when I was doing a tree communication exercise in Witch School, that was the only thing I could get out of the little maple I was working with.

    I have had a little physical therapy for knee problems in my 30s; I now have arthritis in both due to bad structure, so I’m sure more PT is in my future. ATM I do Classical Stretch with Miranda Esmonde White every weekday morning to strengthen them and, with luck, push knee replacement surgery a little further off into the future with every quad exercise.

    My mom told me to save money, and my dad told me to wash and maintain the car regularly. I should have done both. I should also have listened when she said that doing a little bit every day is better than trying to do a lot all at once (she was talking about housecleaning, which is valid, but it’s also good advice for most things in life).

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    1. I’m with Crowgirl. I’d love to have been able to talk to my cats and find out what they really thought about me when they stared at me for minutes at a time.

      Birds would also be interesting to talk to since they seem to have very little on their agendas besides eat, make nests, avoid predators, and raise their chicks. What do they think about when they’re just flitting around in the neighborhood?

      Chimps and apes would be interesting to hear from too since they’re so close to being human and probably have some similar thought processes and emotions to ours.

      I’ve had PT a few times over the years. Always helpful for a short time, then I stop doing the stretches and exercises and I’m either fine or the problem lingers in the background. However, I stretch religiously and do weight training to keep my core strong and minimize back pain issues (I have a slight curvature that has caused problems since college.)

      Mom told me “Don’t slouch” a lot too and I should have listened. I try to walk tall and sit properly but don’t do a good job at it.

      I did take her “Clean your plate” suggestion to heart and have rarely been guilty of failure in that area.

      Chris in Owatonna

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        1. Sandra has an aide named Jasmine, who looks exactly like a Jasmine should, which reminded me of the movie Second-Hand Lions, which I watched last night, which has Breathed cartoons in it, which makes me wish he had done a series called Walter and Jasmine (Jasmine being a lion).

          Liked by 4 people

  4. I love talking to all animals. Some are more responsive than others, but I enjoy taking the opportunity to communicate.

    Yup, done the PT thing when I had my ACL replaced.

    I’m of the opinion that I did the opposite. I took my folks’ advice when I shouldn’t have, with regard to jobs/career/work.

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  6. OT – This is an article written by a young Danish man who is a journalism intern at the Danish museum in Elk Horn, Iowa. I thought it might be of interest to at least those baboons who have roots in Iowa. For those baboons on FB, I have shared the article there, it includes some photos.

