Voting & Pilates
When you vote today, remember to keep your belly button pulled toward your spine.
Elder Mary Bowen
This week I trained with Pilates Elder Mary Bowen for the second time. She has a home in Connecticut, so it is a wonderful opportunity to get to train with her. She is so close I wish I could afford to train with her weekly. In our lessons, she seems to talk more than to instruct exercises, but as an instructor (and a person) I learn a great deal from listening to her and attempting to absorb the wealth of information she has discovered in nearly 80-years.
What struck me most this time I met with her was her commentary on relaxing the body. I tend to be very tight, but that isn’t uncommon. We all carry tension in our neck and shoulders. We’re a society of tight hamstrings. She talked about how itching we all are as humans to move–to get going. “We’ll say, ‘Let’s Go,'” she explained. We’re always on the move; always rushing. She suggested, perhaps, we should consider, “Let’s Relax”–or maybe she said, “Let’s release.” I don’t remember, but it had the same intention. “It’s […]
Ron Fletcher
Last weekend I had the honor to train under my third Pilates Elder: Ron Fletcher. I was one of thirty Pilates teachers participating in the workshop, and I was informed that this will probably be his final workshop that is open the the general Pilates public.
Ron Fletcher was a major inspiration. At eighty-nine (nearly) he still moves his body in ways many people half his age unfortunately can’t do. He still pays homage to Joe and Clara Pilates while he is teaching. He was also a student of http://marthagraham.org/center/Martha Graham and his style really seems to combine dance and Pilates. Ultimately, the movement and exercises are still about control–the intention behind Pilates.
He had many wonderful quotes, some were his own and some belonged to his teachers and colleagues (to whom he always gave credit). One of my favorites was, “And so to up.”
Personal Euphoria Instructor: Karen
Karen currently teaches in South Windsor. She has been teaching Pilates for two years and loves helping others achieve their Pilates goals. She started taking Pilates just for something to do after moving to Connecticut and after realizing that she did not know very many people. It did not take long, however, for her to fall in love with Pilates. Her favorite exercise is short spine on the reformer. She’s lucky to live with her boyfriend and her two cats, who like to help her exercise by providing unexpected weight resistance. When she isn’t teaching or practicing Pilates, Karen is working on a PhD in Comparative Literary and Cultural Studies at UConn, and doing triathlon training. She enjoys eating and making sushi (although she admits her own sushi is not as pretty as what you’d fine in a restaurant), and if she could only eat one flavor of ice cream for the rest of her life, it would be Black Raspberry Chocolate Chip from Graeter’s in Columbus, Ohio (where she grew up).
Written By Katy Leahy, Personal Euphoria […]
Fun Pilates Cartoons
Sue is a student in our Newington classes who has been taking Pilates classes with me from the very beginning. Occasionally Sue will bring me cartoons from the newspaper. I always get a kick out of them and thought you would too. They are all hanging on my refrigerator.