July Newsletter — OLLIE SCHMINKEY

It’s July! Everything in this month’s newsletter is short and sweet!

Me signing a few books at Button’s book at Twin Cities Pride!

WHAT’S COMING UP

This class starts on Thursday, and I can’t wait! We’ll be covering some of my favorite forms!

https://writers.com/course/sonnets-to-sestinas-form-poems-for-this-century

ROOT BEER & RESISTANCE

This Sunday! Free, fun, and with an amazing lineup (if I do say so myself). Special thanks to Kyle for organizing this with me, and a huge thank you to all of the performers who are donating their time! There will be root beer, poems, conversation, and resources for making some change (and of course, a zine-making station!)

GOOD GRIEF: WRITING POEMS ABOUT LOSS

I’m finally running a workshop series on grief writing, and I’m super excited!
More info here: https://buttonpoetry.com/product/button-university-ollie-schminkey-workshop/

BETTER THINGS

I’ll be performing at the August 5th Better Things series! I’ll likely throw in a new poem or two from the new book I’m working on. Oh, and did I mention it’s free?

PROMPT

PETE

OLLIE’S THOUGHT CORNER

What’s on my mind this month is weight lifting and working out. But before I lose you to the bro-ness of this topic (yes, I have even been drinking protein powder…), I promise it’s still very much in my feelings.

Let’s start way back: I have struggled with exercise and eating pretty much as long as I can remember, especially in high school and early college. I was never diagnosed with an eating disorder, but I do remember doing things like bringing plain lettuce to school as a lunch (???? This is terrible! Don’t do this!) and restricting my calories to what I would now consider a totally batshit level. Moving my body was always a punishment-- for eating “too much,” for not being thin enough, for having a body type that has thighs that will naturally touch no matter what I do.

I think there’s been a lot of unearthing of how the diet/thinness culture of the early 2000s affected us (especially those of us who were socialized as girls), but I haven’t seen as many tools for how to heal from this. We know it was fucked up, and then the articles seem to stop there. But when you were taught to hate your body from the time you were born, how do you transition into a place of love? When you were taught to move only out of punishment, how do you begin joyful movement? When you were taught that the only “correct” relationship to have to food was to eat as little of it as possible, how do you come to a strong, nourished mindset that will set you up for health for decades to come?

I’m not here to tell you what to do with your body or your life. I have friends with joyful relationships to their bodies, food, movement, etc at many sizes and activity levels. Do whatever feels good for you! The next little bit is just some processing on what has ended up feeling good for me, at least right now. Maybe this will change, maybe it won’t, but here’s where I’m at right now.

I’ve been working on my relationship to my body for a lot of years. Many of those years involved surrounding myself with body-positive messages and learning how to stop counting calories. A big part of my healing journey was eating more, exercising less, and gaining weight. Letting go of having any goals related to “fitness” was a huge step in my healing, because it led me to a much more comfortable place with myself, where my worthiness wasn’t tied to the size of my body.

About five years ago, because I had learned how to hate myself less, I started doing a daily mobility practice (sounds fancy, but it’s just like 10 minutes of yoga/stretching). I started eating more vegetables and more protein (please notice that I didn’t try to eat less of anything; restricting is a total trap for me and a behavior that I don’t think will ever be healthy for me to engage in). I started going for more walks with friends, working out a few times a week (then getting busy or tired and quitting, time and time again, as one is wont to do). And none of this had anything to do with the way my body looked. I just wanted to feel good, and I began thinking about how to protect my future body as I age.

Because something important had happened a few years earlier: my dad had died, in his mid-fifties. I was in my early twenties and was reckoning with truly feeling my own mortality for the first time. And let me tell you, I sure didn’t want my life to be almost half done already. Plus, I couldn’t touch my toes, and I wanted to be able to touch my toes! (Five years later, not only can I touch my toes, but I can put my entire palms flat on the floor-- it’s amazing what 5 years of 10 minutes a day can do).

This might sound like I started exercising as a form of death-panic (which would probably be correct). But over the years, it’s really morphed into this wonderful sense of tending, of giving gifts to my future self. Like watering a garden, or doing the dishes tonight so I won’t have to do them tomorrow. I’m mindful of my nourishment and my movement because I love the person I’m hopefully going to be, and I want that person’s knees to work. When I’m sixty, if I make it to sixty, I want to still be able to go for a hike with my friends-- and joyful goals like that one are the only things that have helped me to actually maintain the type of relationship I want to have to taking care of my body. Movement and food are not punishments-- they’re gifts, and this mindset has really helped me to love my body at every step of my process. There’s no “before” or “after” photo, and there’s no point at which my body will be “good enough,” because it’s already inherently good enough. And it will stay that way regardless of how I eat or move.

Of course, I can’t control everything. Maybe I’ll get hit by a car or be struck down with one of the many, many (many!) diseases that run in my family. But until then, I’ll be making joyful movements with my one and precious body, and I’ll be loving the energy I get to feel by eating a lot of protein, and I’ll be dragging my friends on lots of walks to hear the latest gossip from their lives.

I hope this season brings you a joyful relationship with your body as well.

Love,

Ollie