    Midwestern Living: How I Learned to Love the Heartland
    By Anders Tornsø Jørgensen
    I have had the pleasure to live in Elk Horn, Iowa for some time now, so here’s some observations straight from the American heartland. I have never lived rurally, so it’s been an interesting to experience a charming Midwestern small town – the kind I imagine John Mellencamp singing about in his hit “Small Town.” However, do add a Danish twist in Elk Horn’s case.
    This is not my first meeting with the Midwest. I had the honor of spending a semester at the University of Illinois in Springfield in 2019, so the Midwest is not completely new to me. I have experienced how quickly the weather can change by the day, or by the hour, the humidity of summers and the harsh coldness of the winters, but also how serious Midwesterners are about ranch dressing. Yet, I have never lived in a town with a population of 601, nor have I lived a place without any kind of public transportation, so that’s a whole new world for me. Luckily, the Museum of Danish America provides their intern with a nice car. My favorite thing about the car is the automatic stick!
    So how do I feel about living in rural Iowa? I appreciate how people say hello to each other, and how locals’ wave from their car when I walk back and forth to the museum. It gives a sense of belonging. In general, I like how genuinely curious Americans is – something I think we Danes could learn a little from. I also enjoy how clean Elk Horn is. People really care about their surroundings. Also, the church is a good place to become a part of a local community. Besides worshiping, the various kinds of churches also provide an important social glue to their communities where events is hosted and where people make friends. Country music is pretty popular around here and fuel-hungry pickup trucks are a common sight on the roads. County fairs is a big thing during summertime, and functions as a kind of warm-up to the Iowa State Fair, which takes places in August. A colleague of mine and her husband invited me to attend the Shelby County Fair, which was an amazing combination of livestock animals, farm equipment, and a midway, reminding me about Roskilde Dyrskue, a joy of my hometown.
    Driving around the state has also led me to notice that many small-towns takes a lot in pride in preserving their local cinemas – a majority were built during Hollywood’s golden era in the 1920s and 1930s. While some may be abandoned, the powerful combination of fundraising, volunteers and willpower has put many of these glorious old architectural treasures back to life. Close to Elk Horn is a town called Audubon, where the local community have re-opened the 98-year-old Rose Theater and offers tickets and snacks to a fair price. This of course includes buttered Iowa-grown popcorn, which is – to put it mildly – an amazing thing.
    I also like all the different tractors I see every day – especially the iconic John Deeres emerging from a currently green sea of cornfields, which will soon turn into ‘amber waves of grain’ as harvest season kicks in. During my stay here, the corn has been growing a lot. As such, corn was ‘knee high by the Fourth of July,’ which is an old saying used to signal that the crop will be safe and sound. Currently, the corn is as high as a man on horseback, so I am pretty sure that this will be a good season. Being located in the heart of the Corn Belt, Iowa leads the nation in corn production and corn has a big cultural impact on the state. My favorite depiction of corn can usually be spotted at local post offices, where 1930s New Deal murals showing corn are located above the entrance, being a testament of how corn has and continues to shape the American heartland.
    You may not usually associate Iowa with top notch art, but Grant Wood, a native Iowan painter who created the iconic “American Gothic” in 1930, was probably the most important figure in the Regionalism art movement. Portraying realistic scenes of rural and small-town America, Regionalism came to prominence in the 1930s as a reaction to the Great Depression and captures the atmosphere of the Midwest during that period. I actually had the chance to visit Iowa State’s Parks Library in Ames, where the largest mural by Wood is located – and they truly depict how essential agriculture is for the state of Iowa. However, I have yet to visit the site in Eldon, Iowa, where the building of which “American Gothic” was inspired is located.
    I am also adjusting to the different scene of food. Whenever I go to new places, I try to eat what is considered traditional food – and Iowans sure like their meat. As such, I have been eating a lot of breaded pork tenderloins, which is a favorite dish among Iowans. The Iowa Pork Producers Association has actually released a “Tenderloin Trail 2.0,” which is an update of an earlier trail – it’s basically a guide to find the finest pork tenderloins of the Hawkeye State. Should you ever complete this trail, then you’ll be the lucky owner of a free t-shirt stating that you conquered the trail. A local business in Elk Horn called Jensen’s Pub was once named the number one place to get a pork tenderloin in the state, and they do indeed serve a great piece of pork fried to golden perfection. What is really fascinating about this Midwestern staple is how truly eye-catching the meal is with a giant piece of breaded fried pork situated between two disproportionately small buns.
    Another favorite of Iowans is the loose meat sandwich. Not quite a hamburger and not quite a sloppy joe, this savory sandwich apparently originates from Iowa’s Maid-Rite restaurants. A local saying is that, when one is in Iowa, one must go on a quest to find Maid-Rite, which this writer did. Originally founded in Muscatine, Iowa, by a butcher named Fred Angell in 1926, Maid-Rite is actually one of America’s first fast food chains and the first chain to feature drive-thru service. Anyway, Angell asked a delivery man to taste his newest creation. The taster exclaimed on the spot: “This sandwich is made right,” which is how the chain got its name. When you order a loose meat sandwich, you’ll usually get a spoon – and trust me, you’ll need it to accomplish this messy mission. One thing I look very much forward to is the Iowa State Fair in August, which is famous for their unique food, such as porkchops on a stick and deep-fried corn on the cob.
    Anyway, eating like that means that I’ll need to get my daily exercise. In the evenings I enjoy taking a brisk walk and look at the different landscapes in Southwestern Iowa. My favorite place so far is the Jens Jensen Prairie Landscape Park at the grounds of the Museum of Danish America, where you’ll get Elk Horn’s finest view of the sunset. The nature around these parts of the state is very similar to Danish nature, which I find quite charming. Besides the nature, there’s also a lot of windmills, which is a common sight back home, but also a big industry in the state of Iowa.
    And whenever I miss home, I go to visit the Danish Windmill or the Museum of Danish America and buy some products from Denmark. The people behind the desk at both places are some of the nicest people you’ll ever meet, so it’s always very enjoyable. It’s Midwestern friendliness and openness at its best.

