It has come to my attention (I’ve been watching a lot of
television lately) that a great number of people in this country
are vitally concerned about whether I am to a sufficient degree
including on my list of Life’s Real Priorities the care and
maintenance of a portion of my body called
”
abs.
”
It has come to my attention (I’ve been watching a lot of television lately) that a great number of people in this country are vitally concerned about whether I am to a sufficient degree including on my list of Life’s Real Priorities the care and maintenance of a portion of my body called “abs.” I find this most curious, among other things because I have never met any of these people, and I consider it more than a little forward of them to become so personal without any solicitation on my part. I mean, if I had approached them in a friendly fashion and offered up a conversation-starter like “Say, let’s talk abs – you know, I’ve been thinking …” But no, I have done no such thing, yet they come on to me with a combination of good-buddy and lecturing gym teacher that is entirely unwarranted under the circumstances.
I know, or at least I am fairly sure, that I have abs. I mean, they must be in there somewhere. I have an extremely vague memory from perhaps a high school class of some sort that they are standard equipment on our species, and I am sure that they have their particular raison d’etre, blending in grand evolutionary harmony with all the other gewgaws and bric-a-brac that make up the marvelous albeit erratically-functioning machine that is me.
What I do not understand is why in television-land it is generally taken as Revealed Truth that my abs should appear as a reasonable facsimile of the tuck-and-roll upholstery with which those among us who were much cooler and wealthier than I would adorn their hotrods Back in the Day. I mean, far be it from me to criticize the look, as it applies to the interior decoration of a ’57 T-bird; I just don’t know why I should want it on my stomach, which is as I infer from the infomercials the general area in which one’s abs could, with adequate time and resources, be found.
Nonetheless, at every break in the action of the sports event I am attempting to watch, I am enticed with unbeatable offers to acquire Ab-Rollers, Ab-Crunchers, Ab-Destroyers, Ab-Annihilators, Ab-Worshipers, Ab-Pummelers, and so on, ab nauseam, in a conspiratorial attempt to make me feel guilty that I have chosen to keep my personal abs hidden under a thick layer of, umm, secrecy.
All of which fairly screams out the question, what is so all-fired significant about abs in the first place? Perhaps I have tragically missed a critical piece of information somewhere – do they perform some incredibly useful function that I have managed to live my entire life without noticing I desperately need? Are they the seat of wisdom, or possibly a handy place to store my mantra? Can I bring democracy to Iraq with my abs if I just pamper them enough?
With the exception of the physiological addendum which has brought so much joy and profit to the makers of Viagra, Levitra, and Cialis there is no other neighborhood of the human frame which receives anything approaching the attention presently lavished on Mr. and Mrs. Ab and all the little Abs; they are the royal family of body parts, with an army of press agents and publicists to tout their pride of place on all our lists of Things to Feel Negligently Inattentive About. I just wish I knew why.
