Like a disappointment
THIS WEEK, I tried being Madonna for a day. Not the Kabbalah part, or the singing and dancing part, or the part where you lapse in and out of vaguely European accents. That’s old news, Madonna-wise. If you’ve seen any publicity related to her “Confessions” tour, which kicked off Sunday in Los Angeles, it’s obvious that Madonna’s main activity and No. 1 priority is exercising. A lot.
Madonna’s career is now chiefly about her body, which has come to represent so much more than a model of physical fitness. By hovering around what looks like 0.5% body fat without any evident assistance from plastic surgery, extraordinary DNA (she used to be sort of pudgy, remember?) or heroin, she represents both our greatest aspirations and our greatest source of self-loathing. As much as we might like to look like her, we know we can’t. Worse, because her body has been carved out of 47-year-old flesh by sheer force of will, we can blame only ourselves for our inability to measure up.
Like any reasonable person, I cut myself major slack for lacking the funds, free time and chutzpah to employ the personal trainers, chefs, nannies, drivers and spiritual advisors who allow Madonna, mother of two, to maintain her regime. According to various reports, she practices two hours of Ashtanga yoga in the morning, follows that with sessions of Pilates or gyrotonics, and then spends a couple of hours running, swimming, horseback riding or doing karate. At the end of the day, she supposedly gets on a StairMaster and makes phone calls. Plus she maintains a strict macrobiotic diet.
Because I too wouldn’t mind resembling a small race horse with cleavage, I decided to spend one day doing the Madonna workout, as best I could. Here’s how it went (for optimum effect, turn on Madonna music, preferably “Like a Virgin”).
5:30 a.m.: Big plans to take dog for a hike before showing up to 7 o’clock yoga class are thwarted by snooze button, not to mention that I went to bed at 1 in the morning. Hit snooze button until about 8:15, which, to be fair, must burn a few more calories than not hitting it at all.
9 a.m.: Attempt to re-create Madonna’s at-home Ashtanga practice by lying on floor and twisting into the yoganidrasana posture. Thwarted by particularly interesting article in newspaper and dog sitting on my face demanding a walk.
9:30 a.m.: Yoga abandoned. Hike implemented. Due to already high temperatures, dog becomes lethargic after 20 minutes and insists on aborting the mission. No hard feelings.
11:15 a.m.: Desperate to turn things around. Drive 45 minutes to the most grueling Pilates class in town. Class lasts one hour. Trip home takes another hour.
2 p.m.: Eat raw vegan sandwich for lunch. Wonder what exactly “sprouted kamut” is?
3:30 p.m.: Drive to YMCA and spend 20 minutes looking for parking place. Swim about 40 minutes, then get on StairMaster for 30 minutes. Attempt to make phone calls but no one’s home. Water in ear causes sudden splitting headache.
6:30 p.m.: Decide to make up for failed yoga session by running, even though Nike crosstrainers still damp after getting rained on last week in New York, wrapped in a plastic bag, thrown in suitcase and never unpacked. Maybe Madonna can relate.
7 p.m.: Drive in rush-hour traffic to a park. Run five miles. Even with fumes from passing cars, I can smell my shoes. I’m pretty sure I pass Madonna on the path, but it’s possible I’m hallucinating.
By sundown, I’ve completed my Madonna workout. Total exercise time: 3 hours and 45 minutes. Total driving time: 3 hours and 10 minutes.
I wish I could say that the Madonna workout -- or at least my low-rent version of it -- is physically impossible. I wish I could say that it’s ludicrous to entertain the thought of looking like her because she’s an anatomical anomaly. But it’s not impossible, it’s just impractical, even boring. Kind of like Madonna herself these days.
Madonna recently told Elle magazine that she wished she “were comfortable enough to look zaftig” but that she “chooses men who like carved-out women.” What happened to Madonna as a symbol of take-it-or-leave-it self-assurance? How is it that even as Madonna’s fans have grown older and more comfortable with themselves, the Material Girl has become ensnared in the kind of tyranny she once opposed? How come she had more moxie as a cherubic twentysomething in trashy leggings than she does as a woman with a reported net worth of $315 million?
Here’s the sad irony of Madonna’s current incarnation. Now that her career is merely a vehicle for her body, her blond ambition has morphed into blatant anxiety. Whether she admits it or not, this kind of insecurity has a way of bleeding over onto her fans, even all those girls who grew up singing “Express Yourself” into their hairbrushes.
No wonder, then, that we haven’t followed Madonna onto her latest dance floor. If she taught us anything over the years, it’s that we don’t have to surrender ourselves to perverse cultural ideas. Madonna may have forgotten, but we owe it to her legacy not to.