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  7. WP is getting on my last nerve. Yesterday it posted a lengthy comment (that I failed to copy before I pressed “submit”), and it never showed up. Today I submitted the following comment a few minutes ago (but wisely copied it before I did so), and now it doesn’t show up, and it won’t let me repost because it “detects a duplicate.” So here we go again:

    OT – This is an article written by a young Danish man who is a journalism intern at the Danish museum in Elk Horn, Iowa. I thought it might be of interest to at least those baboons who have roots in Iowa. For those baboons on FB, I have shared the article there, it includes some photos.

    Midwestern Living: How I Learned to Love the Heartland
    By Anders Tornsø Jørgensen
    I have had the pleasure to live in Elk Horn, Iowa for some time now, so here’s some observations straight from the American heartland. I have never lived rurally, so it’s been an interesting to experience a charming Midwestern small town – the kind I imagine John Mellencamp singing about in his hit “Small Town.” However, do add a Danish twist in Elk Horn’s case.
    This is not my first meeting with the Midwest. I had the honor of spending a semester at the University of Illinois in Springfield in 2019, so the Midwest is not completely new to me. I have experienced how quickly the weather can change by the day, or by the hour, the humidity of summers and the harsh coldness of the winters, but also how serious Midwesterners are about ranch dressing. Yet, I have never lived in a town with a population of 601, nor have I lived a place without any kind of public transportation, so that’s a whole new world for me. Luckily, the Museum of Danish America provides their intern with a nice car. My favorite thing about the car is the automatic stick!
    So how do I feel about living in rural Iowa? I appreciate how people say hello to each other, and how locals’ wave from their car when I walk back and forth to the museum. It gives a sense of belonging. In general, I like how genuinely curious Americans is – something I think we Danes could learn a little from. I also enjoy how clean Elk Horn is. People really care about their surroundings. Also, the church is a good place to become a part of a local community. Besides worshiping, the various kinds of churches also provide an important social glue to their communities where events is hosted and where people make friends. Country music is pretty popular around here and fuel-hungry pickup trucks are a common sight on the roads. County fairs is a big thing during summertime, and functions as a kind of warm-up to the Iowa State Fair, which takes places in August. A colleague of mine and her husband invited me to attend the Shelby County Fair, which was an amazing combination of livestock animals, farm equipment, and a midway, reminding me about Roskilde Dyrskue, a joy of my hometown.
    Driving around the state has also led me to notice that many small-towns takes a lot in pride in preserving their local cinemas – a majority were built during Hollywood’s golden era in the 1920s and 1930s. While some may be abandoned, the powerful combination of fundraising, volunteers and willpower has put many of these glorious old architectural treasures back to life. Close to Elk Horn is a town called Audubon, where the local community have re-opened the 98-year-old Rose Theater and offers tickets and snacks to a fair price. This of course includes buttered Iowa-grown popcorn, which is – to put it mildly – an amazing thing.
    I also like all the different tractors I see every day – especially the iconic John Deeres emerging from a currently green sea of cornfields, which will soon turn into ‘amber waves of grain’ as harvest season kicks in. During my stay here, the corn has been growing a lot. As such, corn was ‘knee high by the Fourth of July,’ which is an old saying used to signal that the crop will be safe and sound. Currently, the corn is as high as a man on horseback, so I am pretty sure that this will be a good season. Being located in the heart of the Corn Belt, Iowa leads the nation in corn production and corn has a big cultural impact on the state. My favorite depiction of corn can usually be spotted at local post offices, where 1930s New Deal murals showing corn are located above the entrance, being a testament of how corn has and continues to shape the American heartland.
    You may not usually associate Iowa with top notch art, but Grant Wood, a native Iowan painter who created the iconic “American Gothic” in 1930, was probably the most important figure in the Regionalism art movement. Portraying realistic scenes of rural and small-town America, Regionalism came to prominence in the 1930s as a reaction to the Great Depression and captures the atmosphere of the Midwest during that period. I actually had the chance to visit Iowa State’s Parks Library in Ames, where the largest mural by Wood is located – and they truly depict how essential agriculture is for the state of Iowa. However, I have yet to visit the site in Eldon, Iowa, where the building of which “American Gothic” was inspired is located.
    I am also adjusting to the different scene of food. Whenever I go to new places, I try to eat what is considered traditional food – and Iowans sure like their meat. As such, I have been eating a lot of breaded pork tenderloins, which is a favorite dish among Iowans. The Iowa Pork Producers Association has actually released a “Tenderloin Trail 2.0,” which is an update of an earlier trail – it’s basically a guide to find the finest pork tenderloins of the Hawkeye State. Should you ever complete this trail, then you’ll be the lucky owner of a free t-shirt stating that you conquered the trail. A local business in Elk Horn called Jensen’s Pub was once named the number one place to get a pork tenderloin in the state, and they do indeed serve a great piece of pork fried to golden perfection. What is really fascinating about this Midwestern staple is how truly eye-catching the meal is with a giant piece of breaded fried pork situated between two disproportionately small buns.
    Another favorite of Iowans is the loose meat sandwich. Not quite a hamburger and not quite a sloppy joe, this savory sandwich apparently originates from Iowa’s Maid-Rite restaurants. A local saying is that, when one is in Iowa, one must go on a quest to find Maid-Rite, which this writer did. Originally founded in Muscatine, Iowa, by a butcher named Fred Angell in 1926, Maid-Rite is actually one of America’s first fast food chains and the first chain to feature drive-thru service. Anyway, Angell asked a delivery man to taste his newest creation. The taster exclaimed on the spot: “This sandwich is made right,” which is how the chain got its name. When you order a loose meat sandwich, you’ll usually get a spoon – and trust me, you’ll need it to accomplish this messy mission. One thing I look very much forward to is the Iowa State Fair in August, which is famous for their unique food, such as porkchops on a stick and deep-fried corn on the cob.
    Anyway, eating like that means that I’ll need to get my daily exercise. In the evenings I enjoy taking a brisk walk and look at the different landscapes in Southwestern Iowa. My favorite place so far is the Jens Jensen Prairie Landscape Park at the grounds of the Museum of Danish America, where you’ll get Elk Horn’s finest view of the sunset. The nature around these parts of the state is very similar to Danish nature, which I find quite charming. Besides the nature, there’s also a lot of windmills, which is a common sight back home, but also a big industry in the state of Iowa.
    And whenever I miss home, I go to visit the Danish Windmill or the Museum of Danish America and buy some products from Denmark. The people behind the desk at both places are some of the nicest people you’ll ever meet, so it’s always very enjoyable. It’s Midwestern friendliness and openness at its best.

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    Reply

  8. Does anyone know if there are rules and regulations about what WP will allow you to post? Or is it just random what it chooses to withhold, delete, or dispose of some other way? I’m about ready to call it quits, too damn frustrating.

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    1. So sorry this is happening. I don’t think there are strict rules about what people post. It seems to be up to the administrators to monitor things. What are you trying to post?

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      1. Yesterday I wrote a comment of some length, that I failed to copy before I pressed “submit,” it never showed up. Today, I tried to post something I had copied from elsewhere (and wisely copied) before I submitted it. It didn’t show up, either. I tried reposting and got the message that it appeared to be a duplicate message. So I added a couple of sentences, still no luck. Then I posted the above short comment, and no problem at all. I’d just like to understand the logistics to what appears to be a random harassment by WP. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of our low comment days are a result of this kind of incompetence by WP.

        Liked by 1 person

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    2. Here’s something I found in a forum: “This issue usually pops up if you don’t have third-party cookies enabled in your browser. Those cookies help you stay logged in when you visit different WordPress.com sites (including sites that use a custom domain name). You can check to see if you have third-party cookies enabled on this support page: Preview Problems and Third Party Cookies at https://wordpress.com/support/third-party-cookies/

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      1. Thanks, Linda. I just checked, and that’s not the problem. I’m open to other suggestions as to what the issue might be and how to fix it; I’m all ears. I’m having no problems with any of the other websites I visit, and have made no computer changes. This business of randomly causing some of my comments to disappear is really getting old.

        Liked by 1 person

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  9. This makes me wish I’d read Dr. Dolittle…
    I do talk to animals – say Hi to birds and bunnies, try and imagine what they might say back. I’ve just listened this week to an interview with Jane Goodall , sort of an overview of her work, and it IS fascinating, well worth the hour. Sums up her attitudes that are fleshed out in her “The Book of Hope”.

    There’s also Machaelle Small Wright’s book “Behaving As If the God in All Things Mattered” about, for one, communicating with other species.

    I have had PT, for hip joint issues, and I still do one of the exercises incorporated in my daily 5 minutes of yoga. There is another PT e exercise for shoulder stuff that I’ve let lapse, but should start up again…

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  11. OT – James Keelaghan, one of my favorite Canadian singer/songwriters and performers, had this to say today about one of his brilliant songs:
    “Today is the anniversary of the Mann Gulch Fire, which took the lives of 13 Smokejumpers in the rugged Gates of the Mountains Wilderness in Western Montana. This is my song about the fire from the point of view of one of the survivors, crew Chief Wagner Dodge. It was a famous story in Alberta, but I wrote this song after reading Norman MacLean’s brilliant “ Young Men and Fire”

    Liked by 2 people

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  12. Another OT – At today’s Signal Hills farmer’s market there was a woman selling home made flour tortillas. Small ones. Twelve for eight bucks. That’s a hefty price tag for tortillas, but I was feeling flush, so I sprung for a package. And, oh my god, am I glad I did. Don’t think I’ll ever buy a store bought tortilla again. These are light, tender, and flavorful, not at all like their store-bought cousins which are basically rubbery discs of flour and water meant to convey a filling of some sort from your plate to your mouth. What a treat!

    Liked by 2 people

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  13. I have lots of physical therapists. The neck therapist, the lower back therapist, the arm and shoulder therapist, the knee therapist, the hand therapist. The one I didn’t like was the lower back therapist, but the arm and shoulder therapist sort of took over on the lower back stuff.

    The neck therapist is kind of spookily good at what he does. It’s kind of a hybrid of traditional PT and energy healing.

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      1. To start with, I had an appointment with a therapist to evaluate dizziness. The woman who evaluated me did a lot of maneuvers to try to figure out what the root of the problem was. There was one thing she did, pressing down on the top of my head and compressing my vertebrae, that was making me feel pretty spinny, and I said so. She called to another therapist, “Hey, Brandon – do you have a minute?” and introduced him as “our best neck guy”. He asked me a lot of questions and had me turning this way and that and looking up and down and demonstrating my range of motion and whatever. At one point, I remember, he said in a very serious voice, “I’m going to place my hand lightly on your sternum, but my intention is going way deep.” I was impressed when he indicated my right shoulder region and said, “I think it’s originating on this side.” It was particularly impressive because he hadn’t looked at my medical record or been brought up to speed at all. And the right is my radiated side. So my feeling is that his powers of observation are pretty sharp.

        I’m not sure how to describe exactly what he does, but it involves some of these short movements he calls releases. And he also gives me the usual exercises, do 10 reps three times a day and that sort of thing. It really seems to help.

        Liked by 1 person

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        4. The therapist, Ned, that I’ve been seeing, is like that. Very good. Unfortunately, he doesn’t accept insurance and his rate is $120 per hour.
          That adds up to real money in a hurry if you have an entrenched problem.

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